‘Everywhere you look right now, it’s Goldilocks, an economy that’s in really good shape and no inflation to speak of and very, very low interest rates…’
IMAGE: geralt (CC) via Pixabay
(Claire Russel, Liberty Headlines) A large majority of Goldman Sachs investors believe President Donald Trump will win reelection in 2020, crediting the strong economy and stable stock market.
During its Global Strategy Conference in London last week, the Wall Street powerhouse surveyed more than 150 of its clients and found that more than 87 percent of its investors believe Trump will defeat his Democratic opponent.
Despite the Democrats’ impeachment efforts, Trump’s strong handling of the economy will help him among independent voters, the investors said, according to Business Insider.
Last year, Goldman Sachs said Trump’s reelection would be a “close call,” according to CNBC. But now, only 5 percent of investors expect an economic recession this year, and the stock market has broken multiple records while unemployment has fallen to record lows.
“Everywhere you look right now, it’s Goldilocks, an economy that’s in really good shape and no inflation to speak of and very, very low interest rates,” Greg Valliere, chief U.S. policy strategist at Canada-based AGF Investments, told Fox Business.
“The bottom line for the markets is that the impeachment story has been background noise and not much more,” Valliere said.
The Wells Fargo Investment Institute also said the stock market’s success could spell good news for Trump, though it’s still too early to tell.
“In years when the incumbent party wins the presidential election, the equity market rally has been stronger than for the average of all U.S. election years,” the institute said.
And Brendan Greeley, the U.S. economics editor for Financial Times, concluded that though Trump “will face many obstacles to his reelection … the economy will not be one of them.”
Trump has vowed that “The best is yet to come!” while touting his economic success.
“As we begin the new year our economy is booming,” he said at an Ohio rally earlier this month. “Wages are soaring, workers are thriving and America’s future has never, ever looked brighter.”
‘These realities of the H-2B program, as it operates today, incentivize unscrupulous employers to hire H-2B workers instead of American workers…’
Laura Ingraham / IMAGE: Alipac via Youtube
(Joshua Paladino, Liberty Headlines) Progressive Democrats, conservative Republicans, and Fox News host Laura Ingraham are all opposing President Donald Trump’s effort to expand the H-2B guest worker visa program.
Republican Sens. Chuck Grassley of Iowa and Tom Cotton of Arkansas joined with Democratic Sens. Dick Durbin of Illinois, Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut and Dianne Feinstein of California sent a letter to the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Labor to express their concerns about H-2B growth.
“These realities of the H-2B program, as it operates today, incentivize unscrupulous employers to hire H-2B workers instead of American workers and create poor working conditions for immigrant workers and American workers alike,” the senators wrote.
“Therefore, absent significant regulatory and legislative reforms to the program, we do not believe that an increase in the number of H-2B visas is in the interests of either American workers or H-2B visa holders.”
This isn’t the first time Trump’s supporters have criticized him for importing more foreign workers to take jobs from native-born Americans.
In spring 2018, the Trump administration raised the cap on H-2B foreign workers by 30,000, for a total of 96,000—the highest in the program’s history.
At the time, the Center for Immigration Studies—a usual supporter of Trump’s immigration policies—called the decision a “betrayal” of his directive to “Buy American and Hire American.”
In an exclusive interview last week, Ingraham pressed Trump hard on the H-2B expansion.
“I hear that your team is planning on advocating more foreign workers coming in for some of these high-tech companies,” Ingraham said. “I’m very concerned about that, as are a lot of your supporters. … You ran on ‘America First.'”
Trump said radio host Mark Levin and “the great Lou Dobbs,” a Fox Business anchor, are also concerned. He explained that foreign countries want to open companies in the United States but cannot find enough workers.
“Here’s the problem,” Trump said. “They can’t get labor. We need help. Otherwise, we could just say, ‘Don’t open up any plants.'”
Ingraham challenged Trump: “If they couldn’t get labor, wages would be going up.”
“Wages are going up,” he said.
“Not in the high-tech industry,” she said. “We’re seeing a plateauing of wages.”
Watch the full discussion about the proposed H-2B expansion:
‘We have a right to believe that without being called a hate group…’
Dana Nessel / Detroit Public TV
(Claire Russel, Liberty Headlines) Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel has been using the state’s Civil Rights Department as a weapon against religious institutions, according to an investigation conducted by the Thomas More Law Center.
After Nessel attempted to put St. Vincent Catholic Charities, a faith-based adoption and foster care center, out of business last year, the TMLC filed a Freedom of Information Act request to find out why Nessel had targeted the Catholic agency in the first place.
Nessel denied the request, but her office did admit that it does not have “policies in place to safeguard the constitutional rights of individuals” who are being investigated for hate-related crimes. TMLC filed a lawsuit against Nessel for her refusal to comply with its FOIA request.
It also appears Nessel is working hand-in-hand with the Southern Poverty Law Center, a radical leftist group that regularly targets religious organizations, according to TMLC.
For example, in early 2019 the SPLC released its annual “Hate Map” targeting conservative organizations that object to the LGBT agenda.
One of the groups listed was Church Militant/St. Michael’s Media, a Michigan-based media organization tied to the Catholic Church.
Just three days after the “Hate Map” was published, Nessel announced the Michigan Department of Civil Rights would investigate Church Militant, citing the SPLC’s “Hate Map.”
Nessel was called out last year by a federal judge for anti-religious maneuvering after St. Vincent Catholic Charities brought its case to court.
U.S. District Court Chief Judge Robert Jonker ruled that Nessel’s case against the agency and her past rhetoric about religion “raised a strong interference of hostility toward a religious viewpoint,” and concluded that she had “targeted” the adoption agency “based on its religious belief.”
Instead of heeding Jonker’s advice to respect religious liberty, Nessel decided to listen to the SPLC and create a new hate-crimes unit to document and prosecute hate crimes in the state.
“These [extremists organizations] range in the ideological extremes from anti-Muslim, to anti-LGBT to black nationalist and white nationalists,” said the state’s Department of Civil Rights Director Agustin Arbulu. “Particularly of concern, over one half of the identified groups are located east of US-23 between Flint and Ann Arbor.”
One of the groups Arbulu said the office will investigate is Church Militant/St. Michael’s Media, which “demonizes” gay people with its “virulently anti-gay” work, according to the SPLC.
The group’s editor-in-chief, Christine Niles, rejected this label and said that all her organization does is teach the biblical understanding of traditional marriage between one man and one woman.
“We have a right to believe that without being called a hate group,” Niles told the Detroit News.
Nessel’s spokeswoman, Kelly Rossman–McKinney, admitted that the SPLC “is a good place to start when investigating these issues,” and explained that the new hate-crime unit will include at least one prosecuting attorney and one full-time investigator.
“The combination of actions by the Attorney General Nessel, the Department of Civil Rights and the Southern Poverty Law Center have a chilling effect on the freedom of speech and religion not only of Church Militant, but every religious group in Michigan that stands for traditional marriage,” TMLC President Richard Thompson said in a statement.
‘Even if he considers you a friend, like Elizabeth Warren, Bernie will come first…’
Bernie Sanders / IMAGE: The Young Turks via Youtube
(Claire Russel, Liberty Headlines) Former Democratic Vermont Gov. Peter Shumlin said Democrats should expect Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., to “play dirty” during the remainder of the 2020 presidential campaign.
“What I’ve seen in Bernie’s politics is he and his team feel they’re holier than the rest,” said Shumlin, who served as Vermont’s governor from 2011 to 2017.
“In the end, they will play dirty because they think that they pass a purity test that Republicans and most Democrats don’t pass,” he told Politico.
Shumlin has endorsed former Vice President Joe Biden.
Sanders, a registered independent and a self-proclaimed Democratic socialist, lacks loyalty to the Democratic Party, Shumlin said, citing Sanders’s recent feud with Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.
“What you’re seeing now is, in the end, even if he considers you a friend, like Elizabeth Warren, Bernie will come first. That’s the pattern we’ve seen over the years in Vermont, and that’s what we are seeing now nationally,” he said.
Sanders is trying to “Hillarize” Warren and make her unlikeable, Shumlin continued.
“We should be weakening Donald Trump, not each other,” Shumlin said. “I’m concerned that we’re seeing a replay of the kind of dynamics that didn’t allow Hillary to win.”
Warren has accused Sanders of telling her back in 2016 that a woman couldn’t win the presidency. However, Sanders has denied the reports.
After last week’s Democratic primary debate, Warren confronted Sanders for calling her a “liar” by denying reports that he had made sexist remarks. After refusing to shake his hand, Warren tried to confront Sanders, who tried to deescalate the situation.
“Let’s not do it right now,” he said. “You want to have that discussion? We’ll have that discussion.”
Warren replied, “Anytime.”
Sanders then added, “You called me a liar,” before concluding, “All right, let’s not do it now.”
‘This may be what you think is safety, but it is not…’
Ralph Northam / IMAGE: Face the Nation via Youtube
(Claire Russel, Liberty Headlines) Virginia Democrats in the state Senate passed three gun control bills that would restrict monthly gun purchases, expand universal background checks and allow localities to prohibit guns in certain designated areas.
Senate Bills 69, 70 and 35 passed the Democratic-controlled chamber on Thursday, despite the fact that more than 100 Virginia counties have declared themselves 2nd Amendment sanctuaries and vowed to block the laws.
“Ladies and gentleman, this is probably the first assault on the Second Amendment, and we’re going to see many after that,” said Republican state Sen. Bill Stanley, according to WSET, a local ABC News affiliate. “This may be what you think is safety, but it is not.”
Now the legislation will need to pass the General Assembly, which is “hostile to the lawful possession of firearms,” according to Republican state Sen. Mark Obenshain.
One bill, SB 16, which was the most controversial, was struck from the record completely. The bill would have banned “assault-style” weapons, high-capacity magazines, bump stocks, and silencers.
“Regrettably, Virginia lawmakers approved a series of measures today that will make it harder for law-abiding Virginians to protect themselves, while doing nothing to stop criminals,” the NRA said in a statement.
Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam has made it clear that the fight over gun control in the state is not over yet. He is still pushing for a package of legislation that would prohibit individuals who had been subject to protective orders from owning firearms, require that lost and stolen firearms be reported to law enforcement within 24 hours, and allow law enforcement to petition courts to confiscate the firearms of those deemed dangerous to themselves and others.
In response to Northam’s threats, gun sales have skyrocketed throughout the state. One firearms store owner said his sales have gone up 200% since the controversy started, and more of his customers are paying cash.
“The only other person that was a better salesman right now is when we had President Obama,” said Jerry Rapp, owner of SpecDive Tactical, in Alexandria.
“Every time [Obama] turned around he was going to ban something or make something illegal,” Rapp said. “But even that isn’t even close to the amount of sales we’re selling right now of magazines, of guns, of every kind of gun from pistol, rifle, shotguns, to AR platforms, and ammunition. We can’t keep it in stock.”
‘I would like to be able to hear from John Bolton…’
Mitt Romney/PHOTO: Gage Skidmore (CC)
(Claire Russel, Liberty Headlines) Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, has lost support among Republicans and independents in his home state because of his support for impeachment trial witnesses, according to a new poll.
A Morning Consult survey found that support for Romney significantly dropped after he said he’d like to hear from former national security adviser John Bolton during the Senate’s impeachment trial.
Before Romney’s impeachment comments, 65% of Utah Republicans supported him. Afterward, that number sank to 57%.
Support among independents also dropped 9%, the poll found.
Democratic voters, however, continue to support Romney. At least 46% of Democrats approved of Romney’s actions, which is 4% more than last quarter, according to Morning Consult.
Romney is one of the few moderate Republican senators who have signaled their support for additional witness testimony and evidence.
Romney called President Donald Trump’s phone call with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy “troubling in the extreme,” and said Bolton’s testimony could help the Senate reach “a final judicial resolution of the still unanswered constitutional questions.”
“I would like to be able to hear from John Bolton,” Romney said earlier this month. “What the process is to make that happen, I don’t have an answer for you.”
A few other Republican senators have been working to secure Bolton’s testimony, too, but Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has made it clear that he wants to conduct the trial quickly and efficiently.
The Senate will “put aside animal reflexes and animosity,” McConnell said, and “cooly consider” the charges made against Trump.
“There will be no haggling with the House over Senate procedure,” he said. “We will not cede our authority to try this impeachment. The House Democrats’ turn is over.”
‘What this president did is worse than anything that any president has done…’
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi sticks out her tongue in a photo op with congressional women—many of whom risked their newly acquired seats over impeachment. / IMAGE: Associated Press via Youtube
(Claire Russel, Liberty Headlines) House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., threatened Senate Republicans about blocking Democrats’ requests for additional witness testimony and refusing to hold President Trump accountable for his “transgression” during his upcoming impeachment trial.
“What is going to happen is the Senate is going to incriminate itself if it says ‘we don’t want to see witnesses, we’re going to ignore the truth,’” Pelosi said during a fundraiser in San Francisco last week.
Even if Republicans stonewall the Democrats’ requests, Democrats have still won an important battle, she claimed.
“Whatever they do, and however they try to run and hide from the truth, as I have said to the president—you are impeached forever,” Pelosi said, according to NBC News.
Although many Republicans have warned that the Democrats’ impeachment efforts will backfire among independent voters in the swing states, Pelosi claimed that public opinion is on her side.
“Over 70% of the American people have said that they want witnesses, and I think that is the leverage that the Democratic senators have, and hopefully some of the Republican senators as well,” she said.
It remained unclear whether Pelosi also supported the possibility of President Donald Trump’s defense attorneys calling to the stand witnesses like presumed whistleblower Eric Ciaramella, as well as former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter.
Central to Trump’s defense will likely be that the corruption implicating the Bidens and their pay-to-play influence-peddling with the Burisma gas company justified calling on Ukraine to reopen its investigations into them, which had been suspended under duress during the Obama administration.
Pelosi encouraged Democrats to continued their attacks on Trump, regardless of what his defense may reveal.
“What this president did is worse than anything that any president has done,” she alleged, implicitly downplaying historical wrongs such as slavery and the exploitation of American Indians.
“We have to make sure that no president—no matter who he or she may be—can think they can get away with this,” Pelosi continued.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has made it clear that the Senate will conduct the impeachment trial quickly and efficiently, pointing out that the Republican majority will almost certainly vote to acquit Trump.
But Pelosi countered that no matter what McConnell does, Trump is “never going to be exonerated.”
“She signed the impeachment papers. And that took place at a table with a political slogan stuck on it. And they posed afterwards, for smiling photos, and the Speaker distributed souvenir pens to her own colleagues emblazoned with her golden signature that literally came in on silver platters. Golden pens on silver platters. A souvenir, to celebrate the moment,” McConnell said on the Senate floor.
“Now, I seem to remember Democrats falling over themselves to say they did not see impeachment as a long sought political win,” McConnell continued. “They recognized the gravity and seriousness of this action, and of course, they had only come to it reluctantly. Of course, nothing says seriousness and sobriety like handing out souvenirs.”
‘I don’t think they showed in large numbers due to the large presence of level-headed gun owners…’
Gun-rights rally-goers gather near the Capitol Grounds in Richmond. / PHOTO: Courtesy of AJ Jenkins
(Ben Sellers, Liberty Headlines) With all eyes on Richmond, the Virginia state capital, an annual Lobby Day demonstration by gun-rights activists looked to avoid any violence, despite controversial Gov. Ralph Northam‘s pre-emptive emergency declaration.
Among those sounding alarm was state Sen. Amanda Chase, R-Chesterfield, who cautioned that Northam might be working in coordination with groups like the Southern Poverty Law Center to infiltrate right-wing demonstrations and foment violence.
Philip Search, an adviser for Chase, told Liberty Headlines that the pro-gun-rights demonstrators working in tandem with local law-enforcement had helped keep the event safe and peaceful.
“As Second Amendment supporters and advocates for constitutional freedom, they are law-abiding citizens,” he said, “and law-abiding citizens follow the law.”
Search said there were credible reports of groups planning to organize counter-demonstrations but “it completely backfired.”
Attendees said that the few left-wing activists who did show up were respected and allowed to voice their opinions without incident.
Left-wing activists confront gun-rights demonstrators in Richmond as members of the media stand by. Despite fears of widespread violence, the demonstrations were reportedly peaceful. / PHOTO: Courtesy of Randy Hedrick
Gun-rights advocate Randy Hedrick, a Danville resident, reported that a group of socialists “got inside the gate and started chanting but everyone let them speak their piece, no violence, and they left.”
Sgt. A.J. Jenkins, a Marine anti-tank gunner and Stafford County resident, also witnessed some instigators clad in black with socialist fist symbols on their clothing.
“They were somewhat talkative, and tried to start something multiple times, until police intervened,” Jenkins said.
However, he added, “I don’t think they showed in large numbers due to the large presence of level-headed gun owners, who wouldn’t allow anybody to entice them into acting in a way that could be portrayed in a negative context.”
PJ Media reported that rally-goers had turned against one agitator who suggested “hopping the fence and killing people,” although it was unclear if the person was affiliated with any left-wing groups.
WATCH: #VirginiaRally agitator recommended “hopping the fence and killing people,”
On the other hand, the attention that Northam and left-wing media outlets brought to the rally had an upside of helping mobilize many on the Right, including well known conservative personality Alex Jones, said Jenkins.
Alex Jones and Marine Sgt. AJ Jenkins at the Lobby Day gun-rights rally in Richmond / PHOTO: Courtesy of AJ Jenkins
The Guardian, a British newspaper reporting from Charlottesville, said left-wing activists there were deliberately avoiding the scene at the state Capitol Grounds in Richmond, about an hour’s drive away from the college down where a deadly 2017 clash occurred.
During that rally, organized by a disgruntled former Obama supporter named Jason Kessler, city officials repeatedly attempted to revoke permits and restrict far-right demonstrators who were protesting the illegal efforts to remove two Civil War monuments.
Out-of-state extremists from both sides showed up, with many mask-clad Antifa activists wielding improvised flame-throwers and hurling projectiles at demostrators, some of whom were dressed in Nazi and KKK outfits.
Conservatives at Monday’s rally expressed relief with being allowed to exercise their First Amendment rights, un-obtruded, while criticizing Democrats and media for over-hyping concerns of white nationalists and domestic terrorists.
An attendee at the rally in Richmond Virginia dispels the media smears against rally-goers.
He says the media is mischaracterizing them, & that they are just law abiding citizens who want to advocate for their constitutional rights.#VirginiaRally pic.twitter.com/Vp3bJX8eNi
No riots.
No violence.
No targeting of citizens.
No attacking cops.
Just Thousands upon thousands or peaceful, law-abiding citizens gathering in Virginia’s capitol to protest an unconstitutional assault on their rights.
Show me an Antifa rally like this:pic.twitter.com/5wUm8gL0Ey
He was elected governor in November 2017, a few months after the Charlottesville violence, but was constrained last year by a Republican legislative majority and kept in check by his own scandal involving a racist yearbook photo.
However, Democrats assumed control of the General Assembly in last November’s elections—in which leftist mega-donors like George Soros, Tom Steyer and Michael Bloomberg invested millions of dollars to outspend statewide GOP efforts.
Radical leftists in the legislature have now scheduled votes on a raft of controversial proposals that threaten to permanently change the character of the state and turn it into an East Coast California.
In response to proposed gun-confiscation measures, the majority of counties in the state recently enacted resolutions to declare themselves 2nd-Amendment sanctuaries.
“What we are now seeing in the General Assembly is a complete gun-grab,” said Search. “They are pretty much declaring war against law-abiding citizens.”
Other legislative measures are being enacted that could secure permanent majorities for Democrats in the once-red state.
Despite the bleak outlook, Search said freedom-loving conservatives in the state have no choice now but to stand up and be heard.
“Republicans have been silent for too long,” he said. “That’s why they’re called the ‘silent majority.’ They need to be considered now as a vocal majority.”
Search said that Chase, who was just re-elected to her third term in the Virginia Senate, is considering a run for governor in 2021 or 2025.
He encouraged voters to hold accountable not only Democratic lawmakers, but also any Republicans who voted in support of their extreme agenda.
“The best way to win a game that’s not being played fairly is to vote in new game players,” Search said.
‘There are thousands of people who made sacrifices to bring aid to the south and it’s unforgivable that resources have been kept in a warehouse…’
(Claire Russel, Liberty Headlines) The head of Puerto Rico’s emergency management services was fired last week after a group of residents discovered a warehouse filled with unused hurricane supplies.
The Trump administration released billions of dollars in emergency aid to Puerto Rico after a deadly earthquake rocked the island. But Carlos Acevedo, who was in charge of the island’s emergency supplies, had hid away thousands of cases of water, along with pallets of bedding, food, and medical supplies.
Warehouses filled with supplies that they sent to #PuertoRico being hidden and never distributed. Supplies they had saved since Hurricane Maria and been left to waste… We have a disgusting government?♀️? pic.twitter.com/jSDPyW5hVX
¡Esto le saca las lágrimas de coraje a cualquiera! ??? Pañales, comida para bebés, estufas, radios, agua, carpas, toldos, ENTRE MUCHOS OTROS SUMINISTROS PERDIÉNDOSE DESDE MARÍA!!! ESTO ES TODO LO QUE PIDE LA GENTE DEL SUR CON LOS TERREMOTOS!!! Video: El León Fiscalizador pic.twitter.com/cd11rdhhhK
Acevedo has denied allegations of mishandling, but Puerto Rico Gov. Wanda Vazquez fired him and called for an immediate investigation into the discovery of the supplies.
In a press conference on Sunday, Vazquez said that no one would be prosecuted for breaking into the warehouse.
She also fired Housing Secretary Fernando Gil and Department of Family Secretary Glorimar Andujar for failing to hold Acevedo accountable.
“There are thousands of people who made sacrifices to bring aid to the south and it’s unforgivable that resources have been kept in a warehouse,” Vazquez said, according to CNN.
Acevedo’s mismanagement comes days after the Trump administration agreed to finally lift an aid hold.
The president had warned that Puerto Rico’s corrupt officials would abuse federal funds, but Democrats continued to fault Trump for refusing to provide disaster relief.
“Their political system is broken and their politicians are either incompetent or corrupt,” he said in September, adding that billions of dollars in previous aid had gone to “crooks pols. No good!”
‘It will be used to put the rest of the nation on notice of what will happen to you, if you resist…’
(Ben Sellers, Liberty Headlines) Virginia gun owners and civil libertarians reacted at first with outrage over Gov. Ralph Northam‘s “emergency” gun ban during an annual rally Monday at the state capitol, claiming he had “credible fear” of violence after intercepting white-nationalist communications.
As the Lobby Day rally approached, though, reactions shifted from outrage to alarm with indications that Northam may be helping engineer a false-flag operation.
The Associated Press reported that thousands of protesters, “mostly white and male,” had showed up in Richmond, the state capital, on Monday morning voice their opposition to Virginia’s controversial gun-confiscation proposals.
In advance of the demonstration, posts like the one from Tom DeWeese of the Virginia-based American Policy Center shockingly suggested that far-left activists may be attempting to infiltrate the rally in order to foment violence and prevent pro-gun demonstrators from exercising their First Amendment rights.
A similar warning came from state Sen. Amanda Chase, who posted on Facebook that Northam was in on the coordinated set-up.
“If anyone steps out of line, all it takes is one person, it may even be a government plant….if that plant does anything to disrupt the rally, you could/will be arrested as a domestic terrorist,” Chase wrote.
“The Governor, using the media has already set the stage for this to happen,” she continued. “He has already laid the groundwork to make the entire movement look like insurrection.”
Similar theories abounded about Antifa‘s presence at the fatal 2017 rally in nearby Charlottesville. During the chaos, a local activist was killed after 20-year-old James Alex Fields Jr., an alleged neo-Nazi who had driven from Ohio, careened his car into a crowd that was blocking the street at the city’s popular Downtown Mall.
The tense rhetoric in advance of the Charlottesville rally set the stage for a violent clash as Charlottesville city officials and then-Gov. Terry McAuliffe fought to prevent free-speech demonstrations by attempting unsuccessfully to revoke permits for the “Unite the Right” rally.
The rally, organized by Jason Kessler—a former Obama voter—was in protest of the city’s illegal efforts to remove two longstanding monuments to Confederate Gens. Robert E. Lee and Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson.
Antifa activists showed up wielding improvised flame throwers and hurling projectiles at the far-right demonstrators, some of whom were wearing Nazi and KKK outfits.
It was later revealed that officials, including City Councilor Wes Bellamy—a radical black-liberation activist with his own history of misogynist and homophobic statements—had been recorded telling police to stand down during the violence.
Northam, who served as McAuliffe’s lieutenant governor, was elected as a moderate, down-home country doctor that same year.
However, he garnered controversy in early 2019 by appearing to support infanticide during a debate over partial-birth abortions, which Democrats in the state sought to legalize.
A gun-rights advocate holds a sign showing Gov. Ralph Northam’s racist yearbook photo. / PHOTO: Associated Press
Not long afterward, he faced a racism scandal of his own when a photo surfaced in his medical school yearbook page depicting individuals in blackface and KKK regalia. He has continued to deny, implausibly, that either was him and claims he doesn’t know how the photo appeared on his personal yearbook page.
Democrats initially called for his resignation, but they later circled the wagons when it became apparent that scandals by the state’s two other top Democrats, Justin Fairfax and Mark Herring, might hand control of the governorship to Republicans.
Bellamy led a group called the Virginia Black Politicos to the governor’s mansion and delivered a laundry list of radical demands in return for their support.
Since Democrats took control of the state’s General Assembly last November, Northam has proceeded to enact many of those demands—and then some.
Chase said that the radical leftists, aided by the corrupt Southern Poverty Law Center, were specifically hoping—as they did in Charlottesville—to use negative optics to push for an even more extreme agenda while mobilizing their own aggressive ‘resistance’ efforts.
“It will be used to put the rest of the nation on notice of what will happen to you, if you resist,” she warned of Monday’s Richmond rally.
Virginia’s House Republican leader, Del. Todd Gilbert, sharply discouraged any actual right-wing instigators from attending, which would do little more than to validate the left-wing extremists’ claims.
“Lobby Day is a time for people to peacefully assemble and petition their government. It is not a place for hate or violence,” Gilbert said Saturday in a statement, according to the Huffington Post.
Virginia State police troopers stand near a security checkpoint before demonstrators enter the capitol grounds. / PHOTO: Associated Press
“Any group that comes to Richmond to spread white supremacist garbage, or any other form of hate, violence, or civil unrest isn’t welcome here,” he said.
Others on social media in advance of the rally pointed out that the gun laws—which have generated a vocal reaction from conservatives in the former red state—are something of a red herring as state Democrats proceed to enact other shocking legislation that would help then solidify a permanent majority in both statewide and national elections.
Among those, SB399 proposes joining the National Popular Vote compact to do away with the Electoral College, widely dismissed as a left-wing ploy after Democrats claimed Hillary Clinton received 2.8 million more votes than President Donald Trump courtesy of blue states like California, where voter fraud is rampant.
Finally, should rigging the elections fail, the Democrats sought to ensure that they left nothing to chance.
Senate Joiint Resolution SJ 29 decrees that the governor would be determined by the majority of congressional districts (which they will soon be able to gerrymander to their own liking) rather than the popular vote—ironic given their hypocritical position on the national popular vote.
Once installed in office, the governor would be eligible to run for a second term, eliminating the state’s current single-term limit.
The state also has proposed ratifying the 70s-era Equal Rights Amendment, a radical-feminist measure to codify abortion and protected designation for LGBT groups into the US Constitution.
And Northam has endorsed legislation that would finally allow it to tear down the state’s many Confederate monuments while redirecting funds and protections to historically black cemeteries and landmarks.
He also earmarked a quarter-million dollars in additional funding from the state’s budget surplus to be used for “correctional” needs in the event of civil disobedience from gun owners and others.
The vast majority of counties within the state have passed resolutions declaring themselves 2nd-Amendment sanctuaries in response to the proposed gun-control measures.
