Obama's Corruption Chronicles:

[SHOOTER13]

Pakistani with Fake Ecuadorean Passport Enters U.S. via Mexico Multiple Times
MAY 18, 2016

A Pakistani man with a fake passport and residence card from two different South American countries has been caught entering the U.S. illegally through Mexico and federal court documents reveal he has previously crossed into the country undetected by immigration authorities. The distressing case comes less than a month after Judicial Watch reported that an ISIS operative who trained terrorists in Pakistan travels back and forth through the porous southern border from a camp in the Mexican state of Chihuahua not far from El Paso, Texas. His name is Shaykh Mahmood Omar Khabir, a Kuwaiti who trained hundreds of Al Qaeda fighters in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Yemen, according to JW’s high-ranking Homeland Security sources.

The Pakistani apprehended in the region this month, Javaid Muhammad, is in federal custody in Texas and is scheduled to appear in court on May 20 in McAllen. U.S. Border Patrol agents busted him on May 8, according to court documents obtained by JW, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has taken over the case. Authorities have confiscated Muhammad’s fraudulent Ecuadorean passport and Chilean residence card and he has admitted he’s never visited or resided in either South American country. Muhammad also “admitted to illegally crossing the international boundary of the United States without prior inspection by a United States Immigration Officer,” court files state. The FBI has evidence, including travel records and other government files, that proves Muhammad’s statements to the Border Patrol and FBI “were materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent,” the court documents say.

Some of the records related to the case have been sealed by the government so many of the specific details are not available, presumably for security reasons. We do know that Muhammad initially lied to both the Border Patrol and FBI and that he has provided the FBI with a sworn statement detailing his illegal travel from Pakistan to the United States, according to the files that have not been sealed. That information is being kept under wraps by the feds. So is Muhammad’s financial affidavit, which is listed on the federal court docket but not available for public view. Another interesting tidbit is that American taxpayers are providing the Pakistani with a free lawyer because the judge, Dorina Ramos, determined this week that Muhammad doesn’t have the money to hire one.

It remains unclear how many times Muhammad has entered the U.S. illegally and if all the violations occurred through Mexico, though it appears to be the case. As part of an ongoing investigation into the growing terrorism threats on the southern border JW has reported that Middle Eastern terrorists and Mexican drug cartels have joined forces to infiltrate the U.S. to plan future attacks. Just a few weeks ago JW’s government sources outlined the operation headed by Khabir, the ISIS leader who’s training in Chihuahua and regularly crosses into the U.S. assisted by Mexican drug traffickers. Khabir actually brags in an Italian newspaper article that the border region is so open that he “could get in with a handful of men, and kill thousands of people in Texas or in Arizona in the space of a few hours.” Foreign Affairs Secretary Claudia Ruiz, Mexico’s top diplomat, says in the article that she doesn’t understand why the Obama administration and the U.S. media are “culpably neglecting this phenomenon,” adding that “this new wave of fundamentalism could have nasty surprises in store for the United States.”

Last summer JW wrote about a sophisticated operation in which Mexican drug cartels smuggle Middle Eastern terrorists into a small Texas rural town near El Paso using remote farm roads—rather than interstates—to elude the Border Patrol and other law enforcement barriers. The foreigners are classified by the U.S. government as Special Interest Aliens (SIA) and they are transported to stash areas in Acala, a rural crossroads located around 54 miles from El Paso on a state road – Highway 20. Once in the U.S., the SIAs wait for pick-up in the area’s sand hills just across Highway 20. At the time JW’s government sources revealed that terrorists have long entered the U.S. through Mexico and in fact, an internal Texas Department of Public Safety report leaked by the media documents that several members of known Islamist terrorist organizations have been apprehended crossing the southern border in recent years.

A few months after JW broke the Acala smuggling piece, five young Middle Eastern men were apprehended by the Border Patrol in an Arizona town situated about 30 miles from the Mexican border. Federal agents spotted the men crossing a ranch property in the vicinity of Amado, which is located about 35 miles south of Tucson and has a population of 275. Two of the Middle Eastern men were carrying stainless steel cylinders in backpacks. Days earlier six men—one from Afghanistan, five from Pakistan—were arrested in nearby Patagonia, a quaint ranch town that sits 20 miles north of the Mexican border city of Nogales.

 

[SHOOTER13]

Do You Believe This BS...?!

Feds Order Colleges to Stop Checking Criminal/School Discipline History Because it Discriminates Against Minorities
MAY 20, 2016

The Obama administration has ordered the nation’s colleges and universities to stop asking applicants about criminal and school disciplinary history because it discriminates against minorities. Institutions are also being asked to offer those with criminal records special support services such as counseling, mentoring and legal aid once enrolled. The government’s official term for these perspective students is “justice-involved individuals” and the new directive aims to remove barriers to higher education for the overwhelmingly minority population that’s had encounters with the law or disciplinary issues through high school.

Instructions are outlined in a cumbersome document (Beyond the Box) issued by the U.S Department of Education (ED) this month. It says that “data show plainly that people of color are more likely to come in contact with the justice system due, in part, to punitive school disciplinary policies that disproportionately impact certain student groups and racial profiling.” Because education can be a powerful pathway to transition out of prison and into the workforce, it’s critical to ensure that admissions practices don’t disproportionately disadvantage justice involved individuals, the directive states. Colleges and universities should also refrain from inquiring about a student’s school disciplinary history—including past academic dishonesty—because that too discriminates against minorities. Civil rights data compiled by ED show “black students are suspended and expelled at a rate three times greater than white students and often for the same types of infractions.”

Therefore colleges and universities should consider designing admissions policies that don’t include disciplinary history so they don’t have the “unjustified effect of discriminating against individuals on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, religion and disability,” the new ED guidelines state. Three out of four colleges and universities collect high school disciplinary information and 89% of those institutions use the information to make admissions decisions, according to the order. That needs to change, according to the administration. A few years ago it warned public elementary and high schools to administer student discipline without discriminating on the bases of race, color or national origin because too many minority students—especially blacks—were getting suspended. The feds assert they issued the directive after reports of “racial disparities” in “exclusionary discipline policies” that created a “school to prison pipeline.”

Colleges and universities are to take it a step further by offering students with criminal histories special support services. This is to include targeted academic and career guidance as well as counseling, legal aid services, mentoring and coaching. “Institutions should recruit and train peer mentors with previous justice involvement to work with justice-involved students to ensure a smooth transition to postsecondary education and provide support and resources throughout their time at the college or university,” the new directive states. “These peer mentors could begin their work by acting as navigators who help acclimate justice-involved students to the educational institutions.” Perhaps colleges and universities should also start sending recruiters to jails across the country.

This is part of a broader effort by the administration to even the playing field for convicts. Earlier this month Judicial Watch reported that the president issued an order prohibiting federal agencies from asking job applicants about criminal history. The measure will ensure that hiring managers are making selection decisions based solely on qualifications, according to a White House announcement. “Early inquiries into an applicant’s criminal history may discourage motivated, well-qualified individuals who have served their time from applying for a federal job,” the announcement says, adding that “early inquiries could also lead to the disqualification of otherwise eligible candidates.”

Years ago the administration tried slamming the private sector with a ban on job applicant background checks by claiming that they discriminate against all minority candidates, not just ex-cons. The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), the federal agency that enforces the nation’s workplace discrimination laws, wasted taxpayer dollars suing companies for checking criminal histories asserting that it violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. The apparent intent was to discourage other businesses from checking criminal histories out of fear of getting sued by the government, but it didn’t quite work out that way. A federal judge eventually blasted the EEOC’s claims, calling them laughable, distorted, cherry-picked, worthless and an egregious example of scientific dishonesty. Of interesting note is that the EEOC conducts criminal background checks as a condition of employment.

 

[SHOOTER13]

Federal Judge Blasts DOJ Lawyers for Lying in Court to Defend Obama Amnesty
MAY 23, 2016

It’s been repeatedly proven that government officials lie regularly to cover up wrongdoing and now a scathing federal court order blasting the Department of Justice (DOJ) and its army of lawyers offers details seldom seen by the public. In fact, the judge in this case appears to go out of his way to write something for the masses, not just the parties involved in the litigation.

The case involves a lawsuit filed by 26 states against the federal government challenging President Obama’s immigration amnesty measures. It was originally filed in the Southern District of Texas and the judge hearing the case, Andrew S. Hanen, issued a 28-page order last week slamming DOJ attorneys representing the administration for intentionally lying to the court, thus violating a multitude of ethics and court rules. Among other things Hanen admonishes DOJ lawyers for lying by claiming in court that the president’s amnesty plan featuring three-year deferrals wasn’t being implemented when in fact it was for more than 100,000 illegal aliens.

The measure is officially known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is the agency charged with implementing it.

In the order Hanen writes: “The Government admits that the lawyer making these statements knew at the time of this hearing that the DHS was already granting these three year extensions (which it also admits are only authorized by the 2014 DHS Directive) instead of the two-year renewals authorized in 2012. Not only did counsel fail to tell the Court that the DHS was already granting relief using the 2014 DHS Directive, she told the Court that nothing would happen with regard to revised DACA until mid-February of 2015.”

The lashing continues. “Apparently, lawyers, somewhere in the halls of the Justice Department whose identities are unknown to this Court, decided unilaterally that the conduct of the DHS in granting three-year DACA renewals . . . was immaterial and irrelevant to this lawsuit and that the DOJ could therefore just ignore it. Then, for whatever reason, the Justice Department trial lawyers appearing in this Court chose not to tell the truth about this DHS activity. The first decision was certainly unsupportable, but the subsequent decision to hide it from the Court was unethical.”

Texas initiated the lawsuit in December 2014 challenging the president’s amnesty order and the other states eventually joined in. Judge Hanen ruled in favor of the states, essentially blocking the amnesty, and later discovered that the administration disregarded the order and government attorneys repeatedly lied about it in court. After Hanen’s reprimand became public, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said this: “Throughout this case, the administration has struggled to provide accurate, reliable information regarding the scope of the President’s plan or even when it would be implemented. From the start, our lawsuit has been about asserting that one person cannot unilaterally change the law, and part of that is ensuring everyone abides by the rule of law.

This kind of pubic scolding, especially from a federal court, is seldom seen while a president is still in office. The DOJ is supposed to defend the public’s best interest, not lie to cover up the president’s wrongdoing. An editorial in a mainstream newspaper points out that the misconduct unmasked by Judge Hanen should trouble Americans of all political persuasions. “Prosecutors often abuse their powers in run-of-the-mill cases,” the editorial states. “But this is a constitutional challenge with major consequences for the separation of powers, and the deceit must have required the participation and coordination of dozens of political appointees and career lawyers.

That suggests a serious institutional failure, not mere rogue actors.” The piece refers to the DOJ’s systematic deception in court about the administration’s conduct an “ethics rot.”

 

[SHOOTER13]

Border Patrol Locked out of Indian Reservation Known for Mexican Drug Trafficking
MAY 24, 2016

An Indian reservation along the Mexican border is prohibiting the Border Patrol from entering its land, which is a notorious smuggling corridor determined by the U.S. government to be a “High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA).” Homeland Security sources tell Judicial Watch that the road in the southeast corner of the reservation has been cordoned off by a barbed wired gate to keep officers out. A hand-written cardboard sign reading “Closed, Do Not Open” has been posted on the fence. “This is the location used most for trafficking drugs into the country,” a Border Patrol source told JW, adding that agents assigned to the area are “livid.”

The tribe, Tohono O’odham, created the barricade a few weeks ago, Border Patrol sources tell JW, specifically to keep agents out of the reservation which is located in the south central Arizona Sonoran Desert and shares about 75 miles of border with Mexico. The reservation terrain consists largely of mountains and desert making it difficult to patrol. For years it has appeared on the Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA) HIDTA list because it’s a significant center of illegal drug production, manufacturing, importation and distribution. The reservation is a primary transshipment zone for methamphetamine, cocaine, heroin and marijuana destined for the United States, a DEA official revealed in congressional testimony a few years ago. In 2015 Arizona led all four Border Patrol sectors in drug seizures with 928,858 pounds of drugs confiscated, according to agency figures.

The relationship between the Border Patrol and the tribe has been stormy over the years, with accusations of human rights violations by federal agents and allegations that the agents’ presence has implemented a police state. Though only 75 miles runs along the Mexican border, the reservation is about 2.8 million acres or roughly the size of Connecticut and has about 30,000 members. The tribe’s official website says that nine of its communities are located in Mexico and they are separated by the United States/Mexico border. “In fact, the U.S.-Mexico border has become an artificial barrier to the freedom of the Tohono O’odham,” the tribe claims. “On countless occasions, the U.S. Border Patrol has detained and deported members of the Tohono O’odham Nation who were simply traveling through their own traditional lands, practicing migratory traditions essential to their religion, economy and culture. Similarly, on many occasions U.S. Customs have prevented Tohono O’odham from transporting raw materials and goods essential for their spirituality, economy and traditional culture. Border officials are also reported to have confiscated cultural and religious items, such as feathers of common birds, pine leaves or sweet grass.”

A New York Times story published years ago explained that tightening of border security to the east and west after the 9/11 terrorist attacks funneled more drug traffic through the Tohono O’odham reservation. This created a need for more Border Patrol officers to be deployed to the crime-infested area. The article also revealed that tribe members are complicit in the trafficking business. “Hundreds of tribal members have been prosecuted in federal, state or tribal courts for smuggling drugs or humans, taking offers that reach $5,000 for storing marijuana or transporting it across the reservation,” the article states. “In a few families, both parents have been sent to prison, leaving grandparents to raise the children.” The drug smugglers work mainly for the notorious Sinaloa Cartel, the piece revealed.

Nevertheless, federal officers have been told by Homeland Security superiors that they can’t cut the new wire fence obstacle to access the reservation even though it sits in the Border Patrol’s busiest drug sector. Perhaps the U.S. government can use money to force compliance. The Tohono O’odham recently got a huge chunk of change from Uncle Sam, $2.75 million, to build single-family homes for its largely poor tribe members. Maybe the feds can withhold future allocations for the tribe’s various projects until it allows Border Patrol officers to do their job. In the meantime, a veteran Arizona law enforcement officer who’s worked in the region for decades says “a little wire and a small gate can cause huge security problems.”

============

Update: a few hours after Judicial Watch posted this story, Border Patrol officials in Arizona reported that the road has been reopened.

 

[CaddmannQ]

"Of interesting note is that the EEOC conducts criminal background checks as a condition of employment"

We have to hire them without checking, but of course the government can't take that risk.

Somehow they can push it on us though.

 

[SHOOTER13]

TSA Failures Keep U.S. Train System Vulnerable to Terrorist Attack
MAY 26, 2016

The nation’s train system remains dangerously vulnerable to a terrorist attack because the agency created after 9/11 to protect it hasn’t bothered implementing crucial security measures, including performing background checks on frontline railroad employees. You can’t make this stuff up. A decade and a half after Islamic terrorists used commercial planes to carry out the worst attack on American soil, the government can’t seem to fulfill its obligation to adequately protect all transportation systems.

It involves the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), the famously inept multi-billion-dollar agency created by Congress to secure the nation’s transportation system after the 2001 attacks. Judicial Watch has reported on a multitude of TSA transgressions over the years and sued the agency to uncover documents detailing sexually-related assaults on passengers by agents at three major U.S. airports. Over the years the TSA has made headlines for missing weapons and bombs during test security checks, hiring an accused child molester without a background check, clearing flight training for illegal immigrants, letting terrorists slip past its highly trained behavior detection officers and failing to properly vet airport workers with access to sensitive areas. A few years ago TSA missed a piece of luggage that somehow got on a commercial plan and exploded after landing in south Florida. The list of transgressions goes on and on.

In this latest case, an audit conducted by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Inspector General reveals that the nation’s passenger train system—known as Amtrak—has been treated like a stepchild when it comes to security. This is worrisome, the watchdog points out, because recent global events highlight the vulnerability of rail systems to terrorist attacks and the importance of security for passengers. As an example, the DHS IG lists in its report the August 2015 incident in which armed gunman terrorized a passenger train traveling from Amsterdam to Paris. The plot inspired two members of Congress to request that the TSA provide an update on the state of domestic rail security, including the implementation of recommendations made by the 9/11 Commission. It’s not pretty. The agency has neither implemented 9/11 Commission requirements or key passenger rail requirements, according to the IG.

This is a major transportation system with 300 trains that travel throughout 46 states and Canada with about 31 million passengers annually. Legislation passed after 9/11 requires the TSA to take a number of rail security measures that the agency has evidently blown off. Among them is a national railroad security strategy, assigning rail carriers to risk-based tiers and creating a training program for rail carriers. The TSA is also supposed to perform background checks for frontline railroad employees as it’s supposed to do for airport workers. Why is this bloated agency dragging its feet? Investigators reveal in their findings that the TSA is blaming it all on the “complex federal rulemaking process.” Keep in mind it’s been eight years since legislation was passed mandating the agency to create a system to protect passenger trains.

It’s not like money hasn’t been allocated to railroad security but the absence of a concrete, organized plan has resulted in waste while the system remains vulnerable. Back in 2011 JW reported that DHS gave Amtrak more than $1 billion to bolster security but the money wasn’t spent efficiently to adequately protect the most vulnerable stations. This occurred because DHS simply doled out the cash but never followed up to ensure it was being properly and effectively spent on security. DHS never required Amtrak to develop a corrective action plan to address its biggest vulnerabilities, approved lower risk projects and didn’t document roles and responsibilities for the grant award process, according to a federal audit. “As a result, some rail stations and the traveling public may be at a greater risk to a potential terrorist attack,” investigators determined. This was five years ago and it seems that little has changed amid growing threats of a terrorist attack.

 

[SHOOTER13]

EPA Gave Convicted Climate Expert Service, Salary Awards While He Defrauded Agency
MAY 27, 2016

The senior Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) official who scammed the agency out of nearly $1 million in pay without working got service and salary awards throughout his lengthy career as a climate policy expert, according to records obtained by Judicial Watch. His name is John Beale and he’s on the verge of completing a 32-month prison sentence for defrauding the government by claiming, while employed at the EPA, to be a “secret agent” for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and going on long vacations that he said were CIA missions.

While he committed the fraud the EPA regularly rewarded him with “Special Act or Service Awards” that included cash and time off, the records obtained by JW reveal. From 1991 through 1998 Beale received thousands of dollars in bonuses for his performance as well as a “Time Off Award” in 1998, the records show. In 2001 he was rewarded yet again with a promotion to work at the White House as a “Senior Policy Advisor.” It’s not like Beale was a lowly employee at the EPA. He was a senior level official who actually worked in the agency’s most powerful office, Air and Radiation (OAR), under President Obama’s current EPA Administrator, Gina McCarthy.

OAR is feared by American companies because it develops polices and regulations associated with climate change air pollution that can impose huge costs to both consumers and businesses. McCarthy headed OAR from 2008 to 2013 when Beale was a high-ranking senior policy adviser, which means the EPA Administrator directly managed him at the time. Beale also defrauded the agency by receiving unlawful reimbursements for upscale personal travel, claiming to be away working for the CIA for 2 ½ years while he collected EPA paychecks and continuing to collect his full government salary years after officially retiring from the agency.

A U.S. Senate investigation blasted McCarthy, his boss at the time at OAR, for not taking action for months after learning that Beale committed fraud. “On March 29, 2012, an OAR official raised concerns about Beale’s retirement when he informed McCarthy that Beale was still on payroll,” the Senate report states. “Despite being aware of the fact that one of her subordinates was collecting a paycheck without providing any work product, this arrangement continued for seven more months before McCarthy ever contacted Beale.” In December 2012, McCarthy met with Beale for the first time in nearly 15 months and he told her he was no longer planning to retire. Beale wasn’t reported to the EPA Inspector General for another two months and, though McCarthy had cause to fire him, she let him retire voluntarily with full benefits. Remember, this is the woman who runs the agency now.

On August 23, 2013, the Department of Justice (DOJ) filed criminal charges against Beale and a year later he was convicted of fraud and stealing $900,000 from the government. He’s on the verge of completing a 32-month sentence in a federal prison in Cumberland, Maryland. The Senate investigation determined that his actions, not only disgraced the agency, but also raised questions about its management and oversight abilities. In fact, despite Beale’s decades-long history of fraud and deceit many of his EPA colleagues refuse to view him as a criminal and even submitted letters to the court requesting leniency during his sentencing. “These officials’ reaction to the scandal suggests that an individual can steal a million dollars from taxpayers and perpetrate a crime for nearly two decades, but still be considered — by some — as an environmental legend,” the Senate report states.

 

[SHOOTER13]

$10.8 Million for Childhood Obesity Including “Latino Fathers Promoting Healthy Youth Behavior”
MAY 31, 2016

The Obama administration just allocated another $10.8 million to tackle childhood obesity among minorities, including about $1 million to a project called “Latino Fathers Promoting Healthy Youth Behavior” that aims to prevent obesity among Latino youth in a “culturally and linguistically-appropriate prevention program.” It’s part of a federal initiative called Childhood Obesity Challenge Area that has doled out north of $166 million since the president and his wife launched it in 2011.

The cash flows through the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and funds all sorts of outrageous projects like the disastrous “healthy” public-school lunches that have resulted in massive waste and caused uproar among students and parents. First Lady Michelle Obama made it her mission to tackle this particular cause because child and adolescent obesity has tripled in the past 30 years, according to information released by the USDA’s special Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) Childhood Obesity Prevention Challenge Area. “Low income children and adolescents are more likely to be obese than their higher income counterparts, but the relationship is not consistent across race and ethnicity groups,” the agency states.

To deal with this epidemic the administration has dedicated a lot of taxpayer money, more than $166 million, according to USDA figures. This latest chunk is going to six universities that will find innovative ways to eradicate childhood obesity among this demographic. The “Latino Fathers Promoting Healthy Youth Behavior” project is getting $998,484 so that academics at the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis can conduct an eight-week study that addresses “paternal parenting practices related to the food and physical activity environment in the home.” Researchers claim that participation will “increase father involvement in positive parenting practices to address youth energy balance-related behaviors.” It appears that they convinced Uncle Sam to fund their project by claiming that few evidence-based interventions have specifically targeted Latino fathers of youth regarding parenting practices that impact youth behaviors. It will be modeled after another government-funded program called “Padres” designed to prevent tobacco and substance abuse among Latino youth by engaging families in culturally and linguistically-appropriate training.

The University of Kentucky will get $746,827 to develop a program called “Smart Shopping” aimed at improving the shopping practices of adolescents with the ultimate goal of increasing fruit and vegetable intake. This group of academics will conduct a community-wide analysis of the school, home and neighborhood food environments. It’s being promoted as “unique” because it will take into account the role that the school environment has in food procurement during the day and will incorporate information from multiple levels of the “social ecological framework.” This is described as home, school and community food environments as well as the social influence of peers. The University of Maryland in Baltimore is getting $943,287 to educate and train teachers and students to be “wellness champions” that specialize in the “tenets of health literacy.” Details are sketchy on this one, but Judicial Watch will continue monitoring it.

The University of New England in Maine will get $797,995 to promote fruit and vegetable purchases and consumption by families in “under-resourced communities.” This will reduce health disparities, improve human nutrition and prevent unhealthy weight gain among children, according to the USDA announcement. Candidates will be identified through food-stamp rolls in low-income neighborhoods so they’re already getting public assistance from the government. The rest of the money is going to the University of Montana to tackle an obesity rate among Native American children that is “double that of white youth in the state” and the University of Puerto Rico to develop culturally-sensitive and age-appropriate nutrition education materials.

Though 25.5% of adolescents on the island are overweight, “budget constraints to develop culturally-specific nutrition education materials for at-risk communities limit the possibilities of an effective obesity prevention program,” according to the grant announcement. “The need for culturally-and-age-sensitive educational materials in Spanish is imperative for the success of any obesity prevention initiative.”

 

[SHOOTER13]

Amid Surge DHS Tries Scaring Illegal Aliens from Entering U.S. with Media Campaign
JUNE 02, 2016

With record numbers of illegal immigrant minors still pouring into the United States through Mexico the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has turned to a media campaign—in lieu of increased border security—to try to stop the flow. Remember that this crisis started back in the summer of 2014, when hordes of Central American minors overwhelmed federal agents and mobilized various government agencies to deal with housing, health and safety issues associated with the new arrivals. The unfolding drama ignited a crisis that earned international headlines.

Though the news coverage has tapered off drastically since the initial 2014 influx the crisis has worsened and the numbers keep rising, according to the latest figures released by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP). Thousands of Unaccompanied Alien Children (UAC) as well as family units continue pouring into the country each month. The numbers have actually surpassed the record 2014 surge levels and they’re on track to break records, the new CBP stats show. This year 70,684 UACs and family units—mostly from Central America—have crossed the southwest border compared to 62,621 during the same period in 2014, when the influx originally started. The government stats also reveal that nearly double the number (5,219) of UACs crossed the southwest border in April, 2016 compared to the same month last year. The number of family units also nearly doubled from last year’s figures to 5,616. Illegal immigrants have also expanded their routes, with Arizona and western Texas ports of entry seeing huge increases in the number of UACs.

So what are the brilliant officials at DHS doing to solve this serious problem? They’ve launched a Spanish media campaign in hopes of scaring would-be illegal crossers from coming to the U.S. via the Mexican border. The experiment includes a series of 60-second Spanish videos featuring real-life illegal immigrants from Central America who share details of their frightening experience with human smugglers during their 1,600-mile trek to the U.S. In the first video released last week by CBP a young Central American mother, whose face is never shown, recounts her experience. The 49-second segment begins by flashing “No Arriesgue Su Vida” (“Don’t Risk Your Life”) before the woman starts telling her story. She says: “When I left my house I was crying and devastated because I left my daughter not knowing when I would see her again.” She goes on to say that she suffered a lot and encountered people that tried to sexually abuse her. “Sometimes you travel in tractor trailer boxes unable to breathe. At the end of it all, nothing was like they said it would be.” The video ends with a narrator saying in Spanish that the woman shared her story freely to warn about the risk and danger of traveling north towards the United States.

In a statement written in English, a CBP spokesperson says that the anonymous woman who appears in the video is one of thousands of Central American migrants, including UACs, who in recent years have endured a myriad of atrocities, sexual abuse, extortion, assault, kidnapping and exploitation by human smugglers. That’s enough to scare anyone contemplating the rigorous journey and the U.S. government has a plan in place to relay the message before the migrants embark on their trip north. It’s called Border Safety Initiative (BSI), a project in which the agency conducts border dangers messaging outreach to key Central American communities in California, Texas, Florida, New York and the Washington D.C. metropolitan areas. Evidently, the plan is that relatives living in those areas get the message back home in time to scare others from coming. We’ll have to wait for the next batch of CBP stats to see if it works.

 

[SHOOTER13]

DHS Quietly Moving, Releasing Vanloads of Illegal Aliens Away from Border
JUNE 03, 2016

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is quietly transporting illegal immigrants from the Mexican border to Phoenix and releasing them without proper processing or issuing court appearance documents, Border Patrol sources tell Judicial Watch. The government classifies them as Other Than Mexican (OTM) and this week around 35 were transferred 116 miles north from Tucson to a Phoenix bus station where they went their separate way. Judicial Watch was present when one of the white vans carrying a group of OTMs arrived at the Phoenix Greyhound station on Buckeye Road.

The OTMs are from Honduras, Colombia, El Salvador and Guatemala and Border Patrol officials say this week’s batch was in custody for a couple of days and ordered to call family members in the U.S. so they could purchase a bus ticket for their upcoming trip from Phoenix. Authorities didn’t bother checking the identity of the U.S. relatives or if they’re in the country legally, according to a Border Patrol official directly involved in the matter. American taxpayers pick up the fare for those who claim to have a “credible fear,” Border Patrol sources told JW. None of the OTMs were issued official court appearance documents, but were told to “promise” they’d show up for a hearing when notified, said federal agents with firsthand knowledge of the operation.

A security company contracted by the U.S. government is driving the OTMs from the Border Patrol’s Tucson Sector where they were in custody to Phoenix, sources said. The firm is called G4S and claims to be the world’s leading security solutions group with operations in more than 100 countries and 610,000 employees. G4S has more than 50,000 employees in the U.S. and its domestic headquarters is in Jupiter, Florida. Judicial Watch is filing a number of public records requests to get more information involving the arrangement between G4S and the government, specifically the transport of illegal immigrants from the Mexican border to other parts of the country. The photo accompanying this story shows the uniformed G4S guard that transported the OTMs this week from Tucson to Phoenix.

Outraged Border Patrol agents and supervisors on the front lines say illegal immigrants are being released in droves because there’s no room to keep them in detention. “They’re telling us to put them on a bus and let them go,” said one law enforcement official in Arizona. “Just move those bodies across the country.”

Officially, DHS denies this is occurring and in fact earlier this year U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner R. Gil Kerlikowske blasted Border Patrol union officials for denouncing this dangerous catch-and-release policy. Kerlikowske’s scolding came in response to the congressional testimony of Bandon Judd, chief of the National Border Patrol Council, the labor union that represents line agents. Judd told lawmakers on the House Judiciary Committee that illegal immigrants without serious criminal convictions can be released immediately and disappear into the shadows. Kerlikowske shot back, telling a separate congressional committee: “I would not stand by if the Border Patrol was — releasing people without going through all of the formalities.”

Yet, that’s exactly what’s occurring. This report, part of an ongoing Judicial Watch investigation into the security risks along the southern border, features only a snippet of a much broader crisis in which illegal aliens are being released and vanishing into unsuspecting American communities. The Senate Subcommittee on Immigration and the National Interest addressed this issue just a few weeks ago in a hearing called Declining Deportations and Increasing Criminal Alien Releases – The Lawless Immigration Policies of the Obama Administration. Judd, the Border Patrol Union chief, delivered alarming figures at the hearing.

He estimated that about 80% of apprehended illegal immigrants are released into the United States. This includes unaccompanied minors who are escorted to their final destination, family units and those who claim to have a credible fear of persecution in their native country. Single males that aren’t actually seen crossing into the U.S. by Border Patrol agents are released if they claim to have been in the country since 2014, Judd added.

 

[SHOOTER13]

Cartels, Corruption & Terrorism — An Investigation on the Mexican Border
JUNE 05, 2016

Cartels, corruption and terrorism have ignited a major security threat on the Mexican border. Islamic terrorists are training in southern border towns near American cities and have joined forces with Mexican drug cartels to infiltrate the United States. Judicial Watch spent the year investigating this national security crisis and interviewed local, state and federal law enforcement officials as well as military sources on both sides of the border. Our reporting confirmed that ISIS has a training cell just a few miles from El Paso, Texas in an area known as “Anapra” situated just west of Ciudad Juárez in the Mexican state of Chihuahua.

We also verified that Mexican drug cartels are smuggling foreigners from countries with terrorist links to stash areas in a rural Texas town called Acala. Judicial Watch also reported the latest development in a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) cover-up involving a narco-terror ringleader with ties to ISIS and Mexican drug cartels. As part of this investigative series, Judicial Watch has uncovered government corruption that allowed weapons from the U.S. into Mexico as part of a secret scheme called Operation Fast and Furious. Dozens of the Fast and Furious firearms have been recovered in Mexico where they were used to commit crimes by major Mexican drug cartels.

 

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Obama Touts Cuba Relations While It Still Appears on U.S Terrorist List Alongside Al Qaeda, Hamas
JUNE 07, 2016

In a quest to normalize relations Obama lifted sanctions against Cuba and celebrated being the first sitting U.S. president to visit the Communist island since 1928, but the Caribbean nation still appears on a crucial government terrorist list along with the world’s most violent Islamic groups. This contradiction indicates that, when it comes to our bloated government, the left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing.

Here’s some of the history. Before Obama “normalized” relations and lifted economic sanctions, Cuba for decades appeared on the State Department’s list of nation’s that sponsor terrorism. Its longtime communist regime is renowned for committing atrocious human rights violations and openly offering refuge to criminals on the run from U.S. justice. Among them is a Black Liberation Army leader on the FBI’s most wanted list after a prison escape following a conviction for murdering a New Jersey State Trooper. More recently, Medicare fraud ringleaders have escaped to Cuba after fleecing the U.S. government out of tens of millions of dollars.

Nevertheless, in 2014 Obama announced he was charting a new course in Cuba by “normalizing relations with a country just 90 miles off our coast.” This has included opening an American embassy in Havana (inaugurated with a flag-raising ceremony led by Secretary of State John Kerry), easing travel and export sanctions, reestablishing direct mail and establishing a bunch of “bi-lateral” commissions to deal with everything from human rights to human trafficking to business ventures and other shared interests. On May 29, 2015, the Obama administration rescinded Cuba’s designation as a state sponsor of terrorism, calling it “another step forward toward a more normal and productive relationship between the United States and Cuba.” Kerry had the final word on that.

However, Cuba still appears prominently—along with radical groups like Al Qaeda, Hamas and Hezbollah—in the latest Terrorist Assets Report released by the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC). This is the 2015 report to Congress on assets in the U.S. relating to terrorist countries and international terrorism program designees. OFAC is the government’s lead office responsible for implementing sanctions with respect to assets of international terrorist organizations and terrorism-supporting countries. Its mission is to administer and enforce economic and trade sanctions based on U.S. foreign policy and national security goals, the report states.

This means it administers sanctions programs targeting international terrorists and terrorist organizations and their supporters as well as countries that have been designated as a state sponsor of terrorism. Cuba is the country with the second-largest amount ($243.2 million) of assets frozen by Uncle Sam in 2015. Iran is the highest with nearly $2 billion. Sudan and Syria have $30.9 million and $25.9 million respectively.

“Based on available information, Cuba and each of the current state sponsors of terrorism own diplomatic and consular real property in the United States,” the new Treasury report says. “Cuba owns six blocked properties located in New York and Washington, D.C. Syria owns four blocked properties located in New York and Washington, D.C. Sudan owns seven blocked properties located in New Jersey, New York, Virginia, and Washington, D.C. Iran owns eleven blocked properties located in California, Illinois, Maryland, New York, Texas, and Washington, D.C.” The report also lists well-known terrorist groups whose assets have been frozen like Al Qaeda ($13,063,764), Hamas ($1,250,615) and Hezbollah ($8,277,178).

Weeks before this government document listing Cuba as a terrorist nation was released, the Obama administration let Cuban military and security officials access crucial U.S. military facilities in Florida. In April Cuban military agents, including the chief of investigations for the country’s National Revolutionary Police, were given a VIP tour of the U.S. Naval air base in Key West, Florida.

A few days later four Cuban national security officials were paraded around the Joint Interagency Task Force South, which is charged with monitoring and intercepting illicit drug trafficking in a region that’s notorious for narcotics activity. A mainstream newspaper editorial pointed out that the National Revolutionary Police chief “is not someone you’d expect to see as an honored guest of the U.S. military” because “he plays a key law enforcement role in a state where beating and arresting human rights activists is considered law enforcement.”

 

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DHS Ordered to Create Off-Duty Conduct Policy after Secret Service Scandals
JUNE 08, 2016

Following shameful debacles involving Secret Service agents getting drunk and hiring prostitutes during foreign travel details a federal audit is recommending that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) develop a policy for off-duty conduct abroad. The Secret Service inspired the probe but many other DHS agencies—including Customs and Border Protection (CBP), Coast Guard and Transportation Security Administration (TSA)—also have a substantial number of employees that travel and work in other countries. Apparently, the belief is that specific rules banning drunken sex scandals could help avoid more public embarrassments, though it’s difficult to imagine that members of an elite law enforcement agency don’t already know this.

“Off-duty misconduct can undermine the Department’s credibility and integrity and hinder its ability to achieve its mission,” the DHS Inspector General writes in a report issued a few days ago. “Our objective was to determine whether DHS has adequate policies and training governing off-duty conduct while abroad.” The answer is no, but you’d think common sense would kick in absent written rules. As we have seen in the last few years that hasn’t been the case. In 2012 a dozen Secret Service agents deployed to Cartagena, Colombia for President Obama’s world leaders’ summit trip engaged in wild partying that included lots of booze and hookers. A few years later a drunken Secret Service agent preparing for Obama’s visit to Amsterdam was found passed out in a hotel hallway after a night of partying.

“Neither DHS nor the six DHS components with the largest international presence have comprehensive policies and training to govern employees’ off-duty conduct while abroad,” the agency watchdog reveals. “DHS has some limited, department-wide policies for off-duty conduct in general, but they do not specifically address employee conduct abroad; the six components’ policies do not cover some aspects of conduct, such as drinking excessive amounts of alcohol and using drugs. DHS as a whole does not offer training in off-duty conduct for employees traveling and working abroad. One component offers training to those working abroad, but only one of the six offers training to both travelers and those working abroad.” In 2015, the agency had nearly 1,500 employees working in 80 countries, according to the audit.

There have been a number of domestic incidents as well. Agents crashed a car in the Florida Keys during an Obama family vacation and top-ranking Secret Service officials—including a member of the president’s personal detail—crashed their government vehicle into a White House security gate after a night of drinking. Could this be why in its official response to the report, DHS “disagreed with the underlying premise that any conduct policy covering DHS employees must specifically state it applies to off-duty conduct while traveling or working abroad.” It’s not clear if the agency wants to broaden the rules to apply domestically as well or if it simply doesn’t want to deal with the disgraceful off-duty conduct of its employees. Regardless, it’s a work in progress that is not expected to be completed for another year, the agency reveals in its response.

In a letter to the IG, the DHS liaison tries to be more diplomatic, though he doesn’t commit to actually issuing rules. He does however, promise that the Office of the Human Capital Officer will at least “provide information regarding drinking excessive amounts of alcohol, using illegal drugs, solicitation of commercial sex, and engaging in notoriously disgraceful conduct to employees who travel outside the United States.” Now the agency created after 9/11 to protect the nation from anther terrorist attack will gather and brainstorm. “The exact manner in which this will be done has not yet been determined,” DHS liaison Jim Crumpacker writes in his letter to DHS IG John Roth. He also warns that “it is important to recognize though that it is not possible to entirely eliminate the potential risk of employee wrongdoing.”

 

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U.S. Doesn’t Track if Millions in Business “Loans” to Refugees on Public Assistance Are Repaid
JUNE 10, 2016

The U.S. government gives refugees on public assistance special “loans” of up to $15,000 to start a business but fails to keep track of defaults that could translate into huge losses for American taxpayers, records obtained by Judicial Watch reveal. The cash is distributed through a program called Microenterprise Development run by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of Refugee Resettlement.

Since 2010 the program has granted thousands of loans to refugees that lack the financial resources, credit history or personal assets to qualify for business loans from commercial banks. Most if not all the recipients already get assistance or subsidies from the government, according to the qualification guidelines set by the Microenterprise Development Program. It’s a risky operation that blindly gives public funds to poor foreign nationals with no roots in the U.S. and there’s no follow up to assure the cash is paid back. The idea behind it is to “equip refugees with the skills they need to become successful entrepreneurs” by helping them expand or maintain their own business and become financially independent.

Earlier this year, Judicial Watch submitted a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to HHS for records related to the refugee business loan program. Specifically, JW asked for the number of loans that are written off per year and the amount of the write-off per defaulted loan. Unlike commercial banks or other lending institutions, HHS doesn’t keep track of default rates on loans issued through the Microenterprise program. This is astonishing considering that these are taxpayer dollars being furnished in the form of loans to foreign nationals granted refuge in the United States. An HHS official told JW the agency doesn’t have a tracking system in place to provide figures involving loan defaults. However, the agency is “preparing to collect this information in the future,” according to the records obtained by JW from the agency.

What we do know is that from 2010 to 2015, HHS gave a total of 3,096 of these so-called micro loans, the records show. In 2015 a record 558 loans were granted to refuges but it’s not clear for what amount. At the high end, if all 558 loans made last year were for the full $15,000 available to each refugee that would mean that HHS can’t account for an astounding $8.37 million. Here’s the rest of the breakdown, according to the records furnished by HHS as a result of JW’s FOIA request; in 2010 the agency granted 550 micro loans; in 2011, 541; 2012, 437; 2013, 466; 2014, 544. That’s a big chunk of change. The last year HHS filed an official annual report on this questionable cash giveaway was 2011. No official records have been made available to the public since then, which is why JW launched an investigation. According to the 2011 annual report, which resembles a promotional brochure, the default rate is only 3% but no further details or breakdown is offered making the information less than credible.

HHS is not the only government agency doling out huge sums of cash for this cause, though its focus on refugees appears to be unique. Others, such as the U.S. Agency of International Development (USAID), the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Department of Labor (DOL) also dedicate hundreds of millions of dollars to various microenterprise causes. For instance, in one recent year alone USAID spent $223 million on microenterprise development activities, according to figures released by the agency. The USDA also allocates large sums to provide loans and grants to microenterprise development through a special “Rural Microloan Revolving Fund” and the DOL regularly pours lots of money into various microenterprise projects that are promoted as workforce investments in areas with high rates of poverty.

 

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Judicial Watch: Court Should Not Seal Clinton IT Official Immunity Agreements
JUNE 10, 2016

Justice Department Files Last Minute Brief Supporting Immunity Agreement Secrecy

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch today announced that it filed an opposition motion to Clinton email witness Bryan Pagliano’s attempt to file immunity agreements ex parte and under seal. Also, Judicial Watch asked the court to deny Pagliano’s effort to avoid videotaping of his deposition, during which he plans to assert his Fifth Amendment right.

Judicial Watch attorneys argue to U.S. District Court Emmett Sullivan that Pagliano’s immunity agreement should be made publicly available:

Mr. Pagliano’s request to file his immunity agreements ex parte and under seal is unfounded. First, the Court ordered Mr. Pagliano to file a memorandum, along with a copy of his reported immunity agreements. The Court did not order the immunity agreements to be filed ex parte or under seal and could have done so…as this Court has repeatedly emphasized, this case is about the public’s “right to know details related to the creation, purpose, and use of the clintonemail.com system.”
The brief also notes that the court can draw adverse inferences from any assertion of the Fifth Amendment in the civil lawsuit and that there is little chance that Pagliano could not answer some, if not all, of Judicial Watch’s questions without having to assert his Fifth Amendment rights.

The Obama administration today filed a “Statement of Interest” supporting continued secrecy of the Pagliano immunity agreements. The government’s brief states that “releasing Mr. Pagliano’s agreements with the United States could prematurely reveal the scope and focus of the pending investigation.”

Mr. Pagliano is the Clinton State Department IT political appointee who reportedly provided support for the Clinton email system.

“Simply put, we need to see Pagliano’s immunity agreements so our attorneys are able to prepare his questions – especially if he’s going to assert his Fifth Amendment privilege,” stated Tom Fitton, Judicial Watch president. “We have faced astonishing roadblocks to getting simple questions answered about the Clinton email system.”

Previously, Judge Sullivan issued a court order requiring Pagliano to produce any reported immunity agreement and identify the legal basis for the Fifth Amendment claim he plans to assert in Judicial Watch’s discovery into the Clinton email system. The order delayed Pagliano’s deposition, which had been scheduled for Monday, June 6th.

This discovery arises in a Judicial Watch Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit that seeks records about the controversial employment status of Huma Abedin, former deputy chief of staff to Clinton. The lawsuit was reopened because of revelations about the clintonemail.com system. (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of State (No. 1:13-cv-01363)).

Judge Sullivan ordered that all deposition transcripts be made publicly available.

 

[John A.]

I understand this thread is more in regards to Obama, but since this happened under his watch, I am going to include it here since he appointed her and was in regular correspondence with her concerning foreign affairs.

Reports that "wikileaks" are going to publish more of Hillary Clintons emails will be forthcoming.

And in my opinion, if wikileaks has access to even a single email that had not been discolsed to congress and or had been classified or top secret, far as I am concerned, all of them were intercepted by any foreign nation that wished.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/wikileaks-says-publish-more-hillary-074044808.html?nhp=1

Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, has said his organisation is preparing to publish more emails Hillary Clinton sent and received while US secretary of state.


In March, wikileaks set up a searchable database that archives 30,322 emails and email attachments sent to and from Clinton between June 2010 and August 2014

https://wikileaks.org/clinton-emails/

 

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Orlando Terrorist Worked at Security Co. Hired by DHS to Transport, Release Illegal Aliens
JUNE 13, 2016

The ISIS terrorist who committed the worst mass shooting in U.S. history worked for a security company contracted by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to protect federal facilities nationwide and transport illegal immigrants apprehended in the southern border region.

Earlier this month Judicial Watch launched an investigation into the Florida-based security firm, G4S, after breaking a story about illegal immigrants being quietly transported from the Mexican border to Phoenix and getting released without proper processing or court appearance documents.

G4S was contracted by DHS to drive the group of illegal aliens, classified as Other Than Mexican (OTM), from the Border Patrol’s Tucson Sector where they were in custody to a Phoenix bus station where they went their separate way. The OTMs were from Honduras, Colombia, El Salvador and Guatemala and Border Patrol officials told Judicial Watch they were in custody for a couple of days and ordered to call family members in the U.S. so they could purchase a bus ticket. Authorities didn’t bother checking the identity of the U.S. relatives or if they’re in the country legally, according to a Border Patrol official directly involved in the matter.

Judicial Watch was on the scene when several vanloads of OTMs arrived at the Phoenix Greyhound station on Buckeye Road just a few days ago. A photo accompanying our story shows one of the uniformed G4S guards that drove a vanload of OTMs from Tucson to Phoenix earlier this month. G4S claims to be the world’s leading security solutions group with operations in more than 100 countries and 610,000 employees. G4S has more than 50,000 employees in the U.S. and its domestic headquarters is in Jupiter, Florida. Judicial Watch has filed a number of public records requests to get more information involving the arrangement between G4S and the government, specifically the transport of illegal immigrants from the Mexican border to other parts of the country.

The investigation will expand to include documents and information pertinent to Omar Mir Seddique Mateen, an Afghan-American with two firearms licenses and a security officer license. Early Sunday morning the veteran G4S security guard carried out the savage attack in an Orlando nightclub, killing 49 and injuring dozens of others. A multitude of media reports have confirmed that Mateen worked for G4S for nearly a decade even though he had been investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) for terrorist ties. In one Florida newspaper report the security company confirms that Mateen has been a security guard, with a firearms license, since September 10, 2007. A former co-worker told another Florida media outlet that Mateen regularly made threats of violence and that he was an angry, loud, profane man who used slurs for gay people, blacks, Jews and women.

In 2013 Mateen was investigated by the FBI for terrorism ties and his connections to an American named Moner Mohammad Abu-Salha who carried out a suicide bombing in Syria. Both men are from the Ft. Pierce area in Florida’s so-called “Treasure Coast.” The federal probe didn’t seem to impact Mateen’s work at G4S however, because there was no disruption in his employment, even after he openly praised ISIS. This is astounding considering that the agency created after 9/11 to prevent another terrorist attack has a $234 million contract with G4S to provide security services for a number of federal agencies, including the nation’s nuclear facilities and the departments of Labor, Justice, Energy, State as well as the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).

Ironically, the government’s contract with G4S stipulates that the company helps identify “suspected terrorists” trying to enter the U.S. and helps the feds with emergency responses to terror threats.

 

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“Islamic Refugee” With Gas Pipeline Plans Arrested in New Mexico Border County
JUNE 15, 2016

Police in a U.S. town bordering Mexico have apprehended an undocumented, Middle Eastern woman in possession of the region’s gas pipeline plans, law enforcement sources tell Judicial Watch. Authorities describe the woman as an “Islamic refugee” pulled over during a traffic stop by a deputy sheriff in Luna County, New Mexico which shares a 54-mile border with Mexico. County authorities alerted the U.S. Border Patrol and the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) Joint Terrorism Task Forces (JTTF) has been deployed to the area to investigate, sources with firsthand knowledge of the probe confirm.

The gas pipeline plans in the woman’s possession include the Deming region, law enforcement sources say. Deming is a Luna County city situated about 35 miles north of the Mexican border and 60 miles west of Las Cruces. It has a population of about 15,000. Last year one local publication listed Deming No. 1 on a list of the “ten worst places” to live in New Mexico due to high unemployment, poverty, crime and a horrible public education system. The entire region is a High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA), according to the Justice Department’s National Drug Intelligence Center due to the large amounts of methamphetamines, heroin, cocaine and marijuana smuggled through the state by Mexican traffickers. Specifically, the renowned Juárez and Sinaloa cartels operate in the area, the feds affirm in a report.

Judicial Watch has broken a number of stories in the last few years about Mexican drug traffickers smuggling Islamic terrorists into the United States through the porous southern border. Last summer high-level sources on both sides of the Mexico-U.S. border offered alarming details about an operation in which cartels smuggle foreigners from countries with terrorist links into a small Texas rural town near El Paso. Classified as Special Interest Aliens (SIA) by the U.S. government, the foreigners get transported to stash areas in Acala, a rural crossroads located around 54 miles from El Paso on a state road – Highway 20. Once in the U.S., the SIAs wait for pick-up in the area’s sand hills just across Highway 20.

A few months ago Judicial Watch reported that members of a cell of Islamic terrorists stationed in Mexico cross into the U.S. to explore targets for future attacks with the help of Mexican drug traffickers. Among the jihadists that travel back and forth through the porous southern border is a Kuwaiti named Shaykh Mahmood Omar Khabir, an ISIS operative who lives in the Mexican state of Chihuahua not far from El Paso, Texas. Khabir trained hundreds of Al Qaeda fighters in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Yemen and has lived in Mexico for more than a year, according to Judicial Watch’s high-level Homeland Security sources. Now Khabir trains thousands of men—mostly Syrians and Yemenis—to fight in an ISIS base situated in the Mexico-U.S. border region near Ciudad Juárez. Khabir actually brags in a European newspaper article about how easy it is to stake out American targets because the border region is wide open. In the same story Foreign Affairs Secretary Claudia Ruiz, Mexico’s top diplomat, says she doesn’t understand why the Obama administration and the U.S. media are “culpably neglecting this phenomenon,” adding that “this new wave of fundamentalism could have nasty surprises in store for the United States.”

This recent New Mexico incident brings to mind a story Judicial Watch broke less than a year ago involving five young Middle Eastern men apprehended by Border Patrol in an Arizona town (Amado) situated about 30 miles from the Mexican border. Two of the Middle Eastern men were carrying stainless steel cylinders in backpacks, alarming Border Patrol officials enough to call the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for backup. A multitude of federal agents descended on the property and the two men carrying the cylinders were believed to be taken into custody by the FBI. Only three of the men’s names were entered in the Border Patrol’s E3 reporting system, which is used by the agency to track apprehensions, detention hearings and removals of illegal immigrants. E3 also collects and transmits biographic and biometric data including fingerprints for identification and verification of individuals encountered at the border.

The other two men were listed as “unknown subjects,” which is unheard of. “In all my years I’ve never seen that before,” a veteran federal law enforcement agent told Judicial Watch.

 

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U.S. Spends More on Medical Care for Inmates than Seniors, Veterans, Military Personnel
JUNE 21, 2016

NO SURPRISES HERE...

President Obama has repeatedly demonstrated that there’s an extra special place in his heart for incarcerated criminals, but this is a bit much. The administration spends a lot more money on the medical care of jailed convicts than retired seniors on Medicare, active U.S. military personnel or veterans, including an extra $100 million in one year alone, according to a federal audit released this month.

The Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) consistently pays outside doctors and hospitals more to treat inmates than Medicare or other federal agencies would pay for the same services, according to the report which is the result of a Department of Justice (DOJ) Inspector General investigation. “We found that the BOP is the only federal agency that pays for medical care that is not covered under a statute or regulation under which the government sets the agency’s reimbursement rates, usually at the Medicare rate,” the report states. “Instead, the BOP solicits and awards a comprehensive medical services contract for each BOP institution to obtain outside medical services.”

This means the BOP negotiates its own rates for medical services, which is outrageous and ends up costing American taxpayers tens of millions of dollars annually. Without the cost regulations that apply to all other federal agencies, the BOP pays a premium above applicable Medicare rates for medical care. In fiscal year 2014, for instance, the BOP spent at least $100 million more for medical care than it would have if it had paid Medicare rates. Other law enforcement agencies, including those within the DOJ like the U.S. Marshals Service and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), stay within the Medicare rates to provide outside medical services for individuals in their custody. So does the Department of Defense (DOD), the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and the Indian Health Service to treat members of the military and their dependents, veterans and Native Americans.

In many cases the same medical providers that work for other federal agencies, charge the BOP a premium above the Medicare rate when treating inmates, the DOJ watchdog reveals. From fiscal year 2010 to 2014, BOP spending for outside medical services increased 24%, from $263 million to $327 million and the figure is only going to increase. “Medical spending constitutes a significant and increasing portion” of the BOP’s budget, the IG found. Specifically, the agency spent $905 million of its $6.2 billion budget on inmate medical care in one year alone, according to the figures provided in the report. This includes salaried BOP medical staff, prescription drugs, medical supplies and outside providers. In all, the agency purchases outside medical care at inflated rates for more than 170,000 inmates nationwide at a cost of more than $300 million annually. The contracts have reimbursement rates at least 15% above the Medicare benchmark rate, the report says.

The BOP claims its medical needs are more complex than other agencies because it provides chronic care for numerous inmates. Because medical providers have the choice not to treat inmates, the agency claims that it must pay extra. That still doesn’t explain why the government spends more money on the medical care of incarcerated criminals than active military personnel, veterans or senior citizens. Just because this information is out in the open doesn’t necessarily mean anything will happen to correct the problem, which is par for the course in government. The agency watchdog suggests convening a “working group” to find ways for the BOP to manage its medical costs and recommends that the agency improve the collection and analysis of data for inmate medical care. This will buy time, but it’s unlikely to result in any concrete action to cut the waste.

In the meantime federal inmates will continue to receive special treatment as long as Obama lives in the White House. Obama is the first sitting president to visit a federal prison and meet with inmates as part of his criminal justice reform movement. In 2010 the commander-in-chief proudly signed a law that, for the first time in decades, relaxed drug-crime sentences he claimed discriminated against minority offenders. Last year the administration released thousands of drug convicts from federal prisons around the country whose sentences were too long. In the aftermath of that mass release, the administration has spent huge amounts of taxpayer funds to help the prematurely discharged convicts reintegrate into society. This includes housing and job programs.

 

[CaddmannQ]

Well at least once we toss them out they have to start paying for Obamacare, right?