Senator Mark Kelly defended the foreign terrorist sympathizer deported recently by the Trump administration: Dr. Rasha Alawieh, a Lebanese kidney transplant specialist and Brown University professor.
Kelly described Alawieh to constituents as a “talented transplant doctor” and a “lawful H1B visa holder” during a town hall on Monday. Kelly failed to mention Alawieh was deported for attending the funeral of terrorist Hassan Nasrallah — Hezbollah’s late longtime leader — and defending the terrorist to immigration agents. Instead, Kelly alleged her deportation had no justification.
“She was tossed out of the country because she visited some relatives in, I think, Lebanon, or somewhere. So, thrown out without cause, without due process. So we’re up against an administration that does not follow the rules, I think it’s very fair to say, and in some cases breaking laws,” said Kelly.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) explained Alawieh was deported for openly admitting her support of Nassrallah to Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers. Alawieh was in the country as a kidney transplant specialist.
“A visa is a privilege not a right—glorifying and supporting terrorists who kill Americans is grounds for visa issuance to be denied. This is commonsense security,” stated DHS.
Court documents revealed Alawieh had photos supportive of Nasrallah along with Iran’s leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, on her phone. Alawieh’s legal counsel withdrew recently from her case, citing “further diligence” as their cause for dropping her as a client.
“Dr. Alawieh stated that Nasrallah is the leader of Hezbollah and as a Shia Muslim, he is highly regarded in the Shia community as a religious figure,” stated the prosecutors. “According to Dr. Alawieh, she follows him for his religious and spiritual teachings and not his politics.”
Kelly made the remarks during a town hall with fellow Senator Ruben Gallego on Monday.
The pair came home this week to disseminate their Democratic leadership’s talking points criticizing the House Republican-led budget as a threat to Medicaid.
House Republicans’ proposed budget (HCR 14) looks to reduce spending by $880 billion. The House approved the plan last month. In response, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries claimed the budget plan would issue “the largest cut to Medicaid in American history,” since the committee charged by the proposed budget to find cuts, the House Energy and Commerce Committee, mainly oversees Medicaid funding (93 percent of its oversight, per the Congressional Budget Office).
House Republicans contested the Democrats’ claim, arguing the budget plan doesn’t mention Medicaid.
While Kelly admitted the mass cancellations of Medicaid hadn’t occurred yet, he said it was a “high probability.” Kelly said Trump’s “giant tax cut” benefited “millionaires and billionaires” mainly.
“All of this stuff you’re hearing every single day is so they give a big giant tax cut to people who don’t need a tax cut. We can raise the taxes of billionaires, and they will still be billionaires, and that’s what we should be doing, we shouldn’t be cutting these services” said Kelly.
Kelly predicted the Trump administration’s changes to Medicaid and Medicare would include additional red tape that would prevent people from getting on or staying on Medicaid, and possibly cutting the match funding number for states.
With reduced or eliminated Medicaid and Medicare, Kelly predicted people would “get sicker” and come to rely on emergency room visits as their primary form of health care, consequently driving up health care costs. Gallego echoed this assessment.
“You will see these emergency rooms become the primary care doctors,” said Gallego.
“This hasn’t happened yet, and it’s possible we can prevent it from happening,” said Kelly.
Kelly proposed expanding access to Medicaid and Medicare as well as increasing taxes on the wealthy as the remedies for reducing health care costs.
According to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), Arizona has about 780,000 individuals enrolled in Medicare and over 483,000 enrolled in a prescription drug plan only out of over 1.5 million individuals recorded as Medicare eligible in the state.
“There’s no way they can get to those tax cuts without Medicaid. The math doesn’t math,” said Gallego.
Gallego said he thought Republicans were “dumb enough” to go after Medicaid, but perhaps not Medicare.
“In order for them to cut $850 billion from a very narrow slice, that means they’re going to have to go deep,” said Gallego.
Kelly disagreed, saying Republicans were “dumb enough” to go after Medicare.
Gallego predicted certain working families above the federal poverty line but still within Arizona eligibility levels would be cut from Medicaid.
Gallego and Kelly encouraged a mass grassroots response to oppose the Trump administration.
AZ Free News is your #1 source for Arizona news and politics. You can send us news tips using this link.
The Trump administration announced its plans for continuing construction of Arizona’s border wall over the weekend.
The continuance of the border wall is the latest in a series of efforts underway by the Trump administration to undo the consequences of former President Joe Biden’s open borders policies.
On Sunday, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem announced the agency’s intent to construct seven miles of border wall where none exists along the Arizona border.
“As of today we’re starting seven new miles of construction,” said Noem. “We’re going to continue to make America safe again.”
Announcing today – we’re building 7 more miles of wall.
Former President Joe Biden all but made good on his campaign promise to not build “another foot” of the border wall during his administration.
The Biden administration sold the parts necessary to complete the border wall in secret. The Pentagon took the profits of the sales.
In January, a federal court ruled against the Biden administration over its efforts to sell off as much of the border wall as possible prior to Trump taking office.
Under Biden, there were over 8.8 million southwest border encounters.
Around the time of Trump’s election last November, border encounters began to drop significantly. Encounters dropped 61 percent from November 2023 to last November, 68 percent from December 2023 to last December, and 65 percent from last January to this January.
During Trump’s first month in office (last month), border encounters dropped significantly further, returning to the low five digits.
Border encounters dropped by 93 percent from the February 2024 total, 92 percent from the February 2023 total, 93 percent from the February 2022 total, and 88 percent from the February 2021 total.
Last week, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) released the “CBP Home” mobile application. The free app allows individuals to “self-deport” by notifying the government of their intent to depart the country. It also enables individuals to check border wait times at legal ports of entry, apply for provisional I-94 entry, request an inspection of agriculture or biological products, and submit a travelers manifest for bus operators.
On Monday, Trump issued a proclamation invoking the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to hasten deportations. The proclamation primarily addressed the foreign terrorist organizations Tren de Aragua, declaring the entity to be “undertaking hostile actions and conducting irregular warfare” against the nation. The proclamation allowed for the immediate apprehension, detention, and removal of terrorist organization members lacking citizenship, while also allowing Noem to apprehend and remove all other illegal immigrants as well.
“As President of the United States and Commander in Chief, it is my solemn duty to protect the American people from the devastating effects of this invasion,” stated the proclamation.
Trump defended his proclamation to reporters aboard Air Force One on Sunday, doubling down on his characterization of Biden’s border crisis as an “invasion” necessitating wartime measures.
“This is a time of war because Biden allowed millions of people, many of them criminals, many of them at the highest level. Other nations empty their jails into the United States,” he said. “It’s an invasion.”
AZ Free News is your #1 source for Arizona news and politics. You can send us news tips using this link.
When Donald Trump assumed the presidency, two allies of the U.S., Israel and Ukraine, were mired in bloody wars with ancient enemies. Both desperately needed more military aid in the effort to defeat their heavily armed foes.
Biden had granted both only enough military aid to enable them to not lose, but not enough to win. Moreover, the arms they received came with the condition that they not be used to inflict serious damage to their enemy. Trump could have helped turn the tide, but instead he snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.
The Oct. 7 surprise attack by jihadists on innocent Israelis was just the latest in a centuries long string of atrocities inflicted by Muslim terrorists who devote their lives to killing Jews. Bitter experience had taught Israelis that agreements with terrorists were essentially useless so, for the safety of his people, President Netanyahu resolved to destroy Hamas.
Soon after hostilities began, the Biden government and other erstwhile friends began demanding a cease-fire, thwarting the original war aims. Grief-stricken Israelis understandably became restive over their families and friends being held hostage and demanded negotiations to secure their release.
Yet for terrorists, hostages are a key tactic in waging successful warfare. Because of the sharp contrast in how the two sides value human life, jihadists are able to command one-sided hostage swaps of up to 100 terrorists returned to duty for each civilian exchanged, plus other concessions.
But help was on the way. Our new president posted that none of this would have happened had he been in office and that he would now personally end the conflict. Ignoring the established wisdom of not negotiating with hostage takers, he vowed to apply his famed dealmaking skills to the problem, earning short term praise while simultaneously ensuring that there would be more hostages in the future.
So far, the promises aren’t working out. The war hasn’t ended. Hamas shamefully cheated on the hostage swap, retaining live hostages to maintain pressure on Israel. Worse, the Israelis will almost certainly not be free from the threat of attacks by Hamas and other Iranian proxies.
Meanwhile, Ukraine had suffered an unprovoked attack three years earlier by Russian strongman Vladimir Putin, who correctly surmised that the fearful and weak Biden administration would not provide robust aid and that without U.S. support, “Ukraine could not win a prolonged war against Russia”.
When Trump was elected, victory was at least thinkable with some additional aid because Ukraine’s troops had fought so courageously to defend their nation and their freedom.
Trump, however, saw it differently. This was another dealmaking opportunity. In January, he had told Putin, “We can do it the easy way or the hard way.” Yet a month later he was putting greater pressure on Kyiv to make concessions than on Moscow
When Zelenskyy balked at prospectively agreeing to ultimatums produced by the Trump-Putin negotiations, from which he was excluded, his relationship with Trump cratered. Suddenly, according to Trump, Zelensky was a badly dressed “modestly successful comedian” who had talked Biden out of $350 billion in military aid (a huge exaggeration).
Zelensky was charged with showing insufficient “respect” and “gratefulness” to his new masters. More preposterously, Trump wrote that Zelensky shouldn’t have started the war in the first place, which of course he didn’t do.
Luckily, Trump wrote, “We are successfully negotiating an end to the war with Russia, something all admit only ‘TRUMP’ and the Trump administration can do.” To teach Zelensky a lesson, Trump temporarily shut off all munitions and intelligence aid to Ukrainian troops.
Zelensky is being forced into the defeat option, which had been available to him all along. He stands to lose a big chunk of his country and the goals for which his people sacrificed so much.
Netanyahu was also put in a difficult position by Trump’s “rescue” and the relentless pressure to settle with his oppressors. He can now look forward to a future of more jihadist attacks and more hostage-taking. Tehran and Moscow are reportedly happy with the results.
We may come to regret insisting on domination rather than support of our allies. In a changing world, you can’t have too many friends.
Dr. Thomas Patterson, former Chairman of the Goldwater Institute, is a retired emergency physician. He served as an Arizona State senator for 10 years in the 1990s, and as Majority Leader from 93-96. He is the author of Arizona’s original charter schools bill.
The Trump administration has been hard at work dismantling offices of “environmental justice” in the federal government.
Last week, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that it began implementing Trump’s executive order “Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing.” The agency placed on leave 171 employees in DEI and environmental justice offices.
The EPA intends to close the Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights, The Washington Post reported. Trump appointees at the Justice Department announced they would restructure the Department of Justice’s Environment and Natural Resources Division.
Shortly after her confirmation, Attorney General Pam Bondi rescinded any “memoranda, guidance, or similar directive that implement the prior administration’s ‘environmental justice’ agenda.”
“Going forward, the Department will evenhandedly enforce all federal civil and criminal laws, including environmental laws,” Bondi noted.
Why does this matter?
“Environmental justice” refers to the toxic brew of critical race theory and climate alarmism. According to critical race theory, America is institutionally racist against black people and other minorities and in favor of white people. According to climate alarmism, the burning of fossil fuels will bring about Armageddon.
The EPA defines “environmental justice” as ensuring that Americans “are fully protected from disproportionate and adverse human health and environmental effects (including risks) and hazards, including those related to climate change, the cumulative impacts of environmental and other burdens, and the legacy of racism or other structural or systemic barriers” (emphasis added).
Trump entered office promising to unleash American energy and reverse the Biden administration’s promotion of critical race theory and its application in the “diversity, equity, and inclusion” movement. This diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) movement aims to promote some racial minorities, rejecting the colorblind approach of focusing on merit or competence.
While President George H.W. Bush established the EPA’s Office of Environmental Equity — the office that President Bill Clinton would later rename the Office of Environmental Justice — President Joe Biden hypercharged its mission, directing all-of-government efforts on DEI, restrictions on fossil fuels, and a promotion of less reliable forms of energy, like wind and solar.
In doing so, Biden followed the demands of activist groups, many of which staffed and advised his administration.
As I note in my book, “The Woketopus: The Dark Money Cabal Manipulating the Federal Government,” Biden tapped climate alarmists for key leadership positions.
Biden picked Michael Regan, a vice president at the Environmental Defense Fund, to head up the EPA. He selected Laura Daniel-Davis, a vice president at the National Wildlife Federation (NWF), to serve at the Department of the Interior. He nominated Tracey Stone-Manning, another NWF staffer who confessed to typing out a letter on behalf of tree-spiking eco-terrorists, to head the Bureau of Land Management.
Gina McCarthy, who headed EPA under President Barack Obama, became president of the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) until Biden appointed her national climate adviser.
When Trump moved against the EPA’s environmental justice office, NRDC released a statement condemning the move as a “disgrace.” Who did NRDC enlist to make the statement? None other than Matthew Tejada, who directed the Office of Environmental Justice from 2013 to 2022.
“The Trump EPA is abandoning the communities across our nation that need help the most,” Tejada said. “Shuttering the environmental justice office will mean more toxic contaminants, dangerous air, and unsafe water in communities across the nation that have been most harmed by pollution in the past.”
That conclusion, of course, relies on the assumptions of critical race theory and climate alarmism, however. If America is not institutionally racist but rather a country with civil rights laws that protect citizens of all races from discrimination, the EPA does not need an “environmental justice” office to combat pollution for Americans of specific skin colors.
If the predictions of climate disaster are overblown and based on false assumptions that exaggerate the risks when actual deaths from climate disaster have declined by 99% over the past century, then perhaps the EPA need not invest extra funds in an office of environmental justice. If fossil fuels have gotten substantially cleaner, perhaps the EPA should focus on specific air quality issues, rather than premonitions of global climate doom.
This seems to be at least part of the reasoning behind EPA’s restructure.
“Under President Trump, the EPA will be focused on our core mission to protect human health and the environment, while Powering the Great American Comeback,” EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said in a statement Tuesday. “The previous Administration used DEI and Environmental Justice to advance ideological priorities, distributing billions of dollars to organizations in the name of climate equity. This ends now.”
“We will be good stewards of tax dollars and do everything in our power to deliver clean air, land, and water to every American, regardless of race, religion, background, and creed,” he added.
While pollution affects Americans in different ways, the EPA need not indulge in critical race theory and climate alarmism to effectively combat the real threats Americans face. Rather than addressing supposed institutional racism and fossil fuel-induced disaster, the EPA should focus on its actual mission: protecting Americans from concrete instances of pollution and environmental harms.
Of course, those humdrum concerns don’t require as much federal funding and staff — and that might explain the real reason behind the Left’s freakout over Trump’s move.
Tyler O’Neil is a contributor to The Daily Caller News Foundation, managing editor of The Daily Signal, and the author of two books: “Making Hate Pay: The Corruption of the Southern Poverty Law Center,” and “The Woketopus: The Dark Money Cabal Manipulating the Federal Government.”
In a bipartisan effort between Republican Congressman Eli Crane (AZ) and Democrat Congressman Mike Levin (CA), the “Hire Veterans Act” was reintroduced to the U.S. House of Representatives. If enacted, the bill would employ U.S. military veterans in vacant, critical roles within the U.S. Forest Service, National Park Service, and Bureau of Land Management.
According to Crane, all three of the federal land management agencies have been suffering from serious staffing shortages that have negatively impacted their operational effectiveness. In particular, both Congressmen cited the U.S. Forest Service facing an ongoing struggle to recruit and train staff in multiple critical roles with what they referred to as “a noticeable gap in the experience and skill sets of candidates, affecting their capacity to address increasing wildfire threats.”
“As a 13-year veteran of the U.S. Navy, I’m all too familiar with the obstacles servicemen and women face when transitioning to civilian life. I’m also well-aware of the challenges our federal land management agencies currently face, particularly in filling vacancies for firefighters, park rangers, and foresters,” said Crane in a press release.
As reported by the New York Times, 3,400 employees from the U.S. Forest Service were terminated by the Trump Administration on Thursday, amounting to approximately 10% of the service’s workforce. Many of the newer employees would have been hired under the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion regimen of the Biden Administration.
“With this bill, Congress has the opportunity to both streamline the employment process for veterans AND better ensure that our natural resources are protected for future generations. I’m grateful to be able to introduce this legislation that serves our veterans while furthering the responsible stewardship of U.S. land,” Crane added.
“Our veterans sacrifice so much for our nation. We have an obligation to ensure that veterans returning to civilian life can get jobs and support their families,” said Rep. Levin. “I’m glad to be partnering with Rep. Crane on our bipartisan bill to expand opportunities for veterans and help connect them to jobs in federal land management agencies. I look forward to working with my colleagues to advance this important legislation.”
According to a press release from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), which manages the Forest Service, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins issued a memorandum to rescind all Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility (DEIA) programs and celebrations. Instead, the USDA will reprioritize unity, equality, meritocracy, and color-blind policies.
Rollins said in her opening remarks at the USDA, “We will neither commemorate nor celebrate our immutable characteristics, neither among ourselves nor among Americans at large. We will instead celebrate the things that make us American: merit, faith, and liberty first among them. All Americans deserve equal dignity, and at this Department they will receive it. On this precipice of the 250th anniversary of our Revolution, we will rededicate ourselves to ‘the proposition that all men are created equal.’”
