Ambush Impeachment in Texas Stole from Voters

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

The ambush impeachment and removal of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton was a shocking and undemocratic assault on the will of the voters. Paxton won reelection by 800,000 votes last November, yet merely one legislative chamber was able to override those votes with a scheme hatched in secret and sprung as a last-minute surprise.
Imagine if Congress could force the removal of a president by secretly plotting an impeachment, suddenly executed a few days later without a single public hearing. The American people would not stand for what the New York Times called “unexpected — as of a week ago there was little public indication that an impeachment could be imminent.”
Who really plotted this unprecedented theft from voters remains a closely guarded secret. Donald Trump led the way by truthing his opposition: “Hopefully Republicans in the Texas House will agree that this is a very unfair process that should not be allowed to happen or proceed—I will fight you if it does.”
Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan, who was elected by pandering to Democrats, “kept this under wraps until the end, there wasn’t a lot of time for Paxton’s defenders to react,” observes Rice University political scientist Mark Jones. It was obviously improper to deprive the voters of an elected official without first informing the public and hearing from them.
As pointed out during the brief debate on the Texas House floor, there was no justification for concealing the plot to remove Paxton from office until shortly prior to the vote. Paxton has been the leader in litigating against open borders and other unlawful policies of the Biden administration, and two months ago he opened an official investigation of Pfizer over its Covid-19 vaccine.
“For the last nine years, Ken has been the strongest conservative AG in the country. Bar none,” Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) stated in opposition to the ambush impeachment of Paxton. Texas Republican Party Chairman Matt Rinaldi strongly defended Paxton and described the proceeding as a “sham” that was “led by a liberal speaker trying to undermine his conservative adversaries.”
A total of 23 Republicans courageously voted against removing Paxton, while none of the Democrats did although some criticized it. The most senior Democrat in the House, the African American Harold Dutton, Jr., eloquently spoke against how improper the impeachment was.
On TruthSocial Trump exclaimed to thunderous support by tens of thousands, “MISSING IN ACTION! Where is the Governor of Texas on his Attorney General’s impeachment?”
The silent Republicans share something in common. In addition to Abbott’s shamefully going AWOL, Trump’s presidential rivals have likewise been silent, as has the senior U.S. Senator from Texas, John Cornyn.
All these Republicans depend on heavy support by dark money mega-donors, who are mostly globalist billionaires seeking their own self-serving agenda that includes an open border. DeSantis, Tim Scott, Nikki Haley, and wannabe Senate Majority Leader John Cornyn all depend on millions from this network to fuel their political ambitions.
Most of the 60 Texas Republicans who voted for Paxton’s removal probably feared retaliation by the dark money globalists, as there are no campaign donation limits in Texas. Gov. Abbott himself has been a frequent attendee to the Koch network donor confabs, whose members funnel money to those who back their agenda and try to punish those who get in their way.
The influence of globalist mega-donors is also reflected in how Texas Republicans enacted the Convention of States resolution to seek a new convention under Article V to change the U.S. Constitution. When the late Justice Scalia was asked in 2015 about the desirability of holding a new constitutional convention, he called it a “horrible idea.”
Yet to appease his ego-driven donors, Texas Gov. Abbott made the Convention of States one of his highest legislative priorities in 2017, ahead of border security and other more important issues. Republican legislators who would ordinarily oppose this were then bullied to vote for it, but on the condition it would expire in eight years.
Conservatives in ten other states have defeated this “horrible idea” of a Convention of States this year. Yet the dark money backing this deceptive attempt to change our Constitution insisted on tacking another 8-year extension to the 2017 Texas application to Congress for a convention.
Every Republican in the Texas legislature then voted this spring for a new 8-year extension on this horrible idea. These were not sincere votes, but rather the product of a campaign funding system driven by large donors.

The good news is that a Democrat state representative raised a point of order against the 8-year extension of the Convention of States, so it died when the Texas legislature adjourned on Monday. The other good news is the upcoming impeachment trial in the Texas Senate should flush out the dark money puppets seeking to overturn the election of Paxton.

John and Andy Schlafly are sons of Phyllis Schlafly (1924-2016) and lead the continuing Phyllis Schlafly Eagles Organizations with writing and policy work.

These columns are also posted on PhyllisSchlafly.com, pseagles.com, and Townhall.com.

Biden to let Boys Play on Girls Sports Teams

The Biden administration published proposed regulations of sex discrimination in school sports, and I submitted this comment:

The proposal refers to "harm" 53 times, but never identifies the harm accurately. It is considered beneficial to have all-girls sports teams. If that is true, then allowing a boy on a girls team harms every girl on the team, every girl who is displaced, and every girl on opposition teams. The boy with gender disphoria who may identify as a girl is probably harmed as well, as the team would be catering to a dangerous delusion.

Sex is binary in humans. That is a scientific fact. Furthermore, our social order has depended on male-female distinctions for millennia. Attempts to upset that social order are based on an extremist political ideology, and not on popular opinion, law, or benefit to children. The proposed regulations should be rejected.

Here is an interview of a feminist bicycle racing champion who is unhappy about men taking over women's cycling.

GOP Should Demand End to Biden’s Open Border

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

By a stunning 20-point margin, the conservative New Democracy Party in Greece prevailed in its national election on Sunday. For decades socialists had badly governed that ancient birthplace of democracy, running up immense debt and causing other problems which the conservative leadership has since overcome.

This landslide surpassed the polling predictions, and is being described as a political earthquake. The reason for this triumph is clear: the conservative party there took a tough stance against migration, which is the opposite of what Biden is doing here.

On the eve of this election a video went viral purporting to show mistreatment of migrants, many of whom sneak in by sea. Supposedly the conservative candidate, currently its prime minister, was allowing the placement of migrants on rafts and then abandoning them in the middle of the Aegean Sea.

That video did not hurt Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis with voters. “We protected our country’s borders both on land and at sea, and reduced irregular arrivals by 90 percent,” he said at a recent campaign rally until he was drowned out by applause.

Greece was getting 10,000 migrants a month from Turkey, while Biden is allowing many times that number to enter the U.S. from Mexico. The Republican Party should take a stronger stance against this than it has, and the Greek election shows where voters are on this issue.

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) should be telling Biden that there will be no deal on increasing the debt ceiling until Biden closes the southern border to illegal immigration. Texas Governor Greg Abbott should demand action by the Texas legislature before it adjourns on May 29, or else force them to return in a special session.

All of Europe has quietly reversed its pro-immigrant policy of five years ago, and now the European Union seems fine with countries closing their borders. In other words, political leaders in Europe have come around to agree with the position first espoused by Donald Trump, despite snickering against him while he was president.

Yet Republicans remain slow on this issue. It has not been a priority in the legislative session in Texas, which along with Arizona receives the largest hordes of illegals pouring into our country. Drugs come in with them, and make their way into schools and communities thousands of miles into the interior of our country.

Last week 11,000 migrants were deported after crossing our border illegally, while another 21,000 were released to await a court appearance scheduled in the distant future. Most of those migrants will never show up in court, but instead will travel to another unsuspecting American community, and if arrested there authorities will typically release them again.

Biden is not going to overcome illegal immigration this way, and probably does not want to. Many Democrats see the migrants as future voters for their party, while the globalists backing both Biden and rivals to Trump see migrants as providing cheaper labor and thus bigger profits for the globalists’ private equity investment funds.

Illegal aliens sleeping in the streets in El Paso, Texas, were being urged to turn themselves in to begin the processing for citizenship. Biden terminated President Trump’s secure border policy known as “Remain in Mexico” and then allowed Trump’s Title 42 policy to expire earlier this month.

Hours before Title 42 was set to expire, a federal judge appointed by Trump in Florida slapped Biden with an injunction against opening the floodgates now. “The Southwest Border has been out of control for the past 2 years,” Judge T. Kent Wetherell said in his court order against Biden’s open border policy.

Biden had planned to release thousands of newly arriving illegal aliens on “parole” into this country, while supposedly evaluating their applications for asylum. But as Americans painfully learned during crime waves in this country, the public is not protected against violence when criminals are out on parole rather than deported or locked up.

On CBS Face the Nation on Sunday, Miami’s Republican Mayor Francis Suarez criticized the new immigration laws signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) as "headline grabbers." The billionaire globalists funding DeSantis’s campaign, and the campaigns of other opponents of Trump, see greater profits in more illegal aliens as they work for lower wages.

Meanwhile in Texas, its Republican Gov. Abbott sent a busload of illegal aliens to Denver, which is the fifth Democrat-run city that has received busloads of migrants from Texas. As Title 42 was expiring, Gov. Abbott even bused some to Vice President Kamala Harris’s residence.

While that is good theater, it does not explain the lack of progress by Gov. Abbott in securing the Texas border. Abbott has failed to endorse Trump and failed to strengthen border security in Texas, because many Never-Trump Republican mega-donors actually support Biden’s open borders.

John and Andy Schlafly are sons of Phyllis Schlafly (1924-2016) and lead the continuing Phyllis Schlafly Eagles organizations with writing and policy work.

These columns are also posted on PhyllisSchlafly.com, pseagles.com, and Townhall.com.

The Leftist War on Self-Defense

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

The prosecution of an unarmed former Marine for acting in self-defense to protect passengers on the New York City subway has sparked a nationwide uproar. This latest salvo in the Leftist war on self-defense has liberals demanding additional charges against the hero.

Daniel Penny, only 24 years old, is a white ex-Marine sergeant from Long Island who wrestled down and restrained a troubled black man, Jordan Neely. With no police officers in sight, Neely was menacing multiple passengers on the moving subway train until Penny restrained Neely while asking others to call the police.

The dramatic rescue by a quick-thinking civilian is reminiscent of other recent episodes in which an ordinary citizen stepped up to save others from harm. The bystander who averted a massacre at an Indiana shopping mall last year, 22-year-old Elisjsha Dicken, was hailed as a hero then, as Daniel Penny should be applauded now.

Other passengers on the subway also viewed Neely as dangerous, and helped restrain him. Penny deserves the praise he’s receiving nationwide for acting in self-defense, and $2.5 million from 50,000 donors has already poured in to support his legal defense.

We don’t know yet what legal or illegal drugs may have triggered frightening behavior by Neely, who has a long criminal record that included punching a 67-year-old woman in the face and breaking her nose less than two years ago. A toxicology report would ordinarily be necessary before declaring a cause of death, but the New York City medical examiner is a political appointee of its Democrat mayor.

The police who were called to the scene saw no reason to arrest Daniel Penny, and no charges were initially brought even after Neely was declared dead at a hospital. Self-defense and protecting others has never been a crime, and should not become one now.

But after days of street protests demanding that Penny be prosecuted for murder, the New York City medical examiner announced that Neely’s death was a homicide caused by “compression of neck (chokehold).” District Attorney Alvin Bragg, famous for his political indictment of Trump over non-crimes, mollified the Leftist protesters by charging Daniel Penny with manslaughter.

The failure of both Bragg and the medical examiner to await the results of the toxicology report proves that politics, not medical science, is the driving force behind the manslaughter charge. It is reminiscent of the George Floyd case, with Penny being made a scapegoat just as the bystander officers in that case were.

The fake medical science in the first jury trial in the Floyd case included a prosecution witness who bizarrely invited jurors to grab their own necks, as though that would prove anything scientific about the cause of death in a criminal suspect who was intoxicated by an illegal drug. Imagine a similar stunt if Penny goes on trial in a hostile venue in New York City.

There are 100,000 unexpected deaths caused annually by illegal drugs in the United States, which is more than double the number of gun homicides. Inevitably, some drug-related deaths will occur while an erratic intoxicated person is being restrained.

When the Leftist mob calls Daniel Penny a vigilante instead of a Good Samaritan, it undermines the rule of law necessary to attain justice. If there is a rush to prejudge or find a scapegoat every time someone on drugs dies while being restrained, then self-defense will no longer be safely available to anyone.

There has been an outpouring of support for this hero, but the jury pool in New York City is not representative of the rest of our country. The District Attorney’s office has far more resources than Penny can possibly raise, while protesters are still demanding that the charges against him be upgraded to include murder.

Despite the partisan divide over this case, one New York Democrat has publicly defended the subway hero. Former Governor David Paterson said on Sunday that Penny “did something because he saw danger for other people and tried to prevent it. He did not meet the threshold where you charge someone.”

Paterson suggested that District Attorney Alvin Bragg, a fellow African-American, may have charged Penny merely because other minorities have died under similar circumstances in the past. During his single term as governor, Paterson often used his pardon power to correct injustices.

An Army sergeant convicted of killing an armed Black Lives Matter protester in Austin, despite asserting that it was in self-defense, just received a harsh sentence of 25 years in prison. Penny could be imprisoned for 15 years if convicted of manslaughter, but reasonable self-defense should not face such punishment.

Donald Trump observes that Penny ”was in great danger and the other people in the car were in great danger.” There should not be a prosecution of an unarmed Good Samaritan who acts quickly to defend others.

John and Andy Schlafly are sons of Phyllis Schlafly (1924-2016) and lead the continuing Phyllis Schlafly Eagles organizations with writing and policy work.

These columns are also posted on PhyllisSchlafly.com, pseagles.com, and Townhall.com.

21 States Stand Against Militant Transgenders

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

Twenty-one states (and counting) stand against the transgender tidal wave by enacting legislation to protect families, vulnerable children, girls’ sports, and the right not to use a transgender pronoun. A new Tennessee law clarifies “sex” as “a person's immutable biological sex as determined by anatomy and genetics existing at the time of birth.”

Pro-transgender marketing for Bud Light beer backfired badly on the Belgian-based beer giant AB InBev. Sales for Bud Light decreased by 21% for the week ending on April 22, a third consecutive weekly decline following the company’s disastrous attempt to reposition that iconic product by insulting its traditional customer base.

President Biden’s poll numbers have also dropped sharply, to a new low of 36% from 42% only three months ago, while he pushes the unpopular transgender agenda. Biden has only 26% approval among the essential voting demographic of voters under 30.

The next three weeks will mark the climax of the biennial Texas legislature, which must adjourn by law on May 29. Militant transgender protesters and parliamentary delay tactics by their allies in the Texas state house twice blocked a key vote last week on a good bill protecting against harmful transgender child treatments, which had already passed the state senate.

While the mostly peaceful Trump supporters who entered the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021 received stiff prison sentences as long as 14 years, favorable publicity showers the transgender militants who disrupted the Texas Capitol. Charges have even been dropped against one transgender protester accused of assaulting an officer there, in sharp contrast with the over prosecution of Trump supporters in D.C.

The transgender activists in Texas were interfering with a vote on SB 14, which would ban the use of puberty blockers and hormone therapy in children. Similar laws protecting children from irreversible treatments and mutilation have passed in 16 states, while 8 states have prohibited persons from using bathrooms of the opposite sex.

But 10 states are moving in the opposite direction, having enacted laws to promote the transgender agenda, even requiring conscientious physicians to provide medical interventions that violate traditional ethical principles. The militant transgenders have enormous financial and political backing as they try to enact their agenda nationwide.

Detransitioners, those who regret being victimized by transgender treatments or operations as children, are suing for the harm inflicted on them. One such lawsuit is against Kaiser Permanente for putting a 13-year-old girl on puberty blockers and testosterone, and then performing a double mastectomy at age 15, who by age 16 wanted to restore her life as a girl.

Despite the many lives being wrecked by transgender medications, the media show us confused kids who want transgender operations or seek to play on a sports team of the opposite sex. Armed with free attorney services from liberal entities, new lawsuits challenge state laws protecting girls’ bathrooms and sports.

Unfortunately, courts are likely to block some of these good state laws, as law schools keep turning out pro-transgender attorneys. The U.S. Supreme Court signaled its unwillingness to defend state laws that protect girls’ sports, when last month it denied a petition from West Virginia to reinstate its law.

Also stalled in the Texas House is a bill to protect women’s college sports, SB 15. The obstacle there appears to be opposition by the pro-transgender NCAA, which insists on using only testosterone tests as a way to pretend to protect women’s sports.

Testosterone tests are inadequate because even if the male hormone is artificially reduced, men still inherently have immense physical advantages over female athletes. For example, the average male is 5 inches taller than the average female, which gives men a decisive margin in many sports including swimming and track and field events.

The average height of players in women’s professional basketball is only 6 feet, while the corresponding average for a man in the NBA is 6 feet 6 inches. Leveling testosterone will not even out that disparity, or other sex differences such as how males are much less vulnerable to sports injuries than women and girls.

Last week a transgender athlete won a women’s cycling event recognized by the world cycling authority. While some international sports authorities are belatedly beginning to change their rules, the top American sports leagues beholden to television contracts with the liberal media are not budging.

Democrat Presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. sides with girls, women, and Trump against allowing males to compete in female sports. But Biden recently issued Title IX regulations that will be used by liberal courts to invalidate state laws protecting girls’ sports against the transgender invasion.

Biden supports extremism in the transgender movement, which is where the media wants him to be. With rock-bottom approval ratings, Biden cannot win renomination without continued backing by the pro-transgender media.

John and Andy Schlafly are sons of Phyllis Schlafly (1924-2016) and lead the continuing Phyllis Schlafly Eagles organizations with writing and policy work.

These columns are also posted on PhyllisSchlafly.com, pseagles.com, and Townhall.com.

On the Debt Ceiling, GOP Should Unplug DOJ

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

A debt ceiling crisis was announced by Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen on Monday, saying the deadline is June 1 for Congress to increase the $31.4 trillion debt ceiling. Suddenly President Biden invited House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) to the White House, while Biden insisted he would not consider any cuts in federal spending.

McCarthy and House Republicans have already rejected Biden’s demand for a debt ceiling increase with no spending reductions. McCarthy said Biden has “refused to do his job” by announcing he would not even discuss the spending limits passed by the House of Representatives.

The lights go out in D.C. unless the GOP-controlled House agrees to keep the money flowing. As long as Biden’s Department of Justice wastes millions on interfering with the next presidential election, the GOP House should decline to increase the debt ceiling.

Many House Republicans who voted for the Republican debt ceiling bill last week have endorsed Donald Trump for reelection in 2024. Yet their bill would continue to fund the political hacks who misuse federal prosecutorial power against Trump.

Federal prosecutors have played video clips of Trump during the multi-million-dollar trials of Trump supporters accused of “parading” in the Capitol on January 6, 2021. As investigative reporter Julie Kelly explains, these trials appear to be dry runs for prosecuting Trump himself, as many Democrats dream about a federal prosecution to derail Trump’s reelection campaign.

The county-level indictment of Trump in Manhattan has remarkably boosted him in the polls, which is the opposite effect for which Democrats hoped. Meanwhile, the county prosecutor in Georgia has put her misuse of power on hold until later this year, disappointing Trump-haters.

Those feeding on federal taxes in D.C. view Donald Trump as a threat to their easy jobs and fat pensions. Their fear is justified, as Trump intends to stop D.C. federal employees from robbing ordinary Americans who struggle to make ends meet throughout the rest of the country.

No Trump supporter has received a fair jury trial in D.C., where the jury pools are filled with people who are stridently opposed to Trump. The 100% rate of jury convictions there of anyone associated with Trump is statistical proof of how unfair that venue is.

Video aired by Tucker Carlson proved that Jacob Chansley, the flamboyantly dressed Trump supporter, was welcomed by Capitol police who escorted him into the Senate chamber. If tried outside of the biased D.C., he would have been acquitted in a heartbeat with that video.

Instead, a D.C. federal judge locked up that entertaining peaceful young man for years. Finally free, Chansley has a new attorney who filed a motion to set aside his patently unjust sentence, a motion he would win if he could bring it in his home state of Arizona or any other reasonable venue.

Yet Congress continues to fund the Trump-hating D.C. prosecutors who take potshots and seek harsh sentences against whomever they dislike. Trump publicly vowed to defund the federal police and that puts him at the top of their “Most Wanted” list.

The Justice Department is also a big promoter of the transgender agenda, which the GOP House should likewise not be funding. Last week the Department’s civil rights lawyers intervened on the side of the ACLU, filing papers seeking to block a good Tennessee law that prohibits transgender mutilation of young people.

With its control of the federal purse strings, the GOP-controlled House should refuse to fund the increasingly partisan actions by the DOJ. The GOP House should say “no” to any increase in the debt ceiling unless it unplugs the abuse of power by federal prosecutors.

Any discussion of holding the line on the debt ceiling brings immediate howls from D.C., falsely asserting that government shutdowns have failed in the past. With that liberal logic, they imply Congress is powerless against a rogue DOJ seeking to indict the leading Republican presidential candidate.

History is no guide here, as never before has it been necessary to shut down the government to protect the People’s right to elect the next president. Previous government shutdowns were for less significant, less understood reasons.

Americans do not want the United States to resemble countries like Turkey, where elections are nominally allowed but the real power is held by the unelected Deep State. Today most political leaders are terrified of retaliation by prosecutors, contrary to our Constitution.

When an electrical appliance is broken and dangerous, the immediate solution is to pull its plug. The Department of Justice is broken, and any revised GOP debt ceiling bill should pull its plug.

The Constitution requires that all revenue-raising bills originate in the House. The Republicans in the House should reject any debt ceiling increase that funds the politicized abuse of power by the DOJ.

John and Andy Schlafly are sons of Phyllis Schlafly (1924-2016) and lead the continuing Phyllis Schlafly Eagles organizations with writing and policy work.

These columns are also posted on PhyllisSchlafly.com, pseagles.com, and Townhall.com.