[Yahoo] Chief Justice John Roberts on Tuesday put a temporary hold on the handover of former President Donald Trump's tax returns to a congressional committee.
Roberts' order gives the Supreme Court time to weigh the legal issues in Trump's emergency appeal to the high court, filed Monday.
Without court intervention, the tax returns could have been provided as early as Thursday by the Treasury Department to the Democratic-controlled House Ways and Means Committee.
Roberts gave the committee until Nov. 10 to respond. The chief justice handles emergency appeals from the nation's capital, where the fight over Trump's taxes has been going on since 2019.
Lower courts ruled that the committee has broad authority to obtain tax returns and rejected Trump’s claims that it was overstepping.
If Trump can persuade the nation’s highest court to intervene in this case, he could potentially delay a final decision until the start of the next Congress in January. If Republicans recapture control of the House in the fall election, they could drop the records request.
The temporary delay imposed by Roberts is the third such order issued by justices in recent days in cases related to Trump.
The court separately is weighing Sen. Lindsey Graham's emergency appeal to avoid having to testify before a Georgia grand jury that is investigating potential illegal interference by Trump and his allies in the 2020 election in the state.
Also before the court is an emergency appeal from Arizona Republican party chairwoman Kelli Ward to prevent the handover of phone records to the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.
The House Ways and Means panel and its chairman, Democrat Richard Neal of Massachusetts, first requested Trump’s tax returns in 2019 as part of an investigation into the Internal Revenue Service’s audit program and tax law compliance by the former president. A federal law says the Internal Revenue Service “shall furnish” the returns of any taxpayer to a handful of top lawmakers.
The Justice Department, under the Trump administration, had defended a decision by then-Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin to withhold the tax returns from Congress. Mnuchin argued that he could withhold the documents because he concluded they were being sought by Democrats for partisan reasons. A lawsuit ensued.
After President Joe Biden took office, the committee renewed the request, seeking Trump’s tax returns and additional information from 2015-2020. The White House took the position that the request was a valid one and that the Treasury Department had no choice but to comply. Trump then attempted to halt the handover in court.
Then-Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. obtained copies of Trump’s personal and business tax records as part of a criminal investigation. That case, too, went to the Supreme Court, which rejected Trump’s argument that he had broad immunity as president.
Trump had most recently sought the justices’ intervention in a legal dispute stemming from the search of his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida in August. The court rejected that appeal.
#4
Setting a precedent about disclosure of tax documents while on the verge of being swept out of power is a dumb move. I’m cheering them on. Jill Biden will be shopping at Plato’s closet for her runway couture.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
11/01/2022 11:03 Comments ||
Top||
#5
How about having all sitting Congresscritters and their staff make public their tax returns? Seems fair to me.
#6
Glad Robert's has slowed down Bidet's attempt to further weaponize agencies of the government against potential 2024 candidate Trump. There will be an accounting if the big red wave is as large as anticipated.
#7
I don't think Joe Biden is concerned about the IRS being turned against him. All of his ill gotten gains were thoroughly laundered by the likes of Burisma.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
11/01/2022 12:28 Comments ||
Top||
#8
If the Republicans take over the house - and don't elect the same leadershit - they should get the tax records of ALL congresscritters and their immediate families. Democrat and Republicans - clean sweep.
[TheBlaze] She claimed that when her husband was first sworn in as lieutenant governor in 2019, she did not want to move her family into the mansion designated for the commonwealth's second family but instead wanted to repurpose the mansion pool so that the public could use it.
"And while we did not want the mansion, that mansion came with a pool I wanted," Fetterman told podcast co-hosts Jill Wine-Banks and Victor Shi.
Per Wiki "Gisele Barreto Fetterman": Fetterman was born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. When she was seven years old, Fetterman came to the United States as an undocumented child immigrant with her mother and younger brother, taking up residence in a one-room apartment in New York City. They left Brazil due to violent crime in their community. In New York, the family lived in poverty, and furnished their apartment with furniture they found on the street. Fetterman said that her family often depended on food banks and thrift stores. Her mother, who had a PhD degree from a Brazilian university and had worked as a nutritionist and educator, took jobs cleaning hotels and houses, and was often denied pay due to her status as an undocumented immigrant.
Fetterman did not speak English when she arrived in the United States, and enrolled in an English as a second language program at her school in Queens. The family later moved to Newark, New Jersey. She studied at the Institute for Integrative Nutrition.
Fetterman received her green card in 2004 and became a citizen of the United States in 2009. Emphasis added. Any bewilderment regarding Monday's Brazil Presidential Election?
“As attentive readers will have noticed, the word “democracy” is appealed to whenever it looks as though Democrats might lose.
One sign that this is about to happen is the promiscuous deployment of the phrase “our democracy.”
They really mean it. It’s not your democracy, peon.
If you voted for a Republican, you voted “against our democracy.”
As I have put it elsewhere, what “democracy” means to them is “rule by Democrats.”
It’s worth pausing to ponder the evolution of this novel meaning of “democracy.”
Originally, of course, “democracy” meant “rule by the demos,” the people.
But as Orwell showed in his novel “Animal Farm,” there’s a moral or political entropy at work in human affairs that, unchecked, regularly perverts “the people” into “some people.”
All animals are equal, you see, but some are more equal than others.
Posted by: Billy B ||
11/01/2022 19:40 Comments ||
Top||
Moderate #Portland city council candidate @reneforportland blames far-left incumbent @JoAnnPDX for inciting violence against his campaign. A direct action was organized to smash up his office again after her campaign lied about him being a Republican.https://t.co/9egBIWIPW3
Posted by: Fred ||
11/01/2022 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11132 views]
Top|| File under: Antifa/BLM
#1
Kristallnacht, Oregon style. I am doubtful that his opponent invited the violence; it’s baked into the Portland system. Graffiti, feces, violence and homelessness are the ambiance of Portland. Philly wafts the aroma of a cheesesteak; Portland wafts the aroma of body odor, urine and hemp. In reality, the cheese steak is a cliche. Philly sucks as well just with fewer hippies.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
11/01/2022 10:56 Comments ||
Top||
#2
It's only fair after Trump incited the attack on Paul Pelosi. /sarc
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
11/01/2022 12:44 Comments ||
Top||
#3
Dave D called Philadelphia, where he lived, Philthadelphia.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
11/01/2022 17:23 Comments ||
Top||
#4
“Philly wafts the aroma of a cheesesteak; Portland wafts the aroma of body odor, urine and hemp.”
Ha! Beautifully said.
Worthy of a fine novelist. Thank you
Posted by: Billy B ||
11/01/2022 18:07 Comments ||
Top||
[BearingArms] The ATF has been up to quite a lot, recently. We’ve outlined a lot of their shenanigans here, though I’m sure there’s plenty we were unaware of. They’re likely to get away with it, at least for the time being, by arguing that it’s their job to make sure guns don’t end up in the wrong hands.
And, to some extent, that’s true.
However, it seems they suck more at their jobs than we thought.
With inflation, prices are up pretty much across the board, but if you’re looking for a new gun for recreation or self-defense, here’s a hint: the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) is offering them at an absolute steal. Seriously, the federal agency tasked with enforcing firearms regulations has such poor security that thousands of guns and gun parts once in its possession disappeared in the hands of thieves. And it has yet to fully implement recommended reforms.
"Since September 2015, the ATF has utilized the National Disposal Branch (NDB), formerly the National Firearms and Ammunition Destruction (NFAD) Branch, to centralize and streamline the disposal process of forfeited and ATF-owned firearms. Each year, the ATF destroys thousands of firearms at the NDB," the U.S. Justice Department’s Inspector General noted in announcing a recent report. "The DOJ Office of the Inspector General (OIG) undertook this audit following the discovery that thousands of firearms, firearm parts, and ammunition had been stolen from NFAD from 2016 to 2019."
So, for three years, the agency that enforces every petty and intrusive federal regulation regarding firearms (as well as alcohol, tobacco, and explosives) let its own security personnel ("a DHS contract security guard was convicted in connection with these thefts") pilfer its inventory.
Strictly speaking, the report isn’t about the thefts themselves, which were discovered by accident during a traffic stop. The recent report delved into the ATF’s progress in implementing anything resembling the security procedures it requires of the private gun dealers it oversees—or maybe just something more challenging than leaving "intact weapons ... in unsecured boxes and unlocked containers." So, how is the ATF doing at storing firearms at least as securely as you might expect of private businesses?
In short, not particularly well.
Now, let’s understand here that the ATF has been quick to hammer gun stores for every clerical error they can find, shutting down stores now over what would have been a warning at most a year or two back. They expect everyone to get everything perfect and if you don’t, your FFL is in jeopardy.
Meanwhile, they’re leaving guns around in boxes for literally anyone to walk off with.
I’m not a big fan of the ATF, but they exist and our tax dollars pay for them to do a certain job. That job isn’t to harass mom-and-pop gun stores into extinction. It’s to keep guns out of the hands of the bad guys.
Yet by not implementing basic security measures from the start, they’ve facilitated those same bad guys getting guns. Forgive me for being cynical, but I think it is by design they make sure the good guys are unarmed and the bad guys are.
I mean, did they think thieves wouldn’t want to get their hands on seized firearms or something? Did someone honestly not realize this could potentially be a thing?
Now that they know, I’m left wondering why they haven’t already tripped over themselves to implement every necessary security measure possible to try and prevent this kind of thing.
What I do know is that the ATF lost any moral authority it had, not that it had much to begin with.
[Red State] The Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency has been hosting meetings with internet platforms and allowing those platforms to flag for deletion any material to which they object. This until now secret program resulted in the federal bureaucracy meddling in the 2020 elections.
You can read the whole 48 pages of minutes at this link.
The documents were obtained by Missouri Attorney General and Republican Senate candidate Eric Schmitt as part of an investigation he is conducting. The left-wing site The Intercept did the initial reporting.
The Protecting Critical Infrastructure from Misinformation and Disinformation Subcommittee meetings began during the 2020 election. That means it was organized and operated under President Donald Trump’s appointees in an organization he created in 2018.
In coordination with this committee, Facebook developed a web portal where "partners" can identify material that the "partner" doesn’t want distributed, and Facebook will see to taking it down or making it nearly impossible to share. The portal, facebook.com/xtakedowns/login, was in operation as I wrote this.
#2
They were successful with respect to 40% of the population. My folks told me the other day, for instance, that Romney is the only politician they trust.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
11/01/2022 10:58 Comments ||
Top||
#3
This is something the founders could not guard against. Our system is based on checks and balances. It doesn't work when branches of government, industry and the press conspire together.
[WASHINGTONTIMES] Florida’s newly created Office of Election Crimes and Security is requesting a criminal investigation into charges of ballot harvesting in Orlando, a Democratic stronghold in the critical swing state.
Cynthia Harris, a Democrat who ran unsuccessfully for District 6 commissioner in Orange County, which includes Orlando, provided a sworn complaint to the election crimes office, alleging left-leaning organizations have been perpetrating a scheme to encourage residents in black neighborhoods to apply for mail-in ballots and to fill out those ballots, which she said have been collected by paid canvassers, and sometimes altered, all in violation of state law.
In an interview with The Washington Times, Ms. Harris said she has video evidence of paid ballot harvesters operating in Orlando neighborhoods in both 2014 and 2017, and that the scheme has been going on for decades, continuing through the 2020 election and the 2022 primary.
[Free Beacon] What happened? Journalists and other Democrats have already started blaming voters for the party's (likely) defeat in the midterm elections.
Seriously? Yes. As the Washington Free Beacon reported earlier this month, Democrats and their allies have a history of lashing out when American voters decline to validate their preferences at the ballot box. The election is in 12 days, but things aren't looking great for Democrats. Polls suggest they are going to lose control of the House and possibly the Senate as well. That's why the voter-blaming is already underway.
What are they saying? What they always say in these situations. That the 2022 election is the most important election of our lifetimes and anyone who doesn't vote for Democrats is ignorant at best and evil at worst.
#1
they think giving Republicans the power to investigate Hunter Biden will bring down gas prices.
This is the correct answer. They're terrified of Congress having the subpoena power to investigate the Biden crime family.
And they LOVE sky-high gas prices. Not only does this punish us, but it makes electric cars viable. With cheap gas, electric cars can never succeed. What the hell do they care? They already have luxury electric cars, they don't pay at the pump. We can go fuck ourselves.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
11/01/2022 10:59 Comments ||
Top||
#5
Democrats are already blaming voters for midterm losses? Well, how about the part where your policies across the board suck? Voters don't like stolen elections, and out of control unaccoutable gangster governments.
[NationalReview] Justice Clarence Thomas pressed North Carolina’s solicitor general to explain how the University of North Carolina
...which surely did not expect to find itself behind the eight ball on this...
defines diversity during oral arguments on Monday in a Supreme Court case centered around the use of race as a factor in college admissions.
"I’ve heard the word diversity quite a few times and I don’t have a clue what it means," said Thomas. "It seems to mean everything for everyone."
He certainly would know. His last job before being appointed to the US Supreme Court was as chairman of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), appointed by President Reagan in 1982.
Students for Fair Admissions (SFFA) has challenged the race-based admissions policies of both Harvard and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC), accusing both schools of discriminating against Asian-American applicants. The cases were initially merged, but are now being heard separately after Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson recused herself from the Harvard case because she had previously served on the university’s board of overseers.
Good for her.
The cases open the door for the Supreme Court’s 6-3 conservative majority to reconsider its 2003 ruling in Grutter v. Bollinger, which allowed race to be used as a factor in college admissions to achieve student body diversity. Justice Sandra Day O’Connor wrote for the Grutter majority that race should be used as a "plus factor," and argued that such usage does not violate the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause. John Riggins: "Hey, Sandy baby, loosen up"
Thomas asked Ryan Park, the North Carolina solicitor general, to offer a specific definition of diversity in the context of UNC and provide a clear idea of what the educational benefits of diversity at the school would be.
"First, we define diversity the way this court has, in its court’s precedents, which means a broadly diverse set of criteria that extends to all different backgrounds and perspectives and not solely limited to race," said Park, before adding that there are "many different diversity factors that are considered as a greater factor in our admissions process than race."
"I didn’t go to racially diverse schools but there were educational benefits," replied Thomas, before again pushing for Park to list specific educational benefits.
Park said that there is a "truth seeking function of learning in a diverse environment," and pointed out that certain studies have found that racially diverse groups of people making stock trading decisions perform at a higher level, and make more efficient trading decisions.
"The mechanism there is it reduces group think and people have longer and more sustained disagreement and that leads to a more efficient outcome," Park explained.
#2
Diversity is important. Unanimity of thought enforced through censorship is how we protect diversity.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
11/01/2022 10:47 Comments ||
Top||
#3
"First, we define diversity the way this court has, in its court’s precedents, which means a broadly diverse set of criteria that extends to all different backgrounds and perspectives and not solely limited to race," said Park, before adding that there are "many different diversity factors that are considered as a greater factor in our admissions process than race."
Whoa! He's giving Kamala a run for her money.
Posted by: Matt ||
11/01/2022 11:05 Comments ||
Top||
#4
"everything but conservative thought. That's going too far"
Posted by: Frank G ||
11/01/2022 11:25 Comments ||
Top||
#5
Conservative thought is a necessary element of contemporary college life. It is the sole focus of the Two Minute Hate.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
11/01/2022 12:01 Comments ||
Top||
#6
CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Okay. So we’re talking about race as a determining factor in admission to Harvard.
MR. WAXMAN: Race in some –for some highly qualified applicants can be the determinative factor, just as being the –you know, an oboe player in a year in which the Harvard-Radcliffe orchestra needs an oboe player will be the tip.
CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Yeah. We did not fight a Civil War about oboe players.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
11/01/2022 15:25 Comments ||
Top||
[NYPOST] A serious recession next year is already baked in, but don’t worry: President Joe The Big Guy Biden ...46th president of the U.S. S I'm not working for you. Don't be such a horse's ass.... is on it. That is, he’s getting set to . . . blame Republicans.
Of course, the real cause is his own disastrous policies: The nation already hit recession as traditionally defined with two quarters of negative growth in the first half of the year, and the third quarter only scored as positive thanks to a shrinking trade deficit driven by higher energy exports. Consumer spending actually slowed.
The Bloomberg Economics forecast finds a 100% chance of deep recession next year; some two-thirds of business economists in the National Association of Business Economics survey say the same. For more warnings, ask Jeff Bezos or Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon.
So there was Biden last week, thundering that a GOP victory in the midterms will "crash the economy" and hike inflation, while bizarrely arguing Democrats "are fiscally responsible."
He brags that the federal deficit dropped by $1.4 trillion in the last fiscal year, skipping the facts that 1) the cause was simply the end of COVID emergency outlays and 2) it would’ve dropped twice as much without all the new spending he’s rammed through.
Meanwhile, ...back at the wreckage, Captain Poindexter wished he had thought to pack sun block... the inflation his spending spree triggered rampages on, with the Federal Reserve obliged to keep hiking interest rates to choke it off, further pushing the economy down.
Biden and his fellow Dems ignored months of warning signs, dismissing skyrocketing inflation as "transitory" (when they weren’t outright mocking average Americans’ worries) and carried on with their economic arson.
The political result: a huge swing in momentum to the GOP. And the polls show the voters know that the party in power is to blame for our economic misery.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/01/2022 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11133 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
He needs to be charging scooters for folks at the DC Walmart.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
11/01/2022 10:43 Comments ||
Top||
#2
..or be a Walmart Greeter Sniffer
Posted by: Big Brother Is Sniffing You ||
11/01/2022 11:38 Comments ||
Top||
#3
With the recent tightness in the Fed's policy (M2, the most commonly used measure of money, hasn't budged since last December), we should be seeing a recession.
However, the tightening doesn't begin to make a dent in the unprecedented $3 trillion the Fed threw into the economy in 2020. So we're in sort of uncharted waters. Normally the tightness of 2022 would cause a recession. But there is SO much money sloshing around that it is hard to tell if the Fed's tightening is having much of an effect on the larger economy so far.
Posted by: Tom ||
11/01/2022 13:34 Comments ||
Top||
#4
The tightening is a factor in a lot of finance calculations. It will just show up in different ways this time.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
11/01/2022 13:59 Comments ||
Top||
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.