Former FBI Director James Comey said on Thursday that Republicans have subpoenaed him to appear before a closed-door meeting of the House Judiciary Committee early next month.
In a Thanksgiving Day tweet, Comey said he would be happy to answer the House Judiciary Committee’s questions, but will “resist a ‘closed door’’ for fear that his testimony will be leaked and distorted.
“Got a subpoena from House Republicans. I’m still happy to sit in the light and answer all questions,” Comey tweeted. “But I will resist a ‘closed door’ thing because I’ve seen enough of their selective leaking and distortion. Let’s have a hearing and invite everyone to see.”
Happy Thanksgiving. Got a subpoena from House Republicans. I’m still happy to sit in the light and answer all questions. But I will resist a “closed door” thing because I’ve seen enough of their selective leaking and distortion.Let’s have a hearing and invite everyone to see.
The subpoena calls Comey to testify as part of the congressional inquiry into allegations of anti-Trump bias that led to the shutting down of the probe of Hillary Clinton’s private email server and the opening of the investigation into purported ties between the Trump campaign and Russia.
President calls the Mueller investigation a ‘total mess’ and ‘disgrace’ on social media; John Roberts reports from the White House.
Comey’s tweet partly confirms a story published in Politicothat reported that the former FBI director and former President Barack Obama’s attorney general, Loretta Lynch, had both been subpoenaed.
A source told Fox News that Lynch and Comey had indeed been subpoenaed. So far Lynch has not made any public statement on the subpoena.
The office of Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., the outgoing chair of the House Judiciary Committee, was also unavailable for comment.
Comey has been the target of attacks by both Trump and Republicans for his time at the head of the FBI, with the president labelling the investigation into allegations of collusion between his campaign and Russia – now headed by Special Counsel Robert Mueller – a “witch hunt.”
Democrats, however, argue that the GOP-led investigation in the House is itself a partisan move to undermine Mueller’s investigation and have promised to renew investigations of their own into Trump’s attacks on the FBI and Justice Department when they take the House majority in January.
In a statement sent to Fox News, Comey’s lawyer, David Kelley, said: “Mr. Comey embraces and welcomes a hearing open to the public, but the subpoena issued yesterday represents an abuse of process, a divergence from House rules and its presumption of transparency. Accordingly, Mr. Comey will resist in Court this abuse of process.”
The news of the subpoenas comes on the heels of a busy week in the Mueller investigation that saw Trump provide the special counsel with written answers to questions about his knowledge of Russian interference in the 2016 election, his lawyers said Tuesday, avoiding at least for now a potentially risky sit-down with prosecutors.
The compromise outcome, nearly a year in the making, offers some benefit to both sides. Trump at least temporarily averts the threat of an in-person interview, which his lawyers have long resisted, while Mueller secures on-the-record statements whose accuracy the president will be expected to stand by for the duration of the investigation.
The responses may also help stave off a potential subpoena fight over Trump’s testimony if Mueller deems them satisfactory. They represent the first time the president is known to have described to investigators his knowledge of key moments under scrutiny by prosecutors.
Also this week, it was revealed by the New York Times that Trump told his counsel’s office last spring that he wanted to prosecute Clinton and former FBI Comey, an idea that prompted White House lawyers to prepare a memo warning of consequences ranging up to possible impeachment.
Then-counsel Don McGahn told the president he had no authority to order such a prosecution, and he had White House lawyers prepare the memo arguing against such a move, The Associated Press confirmed with a person familiar with the matter who was not authorized to discuss the situation. McGahn said that Trump could request such a probe but that even asking could lead to accusations of abuse of power, the newspaper said.
The state allocated $925,000 each to Legal Services of New Jersey and the American Friend Service Committee.
It allocated $125,000 apiece to the law schools at Rutgers and Seton Hall universities.
“Families who came to New Jersey for a better life do not deserve to be torn apart by the federal government’s cruel and discriminatory policies,” Murphy said in a statement. “Deportation is one of the harshest consequences an individual can face under U.S. law, yet most immigrants do not have the right to appointed counsel and many cannot afford an attorney.”
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested 3,189 undocumented immigrants in the Garden State in fiscal year 2017 — a 42 percent uptick from the year before.
Murphy said on his call-in radio show Monday night this money was needed because undocumented immigrants often don’t know where to go “to get the right answer.”
He said “in this era of Trump,” people are being scared “into the shadows,” and it’s “shaken a lot of our communities.”
“I believe with all my heart in the ‘safer cities’ notion,” Murphy said. “When folks feel like they can come out of the shadows, engage with their neighbors, community leaders, elected official, law enforcement members importantly, you have a safer, more stable community.”
He said the “intention here is to put an amount of money in place that begins us on a process where people know where to go.”
Murphy said he didn’t know how many immigrants this would help.
“But it’s a start,” he said on the show, which was broadcast on public radio stations WBGO in Newark, WNYC in New York City, and WHYY in Philadelphia.
Murphy said his administration came up with the $2.1 million figure based on averaging $100,000 per each of New Jersey’s 21 counties.
Erika Nava, a policy analyst at liberal think tank New Jersey Policy Perspective, told NJ Advance Media on Monday the cost to represent every undocumented immigrant who’s incarcerated in New Jersey could reach as much as $15 million.
Even though this money would be a sliver of that, Nava said it’s a “step in the right direction.”
State Treasurer Elizabeth Muoio said the move will also “dramatically reduce” the costs taxpayers foot for detention of undocumented immigrants. There are three ICE detention centers in New Jersey.
Melville D. Miller Jr., president of Legal Services, said immigrants seeking help will “receive a full assessment of their legal claims and specific advice concerning their legal rights.”
Other Democratic-led states, such as New York and California, provide legal help to poor immigrants.
Amber Tamblyn’s frank discussion about her feelings the night that Donald Trump was elected president are generating a lot of anger on Twitter.
A star of The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants movie and co-founder of the #TimesUporganization advocating for women’s equality, Tamblyn read part of her upcoming book, Era of Ignition: Coming of Age in a Time of Rage and Revolution, on Sunday at the “Feminist AF” event at Vulture Fest in L.A. The excerpt she read was about spending the night of the 2016 presidential election at the Javits Center in New York with the Hillary Clinton campaign, and her thoughts at the moment Clinton supporters were told that the presidential candidate would not be addressing the crowd.
“A dark realization swallowed me: I was going to bring a baby into this world. And not just any baby: a girl,” Tamblyn recalled. According to the Hollywood Reporter, she recalled “imagining if she should give her baby away to Canadians or Swedes.” Tamblyn’s team did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
That last part, about Tamblyn’s now 18-month-old baby, drove a lot of people straight to Twitter.
’MERICA 1st@rb_leto
@WilkowMajoritynow I’ve heard everything!!! Hollywood is planning to boycott filming in Georgia and amber tamblyn says she imagines her baby growing up in Canada all these people are dilusional !!!!
11 yr old girl gets gang raped in Sweden. Then her attackers get let go. Now she faces them as they laugh at her on the way to school everyday. USA is next unless we take a STAND! Fight Mass Immigration!
PamelaR@prichvisalia
Hey- @ambertamblyn ~ Like I said in my first TW to you- you surely dodged a bullet. You and your husband shout horrid things about OUR PRESIDENT ~ WHILE SITTING COMFY IN YOUR MANSION? & “WE THE PEOPLE” (#patriots#maga) ARE SUPPOSED TO HEAR YOU? You R both hypocrites! Move to
Do us all a favor and leave the country! People like you are why people like me voted for Trump. If you can’t figure out why then you deserve the Communist life you’ll have because you just don’t get what it means to be an American. #Trump2020
@ambertamblyn nice article of how you thought you would have to give your daughter to Canada or Sweden after 2016 election. It just goes to show how irrational and unhinged some people are. If it’s that bad why did yih just take your baby and leave. Not as dramatic I guess
If you’re one of those news organizations that treated Clinton’s private emails like they were a national emergency, the solution isn’t to treat Ivanka’s private emails like they’re also a national emergency—rather, it’s to acknowledge that you kinda fucked up on Clinton.
Just Jeff@TrumpTheHaters1
Just read that Amber wrote that she thought about giving her baby to Canada after Trump won the election. Looks like someone is looking for attention. Pretty pathetic.
Tamblyn herself jumped into the fray to make a joke about a headline from an extremist website about what happened. She thanked another writer for sharing a poem called “Stay Vigilant,” adding that she “needed this.”
Although commenters didn’t pay much attention, Tamblyn’s moment at the reading included a more hopeful message too. She remembered her doctor suggesting that she deal with her anxiety about protecting her daughter by listening to a one-minute recording of the baby’s heartbeat each and every day, so she shared it with the audience.
Amber Tamblyn Believes Entertainment Is Slowly But Significantly Increasing Inclusivity
This Juan Lopez idiot killed Tamara, a officer, and one other person.
Chicago police officer and two other people were killed in an attack at a South Side hospital Monday afternoon that sent medical personnel and police scrambling through halls, stairwells and even the nursery in search of victims and the shooter before he was found dead.
Officer Samuel Jimenez, on the force less than two years, was gunned down as he went to the aid of other officers who had been called to Mercy Hospital & Medical Center around 3:20 p.m. about an assault. Jimenez, 28, was married with three small children. He’s the second Chicago police officer killed in the line of duty this year, the most since 2010 when five officers were fatally shot. The first was Near North District Cmdr. Paul Bauer, killed Feb. 13 outside the Thompson Center.
“Those officers that responded today saved a lot of lives,” said Chicago police Superintendent Eddie Johnson. “They were heroes because we just don’t know how much damage (the shooter) was prepared to do.”
Police had been called to the hospital after Juan Lopez, 32, confronted emergency room doctor Tamara O’Neal, apparently over a “broken engagement,” sources said. By the time Jimenez and his partner arrived on the scene, Lopez had shot O’Neal repeatedly, standing over her as he fired the last shots, according to police sources and witnesses.
“When they pulled up, they heard the gunshots, and they did what heroic officers always do — they ran toward that gunfire,” Johnson said. “So they weren’t assigned to that particular call, but they went because that’s what we do.”
Lopez, who sources say had a concealed carry license, exchanged gunfire with Jimenez and other officers as he ran into the hospital. Jimenez was shot in the lobby as Lopez continued firing. A squad car was hit, and a bullet hit the holster and lodged in the gun barrel of another officer, according to Johnson.
Dayna Less, 25, a first-year pharmacy resident, was hit as she walked out of an elevator. “That woman got off an elevator and was shot, why?” Johnson asked. Lopez was found inside the hospital, apparently suffering a wound to the head. Johnson said it was unclear how he was shot.
At a press conference late Monday night, Emergency Department director Patrick Connor grew emotional as he described O’Neal as dedicated to her church and patients. The 38-year-old physician graduated from the University of Illinois College of Medicine in Chicago in 2016 and had worked as a resident at Mercy for two years. She raised money for disadvantaged children and led her church choir, Connor said, choking up with emotion and pausing frequently.
“That was her one thing she wanted … to be able to go to church on Sunday,” Connor said, adding that they assured her she could. “We’ll make sure you go to church on Sunday.”
Less recently graduated from Purdue University and started working at the hospital in July.
Michael Davenport, Mercy’s chief medical officer, said the hospital had conducted an active shooter drill last month. About 200 patients were being treated in the hospital on Monday, but authorities only evacuated the emergency room. The hospital’s emergency plans include barricading doors and ensuring patient safety.
In the confusion of the first moments, it was unclear how many people were shot, how many officers were among them and how many shooters there were.
As dispatchers and responding officers tried to make sense of the scene, reports came in of an officer shot somewhere in the lobby, a woman and an assistant also wounded. Finally, there was word of the gunman apparently shot in the head.
Even then, dispatchers continually checked on officers’ status and whether another gunman might still be on the loose.
“How many officers shot?” a dispatcher asked repeatedly.
“Trying to find that out,” an officer radioed.
Officers rushed to lock down the first floor of the hospital for a search, then closed off the stairwells. “We’re checking for victims,” a dispatcher said. “We also need officers on the third floor to check the nursery.”
By 4 p.m., the officer was being taken to the University of Chicago Medical Center, where he died.
Meanwhile, medical personnel continued to be brought out of the hospital by police, who radioed ahead to warn officers outside. At 4:40 p.m., the hospital tweeted that “patients are safe.”
Steven Mixon, an emergency room clerk, said he had received a call hours earlier, around 1 p.m., from a man he believed to be the ex-fiance of the woman shot outside the hospital. “He called and asked to speak with his fiancee,” said Mixon. “And she said, ‘Oh, just tell him I’m in with a patient.’ ”
Mixon said he got off work around 3 p.m. and waited for an Uber in front of the hospital. “I look up and I see her being harassed by some gentleman,” he said. “She was trying to avoid him and move around. And when she saw me, she waved for me to come that way.”
Mixon said he started to run toward his colleague to help when Lopez fired. “I guess it wasn’t my time to go because if I had made it to her, I would have been dead too,” Mixon said.
He watched as the gunman then shot at a police car and shot again at the woman, who had fallen to the ground. Mixon said he ran back into the emergency room, where it was “total chaos.”
“Everyone was running every which way,” he said. “We ran into surgery because they had locked doors. That’s when we heard more shots inside the hospital.”
Mixon said he remembers the woman looking beautiful this year at the hospital’s annual gala. “She was a sweetheart, just a sweetheart. What a fireball.
“Before all this, she was looking forward to getting married,” he said. “Talking about dresses, all of that. But then something happened and it was called off.”
James Gray was coming out of the clinic area when he said he saw a man in a black coat, black hat and dark pants shoot a woman three times in the chest. The man and the woman had been walking and talking to each other before the shooting, he said. The gunman stood over the woman and shot her three more times after she fell to the ground, said Gray. Then a squad car turned its lights on and came down the drive and the gunman shot at the squad car.
“It was chaos,” said Gray. “It was just mass chaos.”
This is how they live now but below is what they where when they first came into office.
Remember this look when they came in to the White House.
The Obamas are “Becoming” — billionaires. The Barack Obama Foundation has seen its contributions soar
The launch of Michelle Obama’s cross-country book tour for her new memoir, “Becoming,” last week is just the latest marker on the road to fabulous wealth for the former first couple, who are on their way to becoming a billion-dollar brand.
In addition to a $65 million book advance and an estimated $50 million deal with Netflix, both of which she shares with husband Barack Obama, the former first lady is poised to rake in millions from appearances on her 10-city US tour and sales of merchandise connected to her autobiography.
And like her husband, Michelle Obama is currently in demand as a speaker for corporations and non-profits, commanding $225,000 per appearance, The Post has learned.
Forbes estimated the couple made $20.5 million in salaries and book royalties between 2005 — when Obama became a federal senator and they first arrived in Washington — and 2016. They are now worth more than $135 million.
And that figure does not include the cash they are raking in for public speaking.
In October 2017, Michelle Obama was a keynote speaker at the Pennsylvania Conference for Women, a non-profit that promotes education and networking.
Obama did an on-stage interview with Hollywood producer and writer Shonda Rhimes in Philadelphia for an audience of 12,000.
The New York-based Harry Walker Agency Inc., which books both Obamas for speaking gigs, billed the Pennsylvania Conference for Women $225,000 in 2017, according to the non-profit’s most recent tax filings.
Barack Obama currently rakes in $400,000 per speech, and earned at least $1.2 million for three talks to Wall Street firms in 2017. The fees come on top of his $207,800 annual presidential pension, which he began receiving as soon as he left office.
SEE ALSO
Michelle Obama’s memoir gets picked for Oprah’s book club
Months after leaving the White House, the former president agreed to speak at a health care conference organized by financial services company Cantor Fitzgerald. This was in addition to $800,000 that he earned for two speeches to Northern Trust Corp and the Carlyle Group.
“Becoming” is already set to turn into an international best seller. In the book, Michelle Obama reveals details of her personal life, such as the couples counseling she sought with her husband and her struggles after a miscarriage, describing how she went on to conceive her two daughters by in vitro fertilization.
In addition to its US launch, the book was released in Australia, Ireland, South Africa, the UK, India and New Zealand. It will also be published in 25 languages around the world, according to a press release from Penguin Random House, the book’s New York-based publisher.
Tickets for “A Conversation with Michelle Obama” at sports venues across the country have also become a hot commodity.
Prices for Obama’s appearance at Brooklyn’s Barclay’s Center next month currently range from $307 to $4,070, which includes a photo with Michelle Obama and a signed copy of “Becoming.”
In addition to cash from appearances and book sales, Obama will also reap the benefits of hawking 25 different items of merchandise connected to the book, many of which bear her likeness and feature inspirational messages.
The items include T-shirts and hoodies, a $20 “Find Your Voice” mug, and “Find Your Flame and Keep It Lit” candles, which retail for $35 each. Ten percent of the proceeds from the sales will go to the Global Girls Alliance, an initiative under the Barack Obama Foundation to provide education to adolescent girls around the world.
SEE ALSO
Obamas ink production deal with Netflix
Barack Obama also donated some of the profits of his three bestselling books to charity.
According to Forbes, he donated $392,000 in royalties from a children’s book — “Of Thee I Sing: A Letter to My Daughters” — to the Fisher House Foundation between 2009 and 2015. The non-profit supports families of veterans.
He raked in a combined $8.8 million for “The Audacity of Hope,” published in 2006, and his children’s book, which was released in 2010. He also made nearly $7 million from “Dreams from My Father.”
In addition to their multi-million dollar literary empire, the couple is set to reap the benefits of a creative production deal they signed with Netflix earlier this year.
The multi-year $50 million deal calls on the Obamas “to produce a diverse mix of content, including the potential for scripted series, unscripted series, docuseries, documentaries and features,” which will be broadcast in 190 countries, according to a statement from the streaming service, which has 125 million subscribers around the globe.
Fox News Channel announced Wednesday it will support CNN’s lawsuit against the White House over the temporary suspension of White House correspondent Jim Acosta’s “hard pass” press credential, revealing the company will file an amicus brief in defense of the partisan network.
Fox News issued a statement accusing the White House of “weaponizing” Secret Service passes for reporters:
FOX News supports CNN in its legal effort to regain its White House reporter’s press credential. We intend to file an amicus brief with the U.S. District Court. Secret Service passes for working White House journalists should never be weaponized. While we don’t condone the growing antagonistic tone by both the President and the press at recent media avails, we do support a free press, access and open exchanges for the American people.
In a brief statement shared to Twitter, CNN thanked Fox News for backing its lawsuit against the White House.
NBC and the National Association of Hispanic Journalists told CNN that they will be joining the brief in support of the network.
NAHJ
✔@NAHJ
We spoke last night with the legal team of @acosta/@cnn and will also be joining an amicus brief in support of the correspondent and the network. #PressFreedom#MoreLatinosInNews
CNN Communications
✔@CNNPR
NBC News will support CNN and @Acosta. Thank you @NBCNewsPR@NBCNews! https://twitter.com/brianstelter/status/1062740096447901698 …
According to Axios, the following news outlets are also joining the brief: The Associated Press, Bloomberg, First Look Media, Gannett, the New York Times, Politico, EW Scripps, USA Today Network, Washington Post, Press Freedom Defense Fund, and National Press Club.
JUST IN: Numerous news outlets, including NBC News, issue joint statement saying they will file briefs “to support CNN’s and Jim Acosta’s lawsuit” against the Trump admin. over its decision to revoke Acosta’s press pass.
Statement from @CBSNews: “CBS News supports the White House Correspondents Association (@WHCA) and CNN’s legal effort to restore access for its White House correspondent.”
The administration stripped Acosta of his pass to enter the White House following President Donald Trump’s contentious news conference last week, where Acosta refused to give up a microphone when the president said he didn’t want to hear anything more from him.
In response to the lawsuit, White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders said in a statement: “this is just more grandstanding from CNN, and we will vigorously defend against his lawsuit.”
The White House Correspondents’ Association backed the lawsuit, filed in Washington, D.C., district court.
“The president of the United States should not be in the business of arbitrarily picking the men and women who cover him,” said Oliver Knox, president of the correspondents’ group.
CNN said Acosta was given no warning of the action, and no recourse to appeal it. Acosta traveled to Paris to cover Trump’s visit there this weekend and, although given permission by the French government to cover a news event, the Secret Service denied him entrance, the company said.
“Without this credential, a daily White House correspondent like Acosta effectively cannot do his job,” CNN’s lawsuit said.
CNN asked for an injunction to immediately reinstate Acosta, as well as a hearing on the larger issue of barring a reporter.
Acosta has been a polarizing figure even beyond the distaste that Trump and his supporters have for him. The Poynter Institute, a journalism think tank, editorialized last week that Acosta’s encounter with Trump at the news conference “was less about asking questions and more about making statements. In doing so, the CNN White House reporter gave President Donald Trump room to critique Acosta’s professionalism.”
In an opinion-editorial published Wednesday, Breitbart News senior legal editor Ken Klukowski argued President Trump will the lawsuit because the “Constitution does not allow a federal court to issue this kind of order to the White House,” while the “First Amendment does not protect” Acosta’s actions.
’MERICA 1st
all these people are dilusional !!!!
}
