If One, As President, Was Planning The Imposition Of Martial Law, Would You Release Low Level Criminals? Of Course Not. You Would Release Hardened Ones.

Administration Freed Illegal Immigrants Charged With Violent Crimes

Thursday, 23 Oct 2014 12:25 PM

By Melanie Batley

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Illegal immigrants charged with violent crimes and serious felonies were among the hundreds of criminals the Obama administration released from jails across the country in February 2013, newly released documents show.

According to records obtained by USA Today, the government released inmates charged with offenses ranging from kidnapping and sexual assault to drug trafficking, armed assault, and homicide.

The evidence contradicts previous assurances by the administration that the 617 criminals who were released as part of a cost cutting exercise were low risk offenders charged with misdemeanors "or other criminals whose prior conviction did not pose a violent threat to public safety," USA Today reported.

The Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency admitted to the newspaper that numerous dangerous criminals had been released but denied direct responsibility.

"Discretionary releases made by ICE were of low-level offenders. However, the releases involving individuals with more significant criminal histories were, by and large, dictated by special circumstances outside of the agency's control," ICE spokeswoman Gillian Christensen told USA Today.

The new records obtained by the newspaper from a Freedom of Information Act requestoutlined previously undisclosed details about the alleged crimes of specific detainees. One person in Texas was charged with aggravated kidnapping and sexual assault of a child.

Another illegal immigrant from Florida was facing charges of conspiracy to commit homicide, according to USA Today.

In addition, two Massachusetts detainees had been charged with aggravated assault using a weapon, while another illegal immigrant from Colorado was being held on a sexual assault charge.

The Obama administration released more than 2,200 illegal immigrants from jail between Feb. 9 and March 1, 2013, as part of an effort to cut the number of prisoners due to the budget sequester funding cuts. The detainees had been awaiting deportation or immigration hearings in a court, and the administration did not give advance notice it would be freeing them.

The releases triggered a furor in Congress and hearings with lawmakers who grilled then-ICE Director John Morton.

According to USA Today, Virginia GOP Rep. J. Randy Forbes asked Morton directly, "No one on that list has been charged or convicted with murder, rape, or sexual abuse of a minor, were they?"

Morton, who subsequently resigned, answered, "They were not."

Former White House spokesman Jay Carney had also described the criminals as "low-risk, noncriminal detainees," USA Today reported.

Meanwhile, Republican Sens. John McCain of Arizona and Tom Coburn of Oklahoma demanded a formal investigation by the Inspector General.

The internal audit, which concluded in August 2014, concluded that ICE broke the lawin releasing the criminal illegal migrants.

"It is baffling how an agency charged with homeland security and immigration enforcement would knowingly release hundreds of illegals with criminal histories. In this single action, ICE undermined its own credibility, the rule of law, and the safety of Americans and local law enforcement," Coburn said when the audit was released.

He added, "This report provides more evidence that our nation's immigration laws are being flagrantly disregarded. Americans need to be assured the problems within ICE that led to the dangerous release of illegal aliens will be fixed, and DHS and ICE will never again violate the law by releasing known criminals into our streets."

McCain said it is "deeply troubling that ICE would knowingly release thousands of undocumented immigrant detainees — many with prior criminal records — into our streets, while publicly downplaying the danger they posed," USA Today reported.

Related Stories:

• Limbaugh: Obama Release of Illegals ‘An Impeachable Offense'
• Brewer: Release of Hundreds of Illegals Ahead of Cuts 'Height of Absurdity'

© 2014 Newsmax. All rights reserved.

Money Set Aside For Poor Goes To Banks And Other Fortune 500 Companies.It Is Tax Payer Abuse.

GOP Lawmaker: Big Banks, Corporations Reap Millions Abusing Tax Credit Designed For Needy Communities

August 12, 2014 by Sam Rolley 

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Senator Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) released a report this week detailing how corporate interests and big banks are abusing a tax incentive designed to empower poor Americans.

During the Bill Clinton Administration, Republican lawmakers created the New Markets Tax Credit to provide incentive for banks to finance projects that would create new markets in financially struggling communities.

But Coburn’s latest waste-illuminating report, “Banking on the Poor,” finds that the program is being used by big banks like Goldman Sachs, Wells Fargo and SunTrust, Hollywood and a number of corporations.

“This tax credit intended to benefit the poor is instead lining the pockets of the well-off, such as big banks and other private investors that claim more than $1 billion in NMTC annually,” Coburn said. “Because it is funded by taxing the labor of Americans, NMTC is essentially a reverse Robin Hood scheme paid for with the taxes collected from working Americans to provide pay outs to big banks and corporations in the hope that those it took the money from might benefit.”

NMTC works through a complicated process—but the crux of the scheme is incentivizing private investment in projects that will increase employment or provide beneficial services to the public by offering lavish tax subsidies to investors.

According to Coburn, 40 percent of the current investments are made by banks. The report outlines how those financial institutions are cashing in on tax credits equaling 39 percent of NMTC investment for 7 years after scheming to maximize profits at taxpayer expense.

From the report:

Many banks have set up their own CDEs in order to receive tax credit allocations from the Treasury, making them both the recipient of the tax credits and the lender. Many of the top CDEs receiving tax credit allocations are subsidiaries of major banks including Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, Wachovia (now Wells Fargo), and SunTrust banks (see Appendix I). From 2003 to 2013, Bank of America’s CDE was awarded $696 million in tax credit allocation authority, while $450 million went to Chase Bank, $488 million to Wachovia, and $428 million to Sun Trust. In the latest round of NMTC allocations alone, Chase announced it was awarded a $60 million allocation and Sun Trust was awarded a $43 million allocation.

Along with setting up their own CDE’s, banks invest in other CDE’s, which provide them with tax credits in return for an investment. Investors in the National Development Council, a CDE that has received $486 million in tax credit allocation authority include Citibank, Citizens Bank, Deutsche Bank, Dudley Ventures, JPMorgan Chase, Key Bank, PNC Bank, Sun Trust, Wells Fargo, and U.S. Bank Enterprise Community Partners, another CDE, has worked with U.S. Bank, Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, and others on over 55 developments.

“While Washington politicians tout the program’s goal is to put more money into the hands of businesses in struggling communities, the real beneficiaries are Wall Street banks, the CDE’s, and other large investment enterprises,” Coburn said.

The lawmaker also outlined how NMTC funds are often used on frivolous projects in areas from Beverly Hills to the Hamptons, where the taxpayer-funded economic boost isn’t even needed. Coburn cites the Congressional Research Service in noting that the definition of qualified low-income communities qualifies “virtually all of the country’s census tracts [neighborhoods and communities]” to NMTC eligibility.

The abuses of the NMTC funds listed in the budget hawk’s report include:

• A financially-failing health center in Desert Hot Springs, California, complete with a $65,000 NMTC funded outdoor sculpture
• A $13.5 million contribution leveraged using NMTCs for lighted water fountains in the Nation’s Capital
• The city of St. Louis offered $10 million in financing through federal New Markets Tax Credits to a Fortune 500 company, Peabody Energy Corporation, to keep their business where it is, rather than move 10 miles outside of downtown St. Louis
• $40 million in tax credits to help SunTrust and Wells Fargo invest in a dolphin show at the Atlanta aquarium.

Coburn said that, in addition to underwhelming success at fulfilling its intended purpose, the NMTC duplicates other wasteful government programs at a cost of $6.5 billion to taxpayers each year— the report even provides examples of NMTC funding being used along with money from programs it duplicates.

“When government picks winners and losers, the losers usually end up being taxpayers,” Coburn said. “Washington should reduce federal taxes on working Americans and all business owners who create jobs by eliminating tax earmarks, loopholes, and giveaways like the New Markets Tax Credit.”

Most Of All Republicans Want Obama Out, Some More Than Others!

Meet the Impeachment Crowd: 6 Republicans Who Want Obama Out

By ERIN DOOLEY and SCOTT WILSON16 hours ago

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Meet the Impeachment Crowd: 6 Republicans Who Want Obama Out (ABC News)

Has President Obama’s use of the “pen and phone” to circumvent Congress gotten out of hand?

Some members of the GOP seem to think so.

Boehner Pins Border Crisis on Obama's 'False Hope'

Even as the embattled president fights criticism over the escalating humanitarian crisis on the U.S.-Mexico border, the release of Arm. Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl in return for five prisoners from Guantanamo Bay, and the botched rollout of the Affordable Care Act, a mounting chorus of Republicans are calling for impeachment.

Here’s a list of the high-profile Republicans who want to kick the president out of office:

Sarah Palin

Who Is She: 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee, former governor of Alaska, sometime reality show host.

What She Said: “Enough is enough of the years of abuse from this president. His unsecured border crisis is the last straw that makes the battered wife say, ‘No mas.’ Opening our borders to a flood of illegal immigrants is deliberate. It’s time to impeach.” (via Breitbert)

When She Said It: July 8, 2014

What Else You Should Know: This isn’t the first time Palin has alluded to impeachment. In 2013, she called Obama’s handling of the debt an “impeachable offense.” Her 2008 running mate, Sen. John McCain, isn’t quite so incendiary. In response to her comments, McCain said, according to today's Washington Post, “I respect always Sarah Palin’s views, but my particular view is that we should devote our energies to regaining the majority in the Senate. I saw the impeachment scenario with former President Clinton and it was not a good thing to do. The American people didn’t like it. The American people wanted us to do their work and that was overall opinion at the time. It did not sit well with the American people.” he respects “other people’s opinions."

Tom Tancredo

Who Is He: Former candidate for Colorado governor, 2008 Republican presidential hopeful, former congressman representing Colorado’s 6th Congressional District.

What He Said: “The case for impeaching and removing President Obama grows stronger each week, as the president continues to violate the constitutional limits on his executive powers. It is time for the Republican leadership to conduct an ‘intervention’ for a president who has become addicted to dictatorial behavior. Let’s stop being the enablers through silence for unconstitutional acts.” (viaWND)

When He Said It: Valentine’s Day 2014

What Else You Should Know: Tancredo also advocated for impeachment in 2010, calling Obama “a more serious threat to America than al Qaeda,”

Allen West

Who Is He: Former congressman representing Florida’s 22nd Congressional District, retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel.

What He Said: “Ladies and gentlemen, I submit that Barack Hussein Obama’s unilateral negotiations with terrorists and the ensuing release of their key leadership without consult — mandated by law — with the U.S. Congress represents high crimes and misdemeanors, an impeachable offense” (via the Washington Post)

When He Said It: June 4, 2014

What Else You Should Know: West’s military record isn’t entirely blemish-free. In 2003, he was fined for inappropriate interrogation tactics, including a simulated execution.

Joni Ernst

Who Is She: GOP Senate nominee in Iowa, Iowa state senator, Iowa Army National Guard lieutenant colonel

What She Said: “[President Obama] is absolutely overstepping his bounds. And I do think that he should face those repercussions. Whether that’s removal from office, whether that’s impeachment.” Ernst also said that Obama has “become a dictator” and “is not following our constitution.”

When She Said It: January 15, 2014

What Else You Should Know: Having won the primary, Ernst recently attempted to walk back her initial remarks, telling Yahoo News that she no longer believes Obama is a dictator. She said that “his repeated use of unilateral action sure makes him look like one … To be clear, I have not seen any evidence that the president should be impeached.”

Tom Coburn

Who Is He: Republican senator from Oklahoma, and physician.

What He Said: “What you have to do is you have to establish the criteria that would qualify for proceedings against the president, and that’s called impeachment.”… I think there’s some intended violation of the law in this administration, but I also think there’s a ton of incompetence, of people who are making decisions. … I don’t have the legal background to know if that rises to high crimes and misdemeanor, but I think they’re getting perilously close.”

When He Said It: August 21, 2013

What Else You Should Know: Coburn is known as a rather conservative senator. Repeatedly advocating for cuts to budgetary spending, Coburn has earned the nickname “Dr. No” for his obstruction to legislation.

The South Dakota Republican Party

Who Are They: 191 state party delegates, who voted to pass an official resolution.

What They Said: “WHEREAS, The president has violated his oath of office in numerous ways with the latest being the release of five terrorists in exchange for a soldier without consulting Congress as required by law … the president of the United States has willfully and wantonly lied to the American people telling them they can keep their insurance company, and they can keep their doctor under Obama Care, prior to an election … THEREFORE, be it resolved that the South Dakota Republican Party calls on our U.S. Representatives to initiate impeachment proceedings against the president of the United States.”

When They Said It: June 21, 2014

What Else You Should Know: Not all the group’s 367 delegates voted for the measure (in fact, 176 did not) – and they don’t’ necessarily speak for their elected representatives. The resolution’s effect is largely symbolic.

Five Of Nineteen Cancer Centers Are Covered Under ObamaCrapCare. Sort Of Sounds Like A Death Panel To Us!

Reid: Cancer-Stricken Sen. Coburn 'In the Weeds' on Obamacare

Wednesday, 02 Apr 2014 12:15 PM

By Drew MacKenzie

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Senate Majority leader Harry Reid has shrugged off cancer patient Sen. Tom Coburn's concerns for Americans that the majority of cancer specialty centers in the United States are not covered by Obamacare.

Reid, a Nevada Democrat, said the Oklahoma Republican was "in the weeds" when it comes to the Affordable Care Act, according to the Washington Examiner.

Coburn, who is battling a recurrence of prostate cancer, lashed out on Tuesday at the coverage given to cancer victims under the Affordable Care Act.

"Nineteen of the cancer centers in this country, only five are covered under Obamacare," he said, blaming the low payments under the Affordable Care Act for the problem.

"You know, it's a market, and what they've done is they've priced it where these cancer centers, a lot of them, aren't going to participate because they don't get paid to cover the costs."

Coburn, a medical doctor who plans to retire at the end of the year even though his term runs through 2016, revealed earlier this year that his cancer center would not cover him, but it has since changed its policy and accepted him as a patient.

In a Senate briefing on Wednesday, Reid fired back at the Republican, saying, "Dr. Coburn is very good at getting into the weeds and trying to find something that he thinks makes sense, but I think we need to look at the overall context of this bill."

And while praising the White House announcement that 7 million people had enrolled in Obamacare by the March 31 deadline, Reid added, "It really brings a lot of people in from the cold so that they have the ability to get health insurance, which they've never had the opportunity [to do] before."

Story continues below video.

 
However, earlier on Wednesday, Coburn told Fox & Friends that the Obamacare enrollment numbers are skewed because most people who signed up had health insurance plans that were canceled under the health reform law, and that fewer than a million people fell into the category of newly insured.

"We'll see how many people really signed up when we see how many people pay. And, one of the measures of that will be what the premium increases are coming [in] late April, early May, for next year's premiums," Coburn said.

Related Stories:

• Sen. Tom Coburn's Exit Sparks Intriguing Oklahoma Race
• Sen. Coburn: Medicaid Costs Up 31,213 Percent Since Start

© 2014 Newsmax. All rights reserved.

We Have Identified The Problem And The Problem Is Congress!

Coburn to Congress: ‘The Problem Is Us’

He said government has grown so big that only one government agency actually knows all of its programs.

by
RODRIGO SERMEÑO

Bio

January 16, 2014 - 12:29 am

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WASHINGTON – A push to eliminate waste across government programs has been hindered by Congress’s own failure to do its job, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) told a congressional committee last week.

The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee heard testimony from Sens. Coburn and Tom Carper (D-Del.) and representatives from various think tanks about ways to reduce government waste.

As part of the 1993 Government Performance and Results Act, Congress must conduct oversight hearings and hold agencies accountable for meeting program goals. Under the law, agencies are to determine performance metrics for programs together with Congress and ensure those goals are being met.

In 2010, Congress passed the Government Performance and Results Modernization Act that directed the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to produce an annual report on duplication across government. Since then, the GAO has released three annual reviews outlining ways the government can save money by consolidating programs.

“I thought it would embarrass us into acting,” Coburn, said at the hearing, referring to the legislation he sponsored requiring the GAO to produce the report. “Boy, was I wrong. We haven’t done anything.”

Thomas Schatz, president of Citizens Against Government Waste, spoke to the committee about the numerous cases of overlap in federal programs.

Schatz said there are 56 programs from 20 different agencies devoted to promoting financial literacy “intended to improve the fiscal acumen of the American people.” Fifteen of those programs cost $30.7 million in fiscal year 2010.

“While it would be funny if it wasn’t so sad, there is no reliable data on the total cost of the financial literacy programs, and a government that itself is going broke is trying to teach others how to balance their checkbooks,” Schatz said in his written testimony.

Coburn recently released his “Waste Book,” an annual compilation of wasteful projects, which identifies frivolous spending on programs that include $3 million spent by NASA to learn how Congress works, and $1 million by the National Endowment for the Humanities over three years to study popular romance in multimedia.

“I’m embarrassed that we, as members of Congress, have allowed this list, with the multitude of programs that are on there, with the duplicity that’s in it, that we haven’t fixed it,” Coburn said. “And we don’t have an excuse. We’re guilty of not doing our jobs.”

Coburn, who is the ranking member of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, said the report contains 100 examples of wasteful and low-priority spending worth about $30 billion.

He said government has grown so big that only one government agency – the Department of Education – actually knows all of its programs.

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), the committee’s chairman, promised his support to Carper and Coburn, and said he would guarantee a vote on any bill addressing government waste in his committee.

“Take anything out of your waste book that falls within our mutual jurisdiction and if you’ll make a vote on it with your chairman, and I’ll make sure our committee brings the same bill and votes it out to the full House,” Issa said. “Let’s start to figure out whether it’s $100 million, which would be $1 billion over 10 years, or $1 billion, which would be $10 billion over 10 years. You pick something out of the book or something that’s not in the book, and if the two of you are prepared to hold a committee vote on it, I’ll guarantee you a vote here on the same bill.”

Carper said cutting waste is a bipartisan issue and the “key is to find that 80 percent that we agree on.”

Both Republicans and Democrats on the committee condemned the government’s profligate spending.

Rep. John Mica (R-Fla.) lamented Amtrak’s $72 million loss on food services and vacant federal property that costs billions of dollars to operate and maintain. Mica has held hearings in empty warehouses in Washington, D.C., to put pressure on the General Services Administration to sell some of these properties.

“You got to just keep going after the bastards until you’re successful. I don’t know anything else you can do,” Mica said.

The GAO found in its 2013 report that agencies spent $95 billion on 162 areas of duplication across government, including 679 renewable energy programs from 23 different agencies that cost $15 billion to run.

The GAO also found that Congress and the Obama administration have made some progress in reducing waste. For example, Congress allowed a tax credit of ethanol to expire at the end of 2011, which reduced revenue losses by addressing overlapping federal efforts directed at increasing domestic production of ethanol.

Nevertheless, the GAO said the executive branch and Congress could do more to achieve substantial savings.

Brandon Arnold, vice president of governmental affairs at the National Taxpayers Union, said his organization worked with the U.S. Public Interest Research Group to come up with ideas that both sides of the aisle could support. The report contains 65 recommendations for Congress that would save over $500 billion over 10 years.

Arnold called for an end to the “use it or lose it” spending sprees that occur at the end of every fiscal year, and reestablishing the Byrd Commission, a bicameral committee tasked with identifying and recommending the termination of non-essential spending.

Several witnesses acknowledged the difficulty in defining waste. But Chris Edwards, director of the Cato Institute’s tax policy studies, laid out a simple way to identify it.

“What is waste? Well, it’s government spending where the cost is higher than the benefits created for citizens,” Edwards said. “And in my view, it’s also federal activities that the federal government does a poor job at that could be much better carried out by state local governments in the private sector.”