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Watch: Lesbian Lawmaker Slams Anti-Gay Colleagues, Reminds Them, ‘We’re Not A Church’

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“My Jesus is different,” says State Rep. Celia Israel, who happens to be a lesbian, taking a swipe at her anti-gay colleagues in epic fashion in a new documentary about the role of religion in the Texas Legislature.

 

“Everyone in Texas is made in the image of God, and because everyone is made in the image of God, that is serious business, it’s almost like representing God, and who would want to blow that opportunity?” –GOP state Rep. James White

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“God and Governing,” produced by The Texas Tribune, could just as easily be an episode of The Daily Show, featuring right-wing lawmakers discussing how their faith (read: conservative Christianity) influences their views on the issues of guns, abortion, gay marriage and education. 

But Israel, who’s Catholic herself and became the state’s first out lesbian lawmaker in 2014, rejects the notion that the Lone Star State should be a theocracy.  

“The way we get things done here is not by reading the Bible, it’s by reading the rules of the floor of the House of Representatives,” Israel says. “All of this is not of God. All of this is a manmade institution that’s designed to do good things. For me, this is a secular environment. We’re not a church. We’re in the Texas State Capitol trying to do good things.

“When someone is introducing anti-gay legislation and you happen to be gay, it’s hard not to take it personally,” Israel says later. “I’m doing the best I can to not let these issues be personal and respect their view, but I was raised a different way, and my Jesus is different.” 

The comments of Israel and other Democrats are presented in response to numerous Republicans who indicate their personal theologies are paramount when it comes to lawmaking. Although four percent of Texans are Jewish or Muslim, and one in five are nonbelievers, all but four of the state lawmakers who responded to the Tribune said they’re Christian. (Texas has 150 representatives and 31 senators).

And while only three percent of Texans believe guns, abortion or same-sex marriage are the most important issues facing the state, the Legislature spent much of this year’s session focused on those topics, with religion more prominent at the Capitol than at any other time in recent memory. 

“Everyone in Texas is made in the image of God, and because everyone is made in the image of God, that is serious business, it’s almost like representing God, and who would want to blow that opportunity?” GOP state Rep. James White declares. 

“A lot of times I look at as a fight for limited government, bringing government down so that God can be bigger, that there’s more of a role for the church,” says Rep. Jonathan Stickland, one of the state’s most prominent Tea Partiers.  

GOP Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick indicates those views stretch to the highest levels of state government.    

“Despite what anyone would want to say in the media, or anyone in the outside world to try to spin for their own purpose, we are still a Christian nation, and there are some people who want us to deny that,” Patrick says. 

And to Patrick and others, “a Christian nation” clearly shouldn’t allow same-sex marriage. 

Texas lawmakers introduced more than 20 anti-LGBT bills in this year’s session, but all were defeated, largely due to opposition from the state’s chamber of commerce. And based on the Tribune‘s interviews with right-wing lawmakers, it wasn’t due to any lack of homophobic fervor on their part. 

“I don’t look at homosexuality any different than I would at an adulterer, a pornographer, those who are caught up in those lifestyles or bondage,” says Sen. Charles Perry, the author of a bill aimed at undermining the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Obergefell. “We all have our demons to slay, but to be in that lifestyle and say I’m a self-professing Christian with no expectation of turning away, that’s a direct violation of the Christian faith. This is a lifestyle and a choice and a decision, rather than an actual right that is granted to our pursuit of happiness.” 

Others told the Tribune they oppose same-sex marriage because they believe the institution was created by God, not government.  

“I do believe it’s revealed in the scripture that marriage is between one man and one women, but I also believe it’s revealed in nature, and so I don’t think it’s government’s right or responsibility to define marriage, but to recognize it,” says GOP Rep. David Simpson. 

Simpson delivers another gem when the subject turns to sex education. During this year’s session, lawmakers unsuccessfully attempted to divert $3 million from HIV/AIDS prevention to abstinence-only education, resulting in a hilarious exchange on the House floor.

“If you’re going to talk about sex and marriage and intercourse, it’s best done with one’s parents in the privacy of one’s home, not when your hormones are really growling and moving in the classroom,” Simpson says. “I remember that when I was in seventh grade, and you know, that’s just so unnatural.” 

Watch the full special below. 

 

Image: Screenshot via The Texas Tribune/YouTube

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JD Vance Schooled by German Ambassador Over Defense of Far-Right ‘Nazi-Lite’ Party

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January 2, 2025

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Vice President-elect JD Vance, the Republican Senator from Ohio, is facing criticism both domestically and internationally for endorsing and seemingly defending an op-ed by Elon Musk that is supportive of a far-right German political party reportedly linked to neo-Nazis.

The New York Times late last month described the Alternative for Germany, or AfD, as “a group with ties to neo-Nazis whose youth wing has been classified as ‘confirmed extremist’ by German domestic intelligence.” The paper of record also noted that AfD has been “called a threat to German democracy” by Germany’s Chancellor Olaf Scholz and others.

“News that members of the AfD attended a secret meeting with the Austrian extreme-right provocateur Martin Sellner, who has admitted to once being a member of a neo-Nazi group and has called for deporting migrants en masse, led to large protests early this year,” The Times also reported. “Then, starting in May, a leading light of the party was twice given a hefty fine for using Nazi-era slogans during campaign stops.”

On Thursday, Vance reposted a thread containing what is allegedly Musk’s op-ed translated into English, titled, “Only the AfD Can Save Germany.”

READ MORE: Republicans Use New Year’s Attacks to Push Border Narrative and Fast-Track Trump Nominees

The Vice President-elect then wrote: “I’m not endorsing a party in the German elections, as it’s not my country and we hope to have good relations with all Germans. But this is an interesting piece. Also interesting; American media slanders AfD as Nazi-lite, But AfD is most popular in the same areas of Germany that were most resistant to the Nazis.”

Vance’s remarks were quickly criticized, with some discussing post-World War II German reunification in 1990, following the fall of the Berlin Wall, to explain how geography has little to do with opposing Nazism. Others suggested Vance’s geographic claim was actually wrong.

And despite Vance’s claim, The Economist as some noted, in 2019 reported: “Post-war population transfers changed politics across Germany,” and added that “a new paper finds an uncomfortable overlap between the parts of Germany that support the afd and those that voted for the Nazis in 1933. At first glance, the link is invisible. The Nazis fared well in northern states like Schleswig-Holstein; the afd did best in the former East Germany.”

Germany’s Ambassador to the U.S., Andreas Michaelis, politely schooled the right-wing American Senator slated to be sworn in as Vice President in just weeks.

“Interesting observation, Senator JD Vance,” Ambassador Michaelis wrote. “Historical context can be tricky – while some areas you are referring to resisted the Nazi party early on, others did not, or later became strongholds of the regime. Germany’s history reminds us how important it is to challenge extremism in all its forms.”

READ MORE: Trump Calls for CIA to Act Inside US, Raising Legal Concerns, During Midnight Tirade

The Bulwark’s Cathy Young blasted the Vice President-elect.

“Vance is now literally channeling old-time Soviet propaganda by portraying the communist-controlled areas of Germany as the most genuinely anti-Nazi,” she observed. “Yes, AfD is most popular in former East Germany, partly b/c people there never got an education that stressed the evil of racism.”

Berlin-based journalist and award-winning documentary filmmaker James Jackson responded to Vance by offering a cartographic refutation.

Last month, U.S. Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT) wrote that the “AfD‘s mission is to rehabilitate the image of the Nazi movement. One leader’s license plate is an open tribute to Hitler. A top AfD official said about migrants, ‘We can always shoot them later…or gas them.’ Another described Judaism as the ‘inner enemy’ in Germany.”

READ MORE: US Sanctions Russian and Iranian Entities for 2024 Election Interference Attempts

 

Image by Gage Skidmore via Flickr and a CC license

 

 

 

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Republicans Use New Year’s Attacks to Push Border Narrative and Fast-Track Trump Nominees

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January 2, 2025

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Despite the suspects in both New Year’s possible terror attacks being Americans and either current or former U.S. military personnel, House and Senate Republicans are leveraging the incidents to advance Donald Trump’s anti-immigrant “America First” agenda, calling for closing down the border and pressing for swift confirmation of the President-elect’s highly controversial national security nominees—including those described by some as “unqualified” or even “dangerously unqualified.”

“First and foremost, close our border,” U.S. Rep. Mike Waltz (R-FL), a former Green Beret, told “Fox & Friends when asked what should be done to protect the nation from further attacks,” The Daily Beast reports. Waltz is Trump’s nominee to become Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs (APNSA), also known as the President’s National Security Advisor (NSA).

“I can’t emphasize enough, close the border, secure our sovereignty, you know, and that is completely unacceptable,” Waltz also said on the right-wing cable channel. “The entire world knows that we have an open border. They intend to hit us, and they are pushing people into our interior to do just that.”

The suspect in the deadly New Orleans attack was a U.S. citizen from Texas, and the “suspected driver of the Tesla Cybertruck that exploded Wednesday outside the Trump International Las Vegas Hotel has been identified as active duty Army soldier Matthew Livelsberger, according to an official briefed on the probe,” CBS News reported.

The Daily Beast Thursday afternoon reported the “man suspected of being behind Tesla Cybertruck explosion in Las Vegas was a ‘big’ supporter of Donald Trump and voted for him in November, a senior law enforcement official tells the Daily Beast.”

READ MORE: Trump Calls for CIA to Act Inside US, Raising Legal Concerns, During Midnight Tirade

“The U.S. Senate must confirm President Trump’s national security team as soon as possible. Lives depend on it,” wrote U.S. Senator John Barrasso (R-WY) at 1:29 PM on January 1.

“The U.S. Senate must confirm President Trump’s national security picks as soon as possible,” said U.S. Senator Markwayne Mullin (R-OK), barely one hour later, at 2:44 PM on January 1.

U.S. Senator John Thune (R-SD), who will become Senate Majority Leader, called the New Orleans attack “a clear example of why the Senate must get President Trump’s national security team in place as quickly as possible.”

U.S. Rep. Randy Weber (R-TX), also pushed the border control narrative, on Fox Business on Thursday.

Eric Columbus, who served as special litigation counsel at the U.S. House of Representatives’ Office of General Counsel, responded to Weber’s remarks by calling it a “Great opportunity for Dems not to defend Biden but to insist that the GOP take the danger seriously and reject nominees plainly unsuited to the task — like [Kash] Patel and [Tulsi] Gabbard.”

Republican Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, just endorsed by Trump for a second term, declared Thursday that the New Orleans attack—whose suspect is a Texan and former military—the FBI is investigating as terrorism—is the reason House Republicans passed “the strongest border security act ever passed by Congress.”

READ MORE: US Sanctions Russian and Iranian Entities for 2024 Election Interference Attempts

Republicans, Johnson also said, have repeatedly expressed concerns about what he called “the wide-open border” in a Fox News segment on the possible domestic terrorism attack in New Orleans. Johnson discussed “the idea that dangerous people were coming here in droves, potentially setting up potentially terrorist cells around the country.”

Punchbowl News on Thursday reported the “New Orleans attack could help limit confirmation drama” for Trump’s “most-controversial” national security nominees, and specified them as “Pentagon pick Pete Hegseth, FBI nominee Kash Patel, and former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (Hawaii), the nominee for director of national intelligence.”

Watch the videos above or at this link.

READ MORE: Trump Medicare Pick Dr. Oz Says Uninsured ‘Don’t Have Right to Health’ in Resurfaced Clip

 

Image via Reuters

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Trump Calls for CIA to Act Inside US, Raising Legal Concerns, During Midnight Tirade

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January 2, 2025

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President-elect Donald Trump, in an angry midnight rant, criticized the United States on multiple fronts and called for the Central Intelligence Agency, a U.S. civilian foreign intelligence entity, to conduct investigations within the United States—a move potentially unlawful and contrary to its charter, and a possible threat to Americans’ civil rights. Hours later, he appeared to directly blame President Joe Biden for the New Year’s Day attack in New Orleans, currently under FBI investigation as an act of terrorism.

Declaring America a “disaster,” and a “laughing stock all over the World,” Trump, early Thursday morning, alleged the U.S. has “open borders,” and “weak, ineffective, and virtually nonexistent leadership.”

He also claimed the “DOJ, FBI, and Democrat state and local prosecutors” are “incompetent and corrupt” and “have not done their job,” but rather, “spent all of their waking hours unlawfully attacking their political opponent, ME, rather than focusing on protecting Americans from the outside and inside violent SCUM that has infiltrated all aspects of our government, and our Nation itself.”

“Democrats should be ashamed of themselves for allowing this to happen to our Country,” Trump declared, never specifying what he was railing against, before calling for the Central Intelligence Agency to investigate.

READ MORE: US Sanctions Russian and Iranian Entities for 2024 Election Interference Attempts

“The CIA must get involved, NOW, before it is too late. The USA is breaking down – A violent erosion of Safety, National Security, and Democracy is taking place all across our Nation. Only strength and powerful leadership will stop it. See you on January 20th,” Trump announced, referring to his upcoming inauguration, before closing with his slogan.

The Washington Post’s Aaron Blake, pointing to Trump’s Truth Social post, reported that the President-elect “again seems to connect the attack in New Orleans to the border.”

The suspect in that attack is a 42-year-old American from Texas, a U.S. military veteran, who is believed to have plowed a pickup truck into people celebrating on historic Bourbon Street in New Orleans early on New Years’ Day, killing 14 or 15 people, and injuring many others. The attack is being investigated by the FBI as an act of terrorism, according to multiple reports.

“The FBI said the suspect, who was killed in a firefight with officers, had an ISIS flag in the vehicle at the time of the attack,” CNN reported Thursday.

Despite the suspect being an American and a veteran, Trump had implied the attack had been carried out by an undocumented immigrant.

“When I said that the criminals coming in are far worse than the criminals we have in our country, that statement was constantly refuted by Democrats and the Fake News Media, but it turned out to be true,” Trump had claimed Wednesday. “The crime rate in our country is at a level that nobody has ever seen before. Our hearts are with all of the innocent victims and their loved ones, including the brave officers of the New Orleans Police Department. The Trump Administration will fully support the City of New Orleans as they investigate and recover from this act of pure evil!”

Reporting that Trump had “shared anti-immigrant misinformation moments after an inaccurate report from Fox News,” HuffPost notes that “Fox News had reported minutes prior to Trump’s Truth Social post that the vehicle used by the suspect had crossed into Eagle Pass, Texas, from Mexico two days before the attack. Just over an hour later, the conservative network retracted that reporting, saying its sources had advised that the truck crossed the border on Nov. 16 apparently driven by someone else. Later in the afternoon, it reported that the truck never crossed over from Mexico.”

As Raw Story reported Wednesday afternoon, Fox News delivered an on-air fact check of Trump’s remarks.

“Now the former president said ‘criminals coming in’ in a statement, meaning into our country, but to be clear,” Fox News justice correspondent David Spunt told viewers (video below), “the suspect was born in the United States, he served in the United States Army, he was a veteran, the FBI is the lead agency in this investigation going through the social media and any other accounts associated with the suspect.”

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Later Thursday morning, Trump doubled down, this time directly attacking President Joe Biden.

“With the Biden ‘Open Border’s Policy’ I said, many times during Rallies, and elsewhere, that Radical Islamic Terrorism, and other forms of violent crime, will become so bad in America that it will become hard to even imagine or believe. That time has come, only worse than ever imagined. Joe Biden is the WORST PRESIDENT IN THE HISTORY OF AMERICA, A COMPLETE AND TOTAL DISASTER. What he and his group of Election Interfering ‘thugs’ have done to our Country will not soon be forgotten! MAGA,” Trump posted to his Truth Social account.

In 1974, The New York Times reported that the CIA, “directly violating its charter, conducted a massive, illegal domestic intelligence operation during the Nixon Administration.”

“Under the 1947 act setting up the C.I.A., the agency was forbidden to have ‘police, subpoena, law enforcement powers or internal security functions’ inside the United States. Those responsibilities fall to the F.B.I., which maintains a special internal security unit to deal with foreign intelligence threats,” The Times had reported.

Watch the video below or at this link.

READ MORE: Trump Claims Dems Will Use ‘All Sorts of Tricks’ to Stall Controversial Nominees

 

Image via Reuters

 

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