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{ theconservativetreehouse.com } ~ Unfortunately, there were no live-stream options available for the Fox News town hall with President Trump at 6:30pm... Despite the efforts of Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum to shape the questions against the interests of the President, the event was very good. No politician is as good as President Trump when it comes to owning the downside and reversing the narrative.  https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2020/03/05/fox-news-president-trump-town-hall-scranton-pennsylvania-no-livestreams-available/  

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{ freebeacon.com } ~ Conservatives are seizing the opportunity created by a vacancy on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit Thursday... culling a shortlist of prospective nominees for a panel frequently called the second most powerful court in the nation. The frontrunners for the vacancy created by Judge Thomas B. Griffith’s retirement are acting associate attorney general Claire Murray, deputy White House counsel Kate Todd, and U.S. District Judge Justin Walker, according to sources who have worked on judicial confirmations for the Trump administration. Other candidates are also under consideration, and the situation remains fluid. President Donald Trump’s stunning gauntlet of judicial confirmation successes will feature prominently in his reelection pitch. The D.C. Circuit nomination could mobilize conservatives in much the same way that Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation drove Republican energy in 2018. The vacancy also aligns with the Trump campaign's messaging on deregulation and reducing agency power, given the D.C. Circuit’s heavy diet of agency-law cases. Murray is widely seen as a strong contender for the federal bench and commands admiration across the administration. Todd, a former chief counsel for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Litigation Center, has coordinated the administration’s judicial nominations process since 2018. Walker was a professor at the University of Louisville School of Law before his appointment to a Kentucky federal trial court in 2019. The judge is close to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, and his advocacy for Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation is especially appreciated among conservatives. "Unless there is a Supreme Court vacancy, this will be the most contentious judicial confirmation fight before the November election," said Mike Davis of the Article III Project, an outside group that supports Trump’s judicial nominees. The shortlist is not exhaustive, and several administration lawyers and private practitioners are also said to be in contention for Griffith's seat. "President Trump has done a phenomenal job finding and credentialing a huge bench of potential D.C. Circuit nominees," Davis added...   https://freebeacon.com/issues/frontrunners-emerge-for-new-vacancy-on-influential-appeals-court/?utm_source=actengage&utm_campaign=FreedomMail&utm_medium=email 

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{ theblaze.com } ~ St. Louis circuit attorney Kimberly Gardner is facing heat following a seven-count felony indictment against her chief investigator... for his actions in a failed prosecution against former Missouri Republican Gov. Eric Greitens. Gardner, who was funded heavily by liberal megadonor scumbag-George Soros during her election, made waves in 2018 when her office led the arrest of then-Gov. Greitens on felony invasion of privacy charges. Greitens was accused of tying up his mistress, blindfolding her, taking a picture without her permission, and then threatening to release the picture if she ever went public about the affair. Later in the investigation, Gardner's office charged Greitens with computer tampering as it related to his campaign's alleged procurement of donor lists. The governor later resigned after mounting pressure from his colleagues. But now, many months later, the picture has never been found and both sets of charges have been dropped — and the investigation is coming back on Gardner. According to a Just the News report, investigators now allege that the Greitens prosecution, which led to the governor's resignation, was built on false testimony and evidence tampering...

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{ news.usni.org } ~ The Navy is evaluating with the Army and Air Force a strategy to beef up U.S. military presence and force protection in the Arctic, Navy leaders told lawmakers Thursday... The surface Navy is limited in the amount of freedom of navigation operations it can accomplish in the Arctic region, Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Mike Gilday told members of the Senate Armed Services Committee the service is evaluating its options. “We’re seeing an increasing drumbeat of operations in the high north. We need to continue that,” Gilday said. “I think that the Bering Strait is strategically as important as the Strait of Malacca or the Strait of Hormuz.” However, Sen. Dan Sullivan, (R-Alaska), pointed out the U.S. capabilities in the Arctic is lagging what the Russians have already established, such as building ports, airfields and infrastructure to maintain force power projection. “The DoD Arctic strategy says there should be FONOPS (freedom of navigation operations),” Sullivan said. “I don’t think we have the capability right now. We have two ice breakers, one is broken. The Russians have 54.” The Navy doesn’t have ice-hardened surface ships. Recent exercises in 2018 provided valuable experience for Navy planners, but also exposed the shortcomings the fleet has when trying to operate in high latitudes. Gilday said the Navy continues operating in the region, including a recent submarine exercise with the United Kingdom’s Royal Navy. Sullivan worried the Navy had not made more progress evaluating potential deepwater Arctic ports, which would help enable the Navy to maintain an Arctic presence. “Without any kind strategic port, we don’t have anything near the Arctic,” Sullivan said. “The closest thing is Anchorage and that’s 1,500 nautical miles away. We can’t project power and we need to defend our strategic interest.” Concern for U.S. Arctic security was also key topic in the House Appropriation subcommittee for defense hearing on the Navy budget. In response to questions from Rep. Betty McCollum (D-Minn.), Acting Secretary of the Navy Thomas Modly outlined how the Navy and Marine Corps were evaluating the threat nations like Russia and China present while pointing out what the Navy needed to work on...

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{ reebeacon.com } ~ Forty-two House Democrats bucked party leadership on Thursday to pass an amendment ensuring that individuals convicted of sex crimes, terrorism, and other violent offenses cannot be employed by the TSA... Despite their support for the #MeToo movement against sexual misconduct, 174 House Democrats voted against an amendment to the Rights for Transportation Security Officers Act that alters the way TSA disciplines and fires workers. The amendment divided Democrats on Thursday despite the fact that it was written by Democratic Rep. Lauren Underwood (Ill.). House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R., Calif.) criticized liberal lawmakers for attempting to sabotage efforts to safeguard the public from sexual predators. "The amendment was pulled back by leadership because the socialist wing of the party did not want to have that amendment go forward on this bill," McCarthy said on Thursday. "When it was offered, overwhelmingly the majority of the House would like to see the TSA not hire terrorists or those who have been convicted of sexual misconduct with minors and others. But the socialist wing of the party, that controls now the Democratic Party, said that that could not be offered. "Republicans were able to include the amendment in the bill only after Underwood and 41 other Democrats broke ranks to insert the language into the bill in a 227-175 vote. Reps. commie-Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., N.Y.), worthless-Ilhan Omar (D, Minn.), worthless-Rashida Tlaib (D., Mich.), and worthless-Ayanna Pressley (D., Mass.), as well as House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D., Md.), all voted against Underwood's amendment when Rep. Debbie Lesko (R., Ariz.) put it forward in a motion to recommit—the last opportunity for a House bill to be amended before a final passage vote. House Speaker liar-Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) did not vote on the motion. A top Republican aide criticized Democratic leaders for bowing to party leaders on the measure. "It's no surprise that Democrat logic in 2020 means taking marching orders from Justice Democrats to give TSA the ability to hire the Harvey Weinsteins of the world," the aide said. "A ‘second chance' for sex offenders shouldn't include patting down traveling families." liar-Pelosi did not respond to a request for comment on why the amendment was pulled, nor did Underwood. commie-Ocasio-Cortez, worthless-Omar, worthless-Tlaib, worthless-Pressley, and Hoyer did not respond to requests for comment about the bill. Lesko argued in favor of the amendment by highlighting troubling examples of sexual misconduct by TSA screeners, including a Los Angeles screener who used fraud to falsely imprison and unclothe a woman going through security...  https://freebeacon.com/politics/174-house-dems-vote-against-anti-sexual-predator-amendment/?utm_source=actengage&utm_campaign=FreedomMail&utm_medium=email  

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{ gatestoneinstitute.org } ~ Turkey's Islamist strongman, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has threatened Europe several times with "sending millions of refugees your way."... Turkey would apparently like to see more progress in the talks to grant it admission as a full member of the European Union. At the moment, these membership negotiations have stalled. He may also wish for Western support -- from the EU, the United States and all of NATO -- for his ideal architecture to install Turkey in northwest Syria. As Turkish servicemen were recently killed in Syria, with direct Russian military involvement, it is probably safe to assume that the support Erdoğan is seeking, both directly and indirectly, is "support for a NATO ally against Russian aggression". In addition, Erdoğan would also most certainly like the West overlook his massive democratic deficit, and to help Turkey secure even more dominance over the Greek islands off its coast, as well as its claims on the gas fields beneath the eastern Mediterranean. On February 27, the Turkish government finally pressed the button to execute the threat: Millions of mostly Syrian migrants on Turkish soil were now free to travel to Europe; Turkish border gates were now open. Why did Erdoğan decide now to resort to the "nuclear option" in his country's deeply problematic relations with the European Union? It seems, bizarrely, that Erdoğan decided to punish the EU because he was angry with... Russia. When, on February 27, Syrian forces, backed by Russian air support, killed 34 Turkish soldiers in the Idlib area in northwestern Syria, the event seems to have sent shock waves through a Turkish public, who were already split: between a fiercely nationalistic rhetoric that supports the "heroic mission" that took Turkish troops into Syria, and a rational questioning of the wisdom of confronting Syria and Russia -- and Iran -- in what looks increasingly like a Syrian quagmire. There also may well have been concerns that public unrest over coffins wrapped in the crescent and star flag could erode Erdoğan's declining popularity even further. For Turkey, open confrontation with Russia is not an option. In November 2015, the last time Turkey tried punishing Russia, which had placed sanctions on Turkish businesses after Turkey downed a Russian jet, the move brought Erdoğan to his knees: in a rare show of repentance, Erdoğan apologized to Russian President Vladimir Putin for having brought down the Russian Su-24 fighter jet in Syrian airspace...   https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15682/europe-erdogan-blackmail   

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