She’s also facing three counts for fraudulent use of an application for ballot by mail. These are state jail felonies. That can include up to four years in state prison and a fine of $10,000.
According to the affidavits, Barron signed up a felon to receive a ballot by mail due to a disability.
Investigators say the felon denied being disabled as he was a cowboy. He also claimed raising the concern to Barron before being signed up.
Yes Democrats would like every dead vote.
Two other affidavits have similar accounts of two separate voters. The voters denied filling out the form stating that they had a disability.
The investigation is under the Starr County District Attorney’s Office.
District attorney Omar Escobar says they seek to ensure the sanctity of voting especially when the ballot is outside of a polling site.
“It’s too easy to exert influence and pressure on somebody at home. An assistant, a worker, an election worker to go and ask them, ‘did you already receive your ballot by mail?’ ‘Yes. I got it here’. And then to hover over the ballot and to vote a particular way,” said Escobar.
The affidavits also state another woman was seen with Barron. There is a potential for other arrests.
Barron is an employee of Rio Grande City Consolidated Independent School District. She has been put on administrative leave.
An internal investigation is also being carried out.
The school district’s attorney says the terms of her leave are still being worked on, this includes whether or not she will be paid during her leave.
On Monday night’s Special Report panel, Mollie Hemingway of ‘The Federalist’ weighed in on the decision to release the report prepared by House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes alleging FISA abuse took place during the 2016 campaign.
Mollie Hemingway: Media Is Missing “Something Huge” Happening At FBI
On Monday night’s Special Report panel, Mollie Hemingway of ‘The Federalist’ weighed in on the decision to release the report prepared by House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes alleging FISA abuse took place during the 2016 campaign.
MOLLIE HEMINGWAY: This is a summary memo, this is a four-page memo that is just a summation of a year’s worth of work, hundreds of thousands of pages of testimony, visits to foreign countries, and speak with all different people.
What broke today with Andrew McCabe, the number two at FBI, stepping down, suggests that we have a pretty big situation on our hands. He’s only the most recent person to be demoted, step down, or be reassigned after Congressional or other inquiries about some of what is happening at the FBI.
You had Bruce Ohr, who was demoted twice.
You had Peter Strzok, who had to be taken off the case.
You had Baker, who is gone, and Rybicki, also.
This is quite a collection of people, obviously, there is something huge going on. And I think a lot of people in the media are missing this very large story. Perhaps this memo will help us learn a little bit more about what it is that is causing these changes.
The Trump administration’s record numbers of airstrikes in Afghanistan have failed to expand the Afghan government’s control over its population and stop the Taliban from quickly replacing its opium and heroin processing labs pulverized by the U.S. military, a watchdog agency said in a report to Congress released Tuesday.
In its latest quarterly audit to lawmakers, the U.S. Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) noted:
The expanded authorities provided [by President Trump] to U.S. forces in Afghanistan have resulted in a significant uptick in U.S. air strikes and special operations against the insurgency, with the U.S. dropping 653 munitions in October 2017, a record high since 2012 and a more than three-fold increase from October 2016.
These actions have yet to increase the Afghan government’s control over its population … The goal of the Afghan government is to control 80% of its population within the next two years.
While the U.S. military is targeting the Taliban’s opium business, dealing a blow worth millions of dollars to the group, it is barely making a dent on the illicit trafficking of the lucrative poppy plant, noted SIGAR, explaining:
U.S. and Afghan air strikes this quarter have targeted the Taliban’s opium-production industry, which the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) estimates has as many as 400–500 active facilities at any given time.
According to [U.S.] General [John] Nicholson, [the top commander of American and NATO forces in Afghanistan], U.S. and Afghan forces recently began targeting them, destroying 10 on November 19 alone.
Gen. Nicholson vowed to continue the pressure on the Taliban’s economic engine — opium and heroin — while remaining careful to avoid collateral damage and civilian casualties, which have increased by more than ten percent to 4,474 between June 1 and the end of November 2017 when compared to the same period the previous year.
Why let the Taliban have the fields.
Afghan security forces, supported by U.S. Air Force B-52s, F/A-18s, and other aircraft, including the F-22 Raptor, are carrying out the operations against opium and heroin, which generate up to 60 percent of the Taliban’s funding.
“Brigadier General Bunch announced that 25 narcotics labs had been destroyed since the beginning of the campaign in November, which he said was the equivalent of nearly $80 million eliminated from the drug-trafficking organizations while denying over $16 million in direct revenue to the Taliban,” reports SIGAR.
The inspector general suggested the cost of carrying out the airstrikes on the heroin labs may outweigh the outcome, noting:
According to the latest DOD [U.S. Department of Defense] financial- management report, an F-22 costs between $35,294 and $36,799 per hour to operate; a B-52 between $32,569 and $34,341 per hour; and an F/A-18 between $9,798 and $16,173 per hour, depending on the model.
By contrast, the labs being destroyed are cheap and easy to replace. Afghans told Reuters it would takes three or four days to replace a lab in Afghanistan. According to UNODC [United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime], the morphine/heroin labs need only simple equipment such as a stove, iron barrel, and locally made pressing machines. According to DOD, the value of seizures and destroyed equipment is based on DEA baselines.
In the report, SIGAR revealed that for the first time, the Pentagon prohibited the watchdog agency from publicizing the full district and land-area under the control of the Afghan government and terrorist groups.
The Pentagon also banned SIGAR from reporting on the strength and capabilities of the struggling Afghan National Defense and Security Forces (ANDSF), who, along with Afghan civilians, have borne the brunt of casualties primarily at the hands of the Taliban in recent years.
“Afghan government control or influence has declined and insurgent control or influence has increased overall since SIGAR began reporting control data in January 2016,” noted the auditor.
U.S. military combat deaths have also increased in recent months.
“From January 1 through November 26, 2017, 11 U.S. military personnel were killed in Afghanistan, and 99 were wounded. This is double the personnel killed in action compared to the same periods in 2015 and 2016,” noted SIGAR in a press release announcing its report to Congress.
Gen. Nicholson did say in November, “About 64 percent of the population is controlled by the government, about 24 percent live in contested areas, and the Taliban control the remaining 12 percent,” without mentioning anything about who controls the territory.
Based on the top commander’s assessment, Afghan terrorist groups, primarily the Taliban, control or contest 36 percent of the population.
Some independent analysts, namely experts from the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies (FDD), have questioned the U.S military’s assessment placing the territory under terrorist control or influence at about 45 percent in late September.
In a significant departure from previous administrations, President Trump authorized the U.S military to strike opium and its heroin derivative in Afghanistan, the world’s top producer of the poppy plant.
Despite investing $8.7 billion in American taxpayer funds on counternarcotics efforts since the Afghan war began in October 2001, Afghanistan is producing more opium and heroin than ever before, doubling production last year to 9,000 tons from 2016, revealed the United Nations.
The Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) branch in Afghanistan is reportedly growing, claiming responsibility for an attack in Kabul this week and “the deadliest attack” covered by the SIGAR quarterly report “when an IS-K [Khorasan province] militant detonated a suicide bomb during a gathering of 150–200 people at a Shi’a cultural center in Kabul. The Afghan Ministry of Public Health said at least 41 people were killed and 84 wounded.”
Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) is slated to deliver a televised address immediately following President Trump’s State of the Union speech on Tuesday.
Waters, one of Trump’s most vocal critics, will appear on “Angela Rye’s State of the Union” on BET, according to BuzzFeed News.
Rye, a Democratic strategist and commentator, is set to produce quarterly news programs for the network focused on issues affecting black Americans.
I can’t wait to hear her.
A spokesperson for BET told BuzzFeed that activists and other elected officials will join Waters to discuss the first year of the Trump presidency following his speech, and will discuss “building black politics and the value of engagement across today’s socio-political landscape.”
Waters, who is one of several Democratic lawmakers who have said they will not attend Trump’s speech on Tuesday, has consistently criticized Trump throughout his presidency, repeatedly calling for his impeachment.
She is a communist
While Waters will be delivering an address Tuesday night after Trump’s speech, Democratic rising star Rep. Joseph Kennedy (D-Mass.) is set to give the party’s official response to the State of the Union, party officials announced this week. That speech is also televised.
A group of anti-Trump celebrities, including Mark Ruffalo and Whoopi Goldberg, have also announced plans to hold a “People’s State of the Union” on Monday night.
No one in their right mind should trust the Government.
The author who wrote Clinton Cash and sparked an FBI investigation into the Clinton Foundation is preparing to launch his highly anticipated investigative follow-up—a book that appears it will be every bit as explosive as his last.
On Monday, publishing giant Harper Collins released the book cover of Government Accountability Institute President and Breitbart News Senior Editor-at-Large Peter Schweizer’s forthcoming book, Secret Empires: How Our Politicians Hide Corruption and Enrich Their Families and Friends. While little is known about the book’s contents, five images on the book’s cover suggest that Schweizer’s next targets may include Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), former Vice President Joe Biden, former President Barack Obama, former Secretary of State John Kerry, and President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.
According to the publisher, Secret Empires will expose vast corruption by top Washington figures who leverage their political power to enrich their family members and friends, often by helping grease deals with foreign entities.
The author of four major New York Times bestsellers, Schweizer has garnered praise from conservatives and progressives alike for his reputation as a nonpartisan deep-dive investigative journalist. Newsweek dubbed him “the wonk who slays Washington.” Indeed, among Washington insiders, the launch of a Schweizer book is regarded as somewhat of an event—one that has resulted in ethics probes, the passage of major anti-corruption legislation, members of Congress stepping down, and, in the case of the Clintons, an FBI investigation.
In 2012, 60 Minutes based a feature report on Schweizer’s book Throw Them All Out that exposed congressional insider trading by members of Congress. The 60 Minutes report won the Joan Shorenstein Barone Award for excellence in Washington-based journalism. After Schweizer’s revelations, Congress overwhelmingly passed a bipartisan bill called the STOCK (Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge) to ban lawmakers from using insider knowledge to make personal stock trades. As left-leaning Slate noted, Schweizer wrote “the book that started the STOCK Act stampede.” One of the main targets of the book, the powerful chairman of the House Financial Services Committee Spencer Bachus (R-AL), announced he would not seek reelection following the book’s revelations.
In 2013, Schweizer released Extortion:How Politicians Extract Your Money, Buy Votes, and Line Their Own Pockets and sparked the resignation of Rep. Rob Andrews (D-NJ). Schweizer revealed that Andrews used $16,575 from his leadership PAC to jet he and his family to a lavish resort in Edinburgh, Scotland. CBS’s 60 Minutes partnered with Schweizer again to report Extortion’s findings. Following Rep. Andrews’s resignation, Schweizer said: “The Government Accountability Institute (GAI) is a nonpartisan investigative research team committed to exposing cronyism and misuse of taxpayer money. For those discouraged by the cronyism corrupting Washington, the Andrews resignation demonstrates that we can hold them accountable. For those in power who are engaging in self-enrichment, we have two words: watch out.”
Then in 2015, Schweizer sent shockwaves through Washington, DC, with the release of Clinton Cash. The book revealed that Hillary Clinton’s State Department, along with eight other agencies, approved the transfer of 20 percent of U.S. uranium and that nine foreign investors in the deal funneled $145 million to the Clinton Foundation. The New York Times ran a 4,000-word front-page story based on the book and confirmed its findings, as did the Washington Post and several others. Hillary Clinton’s campaign kicked into overdrive trying to refute the book’s myriad revelations. Surprisingly, some of Schweizer’s strongest defenders came from the political left. Progressive columnist Eleanor Clift hailed Schweizer “an equal-opportunity investigator, snaring Republicans as well as Democrats.” And Columbia University Earth Institute Director Jeffrey D. Sachs said Clinton Cash was “compelling reading on how Bill and Hillary have mixed personal wealthy, power, and influence peddling.”
A feature-length documentary film based on the book debuted at the Cannes Film Festival and also received wide praise. MSNBC said the film was “devastating” and that it “powerfully connects the dots.”
Later, in November 2016, the New York Times reported that an FBI investigation into the Clinton Foundation “was based mostly on information that had surfaced in news stories and the book Clinton Cash, according to several law enforcement officials briefed on the case.”
Will Secret Empires result in a similar political firestorm? For now, Schweizer isn’t saying.
“My publisher has me under a strict embargo not to reveal any contents from the book,” Schweizer told Breitbart News.
According to HarperCollins, Secret Empiresis slated to hit bookshelves nationwide March 2oth.
Rod Rosenstein needs to be investigated also. He looks like a child molester.
Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein approved an application to extend surveillance of former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page shortly after taking office last spring, according to the New York Times.
That is one of the revelations in a memo compiled by House Intelligence Committee staffers that is set to be released within weeks, according to “three people familiar with it” who spoke to the Times.
The memo is expected to detail abuses by senior FBI officials in their investigation of the Trump campaign, which began the summer of 2016.
The House Intelligence Committee could vote to release the memo as early as Monday. It would give President Trump five days to object; otherwise, the memo will be released.
Democrats, as well as the Justice Department, have warned that releasing the memo to the public would be “extraordinarily reckless,” although the leaks of the memo to the Times makes those claims dubious.
Democrats have also claimed that the memo, which summarizes classified information held by the Justice Department, is misleading and paints a “distorted” picture, and they have prepared their own counter memo they want to release.
The people who spoke to the Times argued that Rosenstein’s renewal of a spy warrant on Carter Page, Trump’s former campaign foreign policy adviser, “shows that the Justice Department under President Trump saw reason to believe that the associate, Carter Page, was acting as a Russian agent.”
The memo, however, is expected to detail how the surveillance warrant was initially obtained inappropriately using the Trump dossier — a political document funded by the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee.
It is expected to show that FBI and DOJ officials did not explain to the secret court granting spy warrants that the dossier was politically fueled opposition research. To obtain the warrant, the officials needed to show “probable cause” that Page was acting as an agent of Russia.
Page joined the campaign in March 2016, around the time the team was under pressure to release names of foreign policy advisers.
The former investment banker and Navy officer took a personal trip to Moscow to deliver a speech at a graduation ceremony in July 2016, which fueled nascent allegations that Trump was somehow colluding with Russia. Page left the campaign in September.
The Trump dossier claimed he met with two high-level Russian officials on that trip, despite no evidence of it and Page’s testimony under oath that he never met with them. Page has sued BuzzFeed for publishing the dossier.
The FBI had been tracking Page, who was previously based in Moscow, since 2013, but was never charged with any wrongdoing. The FBI reportedly received the surveillance warrant on him in fall of 2016, but Page had left the campaign by then.
Rosenstein, after he was confirmed as the deputy attorney general in late April 2017, approved renewing the surveillance warrant, according to the Times. When Trump fired then-FBI Director James Comey in May, Rosenstein appointed Robert Mueller to lead a special counsel.
Rosenstein has been in charge of the Russia investigation since Attorney General Jeff Session recused himself.
