Contrary to the claim by columnist Brian Howey in his March 1st writing, the United States is not preparing “to switch sides to Russia”. That is a ridiculous claim.
President Trump wants the war to stop. He wants the killing of the young on both sides to end. This was a war never started when Trump was last President. It began under the US regime of President Joe Biden. Old Joe may have even given the green light to military action with his remarks on January 20, 2022. I quote: “I think what you’re going to see is that Russia will be held accountable if it invades (Ukraine). And it depends on what it does. It’s one thing if it’s a minor incursion and then we end up having a fight about what to do and not do.”
President Putin has always wanted as much of Ukraine as he could get. The fighting now has become a standoff with little movement east by Ukraine troops or west by Russian troops. And President Zelenskyy of Ukraine has become an overbearing tyrant for that country. For example, he banned all independent TV media with a collapse of all media into one state controlled one. He suspended multiple opposition political parties. He has banned the Russian Orthodox Church which has had a century’s long presence in Ukraine.
Then when President Trump thought there was an agreement for the United States to have access to Ukraine rare earth minerals which would both benefit Ukraine and the United States, Zelenskyy queered the deal when demanding more from Trump. We all saw that on national TV.
And, again contrary to Tribune reporting, President Trump did not “walk out” of the meeting with Zelenskyy. Trump threw Zelenskyy out of the White House and sent him and his entourage packing. No lunch.
All Zelenskyy had to do was agree to what had been negotiated by others ahead of the Trump-Zelenskyy meeting. This would have given the United States access to much desired rare earth minerals and other natural resources in Ukraine. This would have meant both a financial interest of the US in Ukraine and the presence of people from the United States there in significant numbers. Clearly, this would be an enormous deterrent to Russia to do anything more militarily.
President Putin is not going to give up the territory it currently occupies which reportedly contains largely Russian speaking people. This is a given. So, if fighting stops with lines as they are, the killing stops and the Ukraine-US mining agreement becomes an indirect way of stopping any further incursions by Russia into Ukraine.
One more thing — we learned that the USA has funded multiple biological laboratories in Ukraine. Why? One has to wonder if this is yet another evil action taken by Dr. Anthony Fauci. That is a whole other possible story.
TPS Ending
Temporary Protective Status, also known as TPS, is ending the United States at least for some. It will be for more if we can get the liberal courts out of the way. That will be a challenge for US Attorney General Pam Bondi.
TPS was supposed to be just that — temporary with no path to US citizenship. It was to provide a way for the United States to host people from other countries for a time when conditions in home countries were threatening. The problem is that, particularly during the Biden administration, TPS turned into PPS, permanent protective status. Renewals of extensions came to be automatic with no end.
Under the current President Trump administration, TPS has returned to what it was intended for in the first place. Many of those who are in the United States under TPS are on their way back to their home countries. The Trump administration, for example, is ending TPS for 350,000 from Venezuela which is about half of the total Venezuelans numbering about 600,000. The remainder face ending TPS with return to Venezuela later this year.
Reportedly, about 1 million people from 17 countries currently reside in the United States under TPS. These include people from El Salvador, Haiti, Honduras, Nepal, Nicaragua, and Sudan. Trump tried to end TPS for these people in his first term but was thwarted by immigration advocacy groups through court action. Times are different now. More returns home are on the horizon.
All of this is just a part of moving out of the United States of America people who are either in the country illegally or have temporary status. It is a move to establish residence only for American citizens or people who have arrived via lawful pathways. It is for people who have followed the long path to citizenship, are temporary foreign students, or have some other legal authority under immigration law.
President Trump promised removal of illegal aliens in addition to ending TPS. There are millions to be sent back to home countries. The herculean effort has begun.
Hanson and Illegal Aliens
[Article by Victor Davis Hanson, Classicist and Historian at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University for the Daily Signal]
I want to talk about illegal immigration. You know, this is the point in our history that we’ve never been before. We have not a porous border, but no border at all. We’ve had somewhere between 10 to 12 million illegal entrants since the Biden administration began.
There is no real corpus of immigration law. It’s been destroyed. We’re at a historical period in our country, where 55 million people, never such a large number of people born ourside the United States, that are residing here. In terms of percentages, almost 16% of the population was not born in the United States.
That’s an enormous task of assimilation, integration, and civic education, and we just haven’t been doing any of that. So, what are we going to do? Well, this first thing is : We need to stop “catch and release”. We need to make entrants, legal entrants, go back to their country if they’re applying for refugee status. You cannot come here, and then say you’re a refugee. You must ascertain that and prove that at the consulate overseas.
We’ve got to finish the walls. It’s a 2,000-mile border, and we’ve never quite been able to continue. We’ve got a wall of fence or somehow obstruct the entire 2,000-mile border. That will save manpower. It will save time and cost, and it will have an enormous deterrent effect.
The next couple of things are a little bit tricker. I think that whatever your status is, if you are sending money back to a foreign country from the United States that is singled out as a source of illegal immigration — Mexico, Latin America, for example — then the United States government should put a 10% to 20% tax on all the remittances. That would earn us up to maybe somewhere around $20 billion (per year). And that would also deter Mexico, to take one example, that depends on remittances as its largest source of foreign exchange — greater than tourism, greater than its oil revenues. And yet, so often the American taxpayer — state, local, and federal — through generous subsidies, free up the cash so that the illegal resident can send it back for social necessities that the Mexican government itself is responsible for, so we’re subsidizing everybody but ourselves.
I think it’s very important that we start looking at the countries that are the source of illegal immigration in terms of security. A Sudan, a Syria, terrorist countries that support, countries that support terrorism like Venezuela, the Middle East, especially Iran, Russia, as well.
Why would we let them send people here that we have no background checks, have not adjudicated their status? So, we should have a travel ban, an immediate deportation, and immediate consequences for the mother country that knowingly sends these people here. And that, too, would be a deterrent.
We’ve got to also look at anchor babies.
The 14th Amendment didn’t really ever say, as sometimes is alleged, that if you’re born in the United States, then you’re an automatic citizen. It says if you’re born in the United States, and not subject to the laws of another country. All the people coming, in some sense, are subject to the laws of another country. So, we have to redefine that, either through legislation or renewed attempt in the courts.
Europe, the Left always looks for guidance — 17 European countries don’t even allow it. And the other 13 or 14 have restrictions that qualify it. So, we’re the only country in the world that gives unqualified citizenship to people who happen to be born here and then anchor the entire family.
Why not also put a 10-20 year ban on people who have been detained here illegally and stop them from applying for a green card or legal readmissions for 20 years? That would be a powerful deterrent.
In other words, we would announce sometime in February and say, “We want all of you to know, all 12 million who came here during the Biden administration, to take the first iteration of cohort, you have 30 days to go back. If you do not go back to your country, and you are detained, arrested here in the United States, you will be deported, but you will not be given any chance to get a green card for 10 to 20 years,” depending on how the courts or legislation adjudicates it.
And finally, I think it’s time to look at how we deport people. The first 500,000 who have committed a crime, it will be no problem. There’s unanimous consent. They should be deported immediately. They’re wreaking havoc on the American population.
The next iteration, the 1.5 to 1.7 million people who have already gone through the system, they’ve been adjudicated, they fail to show up for the court hearings. Or they left detention when they were facing deportation. Those would be the next group that would face deportation.
The third group of people, as I said earlier, from terrorist countries or terrorist-supporting countries; no one is going to sympathize with their residents here.
The fourth group is a little tricker, but I think we could pretty easily find hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of able-bodied residents who are on public assistance and who have not been here five years. If you haven’t bee here five years, you came during the Biden open-borders era. You were on welfare of some sort, and you’re able to work. You should go back home.
That would leave a large group of people who have been here five years. They’ve never committed a crime. They’re not on public assistance. And they want to get a green card, not citizenship, a green card.
I think if we had won public opinion and support by deporting the most egregious offenders, say 10-12 million, then I think in a bipartisan fashion, we could work out a system for the law-abiding, the productive, and the long-residing American residents and allow them to pay a fine to recapture legality and stay in the United States.
It’s going to be a tough road to restore border security, because the prior administration didn’t believe in it. But I think now that the White House, the Senate, and the House are in Republican hands, it’s absolutely possible. It can be done rather quickly.
Thank you very much. I’m Victor Hanson for the Daily Signal.
Exit Day
Exit day is coming soon for all uninvited “guests” to the United States, also known as illegal aliens. As of now, the estimate is illegal aliens number something between 15 and 20 million persons; it could be more. Tom Homan will be the newly appointed Director of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency under President Donald J. Trump. His work is cut out for him.
The southern and northern borders of the United States are to be closed to illegal crossing the day Trump is sworn in as the 47th President of the United States of America. Trump has promised existing immigration laws will be followed. Illegal aliens will be deported back to their country of origin. The United States cannot afford the hugely negative economic and social impact of the millions. Only legal immigration will be permitted.
In Indiana, our state Attorney General, Todd Rokita, deserves credit for steps he has taken involving illegal aliens. Rokita identified Indiana’s “Sanctuary Cities” and has held them to account with threatened legal action. In case you did not know what cities chose to be “Sanctuary” cities, they were Gary/Hammond, South Bend (Notre Dame), West Lafayette (Purdue), and Bloomington (Indiana University). Who would have guessed? Those would be good places for ICE to look.
There are others, though, that would be illegal alien hot spots. Those include Logansport, Delphi, and Frankfort. Logansport, for example, has said the population of that city has increased by about 30% in the past three years. The result has been a strain on schools, the hospital, housing, and various social services. And Logansport is not known for being an economic growth city. What it does have, though, are two meat processing plants: Tyson and Indiana Packers. In years past, there were already claims at Indiana Packers that illegal aliens were employed there causing wages to be kept down.
No doubt, there are other state hot spots for illegal aliens. Likely, Indianapolis is yet another good bet. As far as I know, there has not been any reporting of an estimate of illegal aliens transported to Indiana by the federal government under Biden’s policies.
We do know, too, that at one point our military Camp Atterbury housed more than 7,000 Afghan refugees; most of whom have left Indiana for guess where: California. There is another population of refugees in Indiana most of us know little or nothing about. Indiana is home to the largest Burmese refugee population in the United States with the majority, about 30,000, living in Indianapolis. Refugees are, by law and under International Treaty, residents in the US legally. However, refugees are not U.S. citizens, do get government financial assistance when arriving, and are a continuing drain on social services.
So, all policies involving immigration and/or refugees must be carefully analyzed and revised. This can only happen if we have US Senators and Congressional Representatives willing to do so. The United States cannot continue to be the destination of all around the world who want to come in. There are enough problems with our own homeless citizens, veterans, and destitute others that deserve U.S. resources over non-US citizens.
Lastly, maybe all foreign aid should end until we get our own country back on the right track. We are financially broke now and must face the fact.
The Garbage Man Cometh
It seems the Kokomo Tribune is trying its best to get Kamala Harris elected. Her promotion is about all I see in the articles, letters, and columns on the Opinion page. But, guess what. It will not work. The Garbage Man Cometh!
We can be called Deplorables, Irredeemables, Nazis, and Garbage but the truth: We are true patriots who oppose what is and has been going on in Washington DC with the Biden/Harris administration and all its cronies for the past four years. No more.
No more open borders. No more support of endless foreign wars. No more spending us into high inflation. No more lawfare against political opponents. No more energy dependence on foreign nations. No more off shoring of our jobs and companies. No more high food costs. And soon to come, no more harmful chemicals in our foods. No more Big Pharma pushing unknown chemicals into our faces and into our arms.
When you have the team of Donald Trump, Tulse Gabbard (former Vice Chair of the Democratic National Committee), Elon Musk, and Robert F Kennedy Jr (a generational Democrat), you have a team that will hold America First. It took great courage for Gabbard and Kennedy to leave the Democrat Party and join forces with the Republican Party and Donald J. Trump. They saw the rot in the Democrat Party and left it behind.
So, now we have the Garbage Man, Donald J Trump, collecting all the garbage folks, the patriots, and heading for Washington, D.C.. The rooting out of the swamp will soon begin.
Frankly, it is inconceivable to me how any person with one functioning brain cell could choose now to vote for Kamala Harris. She has proven herself over and over to be incompetent. The flood over the southern border of millions of illegal aliens is only one factor of many that she has supported and continues to support.
The garbage wave is coming. Harris supporters need to get out their crying towels.
Is Tren De Aragua Coming
If the words, Tren De Aragua, are meaningless to you, you need to pay attention. Tren De Aragua is a transnational criminal empire of Venezuelans that has, since 2021, infiltrated the United States of America. Aurora, Colorado, is the most recent city affected that has hit national news.
Tren De Aragua took advantage of the large-scale migration of Venezuelans across South America to evolve from a notorious prison gang into a transnational criminal empire establishing its presence abroad from about 2018. They, reportedly, did not exist in the United States until about 2021 and that came due primarily to the open US southern border.
Now it is reported this gang has spread to 15 US states including Indiana. Indianapolis is one of the cities now to have Tren De Aragua activity. Given what has happened to Aurora, Colorado; all communities in North Central Indiana must be on alert.
What prompted the formation of Tren De Aragua in the first place was the collapse of the Venezuelan economy followed by the fleeing of over 3 million Venezuelans out of the country from 2017 to 2018. The gang went into the people smuggling business. They began offering package deals to people escaping which provided transportation, accommodation, and food for whatever the entire journey was to be. Early on this was to be to Columbia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, and Chile.
With the wide open southern US border, the gang has expanded into human and sex trafficking and drug smuggling into the USA. In our country, other cases have involved crimes like burglary or robbery. In Aurora, CO, the forceful take over of real estate developments marked another of the criminal enterprises of Tren De Aragua.
Most recently, we have learned Tren De Aragua is a state sponsored terrorist organization of the Venezuelan government against the United States of America. The goal is to destabilize our country via what is called “asymmetrical” warfare. So, alert we all must be.
Any suspicious criminal activity must be reported as early as possible to law enforcement. Tren De Aragua must not be allowed to take root in our communities. Indianapolis is not that far away.
Kamala’s Katrina
The stories and pictures coming out of the southeastern part of the United States are horrific and terrifying. Hurricane Helene was more than catastrophic, but what is even more is the incredible lack of immediate response to human need and suffering by the United States government.
FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, was supposed to be ready to aid at a moment’s notice. It was not and is not. FEMA is the responsibility of President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris. After Hurricane Helene hit the United States, Biden spent days on the breach and Kamala was busy raising money for her campaign. FEMA was no where to be found. Given the condition of Biden who appears can barely fully function, the bulk of the responsibility rests right in the lap of Vice President Kamala Harris.
Now we hear stories that private citizens who did respond are being prevented from helping. We are hearing stories that the National Guard and US Army troop and resources are being hampered or have not been given proper orders to move ahead. What is happening is at the least totally incompetent but bordering on criminal.
We hear now that FEMA has a lack of money. The story is that FEMA does not have enough funds to be able to respond to another hurricane or natural disaster. We know now that billions of dollars allocated to FEMA have been used up to provide for illegal aliens. They have gotten transportation, cash, cell phones, and housing. Funds have been depleted to the point of not having enough to help our own citizens.
Kamala comes in and offers $750 in aid to people who have lost everything. And people have to sign up to even get that paltry amount of aid. The problem is there is little way for people to even sign up.
We hear of all communications systems being destroyed. No cell phones and no Internet available. Power and lines down. Response came from action by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk with Starlink. But, now we hear that the government is taking Starlink down. Trump, as a private citizen, came quickly with aid and has given $25 million of his own money. He and Samaritan’s Purse under the leadership of Franklin Graham are and have been there with help.
Biden, Harris, Mayorkas (Homeland Security Secretary), and FEMA Adminstrator Deanne Criswell must go. They are all either totally incompetent or guilty of criminal neglect. Given the areas most affected by Hurricane Helene, one has to wonder if politics comes into the picture. Many of the areas most affected are heavy Republican politically.
In this time of huge domestic need for citizens of our country, we are reminded as well of the billions of dollars that have been diverted to Ukraine by the Biden administration. Dollars that are needed at home.
We are reminded as well of the response by the Bush administration to Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Bush had Michael Brown at the head of FEMA. Brown had been the Judges and Stewards Commissioner of the International Arabian Horse Association for 12 years before joining FEMA where he was promoted to FEMA Administrator in 2003. He resigned 18 days after Katrina hit New Orleans. Maybe it is time for Criswell and Mayorkas to do the same.
United States citizens are hurting and crying out for help. US government should have been ready and was not. Those responsible must go.
Failed Secret Service
The failures of the US Secret Service nearly got President Donald J Trump killed. It was only by the Grace of God that Trump turned his head to just the right angle that the bullet meant to kill him just grazed the side of his head. The failures that day at Butler, PA, were nearly catastrophic.
Later, we learned the Secret Service protective detail for Trump was grossly under staffed and incompetent. We learned many of those assigned to protect Trump that day were not Secret Service protective agents but rather agents from the Department of Homeland Security that had effectively no training as protective agents. The failures were so egregious many now think they were intentional.
Then yesterday, 9/5/224, when listening to the Dan Bongino radio show, I heard more. Dan, in case you do not know, was a Secret Service agent for more than a decade and was even an instructor at the Secret Service Training Academy in Beltsville, MD.. He spent several years assigned to the Presidential Protection Division. SS whistle blowers have the ear of Bongino.
Bongino reported that the day before yesterday the Republican nominee for Vice President, J.D. Vance, had an event where, properly staffed by the Secret Service, there were 35 posts to be manned. The whistle blower reported in fact there were only 4 Secret Service agents there with the remaining 31 posts manned by untrained Department of Homeland Security agents. Yet another scenario asking for disaster. Intentional? Who knows?
Bongino is highly critical of particularly the upper echelon of Secret Service management. He says the agency has been under staffed for a decade or more. He says even if corrective action is taken and new agents hired, it would take up to 2 years to get correction accomplished given the training required. All of this falls under the umbrella of the Department of Homeland Security and Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas who has proven to either be totally incompetent or intentionally so. Just look at what has been going on at the southern border under the leadership of Mayorkas.
There are those who want Trump dead. There are those who want Vance dead. The real question is who is responsible for keeping both protected from harm. Are they doing their job or are they intentionally lax? That question needs an answer.
Many of us want Eric Prince, former Navy Seal and founder of Blackwater, a private security firm, years ago to come back. In testimony before the US Congress, Prince said at one point he had 3500 employees that over years provided tens of thousands of protective assignments around the world without one protectee loss or harm. From 1997 to 2010, Blackwater was awarded $2 billion in government security contracts for both unclassified services and classified ones. Clearly the Secret Service could learn from Blackwater experience and from Eric Prince.
Now, given the state of the US Secret Service, about all we as citizens can do is pray for the safety of all political office holders and candidates. Do.
Joe
The next few weeks or even days are going to be interesting to watch how Democrats deal with demented President Joe Biden as their candidate for President. They are already squirming. And Joe has taken the position he is not stepping aside.
The fact is, it is already too late in many states for a different name — or absent Joe, any name — to be on the ballot as a Democrat in November for the office of the presidency assuming Joe is still alive or is not declared incompetent by a court. Even removal from office under the 24th Amendment would not get the job done. And impeachment is certainly not going to happen in a Republican House nor would that even affect who is on the ballot in the fall. The Democrats are stuck with ole Joe unless he voluntarily or involuntarily steps aside, it seems.
Even if Joe did step aside or be removed, there are barriers. For example, all the funds sitting in the Biden campaign war chest would have to be returned to donors. They could not be simply transferred to a different candidate. This involves millions of dollars.
And how would a replacement for Joe be chosen if he does voluntarily or involuntarily step aside? It could not be by a vote of citizens in a primary election. Too late for that. It would have to be at the Democrat National Convention where delegates are locked into a vote on the first ballot for Joe Biden. The fight would then begin. The Democrat Party is not homogeneous. There are factions who would want their candidate to prevail. And who would that be? Gavin Newsom, Hillary Clinton, Michele Obama, Kamala Harris, or someone else. All seem to be pathetic. My guess is that Hillary Clinton would emerge. She has been seething ever since her defeat in 2016. Crooked Hillary.
The world saw what some are calling the walking cadaver in the debate on CNN. It is crystal clear Joe Biden is demented to the point of being dangerous as the “leader” of the free world. Before the CNN debate there were millions who were ignorant of how bad the situation really is. Those were the CNN, MSNBC, ABC, NBC, CBS, NYT, WP and others who watched and/or read the liberal media only. Now they know. They saw with their own eyes and heard with their own ears. Shock hit them.
On top of all of about Biden, the US Supreme Court has ruled the J6 Congressional Committee was not legitimate. This likely will mean that most of those being held in prison resulting from J6 court actions will be freed. And the Court has yet to rule on the question of presidential immunity. The prediction is this will favor Trump and will blow away all or most of the politically motivated indictments he has had to deal with. And last, it is likely the Florida court will decide Special Counsel Jack Smith was not appointed legally. The case about Classified documents will disappear.
So, Democrats can mourn. They have tried to destroy our country in so many ways. The chickens are coming home to roost. The people have awakened.
D-Day WWII
Normandy Beaches….. 80 years ago. Invasion of Nazi German held territory by thousands of troops from the USA, Great Britain, Canada, and more. Thousands died there that day, but the first steps toward defeating the dream — no, nightmare — of Adolph Hitler were taken in blood.
Eighty years have passed. The grounds of the American Cemetery at Normandy are lined with white crosses and the Star of David. The grounds are silent. Grounds that one roared from cannon and gunfire and death. The grounds are hollowed by the souls that gave their lives there to preserve freedom around the world. We must never, never forget that.
We watched the 80th remembrance ceremony in full. My wife and I were reminded of our own visit to Normandy some years ago and our walking among the grave sites. We were reminded of our own feelings of sorrow and gratitude for the men who died and were buried there. You really cannot imagine the feelings unless standing among the graves yourself.
We were reminded of the many armed conflicts and men and women who have died since those days of World War II. We think of Korea, Viet Nam, Iraq, and Afghanistan and the untold many smaller fights our military has been asked to fight. And we think, too, that most, if not all, of the undeclared wars fought since WWII resulted from corrupt or unwise USA leadership.
Ole President Joe Biden could not help himself. He could not be content to honor those veterans present and those in military uniforms and the many who had gathered to pay homage to the few who remain alive from that horrific day. Joe had to turn his speech into a political speech. He had to bring up Ukraine and Russia and try to liken that to what happened at Normandy. That is blasphemy. He seems to forget that Russia was an ally to the USA in WWII and that Russia lost more people in that war than all other countries combined. Biden had to bring up NATO; an alliance long ago outdated as a deterrent to any invasion of Europe by Russia later during the Cold War.
The world is a different place today. The power of nuclear weapons is too much to even comprehend. And Joe now has to continue to poke the “BEAR”, as Russia is often referred to. Under Biden, the USA has pumped billions of dollars and tons of weapons to Ukraine; a corrupt country. Now Biden is allowing USA provided weapons to even be used against targets inside of Russia itself. And there are reports there are US troops involved directly. This is insanity. What happens in Ukraine is NOT in the interest of America First. It is time for the USA to butt out and let the European nations figure things out. Bring our troops home and shut off the money. We have mountainous needs in the USA.
I absolutely do not believe Valdemar Putin wants to invade Europe. I do believe he wants at least part of Ukraine given its history of being part of the Soviet Union and that the eastern part of Ukraine is populated with Russian speaking people. I say let him have it. The world does not need WWIII.