Trump Must Stop Allowing Obama Holdovers to Set His Iran – and Other – Policies

SECURE FREEDOM MINUTE

President Trump was reportedly furious when he learned that the State Department had issued a statement on Tuesday declaring Iran in compliance with the so-called nuclear “deal.” Mr. Trump has repeatedly reviled that accord as the worst ever negotiated because Iran can comply with it and still get the Bomb.

Consequently, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson was directed to hold a press conference yesterday describing the many ways in which the threat posed by Iran – non-nuclear and nuclear – continues to intensify. He stressed that all aspects of U.S. policy, including the future of the deal, are under review.

If that review is influenced by the same Obama administration holdovers who claim Iran is complying with its obligations, however, it will be no more accurate, objective or acceptable than the misleading statement the State Department issued on Tuesday.

Clean house, Mr. President.

Read more: Family Security Matters http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/detail/trump-must-stop-allowing-obama-holdovers-to-set-his-iran-and-other-policies?f=must_reads#ixzz4esIuDXOY
Under Creative Commons License: Attribution

State Dept. Withholds Records Of Clinton Ties To Lobbyist

Judicial Watch

Details surrounding the State Department’s expected approval of a controversial oil pipeline are being kept secret in an apparent effort to conceal impropriety created by the tight knit relationship between Hillary Clinton and the lobbyist pushing the multi billion-dollar project.The Secretary of State must approve the permit for the Canada-to-Texas pipeline, known as Keystone XL, which will span nearly 2,000 miles and transport around 1 million barrels of heavy crude oil daily across six states. Predicting opposition from environmental groups, the Canadian company behind the mega project hired one of Clinton’s national campaign directors (Paul Elliott) as its chief lobbyist.The tactic has been quite effective because Clinton indicated that she would approve Keystone XL long before the completion of a federally required environmental impact statement. Incredibly, her support hasn’t wavered in the aftermath of a preliminary Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) report that gives the pipeline project the lowest possible ranking.A coalition of environmental groups has joined forces to obtain details on the influence that the Clinton-Elliott relationship has had in the matter. Using federal public records laws the groups requested all correspondence between the politically-connected lobbyist and State Department officials considering the pipeline permit, including Clinton.In an apparent stall tactic, the agency denied the request claiming that it was “invalid” because it didn’t specify a time frame. The groups appealed and the State Department agreed to open a new request, noting that “unusual circumstances” may arise that could require “additional time to process” the new request. If the Obama Administration, which has promised unprecedented transparency, ever makes the information public, it probably won’t do so until the pipeline is half built.Last week the groups filed a lawsuit against Clinton and the State Department to obtain the records that could prove impropriety. In their complaint the nonprofits assert that the information they are seeking directly relates to whether the relationship between Elliott and Secretary Clinton might inappropriately influence the State Department’s decision to grant or deny the pipeline permit.The groups claim the transcontinental pipeline poses “massive environmental risks” and significant public health dangers that are being concealed from the public. One of the attorneys for the environmental coalition rightfully points out that refusing to provide records on the approval process “raises important questions of transparency and fairness.” Keep in mind that these are liberals who undoubtedly support this administration.

State Department Belatedly Releases New Clinton Benghazi Documents

 

Photo via Fellowship of the Minds

 

Document Release Raises New Questions about State’s FOIA Responses, Court Statements

 

Judicial Watch

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced today it has obtained new documents from the Department of State containing the telephone transcripts from the evening of September 11, 2012, in which then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton informs then-Egyptian Prime Minister Hisham Kandil that the deadly terrorist attack on the U.S. compound in Benghazi “had nothing to do with the film.”  The documents include previously unreleased telephone transcripts with world leaders about the Benghazi attack.

Clinton’s admission to Kandil was first produced to the Select Committee on Benghazi on October 13, 2015 and publicized on the day of Mrs. Clinton’s testimony, October 22, but court filings in Judicial Watch litigation show that the record was only produced after two federal court judges ordered the State Department to produce more Benghazi-related records to Judicial Watch.  Similarly, Judicial Watch litigation also forced the release of the September 11, 2012 email in which Secretary of State Hillary Clinton informed her daughter by email that the attack had been staged by an “Al Qaeda-like group,” rather than as the result of “inflammatory material posted on the Internet,” as Mrs. Clinton had claimed in her official public statement one hour earlier.

The State Department previously told a federal court that the Kandil document wasn’t responsive to Judicial Watch’s request and resulting lawsuit (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of State (No. 1:14-cv-01511)) seeking:

Any and all records concerning, regarding, or related to notes, updates, or reports created in response to the September 11, 2012 attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya. This request includes, but is not limited to, notes taken by then Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton or employees of the Office of the Secretary of State during the attack and its immediate aftermath.

But the State Department then produced this information last month to Judicial Watch.  The records, the State Department told the Court, were found among thousands of new Clinton State Department records supposedly only discovered in December, 2015 – again, two months after the key Kandil document was first produced to the Benghazi Committee.

Under court order, the State Department released 11 documents responsive to the Judicial Watch request with large blocks of information redacted. The documents also include phone conservations between Clinton and other foreign dignitaries and heads of state during the period of the deadly terrorist attack on the Benghazi consulate.

At 10:08 p.m. on September 11, Mrs. Clinton issued an official State Department press statement, approved by the White House, placing the blame for the attack on an Internet video:

Some have sought to justify this vicious behavior as a response to inflammatory material posted on the Internet. The United States deplores any intentional effort to denigrate the religious beliefs of others. Our commitment to religious tolerance goes back to the very beginning of our nation. But let me be clear: There is never any justification for violent acts of this kind.

Yet the next day, in her 7:49 PM September 12 conversation with Kandil, Clinton said, “We know the attack in Libya had nothing to do with the film.  It was a planned attack – not a protest.”  Kandil responded, “You’re not kidding. Based on the information we saw today we believe that group that claimed responsibility for this is affiliated with al-Qaeda.”

On September 15, in a telephone call with then-Egyptian Foreign Minister Mohamed Amr, Clinton emphatically portrayed the “stupid, very offensive film” as the root cause of the Benghazi violence. Clinton told Amr, “I have repeatedly, as has the President and other officials in our government, deplored not only the content of this stupid, very offensive film… But we have to exercise more self-discipline… otherwise we’ll be in a vicious downward circle against everyone who has ever felt offended, particularly on the internet….”

Clinton’s telephone call with Amr also contained a curious reference to what the former secretary referred to as a “very successful investment visit led by my deputy Tom Nides, and on the very day they left this series of incidents began to unfold.” According to the Washington Post, Nides, who was deputy secretary for management and resources at the State Department, was at the same time responsible for “communications with donors” to the Clinton Foundation. Nides was also involved in the scandal involving Clinton’s efforts to provide special access to State Department officials for hedge fund clients of her son-in-law, Marc Mezinsky.

In a September 12 call with the Afghan President Hamid Kharzi, Clinton says at some point they need to talk about “about religious feelings and insults and defamation.”  Islamists seeks to criminalize criticism (“defamation”) of Islam.  The Obama administration worked closely with advocates for restrictions on free speech as part of their Benghazi video pr campaign.

The documents also show that Clinton referenced the “actions of a mob” to Tunisian Prime Minister Jebali on September 14.  Jebali responded that he condemned “these terrorist actions.”

“There are two scandals here.  The first is Hillary Clinton was telling different stories to different foreign leaders about the Benghazi attack – including an admission that it was a terrorist attack,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “The second is the State Department’s cover-up of these documents.  The State Department is forcing Judicial Watch to play ‘whack-a-mole’ with Clinton and Benghazi documents.  It is no wonder that two frustrated federal court judges granted Judicial Watch discovery into the Clinton FOIA issues.”

Scrubbing of 7 FAM 1130 ACQUISITION OF U.S. CITIZENSHIP BY BIRTH ABROAD TO U.S. CITIZEN PARENT

Free Republic

Today I discovered that the reason I could not find a section of the Nationalization Statues is because the section had been scrubbed. This is not an accident. The section removed had confirmed that the interpretation of the State Department based on the Constitution and relevant case law was that Naturalization did not convey natural born status for Constitutional purposes.

The Foreign Affairs Manual (FAM) and associated Handbooks (FAHs) are a single, comprehensive, and authoritative source for the Department’s organization structures, policies, and procedures that govern the operations of the State Department, the Foreign Service and, when applicable, other federal agencies. The FAM (generally policy) and the FAHs (generally procedures) together convey codified information to Department staff and contractors so they can carry out their responsibilities in accordance with statutory, executive and Department mandates.

ACQUISITION OF U.S. CITIZENSHIP BY BIRTH ABROAD TO U.S. CITIZEN PARENT (CT:CON-636; 02-24-2016) is being scrubbed…

The Original Document “7 FAM 1131.6-2 Eligibility for Presidency.” (Still live at Wikipedia)

Section 1 of Article Two of the United States Constitution requires that a candidate for President of the United States be a “natural-born citizen”.

According to the US Department of State Foreign Affairs Manual: “the fact that someone is a natural born citizen (citizen at birth) pursuant to a statute does not necessarily imply that he or she is such a citizen for Constitutional purposes.”[33]

The Current Document

7 FAM 1131.6-2 Not Citizens by “Naturalization”

(CT:CON-636; 02-24-2016)

Section 201(g) NA and section 301g) INA (8 U.S.C. 1401(g)) (formerly 301(a)(7) INA) both specify that naturalization is “the conferring of nationality of a state upon a person after birth.” Accordingly, U.S. citizens who acquire U.S. citizenship at birth by birth abroad to a U.S. citizen parent(s) are not considered “naturalized” citizens under either act.

Source: https://fam.state.gov/FAM/07FAM/07FAM1130.html#M1131_6_2

New Report on Border Terror Threat

Judicial Watch

 

New State Department Intel Confirms Arab Smuggling “Cells,” Al Qaeda Leader in Mexico
Congressional Travel Cover-Up at Pentagon
Judicial Watch Clinton Records Lawsuits Uncovers More Hidden Documents

New State Department Intel Confirms Arab Smuggling “Cells,” Al Qaeda Leader in Mexico

This week, Judicial Watch published another in our series of Pulitzer Prize-worthy reports the narco-terror threat, one of the many existential threats as a result of purposefully lax border security at the U.S.-Mexican border.  I reprint the chilling report below from you from our Corruption Chronicles blog:

For more than a decade the U.S. government has known that “Arab extremists” are entering the country through Mexico with the assistance of smuggling network “cells,” according to State Department documents obtained by Judicial Watch that reveal among them was a top Al Qaeda operative wanted by the FBI. Some Mexican smuggling networks actually specialize in providing logistical support for Arab individuals attempting to enter the United States, the government documents say. The top Al Qaeda leader in Mexico was identified in the September 2004 cable from the American consulate in Ciudad Juárez as Adnan G. El Shurkrjumah. The cable was released to Judicial Watch under the Freedom of Information Act.

The new intelligence records were released as a result of an ongoing JW investigation into the critical national security threats on the southern border, specifically those created by Islamic terrorists teaming up with Mexican drug cartels to infiltrate and attack the U.S. In response to JW’s reporting in the last two years the Obama administration—through various spokespeople, including FBI Director James Comey—has vehemently denied that Islamic terrorists are operating in Mexican towns near American cities or entering the U.S. through the famously porous southern border.

The State Department documents, which include substantial redactions supposedly to protect classified and personal information, contradict this. JW obtained them as part of an investigative series into Shukrijumah, an Al Qaeda operative also known as Javier Robles. In December, 2014 Shukrijumah was killed by the Pakistan Army in an intelligence-borne operation in South Waziristan. But before he died Shukrijumah helped plan several U.S. attacks, including plots to bomb Oprah Winfrey’s studio and detonate nuclear devices in multiple American cities. For years Shukrijumah appeared on the FBI’s most wanted list and, despite being sought by the agency, he crossed back and forth into the U.S. from Mexico to meet fellow militant Islamists in Texas. JW has reported that, as one of the world’s most wanted terrorists, Shukrijumah piloted an aircraft into the Cielo Dorado airfield in Anthony, New Mexico.

The new State Department records show that U.S. authorities knew Shukrijumah was in Mexico because they say that the Regional Security Office (RSO) at the consulate in Ciudad Juárez used newspapers to distribute information throughout Sonora and Chihuahua, Mexico about the Al Qaeda operative at the request of the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force in El Paso. This appears on page 17 of the documents, which are linked above in their entirety. Of interesting note is that the government uses an exemption that applies to classified information to continue to withhold some of the records when the entire file was already declassified back in September, 2014.

 

Information about Middle Eastern terrorists entering the U.S. through Mexico appears in a September 2, 2004 cable—declassified 10 years later—titled “CONFIDENTIAL INFORMANT, A PROVEN CI TO USG IN THE PAST, REPORTS ARAB CELLS WITHIN MEXICO.” It explains that a reputable government informant went to the U.S. Consulate in Ciudad Juárez and provided information pertaining to suspect Arab extremists who have been smuggled into the U.S. through the Mexican border. “The confidential source (SUBJECT) stated his family member, who is a human trafficker, knows the exact whereabouts of three Arabs who are currently being hidden in Agua Prieta, Sonora, Mexico,” the State Department cable reads. “Although not absolutely positive, one of the three is likely Adnan G. El Shukrijumah, alleged to be a Saudi Arabian terrorist cell leader thought to be in Mexico. SUBJECT also provided information on two smuggling networks, “cells,” that specialize in providing logistical support for Arab individuals attempting to enter the United States.”

Many questions remain about the U.S. government’s relationship with Shukrijumah, but last spring JW obtained records from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) that indicate he was a Confidential Source/Informant for the government. Shukrijumah lived in South Florida’s Broward County and graduated from Broward Community College with a degree in computer engineering. Four months before the 9/11 terrorist attacks Shukrijumah fled the U.S. He was one of the suspected actors in a number of planned terror attacks in the U.S., including a plot to simultaneously detonate nuclear devices in several U.S. cities. Convicted terrorist Jose Padilla claimed to have trained with Shukrijumah to blow up U.S. apartment buildings using natural gas explosions.

In 2010 Shukrijumah was indicted in the Eastern District of New York for his role in a terrorist plot to attack targets in the United States—including New York City’s subway system—and the United Kingdom, according the FBI. The plot against New York City’s subway system was directed by senior Al Qaeda leadership in Pakistan, the FBI says, and was directly related to a scheme by Al Qaeda plotters in Pakistan to use Western operatives to attack a target in the United States.

A year earlier Shukrijumah helped plan a terrorist truck-bomb targeting Winfrey’s Harpo Studios in Chicago as well as the iconic Sears Tower. Two of his fellow conspirators—Emad Karakrah and Hector Pedroza Huerta—were arrested in 2014 for unrelated state crimes in different parts of the country. Karakrah got busted in Chicago on charges of making a false car bomb threat after leading police on a high-speed chase with an ISIS flag waving from his vehicle. Huerta, an illegal alien twice convicted for driving intoxicated, got nabbed in El Paso for drunk driving. Both Karakrah and Pedroza were released from custody in 2015 under highly unusual plea deals.

The men formed part of a sophisticated narco-terror ring, exposed in a JW investigative series, with connections running from El Paso to Chicago to New York City. The operation includes an all-star lineup of logistics and transportation operatives for militant Islamists in the United State, drug and weapons smugglers for the Juarez drug cartel in Mexico, an FBI confidential informant gone rogue and two of the FBI’s most wanted terrorists. Shukrijumah was one of them and, though he’s dead, he is an important part of the puzzle and extremely relevant when connecting the dots in the narco-terror ring.

State Dept. preparing to release thousands of top Clinton aide’s emails

Free Republic

State Department officials will begin releasing thousands of emails provided by Huma Abedin, a top aide to Hillary Clinton, starting in March.

The agency agreed to produce all 29,000 pages of Abedin’s private emails by April 2017 in court documents filed late Monday evening. Using a more drawn-out timeline than the one applied to the high-profile monthly releases of Clinton’s emails, the State Department will review and release roughly 400 pages of Abedin’s emails each month between March 2016 and April of next year.

However, the agency will not be publishing all of Abedin’s emails online, as it has done with the portion of the 30,000 Clinton emails it has released so far.

Instead, the rolling productions of the Abedin emails will go directly to Judicial Watch, the conservative watchdog who sued the State Department over its Freedom of Information Act request for the Abedin records.

(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonexaminer.com …

New Benghazi Email Shows DOD Offered State Department “Forces that Could Move to Benghazi” Immediately – Specifics Blacked Out in New Document

Photo via Fellowship of the Minds

Judicial Watch

“They are spinning up as we speak.” U.S. Department of Defense Chief of Staff Jeremy Bash Tuesday, September 11, 2012, 7:19 PM

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch today released a new Benghazi email from then-Department of Defense Chief of Staff Jeremy Bash to State Department leadership immediately offering “forces that could move to Benghazi” during the terrorist attack on the U.S. Special Mission Compound in Benghazi, Libya on September 11, 2012. In an email sent to top Department of State officials, at 7:19 p.m. ET, only hours after the attack had begun, Bash says, “we have identified the forces that could move to Benghazi. They are spinning up as we speak.” The Obama administration redacted the details of the military forces available, oddly citing a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) exemption that allows the withholding of “deliberative process” information.

Bash’s email seems to directly contradict testimony given by then-Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta before the Senate Armed Services Committee in February 2013. Defending the Obama administration’s lack of military response to the nearly six-hour-long attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Panetta claimed that “time, distance, the lack of an adequate warning, events that moved very quickly on the ground prevented a more immediate response.”

New State Department Documents Raise More Questions on Clinton Conflict of Interest Reviews

JUDICIAL WATCH

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch today released 789 pages of State Department ethics review documents concerning former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, revealing that at least one speech by Bill Clinton appeared to take place without the required State Department ethics approval.  The documents also include a copy of Bill Clinton’s draft consultant agreement with Laureate Education, Inc., which was submitted for ethics review by the State Department.  But the State Department redacted the information regarding compensation and the specific services Bill Clinton was hired to provide to the controversial “for profit” education company.  The documents were released as a result of a federal court order in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit filed against the State Department on May 28, 2013, (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of State (No. 1:13-cv-00772)).

The documents include heavily redacted emails from 2009 about the review of a speech Bill Clinton was set to give to the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI).  An April 1, 2009, email from then-State Department Senior Ethics Counsel Waldo W. “Chip” Brooks notes that the ethics review approval of the speech “was in the hands of Jim [Thessin] and Cheryl Mills.  They were to discuss with Counsel to the former President.  I do not know if either ever did.”

U.S. Gives 1,519 Engaged in Terrorism “While Under Duress” Residency, Asylum

Judicial Watch

As if the President Obama’s sweeping amnesty measures haven’t compromised national security enough, the administration let 1,519 “inadmissible” foreigners embroiled in terrorism into the U.S. last year because the crimes were committed “while under duress.”

Before the Obama administration tweaked a federal law last year, these foreign nationals would have been banned from the country for supporting terrorist causes. But under the changes the Secretary of Homeland Security has “discretionary authority” to waive certain grounds of inadmissibility relating to terrorism. We’ve seen this discretionary authority abused in the last few years and in fact, the administration has eliminated a zero tolerance policy for granting asylum or residency to individuals who have provided any sort of terrorism-related support.

Judicial Watch Obtains New Huma Abedin Emails from Clintonemail.com Server

JUDICIAL WATCH

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch today released more than 50 pages of new emails from the clintonemail.com server account of Huma Abedin, a former top aide to Hillary Clinton during her tenure in the State Department. The emails discuss seemingly sensitive security and foreign affairs issues and raise questions about the handling of classified material during Hillary Clinton’s tenure at the State Department.  The documents were obtained as result of Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit seeking Huma Abedin’s government business emails conducted on non-state.gov email accounts (Judicial Watch, Inc. v. U.S. Department of State (No. 1:15-cv-00684)).  The emails were produced from a search of State Department records, as the agency continues to delay full production of records turned over by Ms. Abedin recently.