Month: June 2018

A Washington, D.C., art council has selected a site near the Lincoln and Vietnam War memorials to commemorate Desert Storm, the last armed conflict America won.

The Commission of Fine Arts approved the location on the western end of the National Mall during a meeting Thursday, even though the area is getting crowded with war memorials.

As one who served I am Grateful the new Desert Storm War Memorial will have a prominent place on National Mall. Near Lincoln Memorial. It will be a memorial to those who died & served liberating Kuwaiti. pic.twitter.com/vU1jjoIl8X

— Michael Van Proyen (@MVanProyen) June 23, 2018

Some Commission members expressed concern at a March meeting that the area around Lincoln’s massive Parthenon is becoming too crowded with with “military commemoration” rather than “maintaining its intended original use of public recreation and civic prospect.”

But the veterans spearheading the effort were pleased with both the prominent placement and relieved to have a place for the commemoration.

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Scott Stump, a former Marine who served in Operation Desert Storm, told Military Times that he was “very pleased and very relieved” at the Commission’s decision.

“It’s in close proximity to the National Mall and the other memorials and commemorative works to where a person could actually access it, could walk to it, easily,” said Stump, who is the CEO of the National Desert Storm War Memorial Association.

“We felt like if you have something that’s the most beautiful memorial in the world, but it takes a lot of work for people to get there and people aren’t going to visit, then it kind of defeats our purpose,” he added.

Preliminary designs for the memorial —  which will need final approval from the Commission of Fine Arts, the National Park Service and the National Capital Planning Commission — envision a raised limestone structure reminiscent of the golden spiral of the nautilus shell.

The arcing shape recalls the “left hook” maneuver where U.S. forces were able to flank former Iraq President Saddam Hussein’s army and expel them from Kuwait.

“I hope obviously that if [future visitors] don’t know the story, that they will learn about it,” Stump told WTOP. “If they kind of remember the story, maybe it will jog their memory and remind them that this was not the 100-hour war that it’s so erroneously referred to so many times.

“This was a big deal — it affected 700,000 people, and it was also one of the most overwhelmingly successful military operations in history.”

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Veteran filmmaker David Lynch believes President Donald Trump could be remembered as one of the greatest presidents in American history because of the way he has shaken up the political establishment.

In a wide-ranging interview with The Guardian, Lynch admitted to supporting Bernie Sanders in the 2016 Democratic primary, before supporting Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson in the presidential election. However, he now appears to believe that Trump may have been the right choice.

“I am not really a political person, but I really like the freedom to do what you want to do,” Lynch explained. “[Trump] could go down as one of the greatest presidents in history because he has disrupted the thing so much. No one is able to counter this guy in an intelligent way.”

“Our so-called leaders can’t take the country forward, can’t get anything done,” the Oscar-nominated director said. “Like children, they are. Trump has shown all this.”

David Lynch attends the “Twin Peaks” panel at the Showtime portion of the 2017 Winter Television Critics Association press tour on Monday, Jan. 9, 2017, in Pasadena, Calif. (Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP)

US director David Lynch arrives on May 23, 2017 for the ’70th Anniversary’ ceremony of the Cannes Film Festival in Cannes, southern France. (ALBERTO PIZZOLI/AFP/Getty Images)

Lynch, whose major works include Twin Peaks and Mulholland Drive, has in the past expressed admiration for former President Ronald Reagan’s libertarian philosophy. Yet more recently, the 72-year-old identified himself as a Democrat and even endorsed Barack Obama in the 2012 presidential election.

“At that time, I thought of myself as a libertarian,” he said in an interview with Reason magazine in 2006. “I believed in next to zero government. And I still would lean toward no government and not so many rules, except for traffic lights and things like this. I really believe in traffic regulations.”

“I’m a Democrat now,” he continued. “And I’ve always been a Democrat, really. But I don’t like the Democrats a lot, either, because I’m a smoker, and I think a lot of the Democrats have come up with these rules for non-smoking. And I don’t think that that’s necessarily so bad, but they have to give the smokers a place.”

Lynch is one of the few Hollywood figures to openly express sympathy or admiration toward President Trump since his rise to the Oval Office. Other major figures to express their support or sympathy towards the Trump agenda include Kanye West, Roseanne Barr, Clint Eastwood, Kid Rock, and Jon Voight.

 

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Once again, President Donald Trump has used Twitter to infuriate his critics and fire up his supporters.

The president used seemingly the only topic covered by the media in the past three weeks — the detention of illegal immigrants crossing the U.S. border — to make his boldest declaration yet about the never-ending problem, proposing immediate deportation of illegal immigrants from the border.

We cannot allow all of these people to invade our Country. When somebody comes in, we must immediately, with no Judges or Court Cases, bring them back from where they came. Our system is a mockery to good immigration policy and Law and Order. Most children come without parents…

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 24, 2018

In a tweet on Sunday, Trump said a porous border makes a mockery of the struggles of legal immigrants to enter America.

“Our Immigration policy, laughed at all over the world, is very unfair to all of those people who have gone through the system legally and are waiting on line for years! Immigration must be based on merit — we need people who will help to Make America Great Again!” Trump tweeted.

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….Our Immigration policy, laughed at all over the world, is very unfair to all of those people who have gone through the system legally and are waiting on line for years! Immigration must be based on merit – we need people who will help to Make America Great Again!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 24, 2018

The tweet was immediately met with criticism by those who say the president would be denying illegals their right of due process as guaranteed by the Constitution.

NEVER ignore the Constitution and the RIGHTS it protects. RULE OF LAW &DUE PROCESS MATTER!!!#jonaPOTUShttps://t.co/q2jMI2hOI6

— Jonathan A. Trapani (@JATrapani) June 24, 2018

This is a direct violation of our Constitution and is an impeachable offense #IMPEACHTRUMPNOW

— Jenny Sampson (@JennySampson16) June 24, 2018

The Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment states “any person” in the country shall not be deprived of due process of law, and several Supreme Court decisions have ruled that undocumented immigrants are granted the same rights as U.S. citizens.

But those rights apply to undocumented immigrants already in the country.

As Daniel Fisher of Forbes noted in an article last year about the constitutionality of Trump’s travel ban, there’s an important distinction between the rights of someone trying to enter the country as opposed to those already here.

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“They’re subject to immigration law, under which the executive branch has broad authority to determine whether it wants them in the country or not,” Fisher wrote of incoming immigrants. “And until they’ve passed through immigration control, they aren’t technically on U.S. soil.”

Which means, the president would argue that under immigration law, anyone detained at a border crossing can be sent back to Mexico or their native country without requiring due process.

It would be an emotional legal battle if the president pushes for what he proposed in his Sunday morning tweet, and one that would almost certainly be put before the Supreme Court.

Clearly the president is getting tougher in his border policies to try and get some type of immigration reform passed by Congress. That will require the cooperation of Democrats, who thus far seem to enjoy the chaos and the media criticism the situation at the border is causing the White House.

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President Trump has repeatedly asked the Republican-controlled Congress to close immigration loopholes in order to end the trafficking and smuggling of children across the border by illegal aliens who hope to be released into the interior of the United States.

While Trump has enacted a “zero tolerance” policy at the border — where all adult border crossers, no matter if they are traveling with children, are criminally prosecuted — Democrats have rallied around ending all immigration enforcement.

As Breitbart News noted, every Senate Democrat has signed onto legislation that would end all border enforcement, a plan that Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) said should be called the “Child Trafficking Encouragement Act,” as it sets free every adult border crosser so long as they smuggle a child across the border with them.

In detail, the White House provided Breitbart News with nine examples where MS-13 gang members — the murderous El Salvadorian gang that Democrats defended last month — used these immigration loopholes to try to enter the U.S. in hopes they would eventually be released.

Here are the nine times MS-13 gang members smuggled children across the border to try to eventually be released into the country:

1. MS-13 Gang Member Smuggles Himself and Child into U.S.

On May 2, 2018, Border Patrol apprehended an adult male who was traveling with his one-year-old son. He is a known MS-13 gang member who was previously removed from the country in 2012. The minor child was released to his uncle.

2. MS-13 Gang Member Who Posed as ‘Unaccompanied Minor’ Accused of Murder

On December 7, 2013, Border Patrol apprehended an unaccompanied alien child. He was given a Notice to Appear and released into the interior of the United States. On September 2016, the subject was one of 11 MS-13 gang members involved in the killing of teenage girls in Long Island, NY.

3. MS-13 Gang Member Uses Her Child to Try to Enter U.S. Illegally 

On May 1, 2018, Border Patrol apprehended a known female MS-13 gang member, who was traveling with her minor daughter. After being processed, both mother and child were released under their own recognizance on May 19, 2018.

4. MS-13 Gang Member Enters U.S. Illegally as ‘Unaccompanied Minor’ 

On December 31, 2014, Border Patrol apprehended an unaccompanied alien child. He was given a Notice to Appear and released into the interior of the United States. In July 2017, the subject was a known MS-13 gang member and was listed on the State of Texas’s ten most wanted fugitives list by the Texas Department of Public Safety. He was located and arrested in Virginia and is currently awaiting trial for the murder of two subjects in Houston.

5. MS-13 Gang Member Brings Child to Border, Gets Released 

On May 9, 2018, Border Patrol apprehended a known female MS-13 gang member who was traveling with her minor daughter. After being processed, both mother and child were released under their own recognizance on June 4, 2018.

6. ‘Unaccompanied Minor’ Arrested in MS-13 Gang Murder

On May 13, 2015, Border Patrol apprehended an unaccompanied alien child. He was given a Notice to Appear and released into the interior of the United States. On November 2017, the subject was arrested in connection to an MS-13 related killing of a man who was stabbed over 100 times and decapitated near a Maryland Park.

7. Previously Deported Illegal Alien Rapist Used Immigration Loophole to try to Re-enter U.S.

On June 15, 2018, Border Patrol apprehended an adult male from El Salvador who had previously been removed the country in 2009. The man had been charged and convicted of rape in the U.S. and was sentenced to 15 years in prison with five years suspended. He was accompanied by his 7-year-old daughter. Due to the father’s criminal history, the child is considered a UAC and was processed accordingly.

8. MS-13 Gang Member Uses Her Child to Try to Enter U.S. Illegally 

On March 22, 2018, Border Patrol apprehended a known MS-13 female with an active arrest warrant, who arrived at the border with her minor son claiming credible fear. There is currently an active arrest warrant for known association with a Terrorist Organization issued by the Justice of the Peace of Acajutla, El Salvador, Sonsonate on December 13, 2016. The known MS-13 member is currently in custody pending a hearing scheduled for 6/26/18.  The child remains in ORR custody.

9. MS-13 Gang Member Brings Child to Border, Gets Released 

On December 29, 2017, Border Patrol apprehended a known female MS-13 gang member, who was traveling with her minor son. After being processed, both mother and child were released under their own recognizance on January 19, 2018.

Currently, the U.S. admits more than 1.5 million legal and illegal immigrants every year, with more than 70 percent coming to the country through the process known as “chain migration,” whereby newly naturalized citizens can bring an unlimited number of foreign relatives to the country. In the next 20 years, the current U.S. legal immigration system is on track to import roughly 15 million new foreign-born voters. Between seven and eight million of those foreign-born voters will arrive in the U.S. through chain migration.

John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Follow him on Twitter at @JxhnBinder.