Mitch McConnell Defends Pro-Illegal Immigration Judge in Trump Case: ‘All of Us Came Here from Somewhere Else’

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by JULIA HAHN6 Jun 2016Washington D.C.1,312

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is defending Trump University Judge Gonzalo Curiel from Donald Trump’s recent criticism. In particular, Trump has expressed concern that Curiel is biased against him because of Trump’s pledge to enforce U.S. immigration law, build a wall along the Southern border, and keep American jobs from going to Mexico.

“This is a man who was born in Indiana,” McConnell said while defending Judge Curiel on Meet The Press. “All of us came here from somewhere else. Almost all Americans are either near term immigrants like my wife, who came here at age eight… or the rest of us whose ancestors were risk takers who got up from wherever they were, and came here and made this country great. That’s an important part of what makes America work.”

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McConnell’s comments come in the wake of recent attempts to ramp up the narrative that Trump is allegedly anti-Latino.

For instance, during her recent foreign policy speech, Hillary Clinton reprised the attack that Trump “calls Mexican immigrants ‘rapists and murderers.’” However, what Trump actually said is that Mexico sends rapists and criminals across the border—which government data suggests is quite literally true.

A 2011 government report found approximately three million arrest offenses attached to the incarcerated criminal alien population—which the report defined as an immigrant who has not been naturalized. Of these offenses, 70,000 were sexual offenses, 213,000 were for assault, and 25,000 were for homicides. The report notes that the majority of the 296,000 SCAAP [State Criminal Alien Assistance Program] criminal alien incarcerations in state and local jails were from Mexico.

Yet most recently, the narrative that Trump is “anti-Latino” has tended to focus on two main stories: Trump’s criticism of the judge presiding over the Trump University case, and Trump’s criticism of New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez.

However, just as the media failed to reporton alien crime rates when discussing Trump’s comments about illegal alien crime last summer, so too is the media now leaving out critical facts about these stories.

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For instance, while Mitch McConnell, Newt Gingrich, and members of corporate media have attacked Trump for his criticism of Judge Curiel, they did not mention Curiel’s status as a member of the La Raza Lawyers of San Diego. La Raza literally translates to mean “the race.” Nor did they mention that Curiel “oversaw the gift of a law school scholarship to an illegal alien,” as the Daily Caller reported. Separately, the media rarely reports that the legal firm behind the lawsuit gave money to the Clintons.

The Daily Caller notes that the La Raza Lawyers of San Diego is not a local chapter of the National Council of La Raza, and the San Diego group claims to protest the literal translation of its organization’s name— arguing that they are made up of different races.

While it’s gone largely ignored by corporate media, Ann Coulter has pointed out the implications of Curiel’s decision to join a group that views his profession through the prism of his ethnicity— and joined, not just a Hispanic association, but a group that seems to have more explicitly racial connotations. Coulter tweeted, “Re: Trump University — Would liberals accept a white judge — under any circumstances — who was a member of a White Race organization?” Indeed, if the judge had been Caucasian and was a member of a Caucasian advancement group, one could imagine that anything the judge had ever said or written would be completely parsed out by the public.

The significance of this is underscored by the fact that as a judge sworn to “faithfully and impartially” perform the duties incumbent upon him under the Constitution and laws of the United States, Curiel has been involved in subsidizing illegal activity by partially funding the college admissions of an illegal immigrant.

The judge’s decision to involve himself in the furtherance of an illegal act, which comes at the direct expense of American citizens who need financial assistance, seems to suggest that on matters pertaining to immigration, the judge may perhaps be willing to place political and personal ends above legal ends. This fact could lend credence to the argument that in Trump’s case, Curiel is perhaps placing his political considerations above legal considerations.

Similarly, McConnell, Gingrich and members of the corporate media have attacked Trump for saying that Gov. Martinez has “got to do a better job”.

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Gingrich went so far as to accuse Trump of going “off the deep end” for criticizing Martinez. However, both McConnell and Gingrich failed to mention that Martinez attacked Trump first—and not the other way around.

As the Washington Examiner’s Byron Yorkreported:

The story was really very simple: Martinez hit Trump, so Trump hit back… In mid-April, the New Mexico governor issued a ‘remarkably strong rebuke’ to Trump, in the words of aWashington Post report, when Martinez spoke to a GOP fundraiser at the home of David Koch in Palm Beach, Florida. Martinez, according to the Post, ‘did not mince words.’ She told the crowd of about 60 wealthy GOP backers that, as a Latina, she was offended by Trump’s language about immigrants… Team Trump believes Martinez has continued to criticize him in private since those remarks. And when Trump traveled to Albuquerque, after having clinched the Republican nomination, Martinez told reporters she was ‘really busy’ and did not have time to attend.

Last year, Martinez publicly questioned Trump’s integrity and implicitly called him racist. Martinez described Trump’s factually correct statement about illegal alien crime as “completely and unequivocally wrong.”

“Those are horrible things to say about anyone, or any culture, anyone of any ethnicity. I mean, that is uncalled for completely,” Martinez said.

Trump’s declaration that Martinez has “got to do a better job” seems mild by comparison. Moreover, objective metrics would suggest that his criticism is, in fact, true. For instance, under Gov. Martinez, violent crime—which is mostly a state issue— has surged in New Mexico. As USA Todayreported, New Mexico is one of the most dangerous states in America today:

New Mexico’s violent crime rate rose 6.6% between 2012 and 2013 — the most in the nation — to nearly 597 per 100,000 residents. The increase in violent crime came despite Governor Susana Martinez’s avowal in 2011 to be tough on crime.

Yet Gingrich, McConnell, and the media’s failure to emphasize that Martinez attacked Trump first has allowed his political opponents to falsely characterize his criticism.

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For instance, Hillary Clinton recently seemed to suggest that Trump’s attack was “gratuitous” and without prompting. “He insulted the Republican Governor Martinez of New Mexico, just gratuitously,” Clintonsaid.

Some have argued that a consistent theme of this election is that the Republican establishment is more upset by Mr. Trump’s tone than they are by the dismantling of our nation’s immigration laws and the victimization of Americans that has accompanied it.

For instance, when McConnell was asked about Trump’s tone with respect to Hispanics, McConnell could have just as easily said that Trump’s policy to stem the flow of illegals and reduce the overall rate of migration would benefit low-income minorities, while Clinton’s plan would economically devastate poor American minorities. However, McConnell once again missed an opportunity to attack Clinton to instead seemingly signal to the media that his endorsement of Trump is merely perfunctory.

Under Sen. McConnell’s leadership, there has been no serious effort to dismantle sanctuary cities, crack down on migrant benefits, ensure deportations of criminal aliens, or halt the influx of refugees.

While Democrats have waged months-long campaigns over equal pay or other pet Democrat issues, no similar effort has been waged by Majority Leader McConnell to defend the integrity of the U.S. immigration system.

When Kate Steinle was murdered, Senate leadership failed to even address the issue. In fact, at the height of national focus and public outrage about the issue, the Senate adjourned for its August recess without taking any meaningful action against sanctuary cities.

By contrast, when the GOP wanted to push the passage of the Keystone pipeline, an issue their donors supported, “GOP’s Senate leadership mounted a long and emotional election-style campaign to win nine Democratic votes for their legislation to approve the Keystone pipeline,” the Daily Caller reported at the time.

Moreover, on a factual note, McConnell’s declaration that “all of us came here from somewhere else,” suggests that he holds a starkly different understanding of Americanization than the one held by our founders. America was not founded upon an equal sampling of ideas from all different countries, but rather was founded on the ideas of one nation in particular, as well as a few Western nations that contributed to Enlightenment and Western thinking.

Moreover, although McConnell believes “all of us came here from somewhere else,” today a lot more people are coming from certain places as opposed to others. Almost 90% of current green card allotments come from outside the normally recognized boundaries of the Western world.

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Cuban State Media: ‘Negro’ Obama ‘Incited Rebellion and Disorder’

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by FRANCES MARTEL31 Mar 20163,637

The Havana Tribune, a state-controlled Cuban newspaper, has added insult to injury following Fidel Castro’s scathing criticism of President Barack Obama upon his departure from the island. In an editorial, the title of which refers to President Obama as “negro,” an opinion columnist has accused him of “inciting rebellion.”

The article is titled “Negro, ¿Tu Eres Sueco?” which roughly translates to “Black Man, Are You Dumb?” (The idiom “pretend to be a Swede” means to play dumb, hence the title is literally asking, “Are you Swedish?”) The author, who is black, goes on to condemn President Obama for meeting with Cuban pro-democracy activists and “subtly” suggesting that the Cuban Revolution needed to change. “Obama came, saw, but unfortunately, with the pretend gesture of lending a hand, tried to conquer,” Elias Argudín writes.

“[Obama] chose to criticize and subtly suggest … incitations to rebellion and disorder, without caring that he was on foreign ground. Without a doubt, Obama overplayed his hand,” he continues. “The least I can say is, Virulo-style: ‘Negro, are you dumb?'”

Virulo is a white pro-Revolution comedian.

Argudín’s article later accuses President Obama of presiding over a racist country–mocking the calls for freedom in Cuba by stating, “Which freedom–the freedom enjoyed by white police to massacre and manhandle black people?”–and issue demands parroted straight from the Castro regime: the end of the “genocidal” embargo and giving the Guantánamo Bay Naval Base, which has belonged to the United States since before Cuban independence, to the Castros.

Claims of rampant discrimination on the part of white police in the United States are common among the leaders and spokesmen of rogue communist states like China, North Korea, and Zimbabwe.

The column appears on the Havana Tribunewebsite with a March 23 dateline, though itappeared in the print edition of the newspaper on Monday and has begun to make the rounds online this week. It hasreceived intense criticism from Cuban-Americans on social media for its disrespect of the president and openly racist language.

Argudín has since written a follow-up article in which he claims he “did not expect” the negative feedback and apologizes “to those who may have been offended.” He then accuses his critics of “misunderstanding” his piece:

It is not necessary to be an advanced reader to note: I did not write a racist column. The word “negro” is mentioned twice, in the title and the phrase giving the article its name, which isn’t even mine. It is a reference to a comedy work. Journalism has its rules. It also allows some licenses. Among the demands of the job there is a very important one: capture the reader’s attention from the title.

Argudín’s piece has, nonetheless, highlighted the rampant discrimination against Afro-Cubans that has existed throughout the history of the Revolution. As the leaders of the communist Revolution were all white–and at least one was an avowed racist—few Afro-Cubans currently hold positions of power in Cuba, though an estimated 60 percent of the nation is black.

In a video declaration in 2015, Ladies in White dissident leader Berta Soler explains that, of known political prisoners, 60 percent are black. Black people are often forced to live in segregated neighborhoods and kept far away from tourism industry jobs (except prostitution). “To the government, the black person is a thief, a bandit, a troublemaker,” Soler argues, noting that the Cuban people are significantly less racist than the regime. “Interracial marriage is resulting in fewer black people. … This is a problem for the government,” she notes.

In a series about racism in Cuba, The Rootnotes a common phrase used by revolutionaries: “Negrada–which means, literally, a group of black people–came to signify a screw-up, a f*cked-up affair. ¡Que negrada! became as common as hustling foreigners.”

The inevitable use of what, in the United States, is considered a racial slur (though Cubans often use negro as a term of endearment), is the latest indignity in a trip to Cuba laden with them, from the slight of Raúl Castro failing to greet President Obama upon landing in Havana to Castro openly denying the presence of political prisoners in Cuba, only to have President Obama later “welcome” his criticism on America. The elder Fidel Castro, or someone claiming to be him, weighed in with a scathing column in the national publication Granma this week, in which he accused President Obama of being racist towards Native Americans and refused his call to normalization: “We do not need the Empire to gift us anything.”

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Trump: Obama ‘Has Done a Terrible Job For African-Americans’

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by JOHN HAYWARD18 Jan 2016533

On Sunday, with Martin Luther King Day right around the corner, George Stephanopoulos of ABC News asked Donald Trump what he would say to Americans, especially African-Americans, who believe Dr. King’s dream has not been achieved.

“Oh, I agree with them, and especially under President Obama,” Trump replied.  

“We have an African-American president and the black youth, the African-American youth, has essentially all never done worse. You look at the unemployment in the ’50s. You look at African-American people that are 30 and 35 and 40, in the height of their strength and lives, and they’re doing horribly.”

“President Obama, an African-American, has done a terrible job for African-Americans,” Trump concluded.

“Donald Trump will do a great job for African-Americans. I’ll bring back jobs to this country from China and many other places. And I’ll let people work and make a great living. I will be greatNfor African-Americans.”

Trump is right about African-American unemployment being far worse than the national average, and the rates have been awful throughout the Obama presidency, although at the moment it’s not correct to say things have never been worse.  

The black unemployment rate is always about double the national average.  As the general unemployment rate slowly settled back to “normal” in the final months of the Obama presidency, so too did the black unemployment rate fall below its 2008 and 2009 highs.  As of December, the white unemployment rate was 4.5 percent, while it’s 9.5 percent for blacks.

However, The Atlantic notes that the current gap between black and white is still slightly larger than the gap from 15 years ago.  It’s even worse for those who lack advanced degrees.  The unemployment rate for white high-school dropouts is 6.9 percent, but it’s nearly two and a half times higher, 16.6 percent, for African-Americans.  At the other end of the educational spectrum, unemployment for Americans with a bachelor’s degree or higher is 2.4 percent for whites, 4.1 percent for blacks.

By now we should all be familiar with the way unemployment statistics can be sliced and diced for political purposes, so it’s necessary to also consider the kind of long-term unemployment that falls completely off the media radar screen.  

Even those most eager to hype the long-overdue “Obama recovery” have been forced to admit African-Americans haven’t benefited nearly as much as other demographics.  The black workforce is far smaller relative to the overall population than the white workforce is, while think-tanks on both Right and Left consistently find that average black wages are far lower.  

One study found that over the past 15 years, the average hourly wage of black workers fell by 44 cents, while white and Hispanic wages rose by 48 and 45 cents during the same period.  Such wage gaps are often attributed to black Americans working in more part-time and temporary jobs, as well as jobs with high turnover rates, making it difficult for them to build careers.

Another metric that has gotten steadily worse through the Obama years is the “wealth gap,” referring to the sum of income and valuable assets, most significantly, home ownership.  

A study reported by Forbes in March claimed the typical black household now has only 6 percent of the wealth owned by the typical white household.  The report suggested several reasons for the disparity:

Causes include the fact that blacks and Latinos are less likely to have jobs that include employer-sponsored health care, a retirement plan or paid time off. The net result is that families of color spend more of their savings on dealing with life’s emergencies such as out-of-pocket health care. Or, they have fewer wealth-building vehicles, such as tax-advantaged accounts, available to them.

Other factors stem back to homeownership and education: A child whose parents were steered into a low-income neighborhood with a low-quality school has decreased chances of obtaining a four-year degree, which also then cuts off future job opportunities. Additionally, although it is illegal, discrimination on the basis of race or national original endures, whether unconsciously or overtly.

Of course, that’s what all discussions of black economic difficulty come back to: racial discrimination.  It’s an unquantifiable X-factor that can be cited as the cause of every problem, since it can’t be measured with any accuracy.  

It’s politically useful to say that insidious racism is the cause of “inequality,” and it’s impossible to “prove” it isn’t.  The size of the disparities in employment, wages, and wealth mentioned above is supposed to be taken as evidence of systemic racism in America, because nothing else could possibly explain those differences.

This line of thinking prevents us from considering what those other explanations might be, which in turn makes it impossible to address them.

If racism is the reason for black economic difficulties, we might ask how racism is supposedly getting worse under a black President who won two elections, and presides over the richest and most powerful regulatory state in the world.  As Forbesnoted, racial discrimination is illegal, and the mightiest enforcement state ever created by Man works tirelessly to enforce that prohibition.  

One does not hear many credible allegations that the government is ignoring serious complaints of racial discrimination, under either President Obama or his predecessors.  Among other things, it would be strongly contrary to the nature of bureaucracy to ignore the sort of complaints that make a bureau more prestigious and powerful – they’re not in the habit of downplaying the crises they exist to combat.

One of the biggest problems facing black Americans is that they’ve been locked into destructive politics that keep pushing the same failed “solutions,” with alternative approaches considered beyond the pale.  Large numbers of black Americans live in cities that have been dominated by Democrat political machines for generations.  The same bogus federal remedies have been thrown at them for decades, under Administrations from both parties.  

An increasingly expensive educational bureaucracy, coupled with a university system dominated by political correctness and affirmative-action programs, have failed to deliver on the theory that education automatically confers wealth.  Instead, African-Americans are among the groups hardest hit by the Big Government and Big Business mania for importing cheap foreign labor, at both the low and high ends of the skill scale.  We spend more on education than ever, with more attention paid to getting minority youth into college than ever… but the inequality gap widens.

The effort to confer middle-class wealth by making it easier for people with shaky credit to take out mortgages produced the apocalyptic financial crisis of 2008… and it’s nevertheless being tried again, by people who remain convinced middle-classness is a benefit the government can bestow.  And yet, despite those incredible expenditures and the horrendous damage inflicted on our financial system by the crash, the wealth gap between white and black Americans grows larger.  

It shouldn’t come as a surprise that “giving” someone a house doesn’t make them wealthy, if you also “give” them a mortgage debt they can’t afford.  The depressingly common outcome is foreclosure, and a family left worse off than ever.  

Likewise, attempts at legislating higher income by raising minimum wages have the practical effect of abolishing the jobs entry-level and marginal workers need to get into the game.  Forbes mentions the lack of health insurance as a factor in the black-white wealth gap; ObamaCare “fixed” that by making everyone’s healthcare worth less, with exchange plans so wretched that huge numbers of health young people decided it was better to pay a fine than buy overpriced health coverage.

Liberal social policies inflicted tremendous damage on the black family – the factor in that “wealth gap” nobody wants to discuss honestly.  There is simply no substitute for intact families accumulating wealth across generations, including the incredibly valuable intangible gifts that mothers and fathers can pass along to their children – from good work and study habits, to family connections that ease young people into the workforce.  Any employer will tell you that hiring young people for marginal jobs is a nerve-wracking endeavor.  Family and community reputation go a long way toward easing those jitters.

The effect of the welfare state on our human capital has been horrendous as well, generation after generation.  It’s another of those truths our elites have stubbornly refused to confront during the Obama era: high unemployment is not only due to a lack of jobs offered, but a lack of jobs sought. There are people from every demographic background chomping at the bit to work… and there are people, especially younger people, who won’t throw themselves into the workforce unless they absolutely must.

Demand for employment does influence supply.  Entrepreneurs who see themselves surrounded by eager, dependable workers will make different expansion decisions than those who think good help is hard to find in their community.  Entrepreneurial risk looks even riskier in communities that don’t enthusiastically seek investment, commerce, and employment.

Is there racism mixed among those factors – including both racial discrimination by whites against black employees or entrepreneurs, and the reverse?  Certainly… and sadly there always will be, barring a significant upgrade to human nature over the coming generations.  The question is how to best minimize its effects.  There is no better answer than the flourishing ofopportunity, which has been artificially suppressed by creeping statism for far too long.  Voluntary cooperation, in the pursuit of mutual profit, and vigorous competition have a way of dissolving prejudice.  It takes time, but patience is rewarded.

Look at it this way: the Obama presidency brought us the ultimate example of the opposite viewpoint, which holds that imperfect citizens must be molded to virtue by the strong hand of an all-controlling State.  More spending than ever, more regulations, more enforcement, more centrally-organized social and media pressure against racism… and the black-white economic gap white economic gap got worse.  

How much more evidence do we need that a different path must be tried, before we go bankrupt following this one, into a future of absurdly expensive social strife?

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