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Military experts reject Harris’ claim of ‘no US soldiers in combat zones’ as misleading

Military experts reject Harris’ claim of ‘no US soldiers in combat zones’ as misleading

Critics have offered a fact-check on Vice President Kamala Harris’ claim that the U.S. has “not one member of the United States military who is on active duty” in a combat zone “for the first time this century,” indicating that the statement is misleading. Harris made the claim in Tuesday’s debate with former President Trump. While her phrasing left room for interpretation, it is clear that there are U.S. troops in harm’s way around the globe. “As of today, there is not one member of the United States military who is on active duty in a combat zone in any war zone around the world, the first time this century,” Harris said during the Presidential Debate on ABC.  The Pentagon told Fox News Digital service that members are stationed in various dangerous locations but noted that those deployments are made by the Executive Branch and not due to wars declared by Congress. “An aspect of military service includes serving in locations where hostile actions may occur,” a Defense Official said. “Those locations are designated by executive order and/or the Secretary of Defense.” I BELIEVE PENNSYLVANIA WILL ‘MAKE THE DIFFERENCE’ IN 2024 ELECTION: REP: MADELEINE DEAN “However, it’s important to note that just because a service member is in one of these locations does not mean they are engaged in war,” the official added. “The U.S. is not currently engaged in a war and does not have troops fighting in active war zones anywhere in the world.” Mark Montgomery, senior director for the Center on Cyber and Tech Innovation at the Foundation for Defense of Democracy, told Fox News Digital that the U.S. has “quietly shut down designations of war zones over the past few years.” “I would ask: Is anyone getting combat-related hazardous duty pay?” Montgomery added. “The answer is yes,” and noted Syria as an example. JESUS MARQUEZ ON TRUMP’S CHANCES IN BATTLEGROUND STATE: ‘ABSOLUTELY WE CAN TAKE NEVADA’ The Pentagon did not comment on whether troops in countries such as Syria, Jordan or Iraq or on other bases around the Middle East have received hazardous duty pay over the past 10 months as Iran has backed proxies including the Houthis and Hezbollah.  Hazardous Duty Pay is distributed at a monthly rate of $225 and is payable to a member who is subjected to hostile fire, explosion of hostile mines or other hostile action while performing duty in a hostile fire area, exposed to a hostile fire event or killed, injured or wounded by hostile fire or explosion, according to Military.com. Military members serving in Lebanon have been eligible for hazardous duty pay since 1983, while those in Syria have been eligible since 2003 and 2014 for land and air combat, respectively. Iraq has remained an eligible region since 1990.  Robert Greenway, former senior director for the National Security Council (NSC) during the Trump administration, noted that the U.S. has “continuously” deployed troops to combat zones since the 1991 Gulf War. HARRIS-TRUMP SHOWDOWN: GOP CHAIR VOWS ‘WE ABSOLUTELY HAVE THE RESOURCES’ TO WIN IN NOVEMBER “The assertion is especially egregious, as she is the current VP and should know that we recently conducted a raid in Syria killing a senior ISIS commander, several U.S. troops had to be medically evacuated after another raid against ISIS in Syria,” Greenway told Fox News Digital. “Several servicemembers were wounded in Iraq when Al Asad Airbase was attacked by Iranian sponsored terrorists less than a month ago, and our ships are under near-daily attack in the Red Sea.” “A current VP unaware of our military operations in combat overseas is a dereliction of duty,” Greenway added.  The U.S. has roughly 2,500 troops in Iraq alone, although Iraqi officials this week revealed that they have worked out a tentative plan for the U.S. to withdraw most of its troops by 2025 and leave a residual force, The Washington Post reported.  “The first phase will begin this year and continue until 2025, while the second phase will conclude in 2026,” Iraqi Defense Minister Thabit al-Abbasi said during an appearance on television. 

Pennsylvania mail-in ballots without correct dates will not be counted, court rules

Pennsylvania mail-in ballots without correct dates will not be counted, court rules

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled Friday that mail-in ballots without the correct dates on envelopes cannot be counted in elections, a decision which could prove crucial in this year’s presidential election where 19 electoral college votes are up for grabs. The state’s high court ruled on procedural grounds, saying a lower court that found the mandate unenforceable should not have taken up the case because it did not draw in the election boards in all 67 counties. Left-leaning groups that filed the case only sued two of them, Philadelphia and Allegheny counties. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court said the lower Commonwealth Court “lacked subject matter jurisdiction to review the matter,” according to a court filing. TRUMP CRUSHING HARRIS IN PENNSYLVANIA BAKERY’S ELECTION ‘COOKIE POLL’: ‘PEOPLE ARE UPSET’ Commonwealth Court two weeks ago halted enforcement of the handwritten dates on exterior envelopes. Friday’s ruling now means mail-in ballots must be properly dated in order to be counted enforceable.  The ruling was welcomed by Republicans as a victory for voter integrity in the hotly contested state, while voting rights advocates including the American Civil Liberties Union said they will look at pursuing additional legal options. President Joe Biden won the state by more than 80,000 votes in 2020, and former President Trump and Vice-President Harris have been campaigning in the Keystone State this week. Over 800,000 people requested mail ballots for April’s primary election where officials disqualified nearly 16,000 mail-in ballots for irregularities. Almost half were disqualified because of issues such as missing signatures and wrong dates on outer envelopes, according to the New York Times. About 75% of the mail-in ballots requested were made by Democrats.  Around 2.5 million Pennsylvanians voted by mail in 2020, according to a lawsuit filed by Republicans in the aftermath of the election which sought to declare universal mail-in voting unconstitutional. HARRIS, TRUMP ENTER POST-DEBATE ‘HOMESTRETCH’ WITH DUELING RALLIES IN KEY BATTLEGROUND STATES RNC Chairman Michael Whatley said the Friday ruling was a “huge” win for election integrity. “Following legal action from the RNC and @PAGOP [Republican Party of Pennsylvania], the PA Supreme Court REJECTED a Democrat attempt to count undated ballots,” Whatley wrote. “This makes mail voting in the Keystone State less susceptible to fraud. We will keep fighting and winning!” Steve Loney, the senior supervising attorney for the ACLU in Pennsylvania, said the ruling was a setback for Pennsylvania voters. “These eligible voters who got their ballots in on time should have their votes counted and voices heard,” Loney said. “The fundamental right to vote is among the most precious rights we enjoy as Pennsylvanians, and it should take more than a trivial paperwork error to take it away.” The justices ruled 4-3, with two Democrats joining both Republicans on the Supreme Court to vacate the Commonwealth Court decision. CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP The dissent by three other Democratic justices said the high court should have taken up the dispute. “A prompt and definitive ruling on the constitutional question presented in this appeal is of paramount public importance inasmuch as it will affect the counting of ballots in the upcoming general election,” wrote Justice David Wecht. He and the two other dissenters would have ruled on the matter based on written briefs. Prior to the 2020 election, Republicans sought to prevent mail-in ballots received after election day from being counted, but ultimately, the Supreme Court sided with the Pennsylvania Supreme court decision allowing ballots to be counted if they were received within three days of election day, even if they did not have a legible postmark. The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

Ohio town’s migrant crisis caused by Biden-Harris: Moreno

Ohio town’s migrant crisis caused by Biden-Harris: Moreno

SPRINGFIELD, Ohio – Republican Senate candidate Bernie Moreno took aim at the Biden administration, arguing that the issues faced by residents of this city can be traced back to policies in Washington, D.C. Moreno, who is trying to unseat Democrat Sen. Sherrod Brown, spoke at an event in the city that has recently been thrust into the center of the national immigration debate. Residents say the federal government’s decision to settle as many as 20,000 Haitian immigrants in the city of 60,000 has caused widespread problems. “What’s going on in this community is a total disgrace,” Moreno said. “Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, with the help of their number one ally in the United States Senate, Sherrod Brown, have absolutely corrupted our immigration laws to allow a mass, uncontrolled amount of immigration to come to a community like Springfield.”  The Buckeye State’s other senator, JD Vance, who is running for vice president, has also spoken out about the issue since former President Donald Trump raised it during his debate earlier this week against Vice President Kamala Harris. “Reports now show that people have had their pets abducted and eaten by people who shouldn’t be in this country,” Vance wrote in a post on X this week. “Where is our border czar?” HAITIAN REFUGEES ‘DON’T UNDERSTAND THE LAWS,’ FORMER LAWMAKER SAYS AMID FATAL WRECK, CULTURAL CLASHES “They’re eating the dogs, the people that came in, they’re eating the cats,” Trump said during a response to a question about immigration. “They’re eating the pets of the people that live there, and this is what’s happening in our country, and it’s a shame.” While the claims made by Trump and Vance have not been proven, there is little dispute about Springfield struggling to absorb the influx of Haitian migrants. According to former Ohio State Rep. Kyle Koehler, that has caused some issues in the community. “We’ve got an influx of folks that have come in, and I think we were a little bit shocked that it was close to 20,000 people in a community of 60,000, and that’s caused some issues between the folks that live here and the folks that are coming in,” Koehler, a Republican now running for state senate, told Fox News Digital. Koehler noted that many of the issues can be chalked up to differences in culture, which have been hard to overcome when new people have been coming into Springfield at such a high rate. However, the Republican also noted some other issues faced by the community, including a dramatic spike in traffic accidents. SPRINGFIELD PASTORS SPEAK OUT ON HAITIAN REFUGEE CHALLENGES: ‘THE SUFFERING IS REAL’ “We do have a really abnormal number of car accidents that are happening,” Koehler said. “And it’s not only the number, but the severity of them. When you go on a street that is a 35-mile-an-hour speed limit, and there’s a car sitting on its hood, and I’m not talking about one, I’m talking about five or six accidents a week like that, you begin to wonder.” Moreno highlighted other issues faced by the community during his Saturday event, pointing to schools that have struggled to handle the surge of new students who don’t speak English. “No country on earth would allow to happen what’s happening here,” Moreno said. The Senate candidate vowed to help fix the immigration system if elected, promising that he would work to end the Temporary Protection Status program, which has been the primary driver of migration to Springfield, by letting it expire in 2026 while putting a new program with more strict requirements in place. “Our leaders have failed to address it,” Moreno said, responding to comments by Brown that accused Republicans of using the situation in Springfield for political gain. “Where is Sherrod Brown by the way? . . . Where is he helping the citizens of Springfield resolve this problem?” Moreno also argued that it wasn’t the fault of migrants or local leaders in Springfield that the situation in the town has reached this point, instead pointing to Democrats in Washington. “They didn’t cause this problem. It wasn’t a fair problem,” Moreno said. “This was dumped on them by corrupt federal elected leaders that weren’t looking out for the people in Springfield.”