Texas Weekly Online

Texas-trans-white
Menu
Menu

Year: 2023

Sen Kennedy’s IQ dig at VP Harris sparks backlash from White House, DNC

Sen Kennedy’s IQ dig at VP Harris sparks backlash from White House, DNC

A comment Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., made Tuesday about how American voters feel about Vice President Kamala Harris sparked online backlash from the White House and Democratic National Committee (DNC). Kennedy made it clear he wasn’t speaking for himself during an appearance on Fox News’ “The Story” with Martha MacCallum, citing recent polling that continues to show high disapproval ratings for Harris and President Biden. “I’m not saying that this is accurate, but I can read a poll, and the American people have concluded that President Biden is old, and he needs soup and an early bedtime,” the senator said. “They have concluded that Vice President Harris is not capable — that when her IQ gets to 75, she should sell,” he continued. “Again, I’m not saying that’s fair or accurate, but that’s the conclusion today that the American people have reached. They’re pretty disgusted.” KAMALA HARRIS REACTS TO ROUGH BIDEN POLLS: ‘WE’RE GOING TO HAVE TO EARN OUR RE-ELECT’ The dig at Harris’ intelligence prompted responses on X, formerly Twitter, from White House deputy press secretary Andrew Bates and Democratic National Committee Chair Jaime Harrison. “Shameful and undignified comments like these from [Kennedy] start a fire sale on one’s credibility,” Bates wrote Tuesday evening. “Bless his heart,” wrote Harrison. “[G]uess Senator Foghorn is a bit upset that our VP has done more for the working families of Louisiana than he has done over the entirety of his unproductive senate career.” Kennedy’s office declined to comment when reached by Fox News Digital on Wednesday. During his appearance on Fox Tuesday, the senator argued that the Biden administration “has embraced the neo-socialist, woke wing, loon wing of the Democratic Party. I mean, just look around. The American people might be poorer under President Biden, but they’re not stupid.  “They see an open border. They experience inflation. They see the rampant crime,” he said. “The American people look around and see the world on fire — the war in Ukraine, the war in the Middle East, the embers smoldering in China — and they have concluded that, fair or unfair.” ABC NEWS ASKS KAMALA HARRIS HOW MUCH ‘RACE AND GENDER’ CONTRIBUTE TO HER DISMAL POLLING During an interview with CNN on Sunday, Harris reacted to a number of polls showing former President Donald Trump was ahead of President Biden in hypothetical election match-ups, as well as in battleground states. “We’re going to have to earn our re-elect, there’s no doubt about it,” she said. “It is absolutely right in a democracy with free and fair elections that the candidates, the people who want to continue in leadership have to make their case, and have to make it effectively,” she continued. “And that means communicating in such a way that the message is received about the accomplishments and what we care about.” According to the RealClearPolitics national average of polls, Harris has a 54.6% unfavorable rating, compared to 36.5% favorable, while Biden has a 55.5% unfavorable rating, compared to 40.6% favorable. Fox News’ Hanna Panreck contributed to this report.

Manchin says third-party ticket is a ‘long shot’ for potential candidates, including himself

Manchin says third-party ticket is a ‘long shot’ for potential candidates, including himself

After floating a third-party presidential bid, Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., said in a new interview on a local radio station that it would be a “long shot” for any third-party candidate, including himself, to win the presidential election in 2024.  “I know that a third-party candidate, myself or anyone else who wants to jump into that fray, is really a long shot,” Manchin said on West Virginia’s “Watchdog Radio” show. “But if you can get a movement to where you can move the two established parties, the Democrat and Republican, back to where their roots are, where they’ve come from and what they’ve been able to produce over all these years, they can get back to some normality.” Manchin also touted electoral reforms such as term limits and other strategies that could bolster the interest of middle-of-the-road voters. He and his daughter have been soliciting the attention of rich political donors to launch a centrist political group, the Wall Street Journal reported over the summer.  JOE MANCHIN ANNOUNCES HE WILL NOT SEEK SENATE RE-ELECTION Manchin is also trying to bolster ranked-choice voting, which allows voters to rank candidates in order of preference, eliminating the need for separate runoff elections by reallocating votes until one candidate secures a majority. “Right now you can’t compete in the system we have because it’s a closed system. You only have a duopoly of Democrat and Republican – you have very little activity,” he said. Manchin announced earlier this month he would not seek re-election to the Senate. He has since been mulling his future in politics. VP HARRIS SAYS SHE AND BIDEN ‘OBVIOUSLY HAVE A LOT OF WORK TO DO’ TO WIN RE-ELECTION IN 2024 “When America is at her best, we get things done by putting country before party, working across the aisle, and finding common ground. Many times this approach has landed me in hot water, but the fight to unite has been well worth it,” he said in a video posted on X. “After months of deliberation and long conversation with my family, I believe in my heart of hearts that I’ve accomplished what I set out to do for West Virginia. I’ve made one of the toughest decisions of my life and decided that I will not be running for re-election to the United States Senate,” he added. Manchin said recently that he would “absolutely” consider entering the 2024 presidential race. The senator has long fueled speculation of a presidential run by aligning himself with the third-party “No Labels” organization.  Fox News Digital has reached out to Manchin’s office for comment. Fox News’ Brandon Gillespie contributed to this report. 

Northern border sector sees 550% increase in migrant apprehensions last fiscal year

Northern border sector sees 550% increase in migrant apprehensions last fiscal year

One sector on the often-overlooked northern border saw a 550% increase in migrant apprehensions last fiscal year, the latest statistic highlighting the increase in numbers that border officials are seeing. Swanton Sector Chief Patrol Agent Robert Garcia said this week that agents have seen a 550% increase in apprehensions, with 6,925 apprehensions between October 2022 and the end of September. He also said the migrants were arriving from 79 different countries, with the top five countries from which migrants originated being Mexico, India, Venezuela, Haiti and Romania. GOP LAWMAKER SOUNDS ALARM ON ‘DANGEROUS’ THREAT TO US COMING FROM POROUS BORDER, AND IT’S NOT FROM MEXICO The sector, which covers the borders of New York, New Hampshire and Vermont with Canada, saw just over 1,000 Border Patrol apprehensions in all of FY 2022 and just 365 in FY 2021. It’s part of a broader surge in migration at the northern and southern borders, although the numbers at the southern border vastly eclipse those seen at the northern border. In the north, there were 189,402 migrant encounters in FY 23, but that’s a sharp increase from the 27,000 seen in FY 21 and 109,535 in FY22. At the southern border, there were more than 2.4 million. NORTHERN BORDER SEES MIGRANT SURGE FROM DOZENS OF COUNTRIES; MORE THAN LAST 10 YEARS COMBINED  However, officials and lawmakers have noted that massive parts of the northern border, which is over 5,000 miles long and has only 115 ports of entry, are largely unstaffed compared to the southern border. Garcia had called for volunteers earlier this year as his sector saw spikes, particularly Mexican migrants with no legal documents. “Due to the increased numbers, stations are task saturated with processing large groups, which has contributed to gotaway events, pedestrian and vehicle incursions,” he said in February. BIDEN ANNOUNCES NEW NORTHERN BORDER DEAL, FENTANYL COALITION WITH CANADA AS IMMIGRATION CRISIS RAGES Republicans in Congress have also called for more attention to the border. Rep. Mike Kelly, R-Pa., who is co-chair of the Northern Border Security Caucus, has noted the risks of drugs and other threats that could come through the border. “You don’t have to worry about coming through a jungle, you just walk across,” he said in an interview with Fox News Digital last month. “There’s not a river that you have to get across, there’s really nothing there to keep people from coming over.” The Biden administration has also acknowledged the northern border in its security plans. It announced a new border deal with Canada in the spring, meaning that migrants who attempt to cross illegally between ports of entry into either country will be returned. It updates a 2004 Safe Third Country Agreement, which did not deal with illegal immigration.

Dark money fund poured millions of dollars into eco activist groups blocking highways, destroying famous art

Dark money fund poured millions of dollars into eco activist groups blocking highways, destroying famous art

FIRST ON FOX: A fledgling dark money climate group poured millions of dollars last year into disruptive activist protests that blocked busy highways and destroyed famous artwork in cities across the world, according to tax filings obtained by Fox News Digital. The Beverly Hills, California-based, Climate Emergency Fund (CEF) — which has been funded in large part by Hollywood actors and producers since it was founded in 2019 — raised $6.1 million in 2022, a 165% increase from the $2.3 million it raised in 2021, the tax filings showed. The sharp increase in funding led to CEF sending $5 million to left-wing protest groups, a 274% year-over-year increase. “Climate Emergency Fund is proud to support some of the boldest, bravest climate activists in the world who are not just fighting but are winning,” Margaret Klein Salamon, CEF’s executive director, told Fox News Digital in a statement. “Throughout history, organized, passionate, and dedicated people have awakened the public’s conscience to injustice and achieved change that was once considered impossible.” “That’s why the Climate Emergency Fund supports activist organizations that engage in non-violent protest and civil disobedience worldwide,” she said. “We are experiencing global catastrophic climate events, and they are accelerating – from the months-long summer heat waves in Europe to record-low levels of Antarctic sea ice to ocean temperatures that topped 100 degrees off the coast of Florida.” BIDEN ADMIN QUIETLY DEVELOPING SETTLEMENT WITH GROUPS SEEKING TO TEAR DOWN KEY POWER SOURCE Salamon added the evidence for action is “all around us” and that the world needs to race to zero emissions “as quickly as humanly possible.” In CEF’s tax filings, the group stated that the activist organizations it supported last year “brought new life and vigor” to the climate movement. It further reported that its grantees trained more than 15,000 people, their protests included 47,000 people and their actions were covered by global media outlets 25,000 times. The majority of CEF’s 2022 grants, approximately $4 million, were sent overseas, with the most sizable slice being wired to U.K. climate activists. The largest beneficiary of CEF’s funds appeared to be Just Stop Oil, a British activist group that has repeatedly made headlines for stopping traffic and disrupting public places across the U.K. CLIMATE ACTIVISTS FORCIBLY DRAGGED FROM EVENT WITH BIDEN ENERGY SECRETARY JENNIFER GRANHOLM For example, members of Just Stop Oil made headlines late last year when they hurled tomato soup on a famous Vincent van Gogh painting at London’s National Gallery. Days earlier, dozens of its members blocked emergency service vehicles, including an ambulance, from driving to their destination during a separate protest. “Human creativity and brilliance is on show in this gallery, yet our heritage is being destroyed by our Government’s failure to act on the climate and cost of living crisis,” Just Stop Oil said in a statement after the tomato soup protest. CEF sent an additional $800,000 to other global groups like the France-based Dernière Rénovation, the Canada-based Save Old Growth and the Italy-based Ultima Generazione, all of which staged disruptive protests in 2022. In the U.S., CEF signed grants worth $1 million to domestic groups that have used similar tactics as Just Stop Oil and called for President Biden to declare a “climate emergency.” The largest domestic grant appeared to be a $206,000 wire to the National Institute for Peer Support, which was earmarked for the group Extinction Rebellion. AOC’S PAC FUNNELED THOUSANDS TO ORG FINANCING DISRUPTIVE CLIMATE PROTEST GROUPS While Biden has focused much of his presidency on combating climate change, he has yet to formally declare it a national emergency. A climate emergency declaration would enable Biden to bypass Congress and take a number of regulatory steps not normally authorized to the White House. “The environmental activist left is not an organic movement,” Daniel Turner, the founder and executive director of Power The Future, told Fox News Digital in an interview. “Their activism is well-thought-out and centrally planned, they have signs and T-shirts — someone is paying for all of that, it is orchestrated.” “You may find some young people who are enthusiastic about the cause, but a lot of their authenticity comes into question when you realize it’s being paid for by people who don’t want their fingerprints on the project themselves,” Turner said. “Once you realize that it’s not organic, that it is paid activism and paid indignation and paid anger, well, then you realize the whole thing is just an enormous farce.” According to the tax filing, CEF received more than 50 individual anonymous contributions worth thousands of dollars each. More than 10 were worth more than $100,000, with the largest contribution exceeding $1.2 million and two more exceeding $500,000 each. Since it was created, the group has garnered contributions from high-profile Hollywood figures such as actors Jeremy Strong, Chelsea Handler and Thomas Middleditch, Walt Disney heir and filmmaker Abigail Disney, and director Adam McKay, who serves on the group’s board. Democrat New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s political action committee, Courage to Change, and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s nonprofit, Onward Together, have also donated tens of thousands of dollars to CEF. Nonprofits aren’t legally required to report the identities of their donors, allowing CEF’s contributors to remain anonymous. However, in its annual report, CEF lists numerous donors, including Strong, Handler, Middleditch, Disney and McKay. And, in addition to McKay, CEF’s board of directors includes Aileen Getty, the granddaughter of the Getty Oil founder, and Rory Kennedy, the daughter of former U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy.