White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said Sunday that top U.S.
intelligence officials have told him that Donald Trump’s presidential
campaign did not collude with Russia -- attempting to end widespread new
reports about potentially compromising, illegal talks with the former
Cold War enemy.
“I can assure you, the top levels of the intelligence
community have assured me that [the allegation] is not only grossly
overstated, but also wrong,” Priebus told “Fox News Sunday.” “They have
made it very clear that the story is complete garbage.”
However, his statement is unlikely to end the
controversy, amid bipartisan calls on Capitol Hill to hold investigative
hearings on the matter.
New stories about a potential Trump-Russia connection
began to surface during the 2016 campaign when Trump lauded Russian
President Vladimir Putin’s forceful governing style.
And they appeared to reach a peak following reports
that retired Army Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, before he officially became
Trump’s national security adviser, spoke with a Russian official about
U.S. sanctions, which led last week to Flynn’s forced resignation.
In a freewheeling press conference Thursday, the
president repeatedly said he had no knowledge of campaign officials
talking to Russian officials.
Priebus attempted Sunday to close the matter but
declined to name his contacts within the intelligence community, which
raised questions about him using the same kind of anonymous sources for a
story that the administration opposes.
He also said officials within the intelligence
community -- which includes the CIA and FBI -- have dismissed reports
that they have denied Trump intelligence reports, fearing a national
security breach.
Priebus defended Trump’s tweet in which he called the fake news media the “enemy of the American people.”
“I understand where he is coming from,” he said.
“There are certain things that are happening in the news that just
aren’t honest. We aren’t talking about everyone. … There is nothing
wrong with background. We need to communicate with reporters and give
context.”
What the US could learn from Sweden's refugee crisis
President Trump on Sunday attempted to clarify his remark at a
weekend rally that suggested a terror attack had taken place Friday
night in Sweden.
“My statement as to what's happening in Sweden was in reference to a story that was broadcast on @FoxNews concerning immigrants & Sweden,” the president tweeted.
Friday night's edition of "Tucker Carlson Tonight"
featured an interview with documentary filmmaker Ami Horowitz about a
surge in violent crime in Sweden.
Some have traced the crime increase in Sweden to a
surge in the number of refugees entering from Africa, Asia and the
Middle East.
Trump said at a campaign-style rally Saturday outside
Melbourne, Fla.: “We’ve got to keep our country safe. You look at
what’s happening in Germany, you look at what’s happening last night in
Sweden. Sweden, who would believe this?”
Trump has made securing the United States from
outsiders, particularly radical Islamic terrorists, a major part of
presidential campaign and now his administration.
The president's mention of Sweden along with Germany
resulted in Trump critics saying he had mistakenly referred to a terror
attack.
Among the recent terror attacks in Germany was a
December 2016 incident in which a terrorist drove a truck through a
Christmas market in Berlin, killing 12 people and injuring roughly 50
others. The Islamic State terror group took responsibility for the
attack.
Trump’s comment at the rally Saturday follows White
House special counselor to the president Kellyanne Conway mistakenly
citing a “massacre” in Bowling Green, Ky.
Trump’s Sweden comment was questioned by Swedish
officials, the news media and Chelsea Clinton, the daughter of Hillary
Clinton, the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee whom Trump defeated.
Clinton tweeted: “What happened in Sweden Friday night? Did they catch the Bowling Green Massacre perpetrators?”
“Unclear to us what President Trump was referring to,
have asked US officials for explanation,” the Swedish embassy in
Washington tweeted.
President Trump’s revised travel ban targets the same seven countries
listed in his original executive order and exempts travelers who have
already have a visa to travel to the U.S., even if they haven’t used it
yet.
A senior White House official said the order will
target only those same seven Muslim-majority nations, Iran, Iraq, Syria,
Somalia, Yemen, Sudan and Libya. Trump was forced to come up with a
second order after federal courts held up his original immigration and
refugee ban. The official said the order could come sometime this week.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to
discuss the order before it's made public, said that green-card holders
and dual citizens of the U.S. and any of those countries are exempt. The
new draft also no longer directs authorities to single out -- and
reject -- Syrian refugees when processing new visa applications.
White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said
the version being circulated was a draft and the final version should be
released soon. The Wall Street Journal also reported that the current
draft of the revised order focused on the seven countries but excluded
those with green cards.
Trump's original executive order triggered chaos at
airports around the world, as travelers were detained when the order
rapidly went into effect, U.S. permanent residents known as green-card
holders among them. Attorneys provided legal assistance to those held
and protesters descended on the airports as news of the order's
implementation spread. In its original form, the order temporarily
suspended all travel to the U.S. for citizens of those seven
Muslim-majority countries for 90 days.
The original order also called for Homeland Security
and State department officials, along with the director of national
intelligence, to review what information the government needs to fully
vet would-be visitors and come up with a list of countries that can't or
won't make the information available. It said the government will give
countries 60 days to start providing the information or citizens from
those countries will be barred from traveling to the United States. KELLY: TRUMP IS WORKING ON A ‘STREAMLINED’ TRAVE L BAN
Even if Syrian refugees are no longer automatically
rejected under the new order, the pace of refugees entering the U.S.
from all countries is likely to slow significantly. That's because even
when the courts put Trump's original ban on hold, they left untouched
Trump's 50,000-per-year refugee cap, a cut of more than half from the
cap under the Obama administration.
The U.S. has already taken in more than 35,000
refugees this year, leaving less than 15,000 spots before hitting
Trump's cap, according to a U.S. official. That means that for the rest
of this fiscal year, the number of refugees being let in per week will
likely fall to a fraction of what it had been under the Obama
administration's cap of 110,000.
The travel ban again came under attack when the 9th
Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco refused to reinstate the ban,
unanimously rejecting the administration’s claim of presidential
authority, questioning its motives and ability to survive legal
challenges. The pushback prompted Trump to tweet "SEE YOU IN COURT!" and
he has since lashed out at the judicial branch, accusing it of issuing a
politically motivated decision.
Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, speaking at
the Munich Security Conference about combating terrorism, said Trump was
working on a “streamlined” version of the initial executive order.
Kelly said Trump's original order was designed as a "temporary pause" to
allow him to "see where our immigration and vetting system has gaps --
and gaps it has -- that could be exploited."
He said the Trump administration was surprised when
U.S. courts blocked the executive order and now "the president is
contemplating releasing a tighter, more streamlined version" of the
travel ban.
Kelly said this next time he will be able to "make
sure that there's no one caught in the system of moving from overseas to
our airports."
Kelly mentioned "seven nations" again on Saturday, leading to
speculation they will all be included in Trump's next executive order.
Trump's order sparked an immediate backlash and sowed
chaos and outrage, with travelers detained at airports, panicked
families searching for relatives and protesters marching against the
sweeping measure -- parts of which were blocked by several federal
courts.
Protests were held across the country, including in
sight of the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island in New York City, and at
international airports where travelers were temporarily detained.
She may have been the loser but Hillary Clinton is still getting the ovations, especially in her town, New York.
After a devastating loss, Clinton is recovering her New York state
of mind with the help of the Big Apple's fashion, entertainment and
theater crowds, who always supported her and now have embraced her back
into the fold.
It turns out that many New Yorkers — loud,
opinionated, even obnoxious on occasion — have a soft spot for the
ex-first lady, ex-senator, ex-secretary of state, ex-Democratic
presidential nominee who has become one of them, even more so than
native-born Donald Trump. He couldn't even win his childhood district in Queens (she got 85% of the vote; he got less than 14%)Thus, it was Clinton who got the crowd on its feet Thursday when she appeared at Grand Central Terminal for a U.S. Postal Service
ceremony unveiling a collection of 11 stamps featuring the late Oscar
de la Renta and his designs — long favored by Clinton (and Ivanka Trump during her father's inaugural festivities).
Anderson Cooper was the emcee. Vogue's fashion doyenne Anna Wintour was there. Former Mayor Mike Bloomberg, a
bigger billionaire than Trump, was there. But it was Clinton who
stirred with a rousing paean to de la Renta's fashion savvy and his
immigrant roots in the Dominican Republic. The pointed jab at the anti-immigration policies of the man who beat her was not lost on her audience.
"What
a fitting person to be chosen by our Postal Service, mentioned, by the
way, in the Constitution, something we should all read and re-read in
today’s times, and its choice of this immigrant, who did so much for our
country, his country," she said. "And let there be many, many more
immigrants with the love of America that Oscar de la Renta exemplified
every single day.”Then there was her fun dinner with her SNL doppelganger, Kate McKinnon, at Orso Wednesday night, where much laughter was heard emanating from the table, according to The New York Post(not a fan), which tweeted a picture that was then retweeted.
And don't forget the repeated ovations when she takes her seat in an
audience before showtime on Broadway; the latest roar of cheers was on
Wednesday night after the McKinnon dinner, when she turned up for the
musical Sunset Boulevard at the Palace Theater, a moment documented by scores of tweets and selfies.
And it wasn't the only one. With more time for relaxing and
entertainment these days, Clinton has been taking in multiple shows in
New York, according to Playbill.
On Feb. 1, when she and husband Bill Clinton attended In Transit, they started chanting her name.Earlier, on Jan. 8, when she and her husband and daughter Chelsea Clinton, showed up for the final performance of the Broadway revival The Color Purple,
she got several ovations from the sold-out audience, and another round
of applause when she was acknowledged by the cast after the show,
according to the New York Times.
There is even talk, drummed up by the likes of the New York Post and conservative news sites such as Rightwingnews.com (definitely not fans), that Clinton would run for mayor of New York this year, challenging Democrat incumbent Bill de Blasio and possibly becoming the first female mayor of the city she won with nearly 80% of its presidential vote.
So far, the scoffing about this exceeds the cheering. "Unlikely," concludes Errol Louis, host of Inside City Hall on NY1, in an essay on CNN.
"It's safe to assume that nobody in her right mind — certainly nobody
as familiar with the workings of government and politics as Clinton
— would lightly take on the headaches of the nation's largest city for
such nakedly political reasons." And if she did run, one thing is likely: The ovations would stop.
President Trump is scheduled to interview at least four candidates
for the U.S. national security adviser position in Florida on Sunday.
Speaking to reporters on Air Force One Saturday, Trump said he had "many, many that want the job."
Trump also hinted he had a favorite to fill the position.
"I've been thinking about someone for the last three
or four days, we'll see what happens," Trump said. "I'm meeting with
that person. They're all good, they're all great people."
Reuters reported that Trump also told reporters on Air Force One that he plans to “make a decision over the next couple of days.”
Scheduled to discuss the job with the president at
Mar-a-Lago were his acting adviser, retired Army Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg;
John Bolton, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations; Army Lt.
Gen. H.R. McMaster; and the superintendent of the U.S. Military Academy
at West Point, Lt. Gen. Robert Caslen.
White House spokesman Sean Spicer said more meetings
for the job could happen, which is now open after retired Gen. Michael
Flynn was asked to resign earlier this week.
Flynn resigned at Trump's request Monday after
revelations that he misled Vice President Mike Pence about discussing
sanctions with Russia's ambassador to the U.S. during the transition.
Trump said in a news conference Thursday that he was disappointed by how
Flynn had treated Pence, but did not believe Flynn had done anything
wrong by having the conversations.
Trump's first choice to replace Flynn, retired Vice Adm. Robert Harward, turned down the offer.
Trump tweeted on Saturday that he “will be having many meetings this weekend at The Southern White House.”
Trump tries to get back on message in epic news conference
By
Bryan Dean Wright
Over the past few months, America has lurched from partisan warfare to the cliffs of an existential crisis.
Multiple reports
show that my former colleagues in the intelligence community have
decided that they must leak or withhold classified information due to unsettling connections between President Trump and the Russian Government.
Said an intelligence officer: “I know what's best for foreign policy and national security… And I'm going to act on that.”
Some of us might applaud this man, including a few of
my fellow Democrats. In their minds, this is a case of Mr. Smith Goes
to Langley to do battle against a corrupt President Trump.
One small problem. The intelligence officer quoted above was actually Aldrich Ames, a CIA traitor whose crime of treason in the 1980s and 1990s resulted in the compromise of more than 100 assets. Many were tortured and executed as a result.
Ames’ flawed logic is eerily similar to that of his
present-day colleagues who are engaged in a shadow war with their
commander in chief. They, too, have decided that their superior judgment
is more important than following the law.
For the sake of argument, however, let’s assume that
these officials are somehow different than Ames. Let’s suppose that they
have compelling pieces of information that indeed suggest Trump or his
staff have committed treason.
When you’re trained as a spy, you’re taught how to
handle these kinds of situations. Upon learning the information, it gets
tightly compartmented (restricted) and sent to the Department of
Justice or Congress for investigation. If the evidence is found to be
credible, the constitution makes clear what happens next: impeachment.
That’s how American democracy should work.
And that’s precisely how it has been working. According to former Vice President Biden,
there’s been an on-going investigation into the alleged connections
between Trump and Russia. All of us should take heart in knowing that
the system is functioning exactly as designed.
However, some of America’s spies are deciding that
that’s not enough. For reasons of misguided righteousness or partisan
hatred, they’ve taken it upon themselves to be judge, jury, and
executioner. They have prosecuted their case in the court of public
opinion, with likeminded media outlets such as CNN, The New York Times, and the Washington Post serving as court stenographers.
Elected by no one, responsible only to each other,
these spies have determined that Trump is guilty of high crimes and
misdemeanors.
Days ago, they delivered their verdict. According to one intelligence official, the president “will die in jail.”
I understand how this might feel appealing to deeply
partisan Democrats. After all, I didn’t want Trump to win either. But
the solution to fighting this subpar president cannot be encouraging a
network of spies to tip the scales back in our political favor. We must
instead let the system continue to work, as it has, and make our case to
the American people during future elections.
If you’re not convinced, imagine the consequences of
letting spies decide not just Trump’s fate but other political winners
and losers too. Imagine how they might treat our candidates next.
Flash-forward to November 4, 2020, where Senators
Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren have defeated Donald Trump and Mike
Pence for the White House. Democrats will celebrate in the streets. The
liberal spies will smile.
Mission accomplished.
Conservative spies, however, will take a darker view.
To them, their liberal colleagues will have gotten away with political
murder. They’ll be looking for revenge.
Welcome to the new America. It’s now their turn to burn democracy down. And they’ve got the tools and motivation to do it.
This is the slippery slope of political tribalism
that, up until a few months ago, I would have thought impossible in
America. Certainly it happens in third world nations but not here. I was trained to believe that we were exceptional.
In the culture of America’s spies, you live and die
by a set of rules. One of them is a sacred pledge of allegiance to the
constitution and commander in chief. Spies may not like a president or
their policies but they must salute their leader nonetheless. If they
cannot, they are told to resign.
Spies also take a vow of secrecy, specifically to
keep classified information hidden from anyone who doesn’t have an
authorized need to know. It’s a commitment one keeps for a lifetime. And
should that vow be violated, the consequences are dire. Prison time.
Colleagues and informants killed. Enemies emboldened. The country less
safe.
Spies also accept and embrace a final rule: there
must be an unbreakable wall between government workers and the
democratic process.
Why?
Because many spies have access to powerful tools
that, if used improperly, could cause incredible damage to the nation’s
stability. Accordingly, clandestine officers have a special covenant
with the American people – codified by the Hatch Act – that limits their participation in politics.
During my time as a CIA officer, I quickly learned
why all these rules were in place. I read people’s emails. I listened to
phone calls. I recruited assets that told the dirtiest and most
embarrassing of secrets. I came to realize that my power was both an
awesome responsibility and, at times, wickedly seductive.
Some of us faltered in our commitments. I remember
colleagues who believed themselves above the rules, conducting quiet
investigations into cheating wives or ex-boyfriends. They were
eventually discovered and rightfully thrown out. They had demonstrated
an inability to handle the burden of power.
And that is precisely what we are experiencing today.
The spies who are plotting against President Trump are breaking U.S.
laws. They’re violating their oaths. And they’re committing treason to
remedy (perceived) treason.
They likely don’t see it that way, of course. But, then again, neither did Aldrich Ames.
With luck and aggressive investigations, these
renegade spies will join their fallen colleague at the Allenwood
Correctional Facility for the remainder of their lives.
I look forward to watching the gates forever close behind them. Bryan Dean Wright is a former CIA ops officer and member of the
Democratic Party. He contributes on issues of politics, national
security, and the economy. Follow him on Twitter @BryanDeanWright.
Officials in several U.S. communities labeled “sanctuaries” for
illegal immigrants say the feds have it wrong, and they fear losing
funding under a new directive from President Trump.
Saratoga, N.Y., is on one widely circulated list,
and wants off, said Undersheriff Richard Castle. It didn't make much
difference until Trump said he would punish cities that limit or
virtually prohibit local law enforcement from working proactively with
immigration agents.
“We have no idea how we got on this list,” Castle
told Fox News. “We notify [immigration officials] all along the way when
we arrest someone, and we contact [immigration officials] to verify
their status. We are willing to share all our records with immigration
[agents], and if we have a suspected violation we will notify them.”
The list of sanctuary communities that has gotten the
most attention since Trump became president was compiled by the Center
for Immigration Studies (CIS), a Washington, D.C.-based organization
that favors strict immigration policies.
Jessica Vaughan, a CIS analyst and its point person
on sanctuary communities, put the list together, culling information
from Homeland Security, as well as other sources such as media accounts
and information gleaned directly from interviews of local government
administrators.
Vaughan said she has a thorough method for putting a locality on the list.
“I look at whether they have a policy that blocks ICE
access to jails,” Vaughan said. “Do they have a policy that blocks
officers from communicating with ICE? I may ask them to give me a
statement” to corroborate what they assert.
Then she checks the information with ICE, she said.
Vaughan said she decided to take Saratoga County off
after she spoke with officials there about their objection to being on
the list and looking into their practices.
Some counties end up on the list, apparently, because
they require – often because of state rules – that ICE provide an
administrative or judicial warrant along with a formal request that an
illegal immigrant who has been arrested be held in detention until
agents can arrive and begin deportation proceedings.
Both Saratoga and Bradford County, Pa., officials
believe that was seen by groups compiling lists as an attempt by their
agencies to put up roadblocks to ICE efforts to pick up an immigrant.
Bradford County Commissioner Doug McLinko said the
community he represents had to start requiring a court order from ICE to
hold a detained immigrant beyond a release date because of concerns
over lawsuits.
“I’m appalled that we’re tagged as a sanctuary, we’re
completely the opposite of that,” McLinko told Fox News. “We are a law
and order county.
"It makes us very mad that we got grouped with
sanctuary counties, just because some organization comes out with a
list," he added.
Vaughan added that she does not expect that the Trump
administration will go by CIS’s list and “start tearing up [federal
funding] checks.”
In Ocean County, N.J., officials say they wrongly ended up on some lists of sanctuary communities.
“Absolutely, positively not,” a county public
information officer, Richard Petersen, told Fox News. “We are not a
sanctuary county. Frankly, we don’t know why that’s happened.”
A Trump executive order on immigration said that his
administration would identify places that appear to have sanctuary
policies that prohibit enforcing immigration laws and will deny those
communities federal funding.
DHS officials say the Trump administration will establish its criteria for what constitutes a sanctuary city, county, or state.
“The Department of Homeland Security is working to
implement the president’s executive orders,” said Gillian Christensen,
acting press secretary, in an email to Fox News. “When we have more
information to share about how sanctuary jurisdictions will be
determined, we will.”
Regardless of where they stand on immigration
enforcement and sanctuary policies, many local, county and state
officials say they welcome a clear definition of a sanctuary community.
There is no hard and fast definition, and now, more than ever, that can
have dire consequences, they say.
Vic DeLuca, the mayor of Maplewood, N.J., which has
an ordinance declaring itself a sanctuary city, says the concept of
sanctuary communities has been distorted by Trump and others who oppose
it.
“The president has polluted the term,” said DeLuca,
who added that about 26 percent of Maplewood’s population is
foreign-born. “He’s used it for his own benefit, to say that if you’re a
sanctuary city you’re shielding criminals, you’re harboring fugitives.”