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    Trump Rescinds His Nomination For DC US Attorney

    By
    Madeleine Jackson
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    0

    A big shakeup…

    The White House will soon select a new nominee to serve as United States Attorney for the District of Columbia after Trump’s pick met a series of roadblocks.

    Trump previously nominated Ed Martin, a former defense attorney who represented Americans charged in the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol, for the role. Martin has taken on the responsibilities of the interim U.S. attorney in Washington, D.C., since January. 

    On Thursday, Trump suggested he would put forward another candidate who would receive broader backing than Martin. 

    “He wasn’t getting the support from people that I thought,” Trump told reporters at the White House Thursday. “You know, he’s done a very good job. Crime is down 25% in DC during this period of time … I can only lift that little phone so many times of the day. But we have somebody else.”

    “I have to be straight. I was disappointed,” Trump said. “A lot of people were disappointed. But that’s the way it works. Sometimes, you know, that’s the way it works. And he wasn’t rejected, but we felt it would be very — it would be hard. And we have somebody else that will be announcing over the next two days who’s going to be great.” 

    The Senate has held up confirming Martin amid concerns from lawmakers.

    Republican Sen. Thom Tillis (N.C.), a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, announced Tuesday he wouldn’t endorse Martin. 

    Sen. Dick Durbin (Ill.) the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, also has opposed Martin’s nomination. 

    The move came a day after President Donald Trump resolved to withdraw his nomination of former Fox News contributor Janette Nesheiwat to serve as his surgeon general on Wednesday.

    Nesheiwat’s credentials came into question last month when CBS News reported that records showed she had graduated from the American University of the Caribbean School of Medicine, and not the University of Arkansas School of Medicine, as had been said when her nomination was announced.

    Casey Means, a physician with close ties to the “Make America Healthy Again,” or MAHA, movement, was announced as Trump’s new pick to fill the role.

    Means, a graduate of Stanford Medical School, is the sister of Calley Means, a close ally to Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and a special government employee at HHS. They are both high-profile proponents of Kennedy’s MAHA agenda.

    “I am pleased to announce that Dr. Casey Means, will be nominated as our next Surgeon General of the United States of America. Casey has impeccable ‘MAHA’ credentials, and will work closely with our wonderful Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., to ensure a successful implementation of our Agenda in order to reverse the Chronic Disease Epidemic, and ensure Great Health, in the future, for ALL Americans,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.

    “Her academic achievements, together with her life’s work, are absolutely outstanding,” he added. “Dr. Casey Means has the potential to be one of the finest Surgeon Generals in United States History. Congratulations to Casey!”the Senate Judiciary Committee. 

    Congress Elects House Speaker

    By
    Madeleine Jackson
    -
    4

    On Friday, Congressional lawmakers convened to elect the next Speaker of the House.

    Mike Johnson (R-La.) will serve as Speaker of the House for the 119th Congress.

    With the Republican majority at 219-215, Johnson could lose only one Republican vote to remain speaker.

    Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) was reelected to the top post in the House in a stunning floor vote on the opening day of Congress on Friday, securing the gavel on the first ballot.

    It appeared that he would fail on the first ballot as Reps. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) and Keith Self (R-Texas) voted for other candidates. However, the chamber held the vote open as Johnson conferred with his opponents and Norman and Self switched their votes to applause in the chamber.

    The vote came after President-elect Donald Trump issued his “total” endorsement of Mike Johnson (R-la.) earlier this week.

    “Speaker Mike Johnson is a good, hard working, religious man. He will do the right thing, and we will continue to WIN. Mike has my Complete & Total Endorsement. MAGA!” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social.

    Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene also offered her endorsement of Johnson shortly before Friday’s vote.

    Watch:

    “Tomorrow we convene at noon in the House of Representatives, and our first order of business will be to vote for Speaker of the House. This is a historic vote, and it is the first order of business that we have to accomplish before we can even swear in as members of Congress,” began Greene. “Now, here’s how I feel about it. You all have seen may disagree with Mike Johnson at times. You’ve seen me fight against him at times. But you want to know something else? Here’s what I recognize: For the past four years, all of you and myself included, have put blood, sweat, and tears into electing President Trump. And when you want to talk about blood, President Trump himself actually was the one that shed blood after an assassin shot him in the face.”

    This is a breaking news story. Please check back for updates.

    Report: Justice Dept. Seeks To Block Jan. 6 Defendants From Trump Inauguration

    By
    Madeleine Jackson
    -
    10
    Tyler Merbler, CC BY 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

    Justice Department attorneys are pressuring federal judges to reject petitions from at least two Jan. 6 defendants who are requesting that they be allowed to return to the nation’s capital for President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration.

    Fox News reports:

    Cindy Young, convicted of four misdemeanors for her involvement in the riot at the Capitol, and Russell Taylor, who pleaded guilty to a felony conspiracy charge, both petitioned the courts to allow them to return to Washington, D.C., despite provisions of their sentences requiring them to stay away. 

    “Contrary to Young’s self designation that she ‘poses no threat of danger to the community,’ Young presents a danger to the D.C. community, including the very law enforcement officers who defended the Capitol on January 6, 2021,” U.S. attorneys said in response to Young’s petition. The federal attorneys cited calls from Young “for retribution against those involved in January 6 prosecutions” and argued that she has failed “to recognize the seriousness of her actions.”

    A request from Taylor, who was invited to attend the inauguration by members of Utah’s congressional delegation, is also being challenged by attorneys at the Department of Justice who argue that the serious nature of his crimes should preclude him from being able to “return to the scene of the crime.”

    “He is asking for the Court to bless his desire to return to the scene of the crime, and the Court should not look past his criminal conduct the last time he was on Capitol grounds,” the U.S. attorneys wrote in a filing to U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth. The attorneys added in their court filing that, while they had granted previous travel requests to other defendants involved in the Capitol siege, those approvals were to support people’s continued employment, and the requests did not involve travel to the nation’s capital. 

    There remains uncertainty around whether Trump will pardon any, some, or all of those defendants who were convicted of crimes as a result of their involvement in the U.S. Capitol siege that occurred in 2021. 

    Trump has said at times that pardons will be reserved for those who remained peaceful on that fateful day; however, at other points he has suggested a blanket pardon for all those who were convicted. 

    Report: Top Democrats Hesitant To Commit To Certifying Potential Trump Victory

    By
    Patrick Houck
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    3


    Several top Democrats, including House Oversight Committee Ranking Member Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), have indicated that they may not commit to certifying the 2024 presidential election results if former President Donald Trump secures a victory. This reluctance was revealed during discussions with Axios, raising questions about the party’s stance on the upcoming election certification process.

    Per Breitbart:

    Raskin denied Trump won the 2016 election when he objected to Trump’s electors in 2017.

    If Trump “won a free, fair and honest election, then we would obviously accept it,” Raskin said, assuming the election was free, fair and honest. “I definitely don’t assume that,” he added. “Democrats don’t engage in election fraud and election fabrication.”

    A video surfaced in September of a panel discussion in February 2024 in which Raskin speculated that Congress would invalidate a Trump election victory, even though it could be at the risk of “civil war.”

    “It is not clear whether Raskin was actually outlining a plan of action, or rather using a hypothetical to argue that the U.S. Supreme Court was placing what he considered an undue burden on Congress to keep Trump out of office,” Breitbart News’s Joel Pollak reported.

    House Rules Committee Ranking Member Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) echoed Raskin’s concerns, telling Axios that Democrats would certify a Trump victory “assuming everything goes the way we expect it to … We have to see how it all happens.”

    McGovern also objected to Trump’s electors in 2017.

    The uncertainty among Democrats comes amid heightened political tension with 24 days until the presidential election. Raskin, who has been an outspoken critic of Trump, previously called the former president’s legacy “American carnage.”

    In response to Thursday’s development, former Department of Justice official Jeffrey Clark criticized the Democrats’ position. Taking to X, Clark expressed frustration with what he sees as a double standard in how objections to election certifications are perceived:

    Do you see how this works? If you’re a Republican in Congress and you object to certifying a President, you’re called an insurrectionist. But if you’re a Democrat like Jamie Raskin, you can object all you want, and it’s “protecting our democracy.”

    Election certification has been a contentious issue since the unfounded claims of widespread fraud in the 2020 presidential race, with Democrats consistently emphasizing the need to safeguard democracy. However, their reluctance to fully commit to certifying a potential Trump win could deepen mistrust on both sides of the political aisle.

    Article Published With The Permission of American Liberty News.

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