Raise Your Voices In A Chorus Of Freedom!

Newsletter | April 27, 2023

The desperation of the consortium of political and corporate elites to silence truth and censor truth-tellers is crystal clear.

This week Fox News pushed out its most influential voice and thereby sidelined one of the most powerful figures in contemporary American politics and culture. It’s not clear why the network “parted ways” with Tucker Carlson, and there’s plenty of speculation as to what may have triggered his ouster.

Maybe it was Tucker’s ongoing coverage of the January 6 defendants, violations of their civil liberties, and the absurd claims made by the White House and others that the raucous protests represented an “insurrection.” Maybe his criticism of the vaccine industry and the U.S. media’s complicity in obscuring the unlawful conduct of big pharma enraged advertisers. Maybe, in questioning the wisdom of sending hundreds of billions of dollars to fight a proxy war on the borders of a world power with a large nuclear arsenal, he angered the White House, the Pentagon, the regime media, and U.S. lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.

Or perhaps it was because by calling the castration and sterilization of children conducted under the guise of a civil rights movement an obscenity, he earned the wrath of the medical industry getting rich off the pain of American boys and girls. Maybe it’s because when he says that our struggle is primarily a spiritual one and we should find some time each day to pray for strength he provoked the godless.

Maybe it’s all these things. In telling the truth every night, he delivered information unapologetically and provided insight to millions of Americans desiring to make informed decisions for their families, communities, and country. Tucker Carlson’s ouster exemplifies another front in the ongoing censorship campaign targeting the current administration’s political opponents.

Recall that it was just last week that we discovered how Secretary of State Anthony Blinken asked ex-deputy CIA director Mike Morrell to run cover for the Democratic Party’s 2020 presidential candidate. So, the politically ambitious Morrell knowingly lobbied 50 former colleagues in the intelligence services to sign a letter falsely claiming that reports of Hunter Biden’s laptop were the products of Russian disinformation. The letter provided the false pretext that the media and Big Tech needed to carry out their efforts to censor the reports and keep vital information from the U.S. voting public.

For the present, Tucker Carlson is “off air” but not silenced. We’re confident he’ll be back, as determined as ever to speak the truth. Our great country needs all of us to speak with confidence and clarity like his – courageous voices rising like a great chorus of freedom.

Please participate in our Reader’s Survey. We learn from you – our fellow Americans – and read every comment and share many of the insights we received every Monday at 9 a.m. on America’s Mondays With Mary, hosted by our Executive Director Mary O’Neill. Tune in and listen to what is on the minds and in the hearts of patriotic Americans. Thank you!

Floyd Brown is an author, political commentator, and founder of the Western Journal, an online publication whose motto is “equipping readers with the truth.” We spoke with him recently about his new book, “Counterpunch: An Unlikely Alliance of Americans Fighting Back for Faith and Freedom,” and where he sees the country going.

“Counterpunch” is called the Christian answer to Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals. So what’s your strategy for challenging the left’s master strategist?

Americans have been assaulted by a series of false narratives. The narratives are intended to make each of us feel powerless and isolated. Alinsky teaches activists how to claim power.

I want conservatives to learn a lesson I was taught long ago: we all underestimate the power we have to influence others around us. But to influence others we must engage.

As General Flynn likes to say: “Local action has national impact.” We take back America by taking territory around our cities and towns and then uniting with others doing the same.

Why was Alinksy such a powerful influence on the American left?

Alinksy was a great tactical strategist. He helped the left maximize influence by teaching them how to ridicule and pillory others. His strategies are very divisive, this is likely why he dedicated his book to a divisive character, Lucifer.

I encourage conservatives to build community and use the tactic of protecting and loving those around you. It is the opposite of Alinsky tactics. To save America we must reengage with our neighbors. Alinsky wants you to hate your neighbors.

Western Journal has done great work covering Tucker Carlson’s departure from FOXNEWS. What does his exit from the top conservative media outlet mean for conservative media audiences?

Tucker is an amazing voice for conservative values. He has a devoted audience. His departure leaves a big hole in the FOXNEWS line up.

As I sit here now, we don’t know the whole story because Tucker is not commenting. FOXNEWS also isn’t commenting.

The future of conservative media is very bright. New technologies are allowing more voices than ever to find an audience. Social media suppression of conservatives is an issue, but our audiences want conservative content, and they will go out of their way to find it. Podcasting is growing, conservative news is growing, and our audiences are committed and engaged.

What do you see as the central issue facing our country today?

By far the most pervasive issue America faces is corruption. Corruption in our executive departments, agencies, courts, and law enforcement. Outside of government, we see corruption in the military industrial complex, the pharmaceutical industrial complex and the technology, media complex.

And what do conservatives need to do to be ready to fight it?

First, educate yourself and then educate others. Find other like-minded people in your neighborhood, church, and town. Then work together to capture the local institutions near you for our values. School boards, town councils, county sheriffs, state legislatures are all vitally important to stopping the woke culture in its tracks.

To purchase the book and learn more, visit Counterpunch by Floyd G. Brown.

Border Crisis Escalates As Whistleblowers Step Forward

Yesterday (April 26, 2023), Tara Lee Rodas, a Department of Health and Human Services whistleblower testified that “today, children will work overnight shifts at slaughterhouses, factories, restaurants to pay their debts to smugglers and traffickers. Today, children will be sold for sex.” In her explosive testimony about the crisis of migrant children entering the country unaccompanied by an adult, she said, “It could be argued that the U.S. government has become the middleman in a large scale, multi-billion-dollar, child trafficking operation that is run by bad actors seeking to profit off of the lives of children.”

Ms. Rodas’ testimony was given in a hearing of the U.S. House Judiciary Committee, Subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security and Enforcement, “The Biden Border Crisis: Exploitation of Unaccompanied Alien Children.”

In a separate hearing on April 18, 2023, Arizona Rep. Andy Biggs, a member of the U.S. House Oversight Committee, National Security, Border and Foreign Affairs Subcommittee, questioned the director of the Health Department’s Office of Refugee Resettlement’s (ORR) Unaccompanied Alien Children Program as to the 85,000 migrant children the ORR has apparently lost contact with. Director Robin Dunn Marcos had no direct response.

Americans deserve answers and accountability. Children deserve safety – including all those who have been allowed into the country and who are now unaccounted for, as well as the more than 20,000 children the U.S. Customs and Border Protection(CBP) is reporting have entered the country in February and March alone. According to the CBP report, “encounters of unaccompanied children increased 14%, with 12,374 encounters in March compared with 10,845 in February.” In the same report, CBP states that illegal alien adult “encounters and noncitizens processed at Ports of Entry along the southwest border was 191,900, up nearly 23% from 156,138 in February 2023.”

The devastating whistleblower’s testimony, coupled with the pending end of Trump-Era policy Directive 4510-26 and the fast-approaching Title 42 border policy end date of May 11, 2023, indicates that the entire crisis at the border is about to get much much worse.

Border Policy Changes – Vehicle Pursuits and Ending Title 42

Beginning next week on Monday, May 1, 2023, Border agents will follow a new policy, Directive 4510-26A, regarding vehicle pursuits of suspected smugglers fleeing from law enforcement. The policy replaces yet another workable Trump-Era border policy, Directive 4510-26, with one that is likely to significantly deter and impede Border agents from pursuing vehicles that fail to stop at checkpoints or points of entry.

U.S. Border Patrol agents following the new “vehicle pursuit” policy will have to think twice before initiating or continuing “hot pursuits” of vehicles suspected to be smuggling illegal aliens, unlawful drugs, and/or victims of human trafficking into the United States through our borders. Why? Because this new “hot pursuit” CBP guidance is something akin to a complex legal analysis, requiring a 15+ factor analysis by the agent before deciding whether to initiate a vehicle pursuit, or once in pursuit, to continue. The policy places tremendous burden on our Border agents and, depending on how courts interpret the policy, it might shift legal liability directly to the Border agent in a majority of cases. By its own language, this policy contravenes any notion of securing our borders and, instead, is demonstrably protective of criminal smugglers and the Mexican cartels.

On May 11, the Biden Administration intends to end Title 42, a policy that allows illegal immigrants from Canada or Mexico to be turned away at the border under expedited procedures if they came from countries with high rates of COVID-19 infection.

Numbers Don’t Lie

While it’s nearly impossible to know the exact number of illegals already in the homeland, over the last two years estimates range between four and five million and continue to climb. At a recent Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing, Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson is reported to have said that he “calculated the total to be anywhere from four to five million border crossers and illegal aliens who entered the U.S. interior over the last two years — including those directly released by DHS, known got-aways, and unknown got-aways.” The Center for Immigration Studies reports that “at least 3.4 million border crossers and illegal aliens have entered the U.S. interior since Biden took office with likely hundreds of thousands more of whom DHS is unaware.”

Americans may never know the “real” number, but what citizens do know is that they are paying the price for the present administration’s ineptitude and incompetence in tax dollars, the death of hundreds of young Americans due to the infusion of fentanyl on our streets, our nation’s sovereignty, and our individual safety and security. Reports of terrorists and criminals entering the country at the border are commonplace, as well as human trafficking – including children – by cartels who mark their victims with wristbands toting money due to their handlers, never mind what unknown diseases are infesting our cities and towns causing unnecessary strain on hospitals and health centers to care for local citizens.

And, if all this isn’t enough, Americans learned this week that three former Presidents – Clinton, Bush, and Obama – have put together a nonprofit to fly illegals around the country and onto the streets of America.

Immigration is out of control. Illegals are swarming the borders – south and north, child smugglers are destroying innocent lives, cartels are getting rich off drug and human trafficking, illegals who are criminals are roaming our neighborhoods, our national sovereignty is at stake, and when Title 42 ends, American taxpayers will be footing the bill at the risk of their own safety and that of their families. As President Reagan told us: “A nation that cannot control its borders is not a nation.”

Twenty-Seventh Amendment – Congressional Pay Amendment

With the review of the Twenty-Seventh Amendment below, we conclude our “Constitutional Amendments” series covering the Bill of Rights, or first 10 amendments, and the 11th through 27th amendments. To read and study the complete series of all of the amendments, please click here.

The Twenty-Seventh Amendment, sometimes referred to as the “Congressional Pay Amendment,” was first proposed by Congress on September 25, 1789, at the same time as the Bill of Rights (first ten amendments). Although the Bill of Rights was quickly approved, this Amendment failed when only six of the requisite eleven states approved the language. However, because there was no deadline for ratification in the language of the Amendment, it resurfaced over time and finally, 202 years later, on May 7, 1992, it was approved. In its entirety, the Twenty-Seventh Amendment states:

No law, varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives, shall take effect, until an election of Representatives shall have intervened.

The Amendment prohibits a change in the salary of members of Congress from taking effect until the start of the next term. In our system of checks and balances, the spirit of the Amendment safeguards against the conflict of interest which arises if Congress was permitted to immediately effectuate a salary increase in favor of themselves; it promotes the notion of accountability and provides voters with an opportunity to consider whether their elected representatives deserve a congressional pay raise or should be fired from public office through the election process. Further, members of Congress who are leaving office may be less incentivized to approve an arbitrary or unjustified increase in congressional pay.

The story of how this Amendment came to be is unusual. In 1982, ten years prior to ratification, a student at the University of Texas at Austin named Gregory Watson published a paper on the proposed amendment, kicking off his personal campaign in pursuit of ratification. Going state to state, he lobbied state legislatures for approval, and, in 1983, his efforts began paying off when Maine ratified. Nine years later, after Michigan became the final state to ratify the language, the U.S. Archivist at the time, Don Wilson, certified the Amendment thus modifying the Constitution. Mr. Wilson became the first and only Archivist to certify a constitutional amendment.

The Twenty-Seventh Amendment was yet another Amendment, as we have seen throughout our series, with a set of unique circumstances surrounding its ratification.

Of Note: Regarding deadlines for ratification of proposed amendments: The Supreme Court (SCOTUS) had addressed this issue with decisions ten years apart: In 1929, SCOTUS held that the Constitution authorizes Congress to “fix a definite period” for ratification of an amendment. Then in 1939, SCOTUS ruled that Constitutional amendments without a fixed deadline for state ratification remain pending business before the state legislatures or, if applicable, ratifying conventions, and still may be ratified by the states. Commonly, and as noted throughout our series, proposals to amend the Constitution expire in seven years.

America’s Future Files Amicus Brief in Religious Counseling Censorship Case

Today, April 27, 2023, America’s Future, along with three other nonprofits, submitted an Amicus brief with the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) in Tingley v Ferguson, Attorney General for the state of Washington, et al., Dkt. No. 22-942, a case involving the First Amendment right to freely speak and freely exercise one’s religion. The SCOTUS docket, with all legal filings in this case, is publicly available and located here.

Our brief was filed in support of the petitioner, Mr. Brian Tingley, who is a practicing Christian as well as a licensed marriage and family counselor. According to Mr. Tingley’s Petition for Writ of Certiorari, clients seek his expertise to assist them to work through various issues, including sexuality and gender identity. Aligned with his faith and personal beliefs, “Mr. Tingley grounds human identity in God’s design rather than a person’s feelings or wishes. Many of his clients agree and seek his counsel precisely because they want to align their identity with their faith.”

In violation of Mr. Tingley’s First Amendment rights to freely speak and free exercise of religion, Washington enacted a state statute prohibiting any discussions that might “encourage a ‘change [of] an individual’s sexual orientation or gender identity’, while allowing conversations that ‘support … identity exploration’ and ‘do not seek to change sexual orientation or gender identity’.”

Mr. Tingley requests SCOTUS declare this state law unconstitutional and enjoin Washington from the enforcement thereof. To that end, in seeking SCOTUS intervention, Mr. Tingley presents the following questions to the SCOTUS:

1. Whether a law that censors conversations between counselors and clients as “unprofessional conduct” violates the Free Speech Clause.

2. Whether a law that primarily burdens religious speech is neutral and generally applicable, and if so, whether the Court should overrule Employment Division v. Smith, 494 U.S. 872 (1990).

In our brief, we argue in favor of Mr. Tingley’s right to freely speak, stating, “Washington State assumes a person can change his sex, in defiance of biological and Biblical truth. And the state legislature then empowers its state officials to fine, sanction, and withdraw the licenses from counselors who adhere to Biblical morality. None of these dangerous results can be allowed to stand.”

Further, and at the heart of the litigation is the foundational dogma of our Constitutional Republic – the “First Amendment’s protections of both free speech and free exercise [of religion]” Both are firmly established and deeply rooted in our history and traditions. Morality and faith favor principles over persecution and, as we state in our brief, “[t]he Christian Counseling under attack is pure speech, not conduct, but even if viewed as conduct under the Ninth Circuit’s professional speech exception, the Christian Counselors’ words are protected by the Free Exercise Clause.”

Finally, our brief approaches the philosophical and religious matters raised in this case through a pragmatic perspective arguing “[t]he Framers established the Free Exercise of Religion as a jurisdictional limit on the power of government.”

We, at America’s Future, insist the SCOTUS reverse the Ninth Circuit’s decision on speech and religious grounds. As stated in our brief, “Washington State seeks to restrict the free exercise of religion…[and] once the activity being restricted is understood to be within the definition of ‘religion,’ it is jurisdictionally beyond the authority of the government.”

House Republicans Must Starve the Government Beast

President Reagan said it 42 years ago in his first inaugural speech: “[G]overnment is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.” And while it is easy to blame big spending Democrats for the runaway federal budget and the nation’s staggering national deficit, that’s not really fair. While Democrats love to spend money on social programs, Republicans love to spend money on war. And, everyone in the swamp loves to bring home “pork” for their district.

With Republicans now in charge of the House, should there be reason to be optimistic? Maybe, but at the end of 1995, the national debt was just under $5.0 trillion. At the end of 2022, that debt had increased to almost $31 trillion — a six-fold increase in under two decades. Even if adjusted for inflation, the increase is staggering. We can blame that on the Democrats — right? Not so fast.

Who is to Blame for our $31 Trillion Debt?

It may seem difficult to believe, but since 1995, Republicans have controlled the House of Representatives during 11 of the last 14 Congresses. Republicans controlled the House during six consecutive Congresses, from the 104th through the 109th under Clinton and George W. Bush. Then Democrats took over the House in the 110th and 111th Congresses during the end of the Bush Administration and the first two years of the Obama Administration. Power returned to the Republicans for four consecutive Congresses, from the 112th through 115th Congresses during the Obama Administration and the first half of the Trump Administration. Democrats took over during the 116th Congress for the second half of the Trump Administration, and the first half of the 117th Congress under Biden. And now, Republicans are in control of the House for the rest of the Biden Administration’s term.

To be sure, the nation has had a divided government during many of those years, with Democrats in charge of the Senate and in the White House, but as to taxing and spending issues, it is the House of Representatives that plays the dominant role.

The Constitution has two provisions about taxing and spending. Article I, section 7, cl. 1 states: “All Bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives….” Article I, section 8, cl. 7 states: “No money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by law….” To be sure, over the years, many procedural artifices have been designed to erode the dominant power of the House over taxing and spending, but not one dollar of federal money may be spent without the approval of the House.

Immediately before the Republicans took over the House in January, in December 2022, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and many Republicans joined Democrats to pass a nearly $2 trillion “omnibus package.”

“[W]eak and compromised Republican leaders are choosing to actively help pass this terrible bill filled with Biden-Schumer-Pelosi priorities,” lamented Congressman Bob Good (R-VA):

The omnibus bill pumps over $1.7 trillion out of American wallets…. Among the other provisions is millions in funding for radical gender ideology programs that seek to advance woke leftist messaging. Additionally, they propose massive funding “antiracist” initiatives, … expanding welfare programs to compensate for President Joe Biden’s inflationary policies, pouring millions of dollars into broken government agencies such as the FBI that have caved to extreme ideology, and giving more money to the abortion mill, Planned Parenthood.

Cutting Overall Spending

The next fiscal year begins October 1, 2023 — just five short months from now. If spending continues in the future the way it has gone in the past, Republican voters will have no one to blame but their own elected officials — particularly those in the House.

It is impossible to understand how large our nation’s debt truly is. It ticks upward every second on the debt clock, and is $31,460,819,460,502 at this writing. The number defies imagination. (That translates into $94,200 for every single person in America.) Consider that the U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) for 2022 — the total value of all goods and services produced in the United States — was only $25 trillion. So, even if the value of everything manufactured, plus the value of all services provided in the United States in 2022, were devoted to paying off the debt, it could not do so.

Now the House GOP has passed a proposal to condition a $1.5 trillion increase in the debt ceiling to some modest limits on the government’s spending. The bill would “reset the federal budget baseline to where it was last year —that is, before the December passage of the $1.7 trillion omnibus bill… and would limit future budget growth to one percent annually for the next decade.” Even with such a limitation, government spending would continue to grow faster than the American economy.

Obviously, the GOP measure will not fix the problem. Overall cuts in spending remain essential if the nation is to fall off a financial cliff. But there is one more thing the House Republicans could do.

Defunding the Worst Programs and Agencies

In addition to cutting spending overall, House Republicans could defund the most dangerous and abusive agencies and programs. Ronald Reagan correctly observed that “a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we’ll ever see on this earth.” But the Republicans could at least try to prove him wrong.

The House GOP debt limit bill included one provision to use the power of the purse to stop one runaway government agency. It would end the funding for 87,000 new IRS agents included in last year’s omnibus bill. That could be done, again and again, if the Republicans have the will to do so.

The ability to defund specific wasteful, and often evil, federal agencies and programs is one of the most powerful weapons that Republicans could use to slow the federal Leviathan. Bloated federal agencies, flush with money and abusive of the constitutional rights of Americans, must be hit where it hurts – their budgets. It is absolutely imperative that House Republicans begin to starve the worst aspects of the federal government – before the beast devours what remains of freedom.

Editor’s Note: In coming articles, we will highlight some of the most abusive and oppressive federal agencies and programs that House Republicans should target for ending. Stay tuned!

Reminders & Updates

Join hundreds of Americans who have signed up to be a part of America’s Future Project Defend & Protect Our Children (PDPC) nationwide network to help end child exploitation, abuse, and trafficking. Visit the Project’s web page here to read the PDPC Bulletin, watch multiple videos describing the initiative, and download our tips sheet for suggestions about what you can do to end the war on children in your community.

SHOP TIL YOU STOP: We hope you love America’s Future new online shop display and ease of accessing your favorite items! There are many new products, including a full assortment of tees for the whole family, a wide range of accessories like coffee mugs and totes, and a special line dedicated to our Project Defend & Protect Our Children. Thank you for your support!

AMERICA’S MONDAYS WITH MARY: Tune in every Monday morning at 9 a.m. (ET) to watch our Executive Director Mary O’Neill report out on the comments and insights submitted via our weekly Reader Survey and listen to updates about America’s Future activities and what’s ahead at America’s Mondays With Mary.

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