Benny Thomas, Global Planning lead – Creative & Experiential at Facebook, in a video released by Project Veritas on March 16, 2021. (Project Veritas/Youtube) Media & Big Tech

By Petr Svab March 17, 2021 Updated: March 18, 2021 biggersmallerPrint

Facebook’s drive to register 4.5 million voters swayed the November election to President Joe Biden, a Facebook executive opined in hidden camera footage.

The executive, Benny Thomas, expressed grim views of the giant tech company, but counted the voter drive among its positives while secretly being recorded earlier this year by reporters with Project Veritas, an undercover journalism nonprofit.

“This is the good side of Facebook. … We made a big difference,” he said in a video released by Veritas on March 16, explaining that Facebook exceeded its goal of registering 4 million people and could only accomplish the task because of its “sheer scale and reach.”

“Yeah. I’m pretty sure we [Biden] won that way,” the reporter said.

“Yea!” Thomas replied, laughing. “Exactly!”

“What do you think?” the reporter jumped in.

“Exactly. I think so too,” he said.

Thomas’s LinkedIn profile describes his position as Global Planning Lead – Creative & Experiential at Facebook since September 2019.

Facebook didn’t immediately respond to a request by The Epoch Times for comment.

Thomas suggested to one of the reporters that Facebook needs to do more to control speech on its platforms.

“People are believing whatever they see, and it’s just causing a crisis,” he said in another video published by Veritas on March 15.

When asked about his views on solutions, he said, “The answer is just more controls, more safeguards. … To give people a guide to behavior.”

Behavior needs to be kept in check through surveillance, he suggested.

“That’s called democracy. Somebody is always watching you so that you behave well,” he said.

On the other hand, he acknowledged that Facebook’s judgments are necessarily biased, even when machine-driven.

“There’s always built-in bias because this is the myth that computer programmers told us, which is, ‘Oh, these are computers, computers don’t have bias.’ But guess what? Human beings wrote that code. And that human being has bias.”

Conservatives and some liberals have long complained that Facebook is censoring political speech based on vague, partly secret, ever-changing, and unevenly enforced policies.

Thomas also said Facebook and Google have grown so powerful, they need to be broken up.

“The government needs to step in and break up Google and Facebook. I’ll make less money, but it’s a better thing for the world,” he said.

Facebook needs to be stripped of its major subsidiaries, he suggested.

“Instagram, Facebook, Messenger, Oculus, WhatsApp. They all need to be separate companies. It’s too much power when they’re all one together,” he said.

“It needs to be broken up the way the telecom companies were broken up and the oil companies were broken up. But better than that, because those guys just came back together pretty soon after that. I hope we’ve learned from that. But that’s really the one thing, as you said, I would break it up, and I would remove Zuck [Mark Zuckerberg] as the CEO.”

Facebook’s power ceases to be innocuous, he said, “when you weaponize it as a politician and you go, ‘Tell me, show me people who are racist,’” such as when “a racist politician” is looking to target messaging to “several racists who will vote” for him.

When the reporter asked who would decide what makes one a racist and how would Facebook determine it, Thomas mused, “What would be a proxy for a racist?”

“Lives in all-white town, education, religious preference,” he said. “So you can triangulate three or four data points and say, ‘She’s likely to be racist.’”

Thomas also criticized Zuckerberg’s investment in gene-editing technology.

“It’s eugenics. I don’t know any way to stop it. I think the genie’s out of the bottle,” he said.

He worries the technology would lead to the development of a “superior race” of people and extreme polarization of society into “haves” and “have-nots” that goes beyond mere wealth differences.

“They have a thing that I can never have,” he said, describing the position of the “have-nots.”

When confronted by one of the reporters, Thomas refused to go on record and clarify his comments. Follow Petr on Twitter: @petrsvabHelp us spread the truth. Share this article with your friends.

Border Patrol agents apprehend a group of illegal immigrants near downtown El Paso, Texas, on March 15, 2021. (Justin Hamel/AFP via Getty Images) Immigration & Border Security

By Ivan Pentchoukov March 17, 2021 Updated: March 17, 2021 biggersmallerPrint

Career officials from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) warned then-President-elect Joe Biden’s transition team that revoking President Donald Trump’s border policies would have “catastrophic consequences,” according to Stephen Miller, who served as Trump’s top adviser on immigration issues at the White House.

“Biden’s transition team was warned by career DHS officials that terminating our proven border security measures would lead to catastrophic consequences. … They ignored those warnings and voluntarily unleashed chaos,” Miller wrote on Twitter on March 17.

“By 2020—defeating a flood of meritless years-long litigation—we had in place the most effective, rock-solid, profound border security measures ever realized. Biden inherited an unbeatable system. He then immediately shredded it & created this rapidly-escalating emergency.”

Miller, who is now a senior adviser to Trump, made the remarks in response to a news report about Biden telling Central American migrants to stay in their communities and not make the trek to the United States to cross the border illegally.

“I can say quite clearly: Don’t come over,” Biden told ABC News.

The Biden administration is facing a surge of illegal border crossings on pace to be the highest in two decades. The influx coincided with Biden taking office and swiftly revoking more than a dozen key Trump immigration measures.

“Maybe nobody on his staff informed him, but Biden’s DHS implemented nationwide Catch-and-Release,” Miller wrote. “Illegal migrants from all over the world, in ever-growing numbers, will descend on the border until the Trump policy of Detain-and-Remove is restored.”

Trump criticized Biden’s border agenda in an interview aired on Fox News on March 16, particularly lamenting the decision to halt the construction of his signature wall on the southern border.

“They should finish it,” Trump said about the wall. “But they’re destroying our country. People are coming in by the hundreds of thousands.”

Biden said there’s been a surge of illegal immigrants over the past two years but agreed the current wave “could be” worse. The president said on March 16 that he doesn’t currently plan to visit the border.

Officials in border states have said some illegal immigrants are testing positive for the CCP virus but aren’t being forced to stay in quarantine, stoking concerns about them spreading COVID-19.

Biden sent a contingent of officials earlier this month to view the situation on the ground. He hasn’t offered a perspective on what they saw, and it isn’t clear whether he’s been briefed by them yet. White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters in Washington on March 15 that the administration feels it has a handle on the border situation.

“We recognize this as a problem. We’re focused on addressing it,” Psaki said.

Bowen Xiao contributed to this report. Follow Ivan on Twitter: @ivanpentchoukovHelp us spread the truth. Share this article with your friends.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki speaks during a briefing at the White House in Washington on March 17, 2021. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images) Executive Branch

Psaki Stonewalls Queries on Press Access to Border Facilities

By Zachary Stieber March 18, 2021 Updated: March 18, 2021 biggersmallerPrint

The Biden administration has repeatedly championed its commitment to transparency, but won’t let reporters into facilities holding child immigrants near the U.S. border.

A growing surge of illegal border crossings, including a jump in unaccompanied minors, has led to intense scrutiny of the administration’s immigration policies. At the same time, reporters have clamored for access to facilities housing the child immigrants.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki has repeatedly stonewalled questions on when that access will be granted.

“We remain committed to doing that,” she told reporters at the White House in Washington on Wednesday.

The administration is working with the Departments of Homeland Security and Health and Human Services, which oversee the facilities, to arrange tours, while “respecting the privacy and, obviously, the health protocols required by COVID,” she said.

Pressed on why the administration itself also hasn’t released images from the facilities, Psaki added: “We remain committed to transparency. I don’t have an update for you on the timeline for access, but it’s certainly something we support.”

Some reporters said they’d been denied requests to ride along with Border Patrol agents. Psaki deferred questioning on the matter.

“We fully support transparency, and I would encourage you to talk to the Department of Homeland Security about any requests you have for press access or what you’re looking to accomplish at the border,” she said.

The Epoch Times recently traveled with Border Patrol agents in Texas as they apprehended illegal immigrants.

The Biden administration’s reversal of key Trump era policies has driven the surge in illegal immigrants, according to experts, Republican lawmakers, and some Democrats. Among the reversals: ending Trump’s remain in Mexico policy and allowing unaccompanied minors to stay in the country, even amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

Psaki defended the policies, saying, “We decided that we will be more humane about how we approach this” and that it will take time to deal with the higher numbers of child immigrants.

“Our policy continues to be: We’re not going to send a 10-year-old back across the border. That was the policy of the last administration. That’s not our policy here,” she said.

Asked if that amounted to incentivizing parents to send their kids across the border alone, Psaki pointed to how President Joe Biden said this week that people should not cross the border into the United States.

“And he believes, as he talked about last night, that no parent is looking and just trying to make a bet on whether their kid can, kind of, make it,” she said.

“This is a very difficult and treacherous journey. Most of these kids are fleeing very challenging circumstances. And his view is that there’s a number of steps we need to take and steps that he hopes he can work with Democrats and Republicans on. So that’s his goal.” Follow Zachary on Twitter: @zackstieber

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin looks on as President Joe Biden speaks, in the White House in Washington on March 8, 2021. (Alex Wong/Getty Images) Republicans

By Zachary Stieber March 16, 2021 Updated: March 16, 2021 biggersmallerPrint

The top Republican in the House of Representatives on Monday called for a halt to what he described as politicization of the military.

“Uniformed service members recently criticized a private citizen for his First Amendment rights, & today a Dem lawmaker used soldiers in a political stunt against a GOP member,” Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) wrote in a social media statement.

McCarthy tagged Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin before adding: “This sets a dangerous precedent. It must stop now.”

The military is forbidden from getting involved in politics while in uniform but multiple members recently criticized Tucker Carlson of Fox News after Carlson critiqued the military’s focus on including women, arguing that it would be best for it to spend more time combating rivals like China.

Additionally, on Monday Rep. Michael F.Q. San Nicolas (D-Guam) took uniformed National Guard members with him to confront Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) at her office, after Greene reportedly suggested last month that Guam was not a part of the United States.

Greene wasn’t in her office but San Nicolas asked a staffer to speak to Guard personnel. The staffer did so.

Maj. Gen. Esther Aguigui, adjutant general of the Guam National Guard, told The Epoch Times in an emailed statement that “we appreciate Congressman San Nicolas’ efforts to represent our culture of Inafa’ Maolek, or bringing harmony, practiced here in Guam.”

“We also thank Congresswoman Greene for ultimately helping raise awareness of Guamanians as citizens of the United States, and our rich tradition of service and sacrifice to our nation. As a non-partisan entity, the Guam National Guard is here to continue this legacy of supporting and defending the Constitution of the United States and the freedoms it provides. We will continue to be always ready and always there, to serve our great nation and contribute to a fair, prosperous, compassionate, and safe Guam,” she added.

The Pentagon declined to respond directly to McCarthy. The Department of Defense’s inspector general declined to say whether it was probing either situation.

Greene said via email that “It’s time for our great men and women of the National Guard to go home from Washington DC and be with their families.”

“The Democrats need to stop using them as political theatre and drama on Capitol Hill. Shame on Democrats for disrespecting our military,” she added.

The office of San Nicolas didn’t return an inquiry.

Other members of Congress have also questioned the military’s recent actions, which included issuing a press release that critics said distorted Carlson’s comments.

https://www.facebook.com/plugins/video.php?height=321&href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2FCongressmanMichaelF.Q.SanNicolas%2Fvideos%2F446647236424486%2F&show_text=false&width=560

The Pentagon alleged that Carlson “used his show to denigrate the contributions of women in the military and to say the Chinese military is catching up to the U.S. military because it does not allow women to serve in the percentage the United States does.”

Carlson during a recent show pointed to President Joe Biden talking about designing military flight suits and easing hairstyle restrictions in a bid to have women feel safe and respected in the military.

“It’s a mockery of the U.S. military. While China’s military becomes more masculine as it’s assembled the world’s largest navy, our military needs to become, as Joe Biden says, more feminine, whatever feminine means anymore since men and women no longer exist. The bottom line is, it’s out of control, and the Pentagon is going along with this,” Carlson said.

Attacks were lobbed by the Pentagon’s press secretary, a top Space Force official, and a number of other military members in return. Through the spokesman, Austin also expressed disdain for Carlson’s comments.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) has said he requested a meeting with the head of the Marine Corps after the Marines joined in the attacks, telling one social media user to “come back when you’ve served and been pregnant” and using a pejorative against Carlson.

The Marine Corps later deleted the tweets.

Cruz told Austin in a letter that he’s “deeply troubled” by the situation, accusing the Pentagon of mobilizing “systematic, public attacks” against Carlson.

A Pentagon spokesperson told The Epoch Times via email, “As with all congressional correspondence, the secretary will respond directly to the author of the letter as appropriate.”

The Senate had to approve a waiver for Austin, a retired general, to serve as the defense secretary. During confirmation hearings, he told senators that he understood concerns they had and that “the safety and security of our democracy demands competent civilian control of our armed forces.”

“If you confirm me, I can assure you the Pentagon under my leadership will respect your oversight responsibilities. We will be forthcoming and transparent,” he added. Follow Zachary on Twitter: @zackstieberHelp us spread the truth. Share this article with your friends.

Police tape in a stock photo. (Carl Ballou/Shutterstock) Immigration & Border Security

By Jack Phillips March 16, 2021 Updated: March 16, 2021 biggersmallerPrint

Authorities in Texas said that at least eight illegal immigrants have died in a head-on collision in Val Verde County, Texas—located near the U.S.-Mexico border—following a high-speed chase.

Officers with the Texas Department of Public Safety arrested the driver of the vehicle after he allegedly tried to run away following the crash, authorities told Fox29 in San Antonio.

Eight people were confirmed dead at the scene. Texas Department of Public Safety officials told the outlet that they are all had no documentation. The fatal crash happened at around 1:30 p.m. Monday nearly 30 miles north of Del Rio, KSAT reported.

Officials told the outlet that troopers were chasing a red pickup truck on U.S. 277 when it collided with a white Ford F-150 truck.

“Due to injuries sustained, eight undocumented passengers from the Dodge pickup were pronounced deceased on scene,” the Department of Public Safety told the outlet. “The driver and a child passenger from the Ford pickup and one undocumented passenger from the Dodge pickup were transported to a hospital in San Antonio and are in stable condition.”

Other details about the incident are not clear.

Several weeks ago, in Southern California, officials said that more than a dozen illegal immigrants were killed following a collision with another vehicle. Immigration authorities confirmed that the SUV, which was carrying about 25 people, entered the United States from Mexico in early March via a hole in the border fence.

“We pray for the accident victims and their families during this difficult time,” said El Centro Sector Chief Patrol Agent Gregory Bovino in a news conference on Wednesday. Agents, he said, believe the deceased individuals were part of a larger group of about 44 migrants who were smuggled through a hole in the fence near Calexico, a California city that lies along the border and is next to the Mexican city of Mexicali.

Bovino added that an “initial investigation into the origins of the vehicles indicate a potential nexus to the aforementioned breach in the border wall,” while adding that “human smugglers have proven time and again they have little regard for human life.”

In recent weeks, the number of migrants attempting to enter the United States via Mexico has surged to levels not seen in 20 years, said Department of Homeland Security Chief Alejandro Mayorkas on Tuesday.

U.S. border agents conducted about 100,000 apprehensions or rapid expulsions of migrants at the border in February, officials have said.

The Epoch Times has reached out to the U.S. Customs and Border Enforcement agency for comment.Help us spread the truth. Share this article with your friends.

A Customs and Border Protection officer speaks with immigrants at the U.S.–Mexico border in Matamoros, Mexico, on Feb. 25, 2021. (John Moore/Getty Images) US News

By Charlotte Cuthbertson March 9, 2021 Updated: March 11, 2021 biggersmallerPrint

Mexican cartels are getting stronger as the Biden administration weakens security at the border, according to several current and former law enforcement officials.

Most cartel violence occurs in Mexico as different factions fight for territory along the border into the United States. Smuggling drugs and humans is their primary business, and they control the border.

But the cartels are also embedded inside the United States, and indications point to more violence stateside this year, according to Jaeson Jones, a former captain for the Texas Department of Public Safety, where he ran the border security operations center.

“The game has changed now,” Jones told The Epoch Times on March 3. “They don’t fear us. It’s just not like it used to be. And you can’t blame them. I mean, they have no reason to—we’ve done nothing to contain them. They’re just completely out of control.”

Jones said cartels will “absolutely” cause more violence “everywhere, much deeper” into the United States. He said the problem with cross-border crime and cartel violence is that it’s not identified as such in the FBI’s uniform crime data system.

“So when you hear from a lot of people who say, ‘There’s no proof that cross-border violence is occurring,’ that’s wrong. It is. It’s occurring every single day in many, many ways,” Jones said.

He pointed to an example of a double murder in Alabama in 2018 of a 13-year-old autistic girl, who was beheaded, and her grandmother, who was a drug smuggler with reported ties to the Sinaloa cartel.

In 2019, two Border Patrol agents were fired upon from the Mexican side of the Rio Grande while they were patrolling by boat.

“Agents saw four subjects with automatic weapons who shot over 50 rounds at them. The boat was hit several times but no one on board was injured,” said an Aug. 9, 2019, Customs and Border Protection statement.

Just a couple of weeks ago, Jones said, an alert went out to agents that Cartel de Golfo (CDG) intended to kill agents on a boat the next day.

He said CDG is losing the battle for territory in the small city of Miguel Alemán in Mexico, across the river from Roma, Texas. The cartel wanted to blame the shooting on rivals Cartel Del Noreste (CDN), a faction of the Los Zetas, “to cause the Mexican government to come after CDN,” Jones said. “Think how bold that is.”

He believes President Joe Biden, “whether he wants to or not,” will be forced to take action against the cartels because of the fentanyl issue.

Illicit fentanyl coming across the Mexican border is chiefly responsible for fueling the escalating opioid crisis, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). Overdose deaths are at record highs in the United States.

“The overdose deaths are not going to get lower,” Jones said. “They’re going to go through the roof this year because of the migration issue. Because as they [border agents] focus on migration at the border, they’re not focusing on [drug] seizures. So you give up one for the other.”

Often, the cartels will send large groups of migrants to cross the border illegally in one area to tie up Border Patrol resources while they smuggle drugs and other people through another area nearby.

Sheriff A.J. Louderback from Jackson County, Texas, said Border Patrol has been apprehending about 1,000 illegal border-crossers every day for the past three weeks in the Rio Grande Valley Sector, mostly in large groups.

“We essentially have an open border today on the southern border of the United States,” Louderback told The Epoch Times on March 5.

The Cartel de Golfo controls the Mexican border into the Rio Grande Valley area in Texas; anyone who wants to cross illegally has to pay the cartel. The lowest price he’s heard is $250 per person, Louderback said.

“So 1,000 people a day … you’re looking at a quarter million dollars a day, coming in and funding the cartel for its future violence, and future enhancement of all things criminal that go along here in Texas and the United States,” he said. “So fundamentally what we’ve done is promote this.”

Jones said the price for crossing has recently skyrocketed to $2,500 per person, or even higher, depending on their country of origin. Many of those who cross don’t have enough money and are then indentured to the cartel once they’re in the United States.

Law Enforcement

The Mexican government has also made moves that hamper U.S. law enforcement, particularly the DEA, inside Mexico.

In mid-December 2020, the Mexican government introduced a law that would require “foreign agents” operating in Mexico to share information with the Mexican government. The foreign agents will also no longer have immunity, and Mexican officials will have to get permission before meeting with a foreign agent and to submit a report afterward.

The DEA has offices in Mexico and has had agents operating there for decades. Homeland Security also operates to disrupt drug and human trafficking routes.

Derek Maltz, former head of the DEA’s special operations division, said the new law will “completely expose” law enforcement agents and their operations.

“And so Mexico is taking full advantage of America during all these turbulent times with the transition of presidents, with the COVID, with the weak immigration policies put forth by Joe Biden’s administration,” Maltz told The Epoch Times on Feb. 24.

“They’re setting it up so the only people that win are the corrupt government officials, the Chinese organized crime groups, and the cartels.

“And there’s no doubt in my mind—based on all my experience, and looking at drug enforcement and immigration-related matters—that the cartels are in a much easier place now to position their manpower throughout America, [and] continue to distribute all these poisonous drugs and pick up the mass amounts of proceeds that have been generated from the business.”

As an escalating number of illegal immigrants enter the country, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott announced an operation to surge Texas law enforcement personnel to the southern border to help combat drug and human smuggling.

“Texas supports legal immigration but will not be an accomplice to the open border policies that cause, rather than prevent, a humanitarian crisis in our state and endanger the lives of Texans,” Abbott said in a March 6 statement. Follow Charlotte on Twitter: @charlottecuthboHelp us spread the truth. Share this article with your friends.

Scott Adams, author of “Loserthink: How Untrained Brains Are Ruining America,” in New York on Nov. 4, 2019. (Brendon Fallon/The Epoch Times) Censorship & Socialism

By Petr Svab March 16, 2021 Updated: March 16, 2021 biggersmallerPrint

Famed cartoonist and political commentator Scott Adams told his audience that YouTube removed two of his videos because they contained comments regarding the November election. He said it feels like YouTube is setting him up for a penalty that could lead to his channel being purged from the Google-owned online video platform.

In his March 15 daily livestream, Adams said that YouTube informed him that two of his January videos “promoted false election claims” and were taken down. As far as he could tell, the videos did no such thing, but YouTube, per its common practice, didn’t explain what specifically Adams said that irked its censors.

“I don’t even have a guess why I got censored,” he said.

Normally, an alleged policy violation results in a “strike” and if three accumulate, the entire channel gets deleted. For many a YouTube personality, that’s nearly a career kill. In this case, however, YouTube spared Adams the penalty.

“They’re saying we’re not going to give you a strike because you probably didn’t know you did anything wrong. But what happens the next time?” he asked.

“Then next time, can they not say, ‘We warned you’? I feel like they could, because they did warn me but they didn’t tell me what it was that I did. So I don’t have the option of avoiding it because I don’t know what it was. Now, do you see what’s happening? … Doesn’t that look like a setup to you?”

In response to The Epoch Times inquiry, a Google spokesperson asked for links to the deleted videos. The Epoch Times located the links through the Internet Archive, but didn’t receive further response from Google by press time.

Adams’s situation is part of a pattern that appears designed to induce self-censorship. Tech companies tend to make their content rules vague, keep part of them secret, and not inform users what exactly they did wrong. The result is that people try to guess the boundaries of the censorship themselves and are likely to cage themselves more tightly than the rules would require.

Adams is known to comment on news and politics from a mix of liberal and conservative perspectives. A trained hypnotist, his specialty is pinpointing and decoding persuasion methods, explaining how to use them as well as avoid being affected by them.

He said it looks like YouTube is already throttling his channel as “the monetization, everything for the channel just plunged.”

“I feel as if they’re pushing me to the situation where I will accidentally cancel myself and I’ll never know I did it. I’ll just be cancelled,” he said.

The deleted videos are his Jan. 3 live stream titled, “Episode 1240 Scott Adams: My Impression of Mayor Ted Wheeler Negotiating, China Bad, Election Audit,” and his Jan. 6 livestream titled, “Episode 1243 Scott Adams: Georgia Election Credibility and Where Do We Go From Here?”

His take on election fraud was that it’s likely widespread on both sides of the aisle because the reward is high, there are likely a lot of people willing to engage in it, and the chances of getting caught are low.

In the first video, he said there are “signals” and evidence that the election result was illegally affected, though he also acknowledged that he could be wrong.

In the second video, he called for more inquiry into certain allegations, but voiced skepticism about specific claims.

“It could be all of them, but at least 95 percent of the [voter fraud] claims are bogus,” he said.

He maintained his position that, judging from the election system setup alone, fraud does take place.

“Guaranteed your elections have been fraudulent all of your life, and probably longer, and you didn’t even notice,” he said. Follow Petr on Twitter: @petrsvabHelp us spread the truth. Share this article with your friends.

Border Patrol agents apprehend a busload of illegal immigrants in Penitas, Texas, on March 10. 2021. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times) Immigration & Border Security

By Jack Phillips March 16, 2021 Updated: March 16, 2021 biggersmallerPrint

The number of migrants who are illegally entering into the United States via the Southern Border has spiked during President Joe Biden’s first two months in office, said the head of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) on Tuesday.

“We are on pace to encounter more individuals on the southwest border than we have in the last 20 years,” DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in a statement.

Mayorkas, whose agency oversees Customs and Border Protection and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, defended the Biden administration’s response to what some have described as a growing crisis along the U.S.-Mexico border. Previously, White House officials and top Democrats including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi have said it was the previous administration’s policies that triggered the crisis, although Republicans said President Joe Biden’s moves to rescind Trump-era executive immigration orders essentially served as a welcome mat for illegal immigrants.

“There is understandably a great deal of attention currently focused on the southwest border,” Mayorkas added. “The situation at the southwest border is difficult. We are working around the clock to manage it and we will continue to do so. That is our job. We are making progress and we are executing on our plan.”

Mayorkas avoided using the term “crisis” as conservative-leaning media and Republicans have insisted that the administration use stronger descriptive terms.

“We will also not waver in our values and our principles as a nation,” Mayorkas added. “Our goal is a safe, legal, and orderly immigration system that is based on our bedrock priorities: to keep our borders secure, address the plight of children as the law requires, and enable families to be together. As noted by the President in his Executive Order, ‘securing our borders does not require us to ignore the humanity of those who seek to cross them.’ We are both a nation of laws and a nation of immigrants. That is one of our proudest traditions.”

A tent facility operated by the Border Patrol in Donna, some 500 miles south of Dallas, is holding more than 1,000 children and teenagers, some as young as 4 years of age. Lawyers who inspect immigrant detention facilities under a court settlement told The Associated Press they interviewed children who reported being held in packed conditions in the tent, with some sleeping on the floor and others not able to shower for five days.

Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott issued a statement Monday asserting the Biden administration’s “reckless open door policies have created a humanitarian crisis for unaccompanied minors coming across the border” and that “his policies are risking the health and safety of Texans and putting children at risk from cartels and human traffickers.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.Help us spread the truth. Share this article with your friends.

Mike Lindell, CEO of MyPillow, speaks at the “Let the Church ROAR” National Prayer Rally on the National Mall in Washington on Dec. 12, 2020. (Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times) Tech News

By Isabel van Brugen March 15, 2021 Updated: March 15, 2021 biggersmallerPrint

MyPillow founder and CEO Mike Lindell says a social media platform he will launch in coming weeks will be a “safe place” for those who have been “canceled” by big tech platforms such as YouTube and Twitter.

“You won’t have to walk on eggshells anymore,” said Lindell, whose personal and MyPillow accounts were suspended by Twitter last month, noting that the release of his platform, Vocal, is scheduled within the next fortnight.

“It’s YouTube and Twitter kind of combined. There’s nothing like it out there. Journalists can actually go out and invite guests on and speak the truth,” Lindell told NTD’s “Focus Talk” host Jenny Chang. “I’m really looking forward to it. It’s been four years in the making, and it is absolutely amazing. There’s technology out there that nobody else has.”

Lindell’s site would compete with the likes of Parler and Gab, which have attracted conservatives and supporters of former President Donald Trump.

Twitter suspended Lindell’s accounts over his claims about the 2020 presidential election. When Lindell released his video on YouTube, the Google-owned platform deleted it, citing its “presidential election integrity policy.” The video was also taken down by Vimeo.

He has been sued by Dominion Voting Systems over his statements about the election technology vendor after the election. The company filed a lawsuit against Lindell on Feb. 22 in the District of Columbia.

The suit alleges that Lindell, a staunch supporter of Trump, harmed Dominion’s brand by raising questions about the company’s vote-counting equipment. The company is seeking damages in excess of $1.3 billion.

Trump and his advisers have said the former president is considering starting his own social media company. Lindell, when asked about the possibility of a platform launched by Trump, said, “I think it’s great to have more than one place to speak out the truth.”

“For me, my platform is made for more for the influencers out there—people that have podcasts, people that have radio, and TV stations that they can’t speak the truth or they lose their YouTube or they get threatened to being sued by Dominion or whatever it is,” Lindell said.

“I have so many friends of mine that lost their followers on Facebook, they lost their Twitter, they lost their YouTube channels, they maybe lost Vimeo. … That’s their livelihood. I know a friend of mine had 12 employees. They’re all laid off right now because they took away his whole platform, and just for speaking out his opinions.

“I want to be able to talk about election fraud with the machines, and I want to talk about the vaccine, which I don’t believe in. I want the word to get out.”

Lindell told NTD that his company has so far lost 22 retailers. In a recent interview with Business Insider, he said that he lost about $65 million in revenue this year due to mass boycotts from various firms such as Kohl’s and Bed Bath & Beyond.

“Right now, my company has been attacked,” he said. “Google has attacked me; they won’t let me buy my own name. My Twitter is taken down; my company Twitter is taken down; my YouTube is down; Vimeo’s down; Facebook won’t let me live stream—all these attacks.”

The MyPillow CEO said he intends to countersue Dominion because “this is about our First Amendment right of free speech.”

“What’s coming is communism and socialism. It came into our country, they’re suppressing free speech, and right now, it’s terrible,” Lindell said. “Even Democrats see that’s not who they voted for. This is terrible, what is happening. It’s happening to everybody.”

Jenny Chang contributed to this report.Help us spread the truth. Share this article with your friends.

Sponsored by:
By Mark Truppner Published Mar 16, 2021 06:00 am

US Capitol View Photo

House Republican Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy held a press conference on the Texas border to discuss ‘Biden’s border crisis’.

McCarthy was Tuesday’s KVML “Newsmaker of the Day”. Here are his words:

“I want to thank every man and woman for the border patrol, for the exceptional job they’re doing and under extraordinary times. Their attitude, their work was exceptional. The security of our nation and our border is first and foremost the responsibility of our president. I came down here because I heard of the crisis. It’s more than a crisis, this is a human heartbreak. The sad part about all of this, it didn’t have to happen. This crisis is created by the presidential policies of this new administration. There’s no other way to claim it, then a Biden border crisis.

Every part of what we sat and talked to, we learned more of how it was created. Congressman Gimenez talked to a family from Honduras and asked, “How long have they been traveling?” 22 days, just in coincidence of the actions taken by President Biden of why people think they come here to break the law. We went through a new facility that was built just more than a year ago. They built it with the capacity they thought they could never meet, 1,040 people be processed. Today, broke that record today. Today, they’re beyond capacity. They’re having to build into the parking lot a makeshift facility. Even though the US Congress just passed a $1.9 trillion bill, not $1 in there to help them. It’s taken away the operation costs for the border to be protected. But for all these children, that are on a company that’s sitting in there, there’s 120 border agents that are now inside that unit that are not on the border protecting us when a surge is coming.

As we went up to Monument Three, speaking to the men and women on the front lines, they catch from a hundred to 200 people a night. As we talked to the medical units… And as I tell you, not as a member of Congress, but as a father of a son and a daughter, and you look in the eyes of these children, they came unaccompanied. They tell the story of a one, a three and a five-year-old holding their hands, walking up to an agent with no parents, no adults in sight, who brought them? When you talk to the medical units, talk about the percentage of that get trafficked, they get harmed along the way, who knows what dangerous and who doesn’t make it. All because the policies of our president has changed and told them something different, told them to risk their lives and broke families apart.

We were better as a nation than this. This is about the safety and security of our border, but it’s also about the opportunity that Americans want, and the prosperity. I know the president is going to travel this week. This is where he should bring Air Force One. This is where he should look the people in the eye. This is where he should talk to the border agents and let them know that this is beyond a crisis. He can continue to deny it, but the only way to solve it is to first admit what he has done. And if he will not reverse action, it’s going to take congressional action to do it. And that’s why we’re here, we want to find solutions.

Before we even came here, I sent a letter to the President to work together, to solve this problem. I thought maybe he would reach out. Maybe he’d set an appointment. He doesn’t even acknowledge a letter, let alone a crisis that his policy has created. So we will work together, across the aisle, within our own party, because we know the solutions that it will take. When you talk about what’s coming across, I just left a few border agents and I asked them, ” Who are the individuals you’re catching?” “Yeah, they’re from Central America.” But you know who else? Iran, Yemen, Sri Lanka. When I walked through the facility, there was more Haitians than any other nationality I saw. And why were they coming now? You asked the border agents, they were shocked themselves because they’re being released into the country.

When I talked to the doctor to see when they’re being tested for COVID, when they get out. More than 10% are testing positive, while you’re being stored together. In a time when the president will keep our country closed, when maybe we have hope for a 4th of July to get together just with our family, how much spread of COVID is he creating every single day by his policies along this border? It’s wrong, and it has to end and it needs to end now.”

The “Newsmaker of the Day” is heard every weekday morning at 6:45, 7:45 and 8:45 on AM 1450 and FM 102.7 KVML.

Written by Mark Truppner.