Donald Trump

Damning Prosecutorial Misconduct in [Trump] Special Counsel Probe

Published by Papa Giorgio

(CONSERVATIVE TREE HOUSE) In a good segment of encapsulation, Newsmax host Greg Kelly does a great job outlining how the National Archives and Record Administration (NARA) created a double-standard specifically to target President Donald Trump after he left office. {Direct Rumble Link}

Kelly highlights remarks by former Trump attorney Timothy Parlatore who was responsible for trying to reconcile the issues that NARA had created.  I’ve also included further context with video segments from Tim Parlatore below.  WATCH:

As Special Counsel investigations into former President Trump approach a potential indictment, “irreconcilable conflicts” led attorney Timothy Parlatore to leave the Trump legal defense team. He discusses the cases Trump faces thus far on Meet the Press with Chuck Todd.

Ex-Trump Attorney Reveals Damning Evidence of Prosecutorial Misconduct in Special Counsel Probe

UPDATE!

Trump Prosecutor Jay Bratt’s Alleged Misconduct Causing a ‘Problem’ for DOJ

An attorney who represents former President Donald Trump’s valet, who is under scrutiny as part of Special Counsel Jack Smith’s investigation, alleged in a letter that the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) prosecutor handling the case engaged in misconduct that is reportedly “being viewed as a problem,” within the DOJ, according to The Guardian.

[….]

Last November, DOJ counterintelligence chief Jay Bratt summoned Nauta’s attorney, Stanley Woodward, for a meeting at DOJ headquarters regarding “an urgent matter that they were reluctant to discuss over the phone,” The Guardian reported, relying on a letter filed under seal with the chief U.S. Judge in Washington, DC, James Boasberg.

During that meeting, Bratt allegedly brought up Woodward’s application to be a superior court judge in Washington, DC, when trying to gain Nauta’s cooperation in the investigation.

The meeting between Bratt and Woodward occurred after Nauta had already spoken with prosecutors as part of their investigation into the former president.

As The Guardian reported:

Nauta should cooperate with the government because he had given potentially conflicting testimony that could result in a false statements charge, the prosecutors said according to the letter. Woodward is said to have demurred, disputing that Nauta had made false statements.

Bratt then turned to Woodward and remarked that he had not taken Woodward to be “a Trump guy” before noting that he knew Woodward had submitted an application to be a judge at the superior court in Washington DC that was currently pending, the letter said.

The allegation, in essence, is that Bratt suggested Woodward’s judicial application might be considered more favorably if he and his client cooperated against Trump. The letter was filed after Trump’s lawyers submitted a motion on Monday seeking grand jury transcripts, because of what they viewed as potential misconduct.

The Guardian’s report recognized that Bratt’s mention of Woodward’s judicial application could have been his attempt at making “small talk.”

However, Guardian reporter Hugo Lowell spoke with multiple people inside the DOJ who told him, “This incident with Jay Bratt is widely known inside the National Security Division and is being viewed as a problem.”

“Unclear whether it affects the Mar-a-Lago investigation but the chief judge in Washington has ordered briefings,” Lowell added.

Reports of Bratt’s alleged misconduct came the same week that Timothy Parlatore, a former Trump defense attorney, accused prosecutors working on the special counsel’s investigation of crossing a “red line” during grand jury proceedings [VIDEO ABOVE] ……

(*READ THE REST AT BREITBART)

PSALM 26:10
in whose hands are evil devices,
and whose right hands are full of bribes.

For in their hands is maliciousness. The Hebrew word זמּה, zimmah, signifies properly an inward stratagem, or device. But here it is not improperly applied to the hands, because David wished to intimate, that the wicked, of whom he was speaking, not only secretly imagined deceits, but also vigorously executed with their hands the malice which their hearts devised. When he farther says, Their right hands are full of bribes, we may infer from this, that it was not the common people whom he pointed out for observation, but the nobility themselves, who were most guilty of practising this corruption. Although the common and baser sort of men may be hired for reward, and suborned as agents in wickedness, yet we know that bribes are offered chiefly to judges, and other great men who are in power; and we likewise know, that at the time referred to here the worst of men bore sway. It was no wonder, therefore, that David complained that justice was exposed to sale. We are farther admonished by this expression, that those who delight in gifts can scarcely do otherwise than sell themselves to iniquity. Nor is it in vain, unquestionably, that God declares that “gifts blind the eyes of the wise, and pervert the hearts of the righteous,” (Deut. 16:19.)

John Calvin and James Anderson, Commentary on the Book of Psalms, vol. 1 (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2010), 447–448.

here mischief committed, the hand being the instrument of action, and intends whatever is prejudicial to the person, character, and properties of men. And their right hand is full of bribes; whereby the eyes of judges are blinded, the words of the righteous perverted, men’s persons respected, and judgment wrested, Deut. 16:19.

John Gill, An Exposition of the Old Testament, vol. 3, The Baptist Commentary Series (London: Mathews and Leigh, 1810), 640.

 

A “Domain Awareness Gap” Failure? (U.S. Northern Command)

Published by Papa Giorgio

General Keith Kellogg, who was the Executive Secretary and Chief of Staff of the United States National Security Council in the Trump administration, says he was never notified! And he went to every daily briefing.

NO BRIEFING DURING TRUMP’S PRESIDENCY

GATEWAY PUNDIT notes:

….Former Trump advisor John Bolton, former DNI Ric Grenell, Former Defense Secretary Mark Esper, Former Secretary of State and CIA Direcor Mike Pompeo, President Trump , Defense Secretary Mattis, and former DNI John Ratcliffe, spoke out that that this was a lie.

This never happened during the Trump years. And if it did happen, the top officials in Trump administration were not notified – which is just as bad.

The military is changing their story.  Now they want you to believe that the intelligence community discovered the balloons during the Trump years — BUT NEVER NOTIFIED THEIR INTEL LEADERS!….

DOMAIN AWARENESS GAP

PJ-MEDIA discusses why this may well be the case:

….The American military had a “domain awareness gap,” according to Gen. Glen VanHerck, commander of U.S. Northern Command and North American Aerospace Defense Command.

“Every day as a NORAD commander, it’s my responsibility to detect threats to North America. I will tell you that we did not detect those threats,” VanHerck said. “And that’s a domain awareness gap that we have to figure out, but I don’t want to go into further detail.”

What’s a “domain awareness gap”? General VanHerck didn’t define the term, but Breaking Defense offered a partial explanation.

When VanHerck speaks of a “domain gap,” he’s referring to the U.S. Northern Command not having “the correct mix of sensor capabilities.”

The four-star general, a staunch proponent of beefing up US sensing capabilities to include over-the-horizon radars, did not disclose the number of past detection failures or where the balloons had flown. John Kirby, the White House National Security Council’s coordinator for strategic communications, said today that the Biden administration discovered three incidents during the Trump administration when “surveillance balloons, by the [Chinese government] transited US airspace” for “brief periods of time.” On Saturday a senior defense official told reporters there had been another incident earlier in Biden’s presidency. None were for the duration of last week’s saga.

That still doesn’t answer the question of how the balloon transits were detected after the fact. Here we get into the classified area of intelligence gathering,

“The intel community, after the fact … assessed those threats through additional means of collection and made us aware of those balloons that were previously approaching North America or transiting North America,” VanHerck said. He noted that USNORTHCOM does not have the authority to collect intelligence inside US borders but was able to track the movement of last week’s balloon because it was granted “specific authorities.”

So part of the problem was jurisdictional. But what those “additional means of collection” are is classified. It still doesn’t answer the question of why no one was informed if the intel was somewhere in some database. That would appear to be a big gap in our intelligence gathering that General VanHerck and Northern Command might want to address with all speed.

Likewise JUST THE NEWS has this:

The Air Force general charged with protecting America’s air space from hostile threats acknowledged Monday that the U.S. military failed to detect some previous incursions by Chinese spy balloons, calling it a troubling “awareness gap” that needed fixing.

“We had gaps on prior balloons,” Air Force Gen. Glen VanHerck told reporters.

The comment by the North American Aerospace Defense Command commander both raised concern about NORAD’s vaunted ability to detect airspace threats and also undercut a bungled weekend effort by the Biden administration to try to suggest former President Donald Trump failed to react to three incursions on his watch.

In fact, VanHerck told reporters during a Pentagon briefing, the Trump administration wasn’t told about the incursions because NORAD missed them and that they only recently were detected after the fact by U.S. intelligence agencies.

“I will tell you that we did not detect those threats. And that’s a domain awareness gap that we have to figure out,” he said, declining to be more specific about how earlier flyovers of Chinese spy balloons were missed……

Which makes KJP’s comments seem coherent (POWERLINE):

….Q How is it possible that this administration discovered at least three previous balloons that flew over the U.S. under the previous administration, but Trump officials didn’t know it was happening?

MS. JEAN-PIERRE: Yeah, so, look, I think that — and we have talked about this before, about how the — when it — when the PRC government surveillance balloons trans- — trans- — trans- — transited the continental U.S. briefly at least three times, as you just mentioned, during the President’s — the prior administration and once that we know of the beginning of this administration’s. But never for this duration of time, as we know.

This information was discovered prior to the admin- — administration left, but the intelligence community, as I said, is prepared to give — give briefings to key officials. But this is something —

Q Prior or post?

MS. JEAN-PIERRE: — this is something — sorry, post. So this is something that we — they did not — they were not aware of, as we’ve just laid out. But again, we are ready to brief key officials to let them know what — you know, what the intelligence community was able to figure out…..

They Love To Lie About Trump (Chinese Spy Balloon)

Published by Papa Giorgio
  • Bolton is the most noteworthy because he is very adversarial with Trump. It’s unlikely he would be covering for the President. (LIBERTY DAILY)

EPOCH TIMES has this:

Former President Donald Trump responded to claims that Chinese regime spy balloons entered U.S. airspace during his administration, saying such alleged events “never happened.”

An anonymous U.S. Defense Department official said over the weekend that spy balloons transited over U.S. territory under the Trump administration. But Trump, in a Fox News interview on Sunday, pushed back.

“This never happened. It would have never happened,” Trump told the outlet, adding that the Chinese regime “respected us greatly” under his leadership. “It never happened with us under the Trump administration and if it did, we would have shot it down immediately,” added Trump. “It’s disinformation.”

Before the balloon was shot down, Trump on his social media platform Truth Social had called for the U.S. military to shoot down the balloon last week after it was spotted near Billings, Montana.

“Now they are putting out that a Balloon was put up by China during the Trump Administration, in order to take the ‘heat’ off” the Biden administration, Trump wrote Sunday. “China had too much respect for ‘TRUMP’ for this to have happened, and it NEVER did.”

Other Officials Respond

Mark Esper, who served under Trump as secretary of defense, refuted claims about balloons flying over the United States under the previous administration.

“I don’t ever recall somebody coming into my office or reading anything that the Chinese had a surveillance balloon above the United States,” he told CNN. “I would remember that for sure.”

John Bolton, a former U.S. national security adviser under Trump, said that he never heard of any spy balloons entering U.S. airspace or hovering over U.S. territory while Trump was in office. Bolton, also a Bush administration official when he was in office, also said that he never heard of anything like this happening before he joined the Trump administration in 2018.

“I don’t know of any balloon flights by any power over the United States during my tenure, and I’d never heard of any of that occurring before I joined in 2018,” Bolton told Fox News on Sunday. “I haven’t heard of anything that occurred after I left either.”

Responding to claims made over the weekend, Bolton said that the current administration needs to “tell Congress” about any “specific examples.” He added that “I can say with 100 percent certainty not during my tenure.”

“Unequivocally, I have never been briefed on the issue,” added Robert O’Brien, who served as White House national security adviser under Trump. “It never came up,” he said. “If a balloon had come up, we would have known. Someone in the intelligence community would have known, and it would have bubbled up to me to brief the president,” former acting Director of National Intelligence Ric Grenell told Fox.

“It’s not true. I can refute it,” former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe also said. “The American people can refute it for themselves. Do you remember during the Trump administration, when photographers on the ground and commercial airline pilots were talking about a spy balloon over the United States that people could look up and see, even with the naked eye, and that a media that hated Donald Trump wasn’t reporting?”…………

(READ MORE)

UPDATED ARTICLES

HOT AIR joins the fray:

….Biden partisans pushed the story hard, claiming that Slow Joe was Maverick from Top Gun, while Trump meekly took it when China did the same thing during his administration.

The story appeared in the MSM, of course, and Biden toadies were all over Twitter with posts like these endlessly repeated:

Of course, we all knew the story would turn out to be a fabrication, and indeed it is. The goal was to implant the idea in people’s heads that Biden was a strong leader, even stronger than Trump. More importantly, it muddied the waters.

Now that the idea is out there, the story is starting to change. Not a little, but a lot.

[….]

If the media had any integrity they should reveal the names of the liars when the truth comes out. Instead, they encourage government officials to lie, reward them with fake stories, and impose no cost for lying. Rinse, repeat.

Honest reporters would only reward honest leakers. It should be part of the deal. If you are lying, it will be exposed.

The WASHINGTON EXAMINER opines on a very important point:

THE CHINESE BALLOON STORY IS EVEN BIGGER THAN IT SEEMS. The Chinese spy balloon matter has become far more serious in recent hours — and it was serious enough to begin with.

Of course, there are lots of questions in the aftermath of the U.S. Air Force shootdown of the balloon off the coast of South Carolina on Saturday. Questions such as what, specifically, was it spying on? What information had it gathered? When was the United States aware of its existence? Will experts be able to secure enough of the wreckage from the ocean floor to answer those and other questions?

But there are perhaps more troubling questions raised by the conduct of top Biden administration officials. First, they sought political cover by claiming that Chinese spy balloons had overflown the U.S. three times during the Trump administration, and nobody did anything about them at the time. Then, when a chorus of high-ranking officials of the Trump years said with one voice that simply did not happen, the Biden team responded with an explanation that strains credulity. That’s where we are now…….

Nobody, I Mean Nobody, Lies Like Joe

Published by Papa Giorgio

Some of the lies are repeated, but in different contexts. These are just lying mainly about his life, not policy. THE FEDERALIST has a good list of those. But all-in-all – Biden out-lies any GOPer. Even George Santos (MEDIA’ITE).

George Santos:

  • George Santos takes the cake, but why does Joe Biden get a pass for his lies? (NEW YORK POST)
  • George Santos scandal brings renewed attention to Biden’s fabrications (FOX)
  • The Political Lies That Really Matter: From George Santos to Joe Biden, résumé padding is unacceptable. But it’s all the lies about legislation we can’t afford. (REASON)

Here are the videos (some articles) I used as well as a couple I almost used:

  • VIDEOS
    • ARTICLES
  • Biden Lies About Attending A Black Church (MR. PRODUCER)
  • Joe Biden Lied About Death Of Officer William Evans (RELIGIO-POLITICAL TALK)
  • Trump out dancing Biden at a Black Church but Joe was raised by the Black Church? Maybe Trump was (TERRENCE K. WILLIAMS)
    • Members of black Delaware church don’t recall Biden being ‘raised’ there (NEW YORK POST)

CLICK PICS TO GO TO VIDEO
  • Joe Rogan on Biden’s Lying/Plagiarizing Problem (RED PILL USA PATRIOTS)
  • LYIN’ JOE: 20 Times Joe Biden LIED About Being a Civil Rights Activist. (SEAN HANNITY)
    • Biden says he was arrested during civil rights fight, a claim he’s had to recant before (WASHINGTON EXAMINER)
    • Biden repeats questionable claim he frequented Black church during civil rights movement (YAHOO NEWS)
  • Biden Lies Straight to Our Faces and the Media Refuses to Call Him On It (BONGINO REPORT)
  • Biden lies he’s been to “Afghanistan and Iraq and those areas” twice as president. (NEWS JUNKIE’S CARTOONS)
    • “I’ve been in and out of Iraq and Afghanistan over 40 times.” (POLITIFACT)
    • Biden repeats false claim about trips to Iraq and Afghanistan, this time to graduating midshipmen (FOX NEWS)
  • Forget the Gaffes, What About Biden’s Lies? (THE INTERCEPT)
    • Joe Biden’s MASSIVE List Of Lies (REDDIT)
    • Master of Misinformation: Joe Biden’s 10 Worst Lies (BREITBART)
  • Krystal and Saagar: Hilarious vintage footage reveals repeated Biden lies (THE HILL)
  • Krystal Ball debunks Biden’s parade of lies (THE HILL)
  • The ‘lies’ are starting to ‘catch up’ with Joe Biden (SKY NEWS AUSTRALIA)
  • 47 years of Joe Biden’s lies… (DONALD TRUMP)
    • Joe Biden’s Top 15 Most Outlandish Lies (BREITBART)
    • Let’s Face It: Joe Biden’s Serial Lies and Embellishments About His Biography Are Shamelessly Weird (TOWNHALL)

Pardon Me? | Trump VS….

Published by Papa Giorgio

Trump didn’t even make the top ten in the oldest newspaper in America’s history list of controversial pardons.

  • HEAVY has a state-by-state list of Obama’s pardons and commutations/clemencies.
  • And of course Slick Willy’s list via SOAPBOXIE and the SPECTATOR.

PEW RESEARCH has some numbers:

Despite a burst of pardons and commutations in his last hours in office, Donald Trump used his executive clemency power less frequently than nearly every other president since the turn of the 20th century, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of U.S. Justice Department data.

Trump granted 237 acts of clemency during his four years in the White House, including 143 pardons and 94 commutations. Only two other presidents since 1900 – George W. and George H.W. Bush – granted fewer acts of clemency than Trump.

His predecessor, Barack Obama, granted clemency 1,927 times over the course of eight years in office, the highest total of any president going back to Harry Truman. Obama’s total was skewed heavily toward commutations (1,715) instead of pardons (212).

Yeah. Trump stands head n shoulders above almost all the rest.

The “Very Fine People” Record Set Straight

Published by Papa Giorgio

(Originally Oct 2020, Updated with “Biden vs. Biden” at bottom)

NBC NEWS mocked the following with this headline: “Former NFL player claims Trump never called white nationalist rallygoers ‘very fine people’.” Jack Brewer (below) is right-chya-know:

I made the following short clips not because I haven’t heard versions of this before, but these two versions clearly show that Trump didn’t say it the way the media or politicians mean he said it. He didn’t call on the one hand Nazi/KKK affiliated persons “fine people” — JUST LIKE HE DIDN’T call anyone from Antifa “fine people.” He was speaking about the normal Democrat and Republican (libertarian, independent, non-voter, etc) who came to express their support of tearing down a Confederate monument or for not supporting the destruction of our past (good or bad). Very rarely would a person find an article or video by Steve Cortes to see what the other side of the issue is.

However, these nets support the rhetoric because in the end they wish to defeat Trump, truth be damned. Here — for instance — is People magazine printing the issue:

…To borrow from The Washington Post, this is becoming a “Bottomless Pinocchio” for Biden. He never stops lying and smearing: 

Biden: The easy part of this is like my relationship with Barack — we trusted each other. Think about what happened when those folks came out in Charlottesville, carrying those torches. Close your eyes and remember what you saw, chanting the same anti-Semitic bile that was chanted in the streets of Germany in the ’30s, accompanied by the Ku Klux Klan. And a young woman gets killed protesting against them and the president of the United States says, “There are very fine people on both sides.” That phrase was heard ’round the world. This is going to change.

Harris: That’s right.

Biden: This is who we are [gestures to Harris next to him]. This is America.

(NEWSBUSTERS)

When people say the above (friends, family, MSM, politicians) they are “meaning” this often times:

However, Trump never said that…

Michael Rapaport EDITION

(LANGUAGE WARNING!)

…or meant what many attribute to him saying (in context… remember “context is king”).

TAPPER EDITION:

  • In an often misused comment (ripped from its context) Trump actually denounced Nazi’s in this press conference. I add some prophetic statues predictions coming true as well as Dennis Prager commenting on an evidence this was misconstrued. (See more at my post HERE)

BIDEN EDITION:

Smerconish EDITION:

Michael Smerconish doing what real reporters and media persons should do… that is… track down the real story [the truth of the matter] (“The Michael Smerconish Program” — March 27th, 2019: https://tinyurl.com/y6g4dnhy). The article mentioned by Michael Smerconish’s guest, Steve Cortes, can be found here:

Steve also did Prager University video, “The Charlottesville Lie”:

Did President Trump call neo-Nazis “very fine people” during a famous press conference following the Charlottesville riots of August 2017? The major media reported that he did. But what if their reporting is wrong? Worse, what if their reporting is wrong and they know it’s wrong? A straight exploration of the facts should reveal the truth. That’s what CNN political analyst Steve Cortes does in this critically important video.

BREITBART comments on this Prager-U video.

Wheeler Edition

The Left is obsessed with this Lie?! Ted was hitting home-runs with the bumper sticker mantras. From making fun of a handicapped guy, to many others Lefty Lies. (A quick answer to two of his mishaps can be found in the first two sections here: Some Trump Sized Mantras). Ted Wheeler is a putz.

LARRY ELDER’S EDITION

Larry Elder recaps one of the biggest lies by the media and Democratic Presidential nominee… Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. (e.g., Good Ol’ Joe). I include video “The Sage” had audio for, as well as extending some other audio – like Michael Smerconish doing what real reporters and media persons should do… that is… track down the real story [the truth of the matter] (March 27th, 2019). This is Larry at his best, I only tried to embolden his points [hopefully I did]. I will be making a smaller truncated version to accent my just uploaded video, HERE: https://youtu.be/aXvxgjumk2s

BIDEN CONDEMNS BIDEN

First of all, this is a remaking of my original video titled: “Fine People On Both Sides (Biden Edition)” (My YouTube Channel). I remove Trump and add “Confederate Biden” into the mix (original file at Trump War Room).  The GRUNGE makes a simple notation to start out their wonderful article on “The United Daughters of the Confederacy,” or, UDC:

  • Honestly, with a name like “The United Daughters of the Confederacy,” it’s really not all that hard to imagine why in the world this group would be at the center of some pretty controversial stuff.

My post that gives one of the best synopsis, “media-wise”, is here: “The ‘Big Lie’ Biden Continues To Spread“

 

New York Sues Trump (Beck/Shapiro/Dershowitz)

Published by Papa Giorgio

New York Sues Trump … Over This? After years of investigations, including by intelligence agencies across the world, New York Attorney General Letitia James is suing former President Trump … for allegedly misleading banks. If that’s all they could accuse “the most investigated person in the world” of, Glenn says, then that’s not half bad. Glenn reviews this latest attempt to take down Trump and wonders if this insanity will ever end…

New York Attorney General Letitia James goes after Donald Trump. This is an overreach.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ FLASHBACK

Alan Dershowitz: Letitia James ‘Undignified,’ ‘Disgrace’ to Law

 

 

TCJA | Trump Tax Cuts vs Rhetoric (FLASHBACK)

Published by Papa Giorgio

This is to bring into one place a few of my past posts regarding the tax reforms Trump passed via the TCJA (Tax Cuts and Jobs Act). They are not reforms in the way conservatives think of them. But neither did they overwhelmingly benefit “the rich” and large corporations and did little or nothing to help middle class families — as Democrats state it.

In March, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., called the 2017 Trump tax cuts a $2 trillion “GOP tax scam.”

Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., accused Republicans of hypocrisy for supporting the tax cuts but opposing Congress’ massive spending spree.

The Biden White House issued a press release claiming “the Trump tax cuts had added $2 trillion to deficits over a decade.”

But the numbers tell a different story. Despite the political rhetoric, tax revenues are up.

(DAILY SIGNAL – June 1, 2022)

I will date my posts as I add them in a mixed order. But first… let us start this grand flashback with YAHOO NEWS (February 13, 2019):

…data reflects a single week of tax filing season and it is likely that the size of refunds will increase as tax season continues – Morgan Stanley analysts have predicted that refunds will increase by 26 percent.

In addition, the size of a tax refund means nothing without also comparing the change in paychecks. In net, the overwhelming number of filers will be better off as an estimated 90 percent of Americans are seeing a tax cut.

[….]

the success of the TCJA is clear. In the months following passage of the tax cuts, unemployment fell to a 49-year low and key demographics including women, African-Americans and Hispanics have seen record low unemployment rates.

Job openings have now hit a record high of 7.3 million and over 300,000 jobs were created last month, as most private-sector businesses continued hiring despite the government shutdown. Year-over-year, wages have grown 3.2 percent and the economy is projected to grow at 3.1 percent over 2018.

This positive news is not anecdotal.

According to Guy Berkebile, the owner of Pennsylvania-based small business Guy Chemical and one of the witnesses at the Ways and Means hearing, the bill has been a net positive for businesses.

“On the business expansion front, Guy Chemical was able to build a new laboratory that was five-times larger than our previous one, invest in new chemical compounding equipment and purchase new packaging line,” Berkebile told lawmakers on Wednesday.

Not only was this good for the businesses, it also benefited employees as noted in the testimony of Mr. Berkebile: “We were also able to pass down much of the financial savings to employees. More specifically, we were able to raise wages, expand bonuses by up to 50 percent, start a 401(k) retirement program and create 29 new jobs. These changes also instilled a sense of optimism among our staff, which has produced a less stressful and more enjoyable work environment.”

This is not an isolated story. Workers across the country have seen increased take-home pay, new or expanded education and adoption programs, and increased retirement benefits, while consumers are seeing lower utility bills.

More Good News

To use a few examples, Firebird Bronze, an Oregon-based manufacturer was able to afford to give its nine employees health insurance for the first time while McDonald’s has used tax reform to allocate $1,500 in annual tuition assistance to every employee working more than 15 hours a week.

Visa has doubled its 401(k) employee contribution match to 10 percent of employee pay, while Anfinson Farm Store, a family-owned business in Cushing, Iowa (population 223) has given its employees a $1,000 bonus and raised wages by 5 percent.

In addition to these employee benefits, America’s middle class is seeing direct tax relief.

A family of four with annual income of $73,000 is seeing a 60 percent reduction in federal taxes — totaling to more than $2,058. According to the Heritage Foundation, the typical American family will be almost $45,000 better off over the next decade because of higher take-home pay and a stronger economy.

Tax reform doubled the child tax credit from $1,000 to $2,000, giving over 22 million American families important tax relief. The standard deduction was doubled from $6,000 to $12,000 ($12,000 to $24,000 for a family) giving tax relief for over 105 million taxpayers that took the deduction prior to tax reform and simplifying the code for tens of millions Americans that will not take the standard deduction instead of itemizing.

While the rhetoric of the left has sought to portray the Republican tax cuts as a negative for the middle class, nothing could be further from the truth. The reality is, the middle class has seen strong tax reduction, higher take home pay, more jobs and more economic opportunity……

NOTE:

  • The TCJA reduced the average federal tax rate from 20.8 percent to 19.3 percent for all filers. The bottom 20 percent of earners saw their average federal tax rate fall from 1.2 percent to nearly 0 percent. (TAX FOUNDATION | August 5, 2021)

RPT: December 28, 2017

(As an aside, I sent the “calculator” linked below to my wife’s uncle as he expressed concern in a private discussion to him paying more.)

Larry Elder plays CBS’ tax special with three families (watch the CBS video here at TOWNHALL) from different incomes: (a) little under $40,000 a year; (b) more than $150,000 a year; (c) couple’s combined income was $300,000. Turns out ALL THREE will get a tax return. The Democrats know they are in trouble!

Here Are The Winners And Losers Of The New Tax Law  — In that article is a link to THIS TAX CALCULATOR

 

END

There are critics however, as noted by Robb Sinn at THE FEDERALIST (November 02, 2020):

Many on the left refuse to admit President Trump’s populist policies have provided massive benefits to working-class Americans. Matthew Yglesias argued at Vox that Trump’s refusal to endorse a federal $15 per hour minimum wage proves Trump has abandoned populist ideals. Progressives claim the Trump economy helps billionaires, not workers, and snidely dismiss his outreach to minorities.

Yet, during the first three years of the Trump presidency, wage growth was off the charts, especially for low-income workers and African Americans. The third-quarter economic data released Thursday confirm once again that Trump is on the job for U.S. workers.

The Biden campaign has tried to tie COVID-linked economic devastation to Trump’s leadership. The new third-quarter economic data once again shows that’s wrong. The total number of U.S. wage earners increased more than 5 percent in that period, and the third-quarter rebound for African Americans occurred at a 17 percent faster rate than for wage earners as a whole.

Trump campaigned on exiting the China-centric Trans-Pacific Partnership and renegotiating North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Trump claimed his tax and trade policies would benefit American workers.

Even though evidence shows they are highly effective, Trump’s economic ideas have consistently underwhelmed pundits. Democrats hated his tax cuts. Liberals predicted a worldwide economic crisis if he was elected in 2016 and scoffed at Trump’s “middle class miracle.” Leading up to the 2016 election, economists including eight Nobel laureates derided his economic ignorance and called his proposals “magical thinking.”

[….]

The story grows quite interesting when we focus on wage earners in lower brackets. According to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the 20-year growth trend for the 10th percentile weekly wage was $2.03 per quarter. For Trump’s first three years, wage growth was $4.95.

What about in the Obama era? Even cherry picking Obama’s last three years and ignoring the 2009 recession leaves us with growth of $1.68 per quarter, well below both the historic trend and Trump’s. Table 1 shows striking wage growth under Trump, a reversal of prior patterns, not a continuation, especially in the lowest wage brackets.

Trump Benefited Black Americans More Than Obama Did

During the final presidential debate, President Trump boldly stated he has done more for black Americans than any president since Abraham Lincoln. And he is not so sure Abe did better. While liberals fact-checked his hyperbole, we may employ the quaintly anachronistic approach of using data and logic. The Obama era proved dispiriting for many African American wage earners. The first three years of the Trump administration were a comparative godsend.

Obama oversaw the addition of 2.1 million African American wage earners during eight years in office, about 250,000 per year. Table 2 reveals the tepid results in terms of wage growth. Trump oversaw the addition of 1.3 million African American wage earners in his first three years, more than 400,000 per year. Excellent wage growth occurred across the spectrum. The results for the 10th and 25th percentiles were remarkable.

The 10th percentile U.S. weekly wage grew by $3.25 per quarter for African Americans during Trump’s first three years, nearly double the historic rate of $1.65. The best Obama growth rate was only $1.68. Perhaps having a businessman at the helm of the world’s largest economy is not such a bad idea. Will any deniers admit they were wrong?

……

Here are the links one should enjoy spending time in via my membership retirement org, AMAC:

And please note this as well:

  • …Wages for all workers and measures of real wages show similar upticks. Census Bureau data also show that real household income reached an all-time high in 2019, growing by $4,400 (a 6.8% one-year increase). … (HERITAGE FOUNDATION | March 24, 2021)

RPT: December 4, 2017

GAY PATRIOT [now, sadly, defunct] comments on the main idea that the Left are a bunch of babies with almost zero understanding of anything economic:

The tax “reform” bill the US Senate passed last night is pretty lame, actually. It keeps the current ridiculous progressive structure of seven separate tax rates. (The House reduced it to four, and the correct number ought to be one.) Susan Collins was bought off by retaining the mortgage interest deduction on vacation homes for millionaires. Freeloaders at the lower income brackets still pay nada. Some high income progressives from blue states are whining because some of their state and local taxes are no longer deductible. Sucks that you progressives in high tax blue states forgot to elect any Republican senators. 

There has also been a lot of howling from the “suddenly we’re concerned about the debt” progressive left that the bill will add $1.5 Trillion to the National Debt over ten years. That figure represents less than 3% of Government expenditures in that time period. Cut Government spending 3% (I’m sure we can get by on 97% of the Government). Problem solved.

It’s a lame bill. Really, the best part of the Senate Bill passing has been watching the histrionic meltdown on the Progressive Left. (But even that gets a little boring considering the progressive left has a histrionic meltdown at literally everything Donald Trump does.)

Oh, Patti, don’t feel so bad. There are lots of other countries you can move to. Have you considered Mexico? No Republicans there. Strict gun control, too. The Government is very progressive, taxes are very progressive, and economic activated is highly regulated. It’s a lot like California, come to think of it. But with fewer Mexicans……..

POWERLINE opines well with two RAMIREZ TOONS:

  • It is comical to see Democrats feigning outrage over the claim (likely false) that the GOP tax reform plan will add to the national debt. Talk about a head-snapping about face! Where was the Dems’ concern about debt when the Obama administration ran up $10 trillion of it?

UPDATE FROM GAYPATRIOT

….A remarkable thing happened over the weekend; Democrats rediscovered their concern about the national debt, state’s rights, and voter fraud.

The same Democrats who had no problem helping Barack Obama double the national debt to a mind-blowing $20 Trillion have attacked the Republican Senate’s limpwrist “tax reform” bill claiming it will add $1.5 Trillion to the national debt over ten years.

$1.5 Trillion represents less than 3% of Government spending over the next ten years. If that’s a problem, then, by all means, cut spending by 3%.

Democrats are also  suddenly hollering about “state’s rights” because Congress is looking to make concealed carry licenses valid across state lines; like driver’s licenses. (And, yes, most states require training and a background check before a concealed carry license is issued.) The Democrats have suddenly taken a position analogous to claiming Rosa Parks only had the right to sit in the front of the bus while she was in Alabama…..

END

RPT:  May 25, 2022
(OG Post was March of 2016)

The bottom small section was posted March of 2016… the updated information comes to us as a way of emboldening the comparisons between Hillary’s tax plan and Trump’s compared. With the predictions made about Trumps’ plan coming to fruition.

UPDATE

The WASHINGTON EXAMINER (Dec 2021) has a tracking of how these tax plans worked out (note the highlighted portion readers):

President Joe Biden and congressional Democrats’ Build Back Better Act would increase taxes on higher-income earners and expand business levies to help cover its $2.4 trillion price tag.

Biden and many Democrats in Congress have argued that their plan to raise taxes in the midst of an economic recovery is justified because it would help offset or reverse important elements of the Republican tax reform passed in 2017. Democrats have long claimed that the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act needs to be repealed or heavily altered because it unjustly benefits the wealthy at the expense of working and middle-class families.

However, the most recent personal income tax data from the IRS prove that this claim is completely false. The 2017 tax law has disproportionately benefited lower- and middle-income working families. The data show the law has also led to substantial improvements in economic mobility for middle-income and upper-middle-income households.

A careful analysis of detailed tax data from 2017 and 2018, the first year the TCJA went into effect and the most recent year for which detailed IRS income data are available, reveals that over just one year, households with an adjusted gross income of $15,000 to $50,000 saw their total tax bills cut by an average of 16% to 26%, with most filers enjoying at least an 18% tax cut. Similarly, filers earning between $50,000 and $100,000, one of the largest groups of taxpayers, experienced a 15% to 17% tax cut, on average, from 2017 to 2018.

Higher-income households also experienced sizable tax cuts, but not nearly as large as the tax reductions provided by the law to working and middle-class families. Those with AGIs of $500,000 to $1 million, for example, had their taxes cut by less than 9%, and filers earning $5 million to $10 million received a 3.4% cut, the lowest of any bracket provided by the IRS.

The data also show that wealthier filers ended up providing a slightly higher proportion of total personal income tax revenue in 2018 than they did in 2017. In 2017, filers earning $500,000 or more provided 38.9% of all personal income tax revenues. In 2018, the same group provided 41.5% of revenues.

That means the Trump-GOP tax cuts made the income tax code more progressive than it had previously been. That’s a remarkable finding. After all, Democrats have spent the past few years insisting the TCJA provided a huge windfall to the richest income brackets while leaving everyone else behind!

Perhaps most importantly, the tax cuts caused substantial upward economic mobility. Despite an increase in the total number of tax returns filed in 2018 compared to 2017, the number of people filing who claimed an AGI of $1 to $25,000 fell by more than 2 million. But every other income bracket above $25,000 increased, with many seeing huge gains.

The number of filers claiming an AGI of $100,000 to $200,000, for example, increased by more than 1 million in a single year……

And in April of 2022 AMERICAN’S FOR TAX REFORM noted that this delve into the IRS data shows strongly that the “Trump Tax Breaks for the Rich” helped the middle class the most:

The Internal Revenue Service’s released 2019 Statistics of Income (SOI) data, the agency’s most recent available data, shows that middle income American families saw a significant tax cut – measured as the percentage decrease in “total tax liability” between 2017 and 2019 – from the Trump-Republican Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA). Similarly, Americans saw significant decreases in tax liability from 2017 to 2018.

Total tax liability includes federal income taxes as well as taxes listed on IRS form 1040 such as payroll taxes including social security and Medicare taxes. The TCJA significantly reduced federal income taxes but did not modify payroll taxes. 

As the data notes, Americans with incomes between $50,000 and $100,000 saw a substantial decline in their tax liability:

  • Americans with adjusted gross income (AGI) between $50,000 and $74,999 saw a 15.2 percent reduction in average tax liabilities between 2017 and 2019.  
  • Americans with AGI of between $75,000 and $99,999 saw a 15.6 percent reduction in average federal tax liability between 2017 and 2019. 

Middle-class Americans in key states were delivered significant tax cuts:

  • Floridians with AGI between $50,000 and $74,999 saw a 19.6% reduction. Floridians with AGI between $75,000 and $99,999 saw a 17.2% reduction. 
  • New Yorkers with AGI between $50,000 and $74,999 saw a 18.9% reduction. New Yorkers with AGI between $75,000 and $99,999 saw a 12.4% reduction. 
  • Californians with AGI between $50,000 and $74,999 saw a 18.4% reduction. Californians with AGI between $75,000 and $99,999 saw a 14% reduction. 

The TCJA also caused millions of Americans to see an increased child tax credit, and millions more qualified for this tax cut for the first time. The TCJA expanded the child tax credit from $1,000 to $2,000 and raised the income thresholds so millions of families could take the credit.

The TCJA also repealed the Obamacare individual mandate tax by zeroing out the penalty. Prior to the passage of the bill, the mandate imposed a tax of up to $2,085 on households that failed to purchase government-approved healthcare. Five million people paid this in 2017, and 75 percent of these households earned less than $75,000.

[….]

Additionally, the TCJA enacted a high alternative minimum tax (AMT) exemption and raised the income level at which the exemption begins to phase out. Congress enacted the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) in 1969 following the discovery that 155 people with adjusted gross income above $200,000 had paid zero federal income tax. Over time, the AMT grew so large that millions of Americans paid the tax and millions more saw increased tax complexity. The TCJA caused the number of AMT taxpayers to fall from more than 5 million in 2017 to just 263,720 in 2018. 

For years, President Joe Biden has falsely claimed that the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) passed by the Congressional Republicans and President Trump overwhelmingly benefited “the rich” and large corporations and did little or nothing to help middle class families.

Even left-leaning media outlets have (eventually) acknowledged the tax cuts benefited middle class families. The Washington Post fact-checker gave Biden’s claim that the middle class did not see a tax cut its rating of four Pinocchios. The New York Times characterized the false perception that the middle class saw no benefit from the tax cuts as a “sustained and misleading effort by liberal opponents.”  ……

Yep, another Democrat myth about Trump bites the dust. Here is the small original post:

ORIGINAL 2016 POST

This is with thanks to the US Tax Center:

(to enlarge right click on image and “open in another tab”)

END

FBI ‘Raiders’ Under Investigation by Durham (14 Whistleblowers)

Published by Papa Giorgio

Jim Jordan Says 14 FBI Whistleblowers Have Come Forward to Expose the Corruption

Two days ago CF noted the following:

Prior to the FBI’s raid Monday on former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate, a string of whistleblower reports alleged that senior officials at the FBI exhibited a pattern of bias in their handling of politically sensitive investigations and also reclassified cases without justification to substantiate the White House’s public narratives on crime and extremism.

Beginning in late May, Iowa Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley called attention to then-Washington Field Office Assistant Special Agent in Charge Timothy Thibault over political bias concerns. Thibault expressed support for several “highly partisan” opinion articles on LinkedIn and made a series of politically charged social media posts, according to Grassley, who referred Thibault to the Office of Special Counsel to address the federal agent’s potential violations of the Hatch Act, which bars government officials from partisan political activity.

Concerns surrounding Thibault escalated in July, as whistleblowers came forward claiming Thibault’s partisan persuasion directly impacted his work at the bureau. While seeking approval from FBI Director Christopher Wray and Attorney General Merrick Garland to open an investigation into Trump’s 2020 presidential campaign, Thibault withheld from them that his predicating evidence was based in “substantial part” on information from a “left-aligned organization,” according to Grassley’s office.

In a separate instance, whistleblowers claim Thibault worked to falsely discredit evidence against President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, and prevent the bureau from investigating him.

“Whistleblowers have told my office that the FBI maintains many sources that have provided extensive information on Hunter Biden,” Grassley said in August. “That information allegedly involves potential criminal activity such as money laundering. According to allegations, the underlying information was verified and verifiable. However, instead of green-lighting investigative activity, the FBI shut it down.”

Grassley also pointed to Robert Pilger of the Election Crimes Branch, who he alleges was of vital aid to Thibault in his efforts to open the investigation into Trump. Former Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General Richard Donoghue, the Iowa Republican noted, testified that “Pilger’s conduct frustrated the department’s ability to properly operate the Election Crimes Branch.”

Thibault, Grassley confirmed, was reassigned to an unspecified posting prior to the bureau securing a warrant to raid Trump’s estate. Sources briefed on the raid confirmed to Just the News that the agents came from the Washington Field Office, in which Thibault was serving until just days prior.

In late July, whistleblower reports emerged that bureau supervisors were pressuring agents to reclassify cases under the label of “domestic violent extremism” (DVE) without substantive justification in order to support White House narratives…..

(READ IT ALL)

“You are not allowed to disagree with the FBI”

The raid at Mar-a-Lago was by people flown in from the D.C. Field office where many of the whistleblower accusations have taken place. Which is interesting because some of these individuals at the D.C. office are under investigation by Durham… which would explain why the had the warrant set up the way they did.

And even the “judge” that okayed the warrant had a duty to keep the warrant focused and not as broad as it was. But something smells here. Here is my response to JIM G. on my Facebook:

  • FBI seizes privileged Trump records during raid; DOJ opposes request for independent review: sources (FOX)
  • Trump Warrant Furthers Justice Department’s January 6 Investigation (NATIONAL REVIEW)

Judge Bruce W. Reinhart even recused himself just six weeks before giving the green light to the FBI raid on Trump’s home. All this is important, because it shows a disregard for the law by the FBI. Which Alan Dersowitz notes well:

…..What’s more, the agents had no right to open Trump’s safe, as they did, without a special warrant that goes above and beyond a normal search warrant, Dershowitz noted:

“Not only that, but under the law, if you seize a safe, you don’t go into the safe – you have to get a special warrant to get into the safe, and you have to prove that the material in the locked safe would have been destroyed.”

“They darn well better have smoking-gun proof,” the Constitution scholar and law professor said. And, since it’s unlikely they do, the FBI has violated Justice Department rules, Dershowitz declared:

“So it seems to me that they have violated the rules of the Justice Department, they have gone after both a former president and a future candidate – and they darn well better have smoking-gun proof – which I don’t see happening.”

The FBI’s behavior is not redolent of that of a democratic rule-of-law country, especially since there’s no evidence that Trump committed “a serious, serious crime,” Dershowitz said:

“And, clearly, there’s been a double standard here. But, even if it was a single standard, it’s not good enough!

“You don’t get a warrant, unless a subpoena won’t suffice. In a democratic rule-of-law country, you do it legitimately: you go to the lawyer, you say, ‘By tomorrow I want that safe delivered to the Justice Department. I want these documents turned over.’

“And unless you can demonstrate that there was a very substantial chance they would have been maliciously destroyed – which would have been a serious, serious crime. I mean, that would be a serious crime.

“That’s Nixon – and there’s no evidence that that happened here.”

“I don’t think you use search warrants and prosecutions to go after political enemies,” so the Biden Administration is acting like the government of a third-world Banana Republic, Dershowitz said.

“That’s not supposed to happen in the United States,” Dershowitz said, denouncing the Biden Administration’s unjustified prosecution of its opponents as “impermissible in a democracy”:

“I’ve just written a whole book on that, called ‘The Price of Principle,‘ where I go into the whole issue of why you don’t use partisan considerations to go after political enemies. That’s what happens in Banana Republics.

“That’s what happens in third-world countries. That’s not supposed to happen in the United States. It was right not to go after Hillary Clinton, because she was a candidate for president. You need a much higher standard, but you can’t apply one standard to Hillary Clinton and another standard to Donald Trump. That is impermissible in a democracy.”

What FX does this have?

….A new poll from Convention of States and Trafalgar Group shows that 83.3 percent of Republicans and 71.7 percent of independent voters are now more motivated to vote following the FBI’s raid at Mar-A-Lago on Aug. 8.

Overall, nearly half of voters believe the raid was carried out by Trump’s political enemies. Among Republicans, that figure is more than 76.7 percent and among independent voters that number is 53.9 percent. However, 70.5 percent of Democrats believe the raid was conducted by “the impartial justice system.”

The polling data also show that after the FBI’s raid at Trump’s home, motivation to vote in the 2022 election increased 53.4 percent among Asians, 73.7 percent among blacks, 80 percent among Hispanics, and 69 percent among white voters…..

In real time? A guy I have gone rounds with a couple times on FB had this to say:

Yep. I was pulling for DeSantis… but Trump now is my guy.

RPT’s RUMBLE