Another roundup
I’ve been doing more roundups lately – there’s so much news sometimes that it seems like the best way to deal with it:
(1) Kristi Noem is being pushed aside:
Trump announced on Truth Social that he will nominate Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., to replace Noem, effective March 31.
“The current Secretary, Kristi Noem, who has served us well, and has had numerous and spectacular results (especially on the Border!), will be moving to be Special Envoy for The Shield of the Americas, our new Security Initiative in the Western Hemisphere we are announcing on Saturday in Doral, Florida. I thank Kristi for her service at ‘Homeland.’”
Seems to be a new position, so it’s hard to know whether this is a demotion. I certainly don’t think Noem has been a good head of Homeland Security, particularly her comments about Alex Pretti “brandishing” a weapon. But this is apparently why Trump got angry with her:
Meanwhile, reports surfaced Thursday that Trump is “furious” with Noem over her performance in bicameral Judiciary Committee hearings this week, particularly over a contract for an advertisement that Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., and others grilled her on.
Trump reportedly took issue with her suggesting to Kennedy that he approved a taxpayer-funded ad subcontracted to a firm connected with her inner circle, according to National Review, which also reported that Mullin was being considered a top candidate for her replacement.
Mullin, her replacement, is a Native American, so it puts the “homeland” in homeland.
(2) SCOTUS ruled unanimously that “the standard for reviewing asylum cases [is to keep] it in the hands of immigration agencies” except in the most egregious situations:
… [T]he administrative findings of fact are conclusive unless any reasonable adjudicator would be compelled to conclude to the contrary.
Immigration courts are not part of the regular court system; they are under the executive branch rather than separate from it.
(3) It wouldn’t seem possible, but Gavin Newsom has gotten more vile:
Asked about the military action against Iran that Israel and the United States are jointly waging, Newsom had nothing at all positive to say about it. Instead of saying a single critical word about Iran—the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism, which has killed 35,000 pro-democracy protesters this year, which oppresses women and gays, and which has launched assassination attempts and cyberattacks against America while stoking unrest on U.S. college campuses—Newsom denounced Israel and its prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, for dragging America into war.
“The issue of Bibi is interesting because he’s got his own domestic issues. He’s trying to stay out of jail,” Newsom said. “He’s got an election coming up. He’s potentially on the ropes. He’s got folks, the hard line, that want to annex the West Bank. I mean, [Thomas] Friedman and others are talking about it, appropriately, as sort of an apartheid state. They couldn’t even—I mean, we’re talking about regime change?—for two years, they haven’t even been able to solve the Hamas question in Israel. So this is, I mean, you know, I want to be careful here, but you know, in so many ways, that influence in the context of the conversation of where Trump ultimately landed on this is pretty damn self-evident.”
Newsom said the United States should “reconsider” its military support for Israel. “You just got to reconsider the whole thing,” he said, claiming, not particularly credibly, “it breaks my heart.”
Boo hoo.
(4) A man in NY with 131 prior arrests and many convictions has been arrested for setting a homeless man on fire in Penn Station. He puts new meaning into the phrase “habitual criminal.”
(5) Murals of Iryna Zarutska are being defaced. This reminds me of what happened to many of the posters of the Israeli hostages. The left only allows certain victims to be considered victims.
Austin PD released video earlier this afternoon of the scumbag shooter getting taken down over the weekend. I remain extremely impressed with how fine these cops were in this situation.
Newsom’s comments I would take at two levels: First, he’s positioning himself well (he hopes) with the Dem base in the 2028 primaries, and secondly he’s just a morally corrupt and stupid person. Personally, I thinks it both.
9-0 Supreme Court that other judges should stay out or Immigration might help, or not.
Talk about surrender:
https://instapundit.com/780677/#disqus_thread
hes a slithy tove, possibly a jabberwocky,
Cynical as I’ve grown, I still find it very very difficult to reconcile the vast differences from – or hatred of – “America” that one finds in California, New York, Illinois, Minnesota, and a few other places. There are always the fringe element … but so many, so vocal, so much in power? I can’t believe the nation has much time left riding the status quo.
DT I agree with you conclusion.
About Kristi Norm neo writes that she objected “particularly [to] her comments about Alex Pretti “brandishing” a weapon. She mispoje. Not brandishing but “packing” a loaded weapon. At yet another “protest” where he was already, again, interfering with the duties of Federal Officers.
Pretti’ misfortune led rhe officer he was almost wrestling with to discover it on his person, crying out (as he ought to have) “gun” which instantly made him a threat requiring deadly force.
Noem, I think, is unjustly attacked for her hard headed (hard “hearted?) all business manner. And because she still has her beauty over 50.
I saw the Senate hearing online Thursday. And Norm was blindsided by Sent. Blumenthal. I think she was I’ll prepared by her over a very possible egregious ICE nondeadly shooting in Chicago by an Border or ICE agebdmt I’d a woman named Melendez
Blumenthal States she was on her way in her car ti deliver clothes to give away at her Church.
Exactly the convenient sort of larding up D-commie propaganda love to deploy Raising my suspicions. But Noam wouldn’t budge and say if rhe Senator says says is true, then that Agent would be fired she admitted not to know anything about thus case, which was locally adjudicated in November.
It’s something she should know!
This and possibly other responses and the attack media made Rs uncomfortable and sour on her.
What exactly makes a good DHS Director? People are too negative and lacj lacking in specifics.
Her ICE advertising warnings to illegals I found necessary and beneficial. Yet even this gets gratuitously trotted out as somehow bad! It’s ridiculous.
Whatever rhd case, I think her steely demeanor and beauty will make her effective in the new post, doing much the same in LatAm.
TJ:
Yes, she made a big error using the word “brandishing,” which has a specific and important legal meaning that she should know.
As far as the advertisements go, I think Trump’s big beef with that was that she said he approved them (and the amount they cost) and he said no he did not.
The first 30 seconds, I thought the ad was an announcement of her campaign for President. The beef was the ad was about her. She should not have been in the ad.
Every time I see her I think of this quote; ‘Sure, I could get a facelift. And look like every other grandmother in South Florida.’
My son refers to her as ‘Homeland Security Barbie’.
Is that mean?
Molly Brown:
In the 2000s I remember someone calling Ann Coulter “Fascist Undead Barbie.” I was conservative by then but still thought it funny.,
I believe the beef was that under oath she testified that Trump knew about it beforehand and approved it…
…which he vehemently denied.
“What we have here is a problem of communication “??
When you get a 9/0 ruling that is that beneficial to the Trump Admin, it makes me wonder if this isn’t some kind of deal-making with regard to their tariff ruling not long ago. I have no inside information, but I wouldn’t be entirely shocked to find out that a deal was cut between the factions, invalidating the tariffs in exchange for upholding immigration enforcement.
(Whenever you have a committee, even the SCOTUS, making decisions, deals are going to get struck. I have no idea if this particular tradeoff was a thing, but I consider it plausible.)
We’ll likely never know all the details of why Noem is being moved around. There are probably multiple reasons. I sincerely hope that one of them isn’t a notion somewhere in the Trump Admin that they can give the Dems a head to calm them down. That was the mistake Bush II made in firing Rumsfeld, all it did was stoke the Dems to new attacks.
— neo
Yes. They have a narrative, and they expect it to be maintained and enforced. But they no longer have the same power to make that happen that they held even ten years ago.
— DT
Well, to begin with, it’s not so many. This statement mischaracterizes the issue, it’s not that California, New York State, Illinois, Minnesota, etc. hate America. It’s more that LA and SF, NYC, Chicago, Minneapolis, etc. have a substantial pool of anger and hate. It’s concentrated in a few bit Democratic-ruled cities, and even there it’s a smaller group than the media wants you to believe. The problem is that it’s backed by the power and money of the municipal governments (and sometimes the State Governments, because those States are dominated by their megacities), and the Democratic Party’s vast PR apparat.
We have a ruling class that is alienated from their own nation and their own people, highly educated but trained to identify with a mythical international identity, not large in number but in control of the commanding heights of the state and the academy and the press. They despise and detest conservatives and nationalists and the rest because we are the most immediate threat to their personal power, status, and position, more so than the mullahs or al Queda or Russia/China or so forth.
Their frantic rage, though, is a sign of fear and weakness, not confidence and strength.
“I wouldn’t be entirely shocked to find out that a deal was cut between the factions, invalidating the tariffs in exchange for upholding immigration enforcement.”
I’d take that “deal” in a heartbeat. There is some legitimate question about the extent of Presidential power with regard to tariffs. There should be none regarding immigration enforcement.
“It’s more that LA and SF, NYC, Chicago, Minneapolis, etc. have a substantial pool of anger and hate. It’s concentrated in a few bit Democratic-ruled cities, and even there it’s a smaller group than the media wants you to believe.”
Yes, but they have considerable influence; why else would you see all these grandmothers standing on street corners with “No Kings” signs? They’ve been quite good at convincing a lot of other people that they’re not as radical as they really are and that they’re better than the “fascists” on the other side.
HC68 – Wait until you see what the progressive judges do with “unless any reasonable adjudicator would be compelled to conclude to the contrary.” The can, so they will.
Gruesome Newsome
As if Hizzonah da Guvnah has a solution for “the Hamas question.”