This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
A family court judge in West Virginia, facing impeachment for her outlandish behavior on the bench, has retired.
But that still won't prevent her from facing her own judgment day.
Officials with the Institute for Justice have confirmed that Louise Goldston, who used to be assigned to the state's Family Court, has quit her position.
Her decision came just as the state legislature was pushing to impeach her for violating the rights of West Virginians.
"The resolution to impeach Goldston specifically mentions the judge leading a warrantless search of the home of Institute for Justice client Matt Gibson. Despite her retirement, Matt and IJ will continue moving forward with their lawsuit against Goldston," the IJ confirmed.
Tori Clark, a lawyer with the IJ, said, "The West Virginia Legislature has done the right thing in this case, but Americans cannot and should not have to depend on legislative grace to ensure that judges follow the Constitution. Judge Goldston’s retirement is a good first step, but this lawsuit must continue to move forward so we can ensure that Matt and others who are wronged by unconstitutional judicial conduct can vindicate their rights in court."
Goldston went off the rails in March 2020 when she "stopped a court proceeding between Matt and his ex-wife, ordered everyone in the courtroom to go to Matt’s home, and led a warrantless search party through the home."
The IJ explained its client, Matt, tried to stop her by telling her should could not enter without a search warrant, and she said, on video, "Oh yeah, I will."
At that time Goldston ordered Matt's former wife to take anything from the home that she thought was hers.
Multiple ethics charges soon were filed against the judge, and she was censured and fined by the state Supreme Court of Appeals.
Then Matt brought his lawsuit for violating his rights.
"The judge argued that she should be entitled to judicial immunity and that Matt’s claims against her should be thrown out," the IJ said, but the district court refused to go along with her agenda.
Matt said, "I’m happy that the corrupt judge is stepping down so she can’t violate other people’s rights like she did to me. But judges aren’t above the law. My case will move forward to ensure that what happened to me does not happen again."
WND previously reported when the case developed that some of the items taken by the ex-wife, with the judge's permission, actually belonged to him and his children.
According to Breitbart News, U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro N. Mayorkas just ignored the fact that migrant deaths have soared under his watch.
Mayorkas did so while slamming the Trump administration's southern border policies.
Mayorkas, in particular, resurrected the old Democrat narrative that former President Donald Trump's policies resulted in the wrongful separation of illegal immigrant families at the southern border.
Mayorkas continued this narrative in a statement that he released on Thursday.
Mayorkas released the statement on the "second anniversary of the Family Reunification Task Force that President Biden established soon after he assumed office."
According to the DHS, the task force's objectives are "to identify the remaining separated children, facilitate their reunification with their families, provide needed support services to reunified families, and prevent future family separations."
In his latest statement, Mayorkas praised the work of the task force.
He said:
Thanks to the tireless work of public servants across the federal government and the critical partnership of non-governmental organizations, the Department of Homeland Security and the Task Force it leads has thus far reunited more than 600 children who were separated from their families under the prior administration’s “zero-tolerance” policy.
Mayorkas, though, also went on to indirectly attack Trump by saying, "we reaffirm our commitment to work relentlessly to reunite the other families who suffered because of the prior cruel and inhumane policy – a policy that did not reflect the values of our nation."
Breitbart News, in its report, cites several pieces of evidence that demonstrate that Mayorkas's narrative that the Trump administration's policies were bad and the Biden administration's policies are good is simply false.
"Mayorkas’s policies have caused far more deaths — and family separations — than the policies established by President Donald Trump," Breitbart reports.
Breitbart, as one piece of evidence, cites a report from the International Organization for Migration´s (IOM) Missing Migrants Project (MMP). The report states:
More than 1,238 lives have been lost during migration in the Americas in 2021, among them at least 51 children . . . At least 728 of these deaths occurred on the United States-Mexico border crossing, making this the deadliest land crossing in the world, according to the data.
Breitbart cites several other pieces of evidence that show the same thing.
The numbers make it clear that - contrary to what Mayorkas claims - it is the Biden administration's open border policies that are causing more harm to illegal immigrants than the policies of the Trump administration.
President Joe Biden has not yet formally declared his candidacy for a second term in 2024, but he has stated his intention to do so and seemingly dropped his biggest hint in that regard Friday night.
Biden delivered a speech that had all of the hallmarks of a campaign rally address and declared at one point that "We’re just getting started," Fox News reported.
And, in response to Biden's clear suggestion that "We got a lot more to do" in a presumptive second term, the partisan crowd egged him on with chants of "Four more years!"
President Biden traveled to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on Friday to deliver remarks at the Democratic National Committee's Winter Meeting dinner reception and was instantly greeted with "Four more years! Four more years!"
As he launched into his prepared speech, the president touted a litany of various purported accomplishments and economic gains won by his administration over the past two years.
"So, folks, that’s not even all of it, not even close. In fact, let me say something. We’re just getting started," Biden said. Just a moment later, he proclaimed, "But we got a lot more to do. We got a lot more to do," and then added, "I intend to get it done -- more done."
"So let me ask you a simple question: Are you with me?" the president asked of the crowd of Democrats, which prompted another chorus of "Four more years! Four more years!"
While President Biden and his fellow Democrats believe they have done right by the American people in pursuing and accomplishing certain aspects of their policy agenda, Republicans quite obviously disagree, as exemplified by a statement released before Biden's speech by Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel.
"The Biden-Harris economic agenda has caused nothing but pain and misery for American families," McDaniel said. "Their failed policies have robbed workers of their hard-earned money and forced Americans to take a pay cut."
"Inflation has outpaced wages for 21 straight months and Democrats only want to waste trillions more in taxpayer dollars. American families are struggling to keep up with the Biden pay cut and Democrats don't seem to care," she added.
"Democrats had a pretty good year flying the Biden banner over their heads," DNC member Mo Elleithee told Fox News of the president. "This is a guy who seems fired up. He seems ready to keep it going and I see no groundswell of opposition within the Democratic Party. I think Democrats are actually excited to stand behind him."
"I think he has done a fantastic job navigating the treacherous waters of the Democratic coalition. When you are a coalition not everyone is going to be happy all the time. And he’s done a good job of navigating those waters," he added with regard to a potential primary challenge against Biden in 2024. "I don’t think you going to see a heavy Marianne Williamson contingent at this meeting. I think this is a party that is unified behind this president."
Yet, while President Biden may be popular with DNC members and have the approval of committed Democratic voters, the same cannot be said of the rest of America's voters, as evidenced by his still underwater job approval rating in the various polls.
According to the RealClearPolitics average of polls, Biden currently has the approval of 43.9 percent of Americans compared to the disapproval of 52.3 percent, a negative difference of -8.4 percent -- not exactly the sort of numbers that indicate a nation ready for another four-year term of an unpopular president with an agenda that most Americans disapprove of.
The Democratic Party for the past several years has consistently coddled and sided with the element of its base that holds clear antipathy for law enforcement and wants to defund the police, which has prevented them from working with Republicans to find bipartisan solutions for necessary policing reforms.
Now a senior statesman of the Democratic Party, Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC), is calling upon his fellow Democrats to relax their strident anti-cop demands and try to find areas of agreement on the issue with their GOP counterparts, the Daily Caller reported.
Clyburn specifically highlighted the proposed police reforms of Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), which Democrats flatly rejected in years past, as a good starting point in the search for compromise legislation.
In an interview this week with The Washington Post, Rep. Clyburn was asked about the issue of police reform legislation in the wake of the recent beating death of Tyre Nichols at the hands of several now-former Memphis police officers.
"We came pretty close to getting the George Floyd [Justice in Policing] Act [passed in 2021]," the South Carolina congressman replied. "I said at the time -- I got in trouble for saying it -- there’s no perfect bill. There’s no perfect bill. To keep trying to get the perfect piece of legislation rather than a good piece of legislation -- I just don’t know if that’s a good thing to do."
He noted how it took several years throughout the 1960s to pass various pieces of legislation to protect certain civil rights and said, "So I just think that we have got to make some progress. We may not get everything that we need or everything that we want in one fell swoop, but we need to get this done."
Asked about the possibility of Sen. Scott and Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) resuming negotiations on a police reform compromise bill, Clyburn told The Post, "The chances are fair to good. I talked with Tim Scott two days ago. I’ve talked with Booker. I think the chances are good that we’ll get something done. Will it go as far as I would like to see it go? I don’t know that it will."
As Rep. Clyburn alluded to, Sen. Scott has been focused on the issue of police reform for several years, and in 2020 put forward the JUSTICE Act that contained many of the reforms sought by the left -- only to then watch as Senate Democrats filibustered and killed his bill.
That slap in the face was then compounded in 2021 when House Democrats resurrected much of Scott's initial proposals in the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, which prompted Scott to quip in a Senate floor speech, "The actual problem is not what is being offered; it is who is offering it."
Despite the Floyd bill containing many of the reforms Scott had initially proposed, it garnered very little Republican support in large part because Democrats had added in provisions that would effectively defund many local police departments across the country, as the senator explained in a September 2021 interview with CBS News.
Sen. Scott appears ready to try and negotiate again on a compromise police reform bill, but he made it clear this week in a thread of tweets that "Resurrecting the House progressives’ police reform bill is a nonstarter."
"I’ve been working toward common ground solutions that actually have a shot at passing," he continued. "Solutions to increase funding and training to make sure only the best wear the badge. Solutions that would have made a difference in places like Memphis & Kenosha."
"Here’s the truth: We can get something meaningful done. We can pass a bill that the majority of Congress -- and the majority of Americans -- would agree on," Scott wrote.
He concluded, "The question we have to ask ourselves is, do we care more about tribalism, posturing, and preserving the status quo? Or do we care about actually doing our jobs and restoring faith in our nation? Put me down for the latter."
Lawyers for Hunter Biden said that recent letters to the DOJ accusing a Delaware computer shop owner of efforts “to weaponize Mr. Biden’s personal computer data” did not constitute an admission that the laptop belonged to Biden or that the data was accurate.
In a clear-cut instance of wanting to have one's cake and eat it, too, Biden attorney Abbe Lowell wrote letters on February 1 demanding that the Justice Department investigate Rudy Giuliani, Steve Bannon and John Mac Isaac, the computer store owner over their possession and dissemination of information from the laptop, but still didn't admit that it was in fact, Hunter's computer.
"These letters do not confirm Mac Isaac’s or others’ versions of a so-called laptop," Lowell told Fox News Digital. "They address their conduct of seeking, manipulating and disseminating what they allege to be Mr. Biden’s personal data, wherever they claim to have gotten it."
Big Tech first censored, then colluded with the left-leaning media to largely ignore stories about the Hunter Biden laptop, but the story got out through conservative sites and has led to questions about corruption and pay-to-play schemes, particularly whether they involved President Joe Biden.
Powell's attempt to shut down media stories about the laptop and its data could be an attempt to protect the president and prevent investigation into his connections to the data on the laptop.
For his part, Mac Isaac's lawyer said that Mac Isaac owned the laptop at the time he took and shared its data, because he had contacted Hunter Biden numerous times to pick it up and Biden never did so.
The contract that was signed by Hunter Biden gave Mac Isaac ownership of the laptop if it was abandoned at the shop for 90 days, which it was.
Mac Isaac saw the data when he was repairing the laptop, which he was given authorization to do. After the laptop was abandoned, Mac Isaac surrendered it to the FBI, which was already investigating Biden.
He also made a copy of the hard drive for himself, which he shared with Rudy Giuliani lawyer Robert Costello.
Biden's legal maneuvering now is nothing more than a desperate attempt to save himself from criminal charges related to the data on the laptop, and even more so, an attempt to keep his father out of hot water.
Legal experts say there is little chance Mac Isaac and the others mentioned in Powell's letters will be prosecuted for their actions, even if it could be proven that they were illegal.
“It’s hard to imagine given the time that has elapsed since that happened and the attention of the public and law enforcement that there now would be a criminal investigation,” New York-based lawyer and former federal prosecutor Sarah Krissoff told the New York Post Thursday.
She said law enforcement might poke around a bit to see if there is anything to follow up on, but would probably not find much actionable this long after the events, which happened in 2019 and 2020.
If Biden can make the other side look guilty, though, he might be able to shift the attention off himself and his father long enough to wiggle out from any responsibility, however.
Polling for the 2024 presidential election has Republican candidates in a strong position.
The top Republican candidates are former President Donald Trump, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), U.S. Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, and former Vice President Mike Pence.
Top Democratic candidates include President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D), and others.
There are three questions to consider here: Who's favored to win the 2024 Republican primary? Who's favored to win the 2024 Democratic primary? And, who's favored to win it all?
Trump and DeSantis have consistently been at the top of hypothetical 2024 Republican primary polls for many, many months now. This continues to be the case.
But, now, there is a difference: whereas, before the 2022 midterm elections, Trump dominated the matchup, now some polls actually have DeSantis beating Trump.
A recent national poll from Marquette University, for example, has 64% of voters choosing DeSantis over Trump. And, a recent poll from the University of New Hampshire - an important early state - has DeSantis leading the Republican field with a 42% plurality.
One could just as easily, however, find recent national and local polls where Trump is beating DeSantis. In fact, according to Real Clear Politics, Trump, on average, is ahead of DeSantis by 15.6 percentage points with regard to 2024 Republican primary polls.
Whereas the Republican field clearly appears to be a two-horse race between Trump and DeSantis, the Democratic field is, by and large, led by Biden. Real Clear Politics has Biden up, on average, by 26.3 percentage points over potential Democratic rivals.
A difference between Republican and Democratic 2024 primary polls is that, in the Democratic polls, "other" tends to receive a lot of votes. For example, a December poll from NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist had Biden receiving 35% of the vote, while 27% chose someone other than Biden and the listed candidates.
Accordingly, the perception one gets from the polls is that the voters aren't particularly sold on any of the listed Democratic candidates.
Many polls have either DeSantis or Trump or both beating Biden in a head-to-head matchup. A recent poll from Harvard-Harris, for example, has Trump beating Biden by five percentage points and DeSantis beating Biden by three percentage points.
There are still some polls, however, where Biden comes out ahead of Trump or DeSantis or both. In a recent Emerson poll, for example, Biden beat DeSantis by one percentage point, and, in a recent Economist-YouGov poll, Biden beat Trump by four percentage points.
There is still a lot of time between now and the 2024 primaries, and a lot could still change. But, so far, the conclusions that could safely be drawn from the current polls are: Trump or DeSantis is the Republican favorite. Biden is the Democrat favorite. And, any of the three could win it all.
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
A new survey reveals that most of the students who participated in a free speech assessment at the University of Wisconsin confirmed they fear expressing their views on some topics because other students will disagree, or it could hurt their grades.
WMTV reported a full one-third said they've felt pressure from an instructor to agree with a certain viewpoint.
"I want the University of Wisconsin system to be looked upon as a beacon across the country where people want to go if free speech rights are very important to them," Republican state Rep. David Murphy, chairman of the Assembly universities committee, said in the report.
The results were discussed at UW-Oshkosh.
Campus speech has become a battleground in recent years, as leftist students disrupt conservative speakers, student clubs, and more. Their stated perspective is that those who disagree with the leftist ideology simply do not have free speech and should not be allowed.
As a result, Republicans have pressured universities to protect free speech, and "crackdown on students who disrupt conservative speakers," the report said.
The survey was done by UW-Stout’s Menard Center for Public Policy and Service, and involved undergraduates at all 13 campuses.
The survey was funded partly from a donation from the family that founded Menards, a chain of home improvement centers, and it was controversial even before it went out.
The report explained, "UW-Whitewater Interim Chancellor Jim Henderson was so incensed with plans for the survey that he resigned over it in April. He said then that he was upset over then-Interim System President Michael Falbo’s decision to send out the survey after initially deciding that institutions wouldn’t do it. He accused Falbo of changing his mind because he feared political consequences from Republican lawmakers concerned about campus leaders stamping out conservative viewpoints."
Almost 57% of the respondents – which included thousands of students – said there have been times they've wanted to express their opinion on a controversial topic – but remained silent.
Sixty percent said they feared other students would disagree and 31% said they worried someone would file a complaint targeting them.
"About 40% said they were afraid their grades would suffer if they spoke up. Three-fourths of those students identified themselves as 'very conservative,'" the report said.
Thirty-seven percent said they've felt pressure from an instructor to agree with a "specific" viewpoint.
He continued, "These polls are an indictment of the entire teaching academy. We have converted our universities into echo chambers reflecting overwhelmingly (and sometimes virtually exclusively) liberal faculties. When these polls are raised, faculty often shrug off the concern for free speech and the complaints of rising viewpoint intolerance. It simply does not seem to matter that the vast majority of our students are consistently polling as being afraid to speak openly in classes."
He also noted the response that is developing.
"This latest poll comes as states are moving to use the power of the purse to force greater choice in education and diversity on faculties. This is a state school system and the legislature has every reason to seek measures to address the lack of intellectual diversity and tolerance on campuses or reduce the level of state funding for these schools."
This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
One province in China, Sichuan, stunningly has announced that it is lifting its legal limit of three children per mother, and for five years there will be no population control.
For years, China enforced, through mandatory abortion and sterilization, a one-child policy.
Then when faced with demographic projections that today's citizens, as seniors, would have no younger generation to support them, changed it to two children, then three.
A report from Reggie Littlejohn, president of Women’s Rights Without Frontiers, now has confirmed the latest change, citing an official announcement on the website of the Health Commission of Sichuan Province.
Also, marriage will no longer be a requirement for giving birth, and women can have as many babies as they want.
She explained, "Since the One Child Policy was instituted in 1980, women in China have been subjected to forced abortion, involuntary sterilization, and infanticide. It is momentous that Sichuan has made this move, even if it is only in one province, and even if it is temporary. Unmarried women and fourth babies will not be forcibly aborted in Sichuan, for five years."
However, there still remain huge human rights issues to be addressed, she said.
"First, Sichuan is just one province among many. The population of China is 1.4 billion. While the 80 million people in Sichuan are free of coercive population control, what about the myriad of others, who are not? And what will happen after five years – will the CCP re-institute the Three Child Policy?"
She noted secondly, based on the Chinese government's allegiance to eugenics, "I believe that the motive behind this change in policy is that the Chinese Communist Party wants to increase the Han population."
Other provinces, where other ethnic populations are the majority, will not benefit from canceling forced abortions, she said.
"The reason the Chinese Communist Party has ended the Three Child Policy in Sichuan is not that they have suddenly repented of their crimes against humanity and evolved a new respect for women and babies. Rather, it is that the CCP is dreading the demographic nosedive it has created through decades of brutal population control policies," she continued.
"The consequent decrease in the labor force will stifle China’s ability to support its 'severely aging society.' Indeed, demographers forecast that by 2035, 400 million people – 30 percent of the population -- will be 60 and above. Moreover, the CCP has no ability to support this swiftly aging population."
Actually, she pointed out, China already lost the war.
"Even if the CCP were to lift all birth restrictions nationwide, this would be too little, too late. Even if China were to have the baby boom it so desperately desires, babies born now will not enter the workforce for decades – too late to stem the tide of China’s imminent demographic disaster."