The Department of Homeland Security is warning employees of an increased level of threat to their safety with a series of violent acts taken against them and their children due to the current debate over immigration policy.
In a letter sent to employees, the department said there is a “heightened threat against DHS employees,” according to ABC Radio.
“This assessment is based on specific and credible threats that have been levied against certain DHS employees and a sharp increase in the overall number of general threats against DHS employees,” Claire Grady, acting deputy secretary of Homeland Security, said in the letter.
Threats seem to have advanced well beyond mere talk. The department reported that one official living in Washington, D.C., found a decapitated and burnt animal carcass on his porch.
The threats come as some elected Democrat officials have engaged in extreme rhetoric against those with whom they disagree politically.
California Democrat Maxine Waters, for instance, urged followers to attack Trump administration officials and their children at their homes and public places like restaurants.
Democrat acolytes seem to have taken such suggestions to heart and have stepped up pressure on Republicans in a multitude of venues, including in private life. In the last few days, Trump Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders was refused service in a Virginia restaurant, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen was chased out of a D.C. Mexican restaurant, and Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi was harassed in a Movie theater.
Last year a Democrat operative who had worked for Democrat presidential candidate Bernie Sanders went on a shooting rampage at a Virginia baseball park in an effort to kill Republican members of Congress. Several were wounded, including House Majority Whip, Republican Steve Scalise, who has been seriously and permanently crippled by the wounds.
House Committee on the Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte on Friday subpoenaed former FBI Agent Peter Strzok to appear for a deposition next week.
Goodlatte issued the subpoena even though Strzok’s attorney said that Strzok is willing to testify voluntarily before Congress.
“We regret that the Committee felt it necessary to issue a subpoena when we repeatedly informed them that Pete was willing to testify voluntarily,” Strzok lawyer Aitan Goelman said in a statement after Goodlatte issued the subpoena.
A statement on the Judiciary Committee’s website said that the panel has “repeatedly requested to interview Mr. Strzok regarding his role in certain decisions, but he has yet to appear.”
As the FBI’s deputy chief of counterintelligence, Strzok oversaw the bureau’s investigation into possible Trump campaign ties to the Russian government. He was also a top investigator on the former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton email probe. (RELATED: Strzok: ‘We’ll Stop’ Trump Presidency)
While working on the Trump-Russia matter, Strzok sent numerous text messages criticizing the then-presidential candidate. In one Aug. 8, 2016 text message, Strzok told FBI attorney Lisa Page that “we’ll stop” Trump’s presidency.
A Department of Justice inspector general’s report released June 14 blasted Strzok over the text messages, saying that the messages indicated a “biased state of mind” and implied “a willingness to take official action to impact the presidential candidate’s electoral prospects.”
Strzok was escorted from FBI headquarters June 15. Attorney General Jeff Sessions said on Thursday that Strzok no longer has his security clearance. (RELATED: Strzok Loses Security Clearance)
Goelman said that his client “intends to answer any question put to him, and he intends to defend the integrity of the Clinton email investigation, the Russia collusion investigation to the extent that that’s a topic, and his own integrity,” in a letter sent to Goodlatte on Saturday.
Goelman said that Strzok “wants the chance to clear his name and tell his story.”
This Is Organized By Soros Are Some Vile Anti-America Scum.
Twitter / @JewishAction
Protesters descended on the Alexandria townhouse of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen Friday morning, demanding the Trump administration reunite illegal immigrant families at the U.S.-Mexico border.
Philip Lewis
✔@Phil_Lewis_
Protestors are outside of DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen’s Alexandria townhouse, playing audio of the detained children. She appears to be still be home.
Demonstrators were heard chanting “free the kids” and“no justice, no sleep,” according to HuffPost’s Philip Lewis. Many people in the crowd carried signs bearing Nielsen’s likeness, captioned: “CHILD SNATCHER.”
Amanda House
✔@AmandaLeeHouse
“Beware of Child Snatcher” flyers outside @SecNielsen’s house warn neighbors that this “ruthless hencman” and “human rights abuser” is ripping children from their parents and imprisoning them in cages. Happy Friday! (Credit: Matthew Perdie/@BreitbartNews)
Protestors are outside of DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen’s Alexandria townhouse, playing audio of the detained children. She appears to be still be home. pic.twitter.com/akIcxOcM3q
Philip Lewis
✔@Phil_Lewis_
Protestors are chanting “NO JUSTICE NO SLEEP!” and “FREE THE KIDS!”
Update: Nielsen is hiding in her house and won’t come out to explain her cruel and inhumane actions. Her neighbors are pretty interested, however. Secretary, it doesn’t have to be this way. Resign. #FamiliesBelongTogether#moralemergency#FreeOurFuture
Protesters shouted “Shame!” as Nielsen walked from her home to her security detail.
Secret Service officers monitored the nearly hour-long demonstration, according to FOX 5 DC.
The demonstration outside the Secretary’s home comes days after members of the D.C. chapter of the Democrat Socialists of America drove Nielsen out of a Mexican restaurant on Tuesday. “No borders! No walls! Sanctuary for all!” the activists shouted as she ate at MXDC.
“Aren’t you a mother too?” The far-left agitators asked Nielsen. “Kirstjen Nielsen, you’re a villain! Lock her up!”
Nielsen eventually vacated the restaurant amid fears the situation would escalate.
She was also targeted by actor Peter Fonda, who shared a violent and sexually degrading fantasy about the Trump Cabinet leader Tuesday night. “Kristjen Nielsen is a lying gash that should be put in a cage and poked at by passersby,” Fonda tweeted. “The gash should be pilloried in Lafayette Square naked and whipped by passersby while being filmed for posterity.”
On Wednesday, President Donald Trump signed an executive order aimed at preventing the separation of immigrant children from their border-crossing parents.
Nielsen praised the executive action and called on Congress to find a long-term solution to close the border policy loophole.
“We ask them to do their jobs. The laws need to be changed,” she said.
“According to a source close to Cohen, Cohen has told friends that he expects to be arrested any day now. (Reached for comment, Cohen wrote in a text message, “Your alleged source is wrong!”) The specter of Cohen flipping has Trump advisers on edge,” reportsVanity Fair.
Cohen, whose New York office was raided by the FBI in April, is under investigation for crimes ranging from campaign finance violations to bank fraud.
Following the raid, Stephen Ryan, an attorney for Cohen said in a statement that the raid was conducted based on a referral from special counsel Robert Mueller.
“The decision by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in New York to conduct their investigation using search warrants is completely inappropriate and unnecessary,” said Raid. “It resulted in the unnecessary seizure of protected attorney-client communications between a lawyer and his clients.
“These government tactics are also wrong because Mr. Cohen has cooperated completely with all government entities, including providing thousands of non-privileged documents to the Congress and sitting for depositions under oath,” he added.
Shortly after the raid, President Trump called the law enforcement action “disgraceful,” while flanked by members of his Cabinet.
TheBeat w/Ari Melber
✔@TheBeatWithAri
Breaking: Trump responds to Michael Cohen raid “It’s a disgrace… it’s an attack on our country”
“It’s frankly, a real disgrace. It’s an attack on our country in a true sense. It’s an attack on what we all stand for,” the president said.
“It’s a total witch hunt. I’ve been saying it for a long time. I’ve wanted to keep it down. We’ve given, I believe, over a million pages worth of documents to the special counsel.
“They continue to just go forward, and here we are talking about Syria… and I have this witch hunt constantly going on, for over 12 months now, and actually much more than that. You could say it was right after I won the nomination, it started. And it’s a disgrace. It’s frankly, a real disgrace. It’s an attack on our country in a true sense. It’s an attack on what we all stand for,” he added.
People These Guys Believe They Know What’s Best For You. Both Are Damn Traitors.
Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ) on Monday evening became the first sitting GOP member of the House of Representatives to publicly call for the removal of House Speaker Paul Ryan now, rather than on Ryan’s planned schedule post-election, during an interview onBreitbart News Tonight on SiriusXM.
During a discussion with host and Breitbart News Senior Editor-at-Large Rebecca Mansour about Ryan’s failures on immigration with a looming pro-amnesty discharge petition hanging in the balance, Gosar hammered the entire current leadership team.
“Part of the problem is I think the whole leadership team is toxic,” Gosar said. “And that’s part of the problem. How did we choose this? These are the same group of people that conveyed the jurisdiction of the omnibus. These are the same group of leaders that haven’t honored a promise.”
Gosar pointed to the founding chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), as a solid replacement of Ryan when the time comes. Mansour had asked him about a call from Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney—a Freedom Caucus House member before he joined President Donald Trump’s administration—for Ryan to be removed now to force House Democrats to demonstrate in a floor Speakership vote their true allegiance to House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi.
“There’s a movement of people that are backing Jim Jordan from the Freedom Caucus,” Gosar said. “He would be a great person to get back to having leadership for change and well-statute reform. That’s how you look at this: it’s got to be somebody that is going to bring back good process which brings back good policy which builds good politics. This is problematic.”
News broke this weekend that a group of grassroots conservatives—well more than a hundred of them—are calling to draft Jordan for the speakership.
He further elaborated on his support for Jordan for Speaker.
“I think Jim Jordan is a great person. I think the move is afoot to draft Jim Jordan,” Gosar said. “I think if the votes were already had I think the replacement would have already been there. I think the further this goes down the road—I think this was the latest warning call in regards to that process, on the farm bill. I think it’s time. I think it would energize our base. It would get somebody who would actually get back the jurisdiction and the clout to Congress and the House as equal footings with the Senate and stop taking this crap allowing the Senate to back us into corners and mitigate with ourselves instead of being a fair and equal component like the Senate. This would be the perfect scenario—otherwise we’re going to have the same kind of problems over and over again.”
When Mansour asked again if Gosar was specifically saying call the vote for Speaker now and elect Jordan before the election in November, he replied: “Absolutely.”
“It allows us to pony up but it also allows us to get things done,” Gosar said. “Because we haven’t seen it done.”
Gosar listed a number of things Ryan promised but has not delivered as speaker.
This all comes amid a fraught political time for the House GOP leadership. Ryan, who announced he is not seeking re-election thereby ceding his authority as Speaker by taking a lame duck approach to the midterm elections, is widely viewed as not doing enough to stop an effort by pro-amnesty open borders Republicans to use a discharge petition to force the issue of amnesty onto the floor of the House of Representatives.
“Once again, the damage is done because if you’re a member of the moderates why would you sign onto that when you know you can have the discharge petition come forward if this Goodlatte bill doesn’t come forward? So they’ve played this whole hand out publicly which is totally bananas,” Gosar said.
Meanwhile, Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy—the presumed heir apparent as Speaker—has a major uphill battle ahead of him to convince members like Gosar and other conservatives to vote for him if and when he does have a speakership vote on the floor. While McCarthy is indeed personally close with President Trump, he was thwarted by these same conservatives in his last bid for speakership back in 2015 which cleared the way for Ryan’s ascendancy to third place in the line of the presidential succession. McCarthy could very well win them over in the end, but he has an enormous amount of work to do—and palling around with Ryan, when Ryan is not stopping this discharge petition, does not help his case.
Waiting in the wings is House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, also viewed as a potential contender for the speakership should McCarthy not succeed. Scalise would face many of the same hurdles as McCarthy faces.
It remains to be seen how this all will go down but one thing is certain at this stage: Ryan is in serious trouble, and is very likely to not survive to his desired expiration date at the beginning of next year at the end of this Congress.
Last week, reports indicated Stefan Halper, a Cambridge professor and longtime aide to some of Washington’s most powerful figures, was outed as an FBI informant planted inside Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign.
The New York Post writes:
Halper made his first overture when he met with Page at a British symposium. The two remained in regular contact for more than a year, meeting at Halper’s Virginia farm and in Washington, DC, as well as exchanging emails.
The professor met with Trump campaign co-chair Sam Clovis in late August, offering his services as a foreign-policy adviser, The Washington Post reported Friday, without naming the academic.
…
Days later, Halper contacted Papadopoulos by e-mail. The professor offered the young and inexperienced campaign aide $3,000 and an all-expenses-paid trip to London, ostensibly to write a paper about energy in the eastern Mediterranean region.
Here are a few fast facts about Halper’s history in politics.
Got His Start in Nixon/Ford Years
The Stanford and Oxford-educated Halper started his career in government in 1971 as a member of President Richard Nixon’s Domestic Policy Council. The foreign policy expert served as the Office of Management and Budget’s Assistant Director of Management and Evaluation Division between 1973-1974. Halper then served as an assistant to all three of President Gerald Ford’s Chief of Staffs — Alexander Haig, Donald Rumsfeld, and Dick Cheney — until 1977.
Accused of Leading a Spy Ring Inside Jimmy Carter’s Presidential Campaign
The Reagan-Bush presidential campaign hired Halper to serve as Director of Policy Coordination in 1980 and would later be embroiled in the Debategate affair, a scandal in which CIA operatives were accused of leaking the Carter campaign’s foreign policy positions to the Republican ticket.
Four decades ago, Halper was responsible for a long-forgotten spying scandal involving the 1980 election, in which the Reagan campaign – using CIA officials managed by Halper, reportedly under the direction of former CIA Director and then-Vice-Presidential candidate George H.W. Bush – got caught running a spying operation from inside the Carter administration. The plot involved CIA operatives passing classified information about Carter’s foreign policy to Reagan campaign officials in order to ensure the Reagan campaign knew of any foreign policy decisions that Carter was considering.
Halper also worked as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs during President Ronald Reagan’s first term.
Had a Stint as a Bank Executive
In 1984, Halper was chairman of three financial institutions — National Bank of Northern Virginia, Palmer National Bank, and George Washington National Bank. White House official Oliver North wired loaned funds from the Palmer National Bank to a Swiss bank account, which were later used to aid the contras.
Believed Hillary Clinton Would Be a Better Steward for U.S.-UK Relations
In March 2016, Halper told Russia’s Sputnik News that he believed then-Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton would prove to be a steadier hand in preserving the “special relationship” enjoyed by the United States and Britain.
“I believe Clinton would be best for US-UK relations and for relations with the European Union. Clinton is well-known, deeply experienced and predictable. US-UK relations will remain steady regardless of the winner although Clinton will be less disruptive over time,” Halper said.
