Congressman Tom McClintock recently spoke on the US House Floor.
McClintock was Tuesday’s KVML “Newsmaker of the Day”. Here are his words:
“Mr. Speaker:
Last year, we finally achieved operational control of our southern border for the first time in decades. The Trump Administration had made it clear that our border would be enforced, and illegal immigration dropped dramatically.
That all ended on January 20th, when Joe Biden issued executive orders to stop deporting illegal immigrants, abandon the border wall, to admit anyone claiming to be under 18, and rescinding the remain in Mexico policy for asylum claims. That message has been heard loud and clear. The border patrol reported more than 100,000 encounters in February alone. That’s the entire population of South Bend, Indiana or Green Bay, Wisconsin. In a single month. And it’s getting worse.
We’re way beyond the debate over whether this is a border crisis. The question now is whether we have a border at all.
What is the Democrats’ response? This bill promises a path to citizenship not only for the 700,000 DACA recipients, but millions more who illegally arrived prior to January 1st, were under 19 when they arrived and have only committed two misdemeanors. How do you prove you qualify? Under this bill, it means having a friend vouch for you.
We all sympathize with those illegally brought here as young children years ago and more than 200 Republicans supported legislation to give them legal status in the 115th Congress. But it included measures that secured our border and enforced our laws to discourage another generation of young people being brought here – exactly as we are now seeing unfold today.
Why are so many children being placed in the hands of Mexican criminal cartels, and forced to suffer the 2,000-mile trail of terror to our border? Because it works.
This bill proves the Mexican crime cartels are right – you’ll be admitted into our country and need only wait for the next amnesty.”
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
Border Patrol agents apprehend about two dozen illegal immigrants in Penitas, Texas, on March 11. 2021. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times) US News
As Americans start to receive the latest round of stimulus checks, a new analysis reveals that about $4.38 billion will also go to illegal immigrants.
The Center for Immigration Studies estimates that 2.65 million illegal immigrants have Social Security numbers that allow them to receive stimulus checks. This group of illegal immigrants can be described as “aliens temporarily present without status,” according to Steven Camarota, director of research for the Center for Immigration Studies.
“These individuals are in the country illegally and could be required to leave. Yet, under the current system, they are still given work authorization and Social Security numbers.”
They include Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals and Temporary Protected Status recipients. In addition, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services issued 882,000 work authorizations and Social Security numbers to other illegal immigrants in fiscal year 2020, the analysis states. These include asylum applicants, as well as those applying for adjustment of status and suspension of deportation, among other categories.
Not included in the numbers are the 1.8 million illegal immigrants that the Social Security Administration has estimated use Social Security numbers that don’t match their names, according to Camarota. Another 600,000 have Social Security numbers from when they were legally in the country, but overstayed their visa.
“There is simply no question that millions of illegal immigrants will receive billions of dollars in COVID relief checks,” Camarota said. “This highlights an even more disturbing fact—illegal immigrants are being issued Social Security numbers in large numbers. This is a clear indication that America is simply not serious about enforcing its immigration laws.”
Asylum-seekers are routinely given work authorization while they wait for their case to be adjudicated—regardless of the merit of the application. While almost 90 percent of those who claim credible fear when presenting themselves at the border pass the initial screening, less than 20 percent are ultimately granted asylum relief by an immigration judge. For Central Americans, that number is less than 10 percent.
During the last border surge in 2019, the southern border became so overwhelmed that most illegal aliens didn’t even claim credible fear, knowing they’d still be released expeditiously into the United States—especially if they were accompanied by a child. Only about 25 percent of illegal border crossers were claiming credible fear, according to Kevin McAleenan, acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), on July 12, 2019.
Received a nice telephone call from LDPCSD GM McGowan today regarding the second January meeting CD received after the request for the March meeting CD. Ready for this? The CD (REM with damaged envelope?) was the CD the GM had mailed back in January that was lost within the USPS until recently and again sent on its way! lol GM McGowan stated the March CD had not even been created yet but confirmed he would be dropping it off at my place again which is greatly appreciated. Hopefully we’ll know what, if any, action is being taken on the county’s attempt to force that loser of a sanitation facility on the LDPCSD. Mariposa County created that situation and should be the entity to deal with it as the LDPCSD (and this community) has had enough trouble the last 40 years with just providing water service according to applicable regulations that Mariposa County LAFCO completely ignored.
President Donald Trump arrives on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 24, 2017. (Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times) Donald Trump
Former President Donald Trump, in an interview on Monday morning, decried the media landscape in the United States saying it no longer has a “free press.”
Using the current border crisis as an example of a lack of proper coverage, Trump said that “this is not a free press,” according to his interview on Lisa Boothe’s podcast on Monday morning. “This is a press that we have to be very, very smart to get around, but they don’t cover bad things if it happens to be bad for Democrats. It’s pretty amazing. You take a look at some of the coverage and some of the travesty that’s taking place at the border, and the coverage is not commensurate.”
The former commander-in-chief remarked: “If you look at NBC, ABC, CBS, and of course CNN and MSNBC, and see—if you look at some of those networks—it’s just not covered. It’s covered so little. It’s amazing. And it’s a massive story because it’s going to destroy—it’s going to destroy our country.”
Throughout his presidency, Trump decried the “fake news” media, using the pejorative to describe outlets that he believed promoted certain narratives that went against him or his policies while generally promoting his opponents or critics. The former president also repeatedly panned MSNBC, the New York Times, and CNN—saying these outlets are essentially wings of the Democratic Party.
Over the weekend, one longtime Getty photojournalist, John Moore, called on the Biden administration to allow media workers to observe U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents operate as a massive surge of illegal immigrants arrives at the Southern Border.
“I respectfully ask US Customs and Border Protection to stop blocking media access to their border operations,” Moore wrote on Twitter Friday. “I have photographed CBP under Bush, Obama and Trump but now—zero access is granted to media. These long lens images [were] taken from the Mexican side.”
“There’s no modern precedent for a full physical ban on media access to CBP border operations,” Moore added in another Twitter comment. “To those who might say, cut them some slack—they are dealing with a situation, I’d say that showing the U.S. response to the current immigrant surge is exactly the media’s role.
Recent polls have suggested that Americans are largely distrustful of corporate, mass media. A Gallup poll released last year showed that only 9 percent of Americans trust the media “a great deal” and 31 percent trust it a “fair amount.” Meanwhile, 33 percent have “no trust” at all in the media and 27 percent don’t trust the media “very much,” according to the survey. In other polls, a significant number of Americans have blamed mass media for exacerbating the political divide in the U.S.Help 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) Executive Branch
The Biden administration has given no access to observe or report on Customs and Border Protection (CPB) operations at the U.S.-Mexico border, according to an award-winning photographer and journalist.
Getty Images correspondent John Moore alleged there is a lack of transparency along the border. Last week, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) stated that Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas’ trip to the border, including El Paso, Texas, “will be closed to press due to privacy and COVID-19 precautions.”
Moore won a 2019 photo for a Honduran toddler crying at the border.
“I respectfully ask US Customs and Border Protection to stop blocking media access to their border operations,” Moore wrote on Twitter Friday. “I have photographed CBP under Bush, Obama and Trump but now – zero access is granted to media. These long lens images taken from the Mexican side.”
Moore described the current situation as unprecedented.
“There’s no modern precedent for a full physical ban on media access to CBP border operations,” Moore added in another Twitter post. “To those who might say, cut them some slack—they are dealing with a situation, I’d say that showing the US response to the current immigrant surge is exactly the media’s role.
Moore added that the “vast majority of river crossings by asylum seekers happen on federal land in south Texas’ Rio Grande Valley. The federal [government] controls access to those areas. The Border Patrol has been removing journalists who enter, including recently myself, CBS, others.”
It comes in the midst of a surge of illegal immigration along the border, including thousands of unaccompanied children who are being housed in federal facilities. In January, President Joe Biden rescinded a number of Trump-era immigration rules, including the Remain in Mexico policy, halted the construction of the border wall, and also has said he would support more pathways to citizenship for illegal immigrants.
Republicans have seized on the issue, saying that Biden’s executive actions and messaging led to the unprecedented surge. White House officials, including Mayorkas, blamed former President Donald Trump for allegedly leaving the administration with a broken immigration system. https://platform.twitter.com/embed/Tweet.html?creatorScreenName=jackphillips5&dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-0&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1372930795548082179&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theepochtimes.com%2Fwhite-house-giving-journalists-zero-access-to-border-patrol-operations-photographer_3742722.html&siteScreenName=EpochTimes&theme=light&widgetsVersion=e1ffbdb%3A1614796141937&width=550px
Separately, White House press secretary Jen Psaki has been questioned during briefings about the lack of press access.
“The DHS oversees the Border Patrol facilities, and we want to work with them to ensure we can do respecting the privacy and obviously the health protocols required by COVID,” the press secretary said on March 18 in response to one question about press access.
A reporter then noted that no photos have been released either about the border crisis.
“Again we remain committed to sharing with all of you data on the number of kids crossing the border, the steps we’re taking, the work we’re doing to open up facilities, our own bar we’re setting for ourselves, improving the and expediting the timeline and the treatment of these children,” Psaki said. “And 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.”
The Epoch Times has contacted the DHS for comment.Help us spread the truth. Share this article with your friends.
Alejandro Mayorkas testifies during his confirmation hearing in the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee in Washington on Jan. 19, 2021. (Joshua Roberts/AFP via Getty Images) Executive Branch
Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Sunday said the border is closed but the United States will not turn back unaccompanied children who unlawfully cross into the United States.
“We are expelling families. We are expelling single adults. And we’ve made a decision that we will not expel young, vulnerable children. I think we are executing on our plans?,” Mayorkas told NBC News’ “Meet the Press” on Sunday.?
Mayorkas was then asked by Chuck Todd, the host, about whether the policy encourages parents in Mexico and other countries to send their children alone to the border.
“We have a short-term plan, a medium-term plan and a long-term plan, and the president and I have spoken to this repeatedly. Please remember something: That ?[former] ?President ?[Donald] ?Trump dismantled the orderly, humane, and efficient way of allowing children to make their claims under United States law in their home countries?,” the secretary said, without elaborating.
However, President Joe Biden’s immigration policies have been blasted by Trump administration officials and Republicans, who have said that they are weak and encourage illegal immigration. Biden moved to rescind a series of Trump-era policies starting on Jan. 20 and also indicated that he supports expanded pathways to citizenship for illegal immigrants.
But Mayorkas said that the border is not open.
“I?n the meantime, we will not expel into the Mexican desert, for example, three orphaned children whom I saw over the last two weeks. We just won’t do that. That’s not who we are?,” he said on Sunday morning. ?
Illegal immigrants from Central America take refuge in a make shift U.S. Customs and Border Protection processing center under the Anzalduas International Bridge after crossing the Rio Grande river into the United States from Mexico, in Granjeno, Texas, on March 12, 2021. (Adrees Latif/Reuters)
In an interview last week with ABC News, Biden made a similar remark, saying the border is closed and called on people not to show up at the border.
“We are safely processing the children who do come to our border. We strongly urge, and the message is clear, not to do so now. I cannot overstate the perils of the journey that they take,” Mayorkas said.?
Mayorkas told CNN later on Sunday that the agency set up three new facilities in the past week.
“We established three new facilities last week. … We are working on the system from beginning to end. We are working around the clock 24/7,” he said. “We have dealt with surges in the past and the men and women of Department of Homeland Security will succeed.”
At the same time, members of the media have raised red flags about how the administration is handing press access. Getty photographer John Moore over the weekend said that the press has been provided “zero access” to the border and photographers have been forced to shoot photos from the Mexican side of the border.
“I respectfully ask US Customs and Border Protection to stop blocking media access to their border operations,” Moore tweeted Friday. “I have photographed CBP under Bush, Obama and Trump but now – zero access is granted to media. These long lens images taken from the Mexican side.”
Meanwhile, there have been reports that Border Patrol officials have been muzzled by DHS officials about the situation at the border.Help us spread the truth. Share this article with your friends.
I admit to being sick to my stomach with such nonsense. (But what should we expect considering what is occupying the white house right now?) Decided I would take the time today to post and report on the March 15, 2021 Lake Don Pedro Community Services District (LDPCSD) Board of Directors meeting. Placed the LDPCSD mailed CD into the drive and guess what? Wrong meeting! I was provided a copy of the old January 25th meeting instead. Recall that I mentioned before these CDs are provided by the LDPCSD are not even date labeled? Not at all, either on the envelope or the CD itself. Seriously, how much “office time” is spent writing: “LDPCSD <date> ” on a frigg’n disk with a marker? Might even improve efficiency.
Anyway, I received an envelope in the mail with a plastic enclosed written apology from the USPS for what appeared to be ink/oil over the envelope, – but the disk was fine inside – just the wrong meeting.
Strange. The last two CD deliveries were made by the GM himself to my mail box (with my expressed permission and thanks) but this one goes through USPS again and…… oh well, stuff happens right? (Can you imagine the number of automatic sorting and processing machines every piece of mail must go through in its journey from being sent and ultimately received? Undoubtedly extremely complex with many potential problems and understandable that jams or “incidents” will occur sometimes.)
Anyway, here’s the second request for the LDPCSD MARCH 15 2021 meeting that was supposed to have the item of MARIPOSA COUNTY FORCING THAT LOSER OF A SEWER SYSTEM ON A WATER DISTRICT THAT CAN’T HANDLE WATER SERVICE YET! Who knows what happened? Anyway, here’s the second request – I’ve got other things to do now. later!
Recently LDPCSD mailed CD was the incorrect meeting recording
09:29 To: Syndie M LDPCSD
Sunday. Syndie, recently I requested the last LDPCSD BOD meeting for March 15th, unfortunately I was mailed another copy of the January 25, 2021 meeting – again. Much time is being wasted (on both sides) when important issues scheduled for board hearings are, for one reason or another, unreasonably delayed. Heck in some cases such requests for PUBLIC INFORMATION have been completely ignored (by the county and district) and NEVER provided despite multiple requests through the years (ie, such as the 1993 Merced Irrigation District shape file map which Peter Kampa wrongfully used for years (2014-2019) in misdirecting the LDPCSD into developing extremely expensive ground water wells with government grant funds intended for drought relief OF EXISTING CUSTOMERS (AND SPECIFICALLY NOT FOR INCREASING NEW SERVICE CONNECTIONS – MUCHLESS SERVICE CONNECTIONS OUTSIDE THE MERCED IRRIGATION DISTRICT PLACE OF USE FOR MERCED RIVER WATER PER WL11395 where our district owes no legal duty or moral obligation to provide JACK SQUAT!) , yet those water wells were actually intended to be used in yet another unethical attempt to supply a blended water mix outside the permitted service area for Merced River water (according to MID’s own water license 11395 restrictions) for the many LAFCO [LOCAL AGENCY FORMATION COMMISSION] ANNEXATION DEVELOPMENTS KAMPA WRONGFULLY SETUP some 20 years earlier WITHOUT BOARD PERMISSION when first employed at the LDPCSD as manager. (Why should entitled water users provide their water (and pay for the extra costs involved in producing and furnishing the LAFCO BLENDED WATER) for other outside PLACE OF USE proposed residential subdivisions (and other proposed developments) approved by LAFCOs in this drought prone region?)
I sure hope our current GM and his Board are not again working with the Merced Irrigation District, the CALIFORNIA SPECIAL DISTRICTS ASSOCIATION (CSDA), and other public/private entities in the same ANTI-CUSTOMER MODE as our previous GM PETER KAMPA did to thwart PUBLIC INFORMATION ACQUISITION and/or DISTRICT ACTIVITY AWARNESS FROM THE ALREADY VICTIMIZED CUSTOMERS OF THIS FRAUD OF A CALIFORNIA SPECIAL DISTRCT.
What are the characteristics of a California Special District anyway? A limited public service; a defined geographical service area; a specific class of designated customers, and the service is provided for only the cost necessary in delivering that service to the customer, yet all four characteristics in our CALIFORNIA SPECIAL DISTRICT have been ignored in favor of beneficial exploitation for LAFCO ANNEXATION DEVELOPMENT PROMOTERS and all to the detriment of the MANDATORY LDPCSD CUSTOMERS WITHIN THE RESIDENTIAL SUBDIVISION. Imagine, all the decades of expensive turmoil only continued by the same organizations that formed the LDPCSD in the first place back in 1980. Apparently this was all an intentionally designed trap for the “deep pocket” designated LDP property owner. Creating a community services district with a deep pocket MANDATORY CUSTOMER BASE OF INNOCENT LAKE DON PEDRO PROPERTY OWNERS WHO ARE FORCED TO SUBSIDIZE AN EXTREMELY EXPENSIVE GROUNDWATER SUBSTITUTION PROGRAM TO CIRCUMVENT MERCED RIVER WATER PLACE OF USE RESTRICTIONS IN 11395 FOR LAFCO ANNEXATIONS INTO THE LDPCSD THAT NEVER SHOULD HAVE BEEN APPROVED 20 YEARS AGO ACCORDING TO LAFCO’s OWN REGULATIONS? LAFCO RESOLUTION 76-4….
Sorry, I digress but I have spent over a decade trying to make sense of this nightmare which continues to harm and exploit the taxpaying property owners within the Lake Don Pedro subdivision. Is this part of LAFCO Special District Socialism 101?
Anyway, I would still appreciate a copy of the last March 15, 2021 LDPCSD BOD meeting. Thank you, Lew
A report from the U.S. intelligence community suggests that a minority of intelligence officials believed that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) did, in fact, attempt to hinder former President Donald Trump’s chances in the 2020 election, while reporting that the CCP did not “deploy interference efforts.”
A report from the National Intelligence Council (pdf) released March 10 stated that Russia sought to denigrate President Joe Biden and boost Trump during the 2020 election, and that China “did not deploy interference efforts and considered but did not deploy influence efforts intended to change the outcome of the U.S. presidential election,” adding: “We have high confidence in this judgment.”
The report further asserted that the CCP “sought stability in its relationship with the United States and did not view either election outcome as being advantageous enough for China to risk blowback if caught,” while intelligence officials suspected that “Beijing probably believed that its traditional influence tools, primarily targeted economic measures and lobbying key individuals and interest groups, would be sufficient to achieve its goal of shaping U.S. policy regardless of who won the election. We did not identify China attempting to interfere with election infrastructure or providing funding to any candidates or parties.”
But the report also indicated that some U.S. intelligence officials believe the CCP tried to undermine Trump.
“The National Intelligence Officer for Cyber assesses that China took at least some steps to undermine former President Trump’s reelection chances, primarily through social media and official public statements and media,” says the report in its minority view section. “The NIO agrees with the IC’s view that Beijing was primarily focused on countering anti-China policies, but assesses that some of Beijing’s influence efforts were intended to at least indirectly affect U.S. candidates, political processes, and voter preferences, meeting the definition for election influence used in this report. The NIO agrees that we have no information suggesting China tried to interfere with election processes. The NIO has moderate confidence in these judgments.”
The short paragraph is referring to the National Intelligence Officer (NIO) for Cyber Issues on the National Intelligence Council, which leads the U.S. intelligence community in its cyber analysis and analyzes challenges to elections.
And the assessment termed election influence as activities “intended to directly or indirectly affect an election” and deemed interference as “attempts to target the technical aspects of elections,” as noted by the Washington Examiner.
“We assess that Beijing’s risk calculus against influencing the election was informed by China’s preference for stability in the bilateral relationship, their probable judgment that attempting to influence the election could do lasting damage to U.S.-China ties, and belief that the election of either candidate would present opportunities and challenges for China,” the majority view stated.
Last year, then-Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe said that China meddled in the 2020 federal elections, and further alleged that intelligence about China’s election interference was suppressed by management at the CIA, which pressured analysts to withdraw their support for the view.
Also this week, the Department of Justice, including the FBI, and the Department of Homeland Security and its cybersecurity agency said in a joint report that they “have no evidence that any foreign government-affiliated actor” such as Russia, China, or Iran “prevented voting, changed votes, or disrupted the ability to tally votes or to transmit election results in a timely manner, altered any technical aspect of the voting process, or otherwise compromised the integrity of voter registration information of any ballots cast during 2020 federal elections.”
Ratcliffe, meanwhile, said at the time that he supports “the stated minority view—based on all available sources of intelligence, with definitions consistently applied, and reached independent of political considerations or undue pressure—that the People’s Republic of China sought to influence the 2020 U.S. federal elections.”Help us spread the truth. Share this article with your friends.
Writers for the New York Times may have spread deceptive claims about the nonprofit journalism group Project Veritas, a judge ruled this week.
In stories from 2020 about Project Veritas videos, writers Maggie Astor and Tiffany Hsu inserted sentences that were opinions despite the articles being billed as news, New York Supreme Court Justice Charles Wood said.
“If a writer interjects an opinion in a news article (and will seek to claim legal protections as opinion) it stands to reason that the writer should have an obligation to alert the reader, including a court that may need to determine whether it is fact or opinion, that it is opinion,” Wood wrote in a 16-page decision denying the paper’s request to dismiss a lawsuit from Project Veritas.
“The Articles that are the subject of this action called the Video ‘deceptive,’ but the dictionary definitions of ‘disinformation’ and ‘deceptive’ provided by defendants’ counsel certainly apply to Astor’s and Hsu’s failure to note that they injected their opinions in news articles, as they now claim,” he added.
At issue are five articles that Project Veritas alleges contained false and defamatory information. All five were about a 2020 video report from the journalism group on alleged illegal voting practices in Minnesota.
In one of Astor’s articles, she wrote: “Mr. O’Keefe and Project Veritas have a long history of releasing manipulated or selectively edited footage purporting to show illegal conduct by Democrats and liberal groups.” The source of the statement, and whether it is fact or opinion, is not clear, according to the judge.
Hsu, meanwhile, wrote in part that conservative publications “magnified the reach of a deceptive video released last month by Project Veritas, a group run by the conservative activist James O’Keefe,” adding: “The video claimed without named sources or verifiable evidence that the campaign for Representative Ilhan Omar, a Minnesota Democrat, was collecting ballots illegally.”
“Stating that the video is ‘deceptive’ and stating ‘without verifiable evidence’ in a factual way in a news article certainly presents the statement as fact, not opinion,” Wood wrote in his decision. “Further, the Astor and Hsu Articles could be viewed as exposing Veritas to ridicule and harm to its reputation as a media source because the reader may read these news Articles, expecting facts, not opinion, and conclude that Veritas is a partisan zealot group, deceptively editing video, and presenting it as news.”
James O’Keefe, the founder of Project Veritas, is seen in Washington on Oct. 12, 2019. (Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times)
The judge said he reviewed the total context and tone of the stories and concluded a reader could believe the statements were conveying facts about Project Veritas.
The New York Times had argued that statements describing the video as “deceptive” and “false” were opinions incapable of being judged true or false.
Lawyers for the paper also argued that even if the term “deceptive” could be given objective meaning as a factual statement, writers demonstrated that the video was deceptive, citing other news outlets and so-called fact-checkers, such as Fox News and The Washington Post.
“While this is a lengthy media list, polling does not decide truth nor speak to evidence, and Defendants have not met their burden to prove that the reporting by Veritas in the Video is deceptive,” the judge said. Additionally, Veritas demonstrated in its complaint that Astor did not likely in 63 minutes digest a report from a group that alleged the video was disinformation, review news reports on Minnesota ballot issues, view the video online, obtain a comment from Alex Stamos from the Stanford Internet Observatory, write her own article, submit the article to her editors, and have it posted online.
“The facts submitted by Veritas could indicate more than standard, garden variety media bias and support a plausible inference of actual malice,” the judge wrote.
A lawyer representing the New York Times referred The Epoch Times to the paper. A spokesperson for the paper didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Project Veritas said in a statement: “This ruling means Project Veritas will now be able to put New York Times reporter Maggie Astor and New York Times executive editor Dean Baquet under oath where they will be forced to answer our questions. Project Veritas will record these depositions and expose them for the world to see.”
Correction: A previous version of this article misidentified one of the writers. The Epoch Times regrets the error. Follow Zachary on Twitter: @zackstieberFollow Zachary on Parler: @zackstieberHelp us spread the truth. Share this article with your friends.
Federal prosecutors in North Carolina said Friday that 24 additional people have been charged in an ongoing probe into voter fraud, including two who are accused of illegally voting in the 2016 presidential election.
Gabriela Guzman-Miguel, 26, and Jose Abraham Navarro, 42, both of Mexico, are accused to have voted despite lacking the legal status to do so, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of North Carolina said in a list of defendants obtained by The Epoch Times. The list described both as aliens or immigrants.
A slew of other defendants were charged with falsely claiming U.S. citizenship in order to register to vote. Some also engaged in naturalization fraud and misuse of visas, permits, and other documents relating to voter registration, officials said.
Defendants hailed from 15 countries, including Honduras, Iraq, and Canada. The charges date back to the fall of 2019, though the cases were just unsealed.
Those charged face jail time and fines of up to $350,000 if convicted.
Each defendant was charged separately and there are no charges of conspiracy, the prosecutor’s office said.
Robert Higdon, who headed the office until recently, had aggressively pursued illegal voting cases, subpoenaing records from the state board of elections, and 44 county boards in 2018.
The state board called the subpoena “overly broad, unreasonable, vague.” It advised North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein, a Democrat, to quash the subpoenas.
Stein eventually directed the board to acquire records associated with approximately 789 people who had registered to vote—far less than Higdon, a Trump appointee, had sought.
Higdon in 2018 announced charges against 19 foreign nationals for voting in the 2016 election and last year another U.S. attorney in the state unveiled voter fraud charges against 19 others.
“The right to vote is a precious privilege available only to citizens of the United States. When a non-citizen votes in a federal election it serves to dilute and devalue the vote of American citizens and places the decision making authority of the American electorate in the hands of those who have no right to make those choices,” Higdon said in a previous statement.
An audit by the state board of elections after the 2016 election found 41 individuals had acknowledged voting despite not being U.S. citizens. Sixty-one others who may have voted illegally did not respond while another 34, identified in the audit, provided proof of citizenship.
“Information obtained from those who are not citizens illustrates the complexity of this work. A number of non-citizens said they were not aware that they were prohibited from voting. Interviews and evidence show that some non-citizens were misinformed about the law by individuals conducting voter registration drives or, in at least one documented case, by a local precinct official,” the audit stated.
“One registrant in her 70s has lived in the United States for more than 50 years and believed that she was a citizen because she had been married to a U.S. citizen.” Follow Zachary on Twitter: @zackstieberFollow Zachary on Parler: @zackstieberHelp us spread the truth. Share this article with your friends.
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