Voluntary Deportations Gain Steam

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

On Monday, the Trump Administration announced it is tripling its bonus to $3,000 for illegal aliens who voluntarily self-deport, along with free travel back to their homeland. Liberals can hardly complain about this Christmas gift to those who crossed our border and remained in our country in violation of our laws.

Many illegal aliens are willing to self-deport. Since Trump became president on January 20, a remarkable 1.9 million illegal aliens have voluntarily returned to their home country according to data released by the Department of Homeland Security, although some dispute this total.

Involuntary deportation costs an estimated $17,000 per individual, so it makes sense to share the savings in a way that everyone comes out ahead. There is room to sweeten this pot further while still trimming the overall expense.

The average lifetime cost of an illegal alien for American taxpayers is $100,000, with some estimates higher than that. The demands placed by these migrants on government entitlement programs, remedial education in schools, law enforcement, and our health care system are far greater than the $3,000 being offered for them to return home.

Self-deportation is the primary method by which President Dwight Eisenhower achieved the largest deportation in American history in 1954. It would have been unthinkable then for liberals to interfere with the president in removing aliens from our country.

CBS News had prepared a smear piece against Trump’s forced deportations, and scheduled it to air on its 60 Minutes show on Sunday evening. But merely two hours before airing, the newly installed CBS editor-in-chief pulled its one-sided story off the air, illustrating that Trump is winning on this issue.

Another victory for Trump came last Thursday, when Wisconsin Judge Hannah Dugan was convicted of a felony count of obstructing federal agents seeking to arrest an illegal alien who was in her courtroom on battery charges. Dugan sent the federal agents in one direction while leading the illegal alien to exit by a private jury door to evade arrest.

It is safer to arrest a suspect in a courtroom than to try to catch and handcuff him on the street, which was a point emphasized by federal prosecutors during the short trial of Judge Dugan. She has continued to collect her full salary of about $175,000 as a judge despite being a felony defendant, and she vows to appeal her conviction.

Liberals are appalled by the jury verdict, as they are accustomed to juries in D.C. rendering every verdict against Trump and his supporters. D.C. and Virginia grand juries have even refused to indict opponents of Trump, despite how indictments are nearly always automatically rendered as prosecutors request.

But Wisconsin is in middle America, and the 12 mostly rural counties that comprised that jury pool are nothing like D.C. Few if any of those jurors in Wisconsin are federal employees, as D.C. juries predominantly are, and Trump won Wisconsin in the last presidential election.

Conservatives who were once disappointed at Trump for not building a full border wall during his first term in office, because Congress failed to fund it, are seeing that deportations have nearly as strong an impact as a wall would.

There has been a 93% decrease in apprehensions at the southern border near San Diego, a 50-year record low of only 1,793 apprehensions. During the Biden Administration a year ago, there were more than 24,700 apprehensions for the same two-month period.

The termination of the catch-and-release program, whereby the Biden Administration would senselessly release illegal aliens in the United States after capturing them, is cited as one reason for the disappearance of nearly all of the illegal crossings. But surely the high-profile deportation program by the Trump Administration is the single biggest factor.

Still, some say that the deportations need to go faster in order to meet the goals set by Trump. There have not been as many workplace raids of illegal aliens as expected.

Where illegals have been arrested en masse and deported, it appears that Republican areas like Omaha, Nebraska, have been targeted more than Democrat strongholds like Los Angeles and New York. The much-publicized raid on a food plant in June in Omaha was in a swing district that Democrats hope to capture in the midterm elections.

The thousands of Democrat loyalists who staff the Department of Homeland Security still have their jobs, and have not been replaced by conservatives. Those staffers appear to be picking regions for deportation for political reasons, rather than to meet Trump’s goals.

Activist judicial rulings have also hindered deportations from Democrat strongholds. For more than two months the U.S. Supreme Court has failed to resolve an emergency petition on this issue by Trump’s Solicitor General, John Sauer, despite quickly ruling in his favor nearly two dozen times on other issues.

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.

Job Visas Are Costing GOP Elections

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

The young men who carried Trump and Republican Senators to victory last November have recently been drifting back to the Democrat Party, or staying home, in the off-year elections. The perception that top jobs in America continue to be given to foreign workers is a big reason why.

Last week Democrats flipped a Republican state house seat in a special election in Georgia, an upset that has rattled Republican leaders nationwide. A Democrat who fell short of 40% last November won this seat with a 12-point gain, signaling the potential for landslide GOP losses in the upcoming midterm elections.

Job postings for recent graduates and students have dropped by more than 16% this year on one popular website. Unemployment for recent graduates is higher than overall unemployment, a historic shift that is bad news for young men.

On Saturday the New York Times ran a long story about the dismay among young Trump supporters (dubbed zoomercons) at the continued use of the H-1B visa program that allows ambitious foreigners to grab jobs in fast-growing industries such as robotics and AI. Most of these jobs are entry-level and do not require any special skills other than an engineering degree that many unemployed American graduates have.

The job prospects for college graduates this year are near a record low. Imagine spending four or five years working hard and incurring a pile of debt, only to be unable to find employment as our own government is recruiting foreigners to fill these positions.

Google, Microsoft, IBM, Adobe, and other tech giants are run by foreigners now and, like chain migration, they tend to hire workers from their homeland. In the most recent fiscal year, 71% of H-1B visa workers came from India and 12% came from mainland China, almost none of whom is Christian or likely to assimilate into American culture.

Last week many H-1B visa holders received official notices from their consulate that their visas have been “prudentially revoked” due to their run-in with law enforcement. But these notices take effect only if the foreigner leaves the U.S., so their impact is to encourage these foreigners never to leave.

A commentator in India, lamenting the brain drain from his country, applauds Trump’s new $100,000 fee for H-1B visas, which is being challenged in court by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and a separate lawsuit by 20 Democrat-led states. Very few of the H-1B visa holders ever return to their home country, even though a visa is supposed to be only temporary.

Big Tech companies have amassed record-breaking wealth, at levels never seen before in world history. They do not need the incentive of H-1B visas, which enable them to hire lower-cost foreigners who would face deportation if they leave to work for a competitor.

It is not only Big Tech that is abusing the visa system. Professional sports, particularly baseball and basketball, are also bringing in too many foreigners to take jobs that should be going to Americans.

Many types of visas for entertainers and other highly paid workers are also being abused to give coveted positions to foreigners rather than American citizens. High-paid finance positions, such as investment banking, medical positions such as physicians, and executive management employment are going to foreigners on visas too.

It is wonderful that Trump is rebuilding American manufacturing, which traditionally offers higher wages than unskilled menial labor. But manufacturing is only 9% of the American workforce, so even if Trump were able to double that it would still not be as large, or as well-paying, as jobs in all the non-manufacturing fields that foreigners are taking on visas.

The professional baseball and basketball players who come here on visas should be sent back home after a year or two, or not allowed here in the first place. American teams can play foreign teams, including competing with them at the Olympics, and nothing is gained while much is lost by promoting and overpaying foreigners to play on American teams.

The three largest contracts in Major League Baseball have been given to foreign players. More than half of the players on the Houston Astros this past baseball season were foreign-born, despite how Texas high schools and colleges are rich in athletic talent.

One of the biggest travesties is in college basketball, where foreign players who are not serious students gobble up scarce scholarships and publicity here at the expense of American players. As budget shortfalls hit college athletic programs due to court-imposed liabilities, it makes even less sense to have foreigners playing on American college basketball teams.

There is a panoply of different visa programs available to foreigners to enter the U.S. at high salaries. These programs should all be shut down as part of the MAGA goal to protect and create good job opportunities for American citizens.

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 most important anti-feminist

Michelle Goldberg writes in the NY Times:

In 1982, Phyllis Schlafly, perhaps the most important anti-feminist in American history, debated the radical feminist law professor Catharine MacKinnon. Schlafly believed that sexism was a thing of the past; to her, if women had different roles in society than men, it was due to their distinct talents and inclinations. She herself, she said, had never experienced discrimination.

Dems Try to Thwart Republican Redistricting

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

Republican redistricting is sweeping the nation, from North Carolina through Texas. Districts are typically redrawn every ten years following the census, but they can also be revised by a state legislature at any time.

Control of the House of Representatives hangs in the balance, where the majority is determined by a margin of only a few seats. Whichever side controls the House gets to decide what is voted on, and if Democrats regain power there they will surely try to impeach President Trump yet again.

The redistricting movement can allow Republicans to pick up as many as ten seats, thereby enhancing their current margin of control. The Indiana legislature is debating a plan that would yield a net GOP gain of two seats in that small state alone.

The Supreme Court gave a green light to this effort last month when it stayed a lower court decision in Texas that had blocked the redistricting effort there, which could give Republicans up to 5 more seats in that state alone. Several entrenched Democrat incumbents, including Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-TX), announced their retirement earlier this month rather than seek reelection against a younger Democrat in a newly drawn district.

Texas holds a very early primary, which is less than three months away, so the Supreme Court had to act fast to allow the redrawn lines to take effect. The High Court has not rendered a full ruling in the challenge to this, but in another case appealed from Louisiana the Court is expected to weaken a provision of the Voting Rights Act that Democrats have used to thwart Republican redistricting.

The Missouri legislature recently redrew its congressional districts, as many Democrat-controlled legislatures such as next-door Illinois have already done in the past to maximize their representation in Congress. But Democrats just submitted 300,000 signatures on petitions seeking to overturn the Missouri legislature through a vote of the people at an upcoming election.

The initiative process is allowed in roughly 20 states, and Democrats have been using it in Ohio, Missouri, and many other states to advance abortion, gambling, and marijuana. These measures enable dark money-funded groups to bypass state legislatures entirely, and that is particularly improper for redistricting, which is exclusively for state legislatures to decide.

On Monday, a Trump-appointed federal judge dismissed as premature a lawsuit by Republicans in Missouri to preserve the authority of legislative redistricting from being overturned by a ballot measure. U.S. District Judge Zachary M. Bluestone punted the issue to the Missouri Secretary of State, saying that he “has a tool at his disposal that almost no other litigant could boast — the power to declare the petition unconstitutional himself.”

While the Missouri redistricting would achieve a gain of just one GOP seat, unless it is reversed by a ballot initiative, a similar type of redistricting in Florida could net three to five new GOP seats. Currently 20 out of the 28 congressmen from deep red Florida are Republican.

Florida holds a late primary, nearly half a year later than Texas’s, on August 18 of next year. So there is plenty of time for Gov. Ron DeSantis and the Republican-controlled legislature there to do this right.

Florida, too, has a ballot initiative process that bypasses the legislature, but fortunately it requires a 60% threshold for passage while Missouri and other states require only a simple majority. In Ohio a ballot initiative attempted to establish a more Democrat-favorable process for redistricting but it was defeated last November as Trump won that state by a landslide.

Ohio has a redistricting plan expected to swing two seats to the Republican side, but a stronger plan could do even better. A decade ago Ohio sent more Republicans to Congress than it does today, even though Ohio was less Republican then.

Redistricting in Pennsylvania in 2010 was what helped convert that former Democrat stronghold into a state that Republicans can win, as they have when Trump heads the ticket. But now Democrats control the Pennsylvania legislature and the state supreme court, so there is no prospect of a new redistricting effort there helping the GOP, even though Pennsylvania voter registration is on course to give Republicans a majority next year.

The Department of Justice has sued California over its ballot initiative that would add even more Democrat-majority congressional seats. But in that case the popular vote overturned a prior initiative, not the legislature, as Democrats are improperly doing in Missouri by seeking to block the Republicans’ legislative redistricting there.

It is overdue for courts to invalidate wide-ranging ballot initiatives that encroach on the legislative function, and Judge Bluestone erred in not swatting down the Democrats’ ballot measure in Missouri. There could soon be a swift appeal of his decision to the conservative Eighth Circuit.

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 End of Migration

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

While President Trump placed a moratorium on migration to the U.S. from third-world countries, Pope Leo was speaking against migration in Lebanon. These two leaders with very different backgrounds reached the same conclusion.

The Pope was addressing Lebanon, which has the largest Christian population in the Middle East amid a Muslim majority. He declared, “There are times when it is easier to flee, or simply more convenient to move elsewhere.”

He emphasized that “it takes real courage and foresight to stay or return to one’s own country, and to consider even somewhat difficult situations worthy of love and dedication.” He urged people not to leave their homeland, adding that “we must not forget that remaining in our homeland and working day by day to develop a civilization of love and peace remains something very valuable.”

Joe Biden should have adopted that approach for the 200,000 Afghans whom he disastrously brought into our country. One of them has been charged with shooting two National Guard soldiers in Washington, D.C., killing one young woman and critically wounding a young man.

The shooter, Rahmanullah Lakanwal, was reportedly living in an apartment without beds, and repeatedly playing the violent video game “Call of Duty” before driving nearly 3,000 miles across our country to go on his rampage. This is not assimilation that is needed for an immigrant to become a productive member of American society.

Biden brought in more refugees than any other president since the end of the Cold War. In 2024 alone, Biden transported 105,500 refugees from multiple third-world countries into the United States, at a time when American college students are struggling to find jobs.

Biden’s lax immigration and refugee policy brings in future Democrat voters, which is the only way that the Democrat Party can survive demographically in the long term. Surveys show that liberal young women are much less likely to have children than conservative young women, and Republican states are growing faster than Democrat states are.

Bringing in hordes of refugees and other migrants has been done by Democrat presidents for political reasons, not because it makes sense for our country or for the migrants. It is impossible to screen so many people from primitive countries like Afghanistan, and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said that 29-year-old Lakanwal was radicalized after he resettled here.

Refugees are not even required to swear allegiance to the United States upon arrival here. It is only as a final stage in obtaining citizenship that Congress requires an oath of allegiance to our Constitution and laws.

Any foreigner unwilling to swear his full allegiance to the U.S. should not be allowed to remain here, but should be returned to his country of origin. This should be the first step, not merely the last, in every immigration program that is not discontinued.

Trump has properly ordered a “comprehensive review and a re-interview of all refugees admitted from January 20, 2021, to February 20, 2025,” which is when refugees entered our country under Biden’s policies. Trump referenced a Citizenship and Immigration Services finding that the Biden Administration “potentially prioritized expediency, quantity, and admissions over quality interviews and detailed screening and vetting.”

The Biden Administration’s policy allowed millions from all over the world to cross our southern border into our country, with no way to screen them. Many of these illegal aliens were from hostile nations, which Trump has already shut down by beefing up border security.

On November 12, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops issued its first “Special Message” in a dozen years, to address the migration issue. Although reported by the liberal media as a rebuke of Trump, in fact it included a strong statement against illegal migration.

“We recognize that nations have a responsibility to regulate their borders and establish a just and orderly immigration system for the sake of the common good. Without such processes, immigrants face the risk of trafficking and other forms of exploitation.”

Less than a week later, Pope Leo declared, “No one has said that the United States should have open borders. I think every country has the right to determine who enters, how, and when.”

In September, the Southern Baptist Convention cut its ties with a migration coalition of evangelical groups which has been criticized by Trump supporters for being too permissive toward migrants. White evangelical voters supported Trump by a record 84% in 2024 as he campaigned hard against the open-border policies of Biden and Harris.

But Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ), once considered the frontrunner to become Harris’s 2024 running mate, said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” that Trump’s crackdown on migrants constitutes “the U.S. Government harassing” refugees. The real harassment has been Democrats bringing in migrants who should not be here.

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.

“It’s OVER!” Trump Targets Fraud by Somali Immigrants

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

President Trump is ending the gravy train of fraud in Minnesota, much of it perpetrated by Somalis relocated here and some of the money funding terrorism back in Africa. Trump vows to end the Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Somalis, which has lasted many years longer than intended.

Trump’s acting U.S. Attorney for Minnesota, Joseph H. Thompson, recently indicted six from Somalia and two others for wire fraud. They allegedly defrauded Minnesota’s Medicaid-funded housing stabilization program.

This comes after 56 people, mostly from Somalia, pled guilty in connection with a federal investigation into a Minnesota nonprofit organization called Feeding Our Future. Even the Washington Post Editorial Board expressed its outrage at the vast extent of fraud in this state run by Governor Tim Walz, who was the Democrats’ Vice Presidential nominee last November.

Trump observes that “Somali gangs are terrorizing the people of that great State, and BILLIONS of dollars are missing. Send them back where they came from.”

A total of 78 defendants associated with Feeding Our Future have been charged with crimes. In just two years, the organization increased its take of government funding from $3 million in 2019 to nearly $200 million in 2021. Meanwhile, Medicaid payments on autism claims increased by $200 million in Minnesota between 2020 and 2024, and federal charges have been filed based on alleged kickbacks to the Somali community.

Minnesota has the largest Somali population in the U.S., who were settled here under the TPS program and among whom many have become American citizens. Earlier Trump terminated the TPS program for 600,000 Venezuelans and 500,000 Haitians.

It was over 30 years ago that an ill-advised President George H.W. Bush brought Somalis into our country under this temporary program, beginning in 1991. No “temporary” program should last more than three decades as this one has.

Acting U.S. Attorney John Thompson is an experienced career prosecutor, and he sounds just like the Trump appointees as he uproots fraud by immigrants that is bleeding our scarce government resources. He estimates that the defrauding of government programs in Minnesota exceeds $1 billion.

“It’s an extraordinary problem, the fraud that’s pervasive in this state,” Thompson told a news station in an interview in July. A Somali American former investigator confirmed this problem in an article published in the Minnesota Reformer.

“Minnesota’s public programs don’t adequately guard against organization fraud,” the Somali American said. He added that many Somalis are “skilled professionals whose experience and education credentials are not recognized in the U.S.”

“Somalis inherently trust one another. This creates a vast opening for fraudsters,” he continued.

Decades ago Phyllis Schlafly criticized the lack of assimilation by refugees and other immigrants in our country. The fraudulent conduct worsens because tribal behavior dominates in these non-assimilated communities, rather than a competitive market that helps keep participants honest.

Many millions of these dollars stolen from the government in Minnesota are funneled to Al-Shabaab back in Somalia. Al-Shabaab seeks to impose strict Sharia Law in Somalia, and is affiliated with the notorious al-Qaeda.

The City Journal quotes a former official who worked on the Minneapolis Joint Terrorism Task Force to say, “Every scrap of economic activity, in the Twin Cities [Minneapolis-St. Paul], in America, throughout Western Europe, anywhere Somalis are concentrated, every cent that is sent back to Somalia benefits Al-Shabaab in some way.”

“The largest funder of Al-Shabaab is the Minnesota taxpayer,” observed another expert on terrorism quoted by the City Journal.

House Majority Whip Tom Emmer, who is a Republican congressman from Minnesota, demanded on Monday that there be an investigation into this. “Minnesota has become the land of 10,000 frauds under Tim Walz,” declared Rep. Emmer in a play on its “10,000 lakes” nickname.

News that stolen taxpayer dollars are funding Al-Shabaab terrorists “is not only a grave national security concern, it’s a slap in the face to the hardworking, law-abiding people of Minnesota,” Rep. Emmer said.

Located in East Africa on the equator, Somalian temperatures commonly exceed 100 degrees Fahrenheit, and its capital, Mogadishu, has been called the world’s most dangerous city. It was senseless for Somalis ever to be relocated to the cold climate and different culture of Minnesota in the first place.

But so many Somalis have resettled now in Minnesota that they have oversized political clout in elections there. “If you don’t win the Somali community, you can’t win Minneapolis,” observed former Minnesota state senator David Gaither. “And if you don’t win Minneapolis, you can’t win the state,” he added.

Amid all this fraud, Gov. Tim Walz seeks reelection to a third term as governor of Minnesota. Republicans are campaigning against him on this issue of rampant fraud under Walz’s watch.

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.

GOP Should Focus on Young Voters’ Hard Times

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

Hard times have hit young Americans, who are a pivotal voting bloc. Jobs are scarce, housing is unaffordable, student debt is suffocating, and foreign labor has taken away opportunities from American workers.

A downturn in the hiring of college graduates leaves the class of 2026 victims facing the weakest job market in five years. A National Association of Colleges and Employers survey found that 51% of employers rate the job market for college grads as “poor” or merely “fair,” and only 2% said it is “excellent.”

This does not bode well on Election Day for the GOP. The landslide victory by socialist Zohran Mamdani for Mayor of New York City was propelled by young voters, despite warnings that electing him would be a big mistake.

Polling indicates that 75% of young voters in New York City cast their ballots for Mamdani, and there was a surge in youth turnout. The blowout victories by Democrats in New Jersey and Virginia were also propelled by sharp increases in turnout by young voters.

The redistricting ballot initiative in California to send more Democrats to Congress was enacted with 80% support by young voters, and a large turnout by them. While some of this is due to a superior get-out-the-vote operation by Leftist groups, young people are struggling financially today.

Young adults should not face astronomical costs for health insurance, as they are mostly healthy and typically need coverage against only catastrophic losses. They should be able to purchase low-cost health insurance that is not dependent on their employer, so that they do not lose it when they are laid off or switch jobs.

Young adults are vastly overpaying for health insurance, as they are required to fund costly care they typically never need. The current system of tying tax breaks to employer-based health insurance no longer works, as the record 14.8% of American-born, working-age men who lack a job has increased from 4.2% in 1960.

Young men today are additionally burdened by gambling debts, due to the explosion in sports gambling that is heavily promoted with advertising. One out of every four of these men is unable to pay a bill because of his gambling losses.

Only 44% of young voters aged 18-29 have any investments in the stock market, so news of Wall Street records does not help with that demographic. Most of those voters are in debt.

In an interview with Tucker Carlson weeks before he was assassinated, Charlie Kirk explained how debt has radicalized the young generation. Kirk explained that in the 1970s and 1980s, the price of a home was about three times the average income.

Today, the price of a home is as high as seven times the average income. The average age of a first-time homeowner has increased by ten years, from 30 to 40, and people are marrying later, perhaps likewise due to economic difficulties.

“Gen Z owes the most money in any generation in history,” warned Charlie Kirk in the interview. He added that young adults are not living beyond their means, but “most are actually doing this to meet their means.”

Verizon just announced its biggest layoff ever, cutting loose a breathtaking 15,000 jobs. Layoffs by large, typically profitable corporations just reached their highest level for an October in 22 years.

Ending the racket of allowing hundreds of thousands of foreigners to continue to take jobs away from American college graduates would help. For fiscal year 2025, the four highest exploiters of H-1B visas for foreigners are Amazon, Meta (Facebook), Microsoft, and Google.

Private equity is a culprit in increasing costs and eliminating jobs, and Republicans are allowing Democrats like Mamdani to take the lead in scrutinizing predatory practices. Mamdani picked as co-chair of his transition team Lina Khan, the former Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chair who investigated private equity tactics.

Toys “R” Us was a well-liked retailer employing 31,000 people, until private equity acquired it in a leveraged buyout. Private equity typically loads its target with debt, and a company acquired in this way is 10 times more likely to go bankrupt as Toys “R” Us then did.

Other companies that spiraled downward into bankruptcy after being acquired by private equity include Red Lobster restaurants, Payless shoes, Party City, Sears, Envision Healthcare, and the multi-state hospital system Steward Health Care. Each time this happens, jobs and healthy competition are lost, and prices increase.

An estimated 40% of emergency rooms in our country are controlled by private equity firms, and deaths increased as a result. Billed charges for visiting an emergency room are far higher, even after adjusting for inflation, than a generation ago.

Republicans should address the economic hardship of young voters as a high priority to have any chance of electoral success.

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.

“Full, Complete” Pardons for 2020 Presidential Electors

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

Fake news was working overtime on Monday by declaring, without authority, that the “full, complete” presidential pardons related to the 2020 presidential election cannot protect against bogus state charges arising from that election. The liberal media wrongly insisted that the Pardon Clause in the U.S. Constitution applies only to charges brought by federal prosecutors.

Not so. The Pardon Clause states that the President “shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.” Every attempt in court to narrow the scope of the Pardon Clause has failed.

Our system of dual sovereigns, federal and state, is subject to the Supremacy Clause, which means that state sovereignty cannot limit the scope of the Pardon Clause. It was modeled on the vast, nearly unlimited pardon power of the King of England.

The newly pardoned 77 alternate electors, federal officials, attorneys and activists who objected to voter fraud in 2020 were acting in defense of the integrity of a presidential election, and thus in defense of the United States. Their conduct is fully pardonable by the President, which Trump has appropriately done.

Yet naysayers argue that the term “United States” in the Pardon Clause means only crimes prosecuted by the federal government. If that were true, then the Supreme Court would not have upheld in Ex parte Wells (1856) the last-minute commutation of a death penalty by President Millard Fillmore of a man convicted of murder in a District of Columbia court, as there were no federal common law crimes.

Federal law never denied women the right to vote, but New York prosecuted Susan B. Anthony for voting illegally in the 1872 presidential election, and prosecuted local officials for allowing her to vote. After his reelection as our 18th President, U.S. Grant pardoned the state officials for their violation of state law, and in 2020 President Trump pardoned Susan B. Anthony for casting an illegal vote.

Just last week an all-Democrat panel of the Second Circuit ruled in favor of Trump’s argument that the charges against him in the so-called hush money case that resulted in 34 felonies should have been heard in a federal court. The charges brought by the New York District Attorney Alvin Bragg accused Trump of violating campaign finance laws during his 2016 campaign for President of the United States.

If a case can be heard in federal court, as all Trump-related cases can be, then the charges are pardonable by the president. No one credibly doubted that President Ford’s pardon of President Nixon protected him against all potential charges relating to the Watergate scandal, including non-federal ones.

The tradition of complete pardons by the president, which began with President George Washington, has always precluded prosecution of the underlying conduct in state court. Those who doubt this broad scope of the pardon power cannot cite any example of a beneficiary of a presidential pardon being prosecuted in state court for the same conduct.

Even Democrat-dominated New York courts shut down an attempted prosecution of Paul Manafort after President Trump granted him a pardon. While the rationale for that decision was based on New York’s strong rule against double jeopardy, the result was to prohibit a first-of-its-kind state prosecution of conduct excused by a presidential pardon.

The ban on slavery in the 13th Amendment to the Constitution prohibits its use “within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.” This is not a reference to the federal government but to all of the States and territories, as demonstrated by the plural pronoun for jurisdiction.

The U.S. Supreme Court emphatically held after the Civil War, in Ex parte Garland (1867), that the presidential pardon “is unlimited, with the exception” for cases of impeachment. “It extends to every offence known to the law,” not merely to federal crimes.

Alexander Hamilton, a Framer of our Constitution, wrote favorably of a broad pardon power in The Federalist No. 74. Hamilton explained, “The criminal code of every country partakes so much of necessary severity that without an easy access to exceptions in favor of unfortunate guilt, justice would wear a countenance too sanguinary and cruel.”

The use of the term “United States” to mean only the federal government and only federal laws is a modern distortion of the elite in Washington, D.C., to puff themselves up. The national liberal media distorts this further by obsessively reporting on D.C. as if that enclave represented the entire United States.

As the Supreme Court recognized in Schick v. Reed (1974), the Framers of the Pardon Clause stated that this power is a “prerogative” of the President, which ought not be “fettered or embarrassed.” The presidential pardon power would be impermissibly undermined if federal charges could be refiled as state charges by an unscrupulous local prosecutor like Alvin Bragg.

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.

National Review on Phyllis Schlafly

Rachel Lu published The Rise of a Populist Influencer in the Age of Print Media, archived here, in National Review.

There are responses by Mark Hemingway and Anne Schlafly, archived here.

Lu wrote a brief rejoinder.

Lu takes some unnecessary and unfounded cheap shots.

Update: Another response is National Review Smears Schlafly.

Road Carnage Caused by Illegal Aliens

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

Not one, but two triple-fatality car accidents were recently caused by illegal aliens driving trucks with commercial driver’s licenses (CDL) issued by California. Florida has investigated and uncovered devastating details about the road carnage wrought in its state by a California resident who never should have received a CDL.

Driving in India is on the left side of its roads, the opposite of here in the U.S. Speeds are typically lower in India compared with the U.S., and the high-velocity, high-congestion movement on our interstates and turnpikes is unlike travel in India.

In our country illegally from India, Harjinder Singh had failed his CDL exam 10 times within two months in Washington State in 2023, but then that liberal state granted him this license anyway. That authorized him to drive large trucks on our highways nationwide.

He next obtained a similar license from California, where he was residing this year. Driving a truck in Florida, he attempted a shockingly reckless maneuver that no American trucker would ever do.

While driving northbound in the outside lane near Fort Pierce on the Florida Turnpike, Singh unexpectedly turned his 18-wheeler across all the inner northbound lanes to make a bizarre, illegal U-turn in a median area limited to authorized vehicles. High-speed traffic behind him had no way to anticipate that swerving maneuver, and a minivan carrying three could not stop.

All three in the minivan were killed by the collision, but Singh and his passenger were uninjured. He is being held without bond in the local St. Lucie County Jail.

Singh has an insufficient understanding of English to drive a big rig on our turnpikes, as he was doing. His reckless U-turn was prohibited by signage and tradition well-known to American drivers, but he cannot read road signs if he cannot understand English.

After the crash, the U.S. Department of Transportation discovered that Singh correctly answered only 2 out of 12 questions in English. He could read only 1 in 4 road signs.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom has granted 62,000 CDLs to illegal aliens, which makes the tragic accidents inevitable until the Trump Administration cracks down against California for allowing this. Merely two months later, another illegal alien with the last name of “Singh” crashed his truck on a California highway, likewise killing three in his accident.

Jashanpreet Singh, apparently having no relation to Harjinder Singh, had illegally entered our country, and was caught but then released by the Biden Administration. Gov. Newsom turned him loose on our highways to drive big trucks here.

On October 21, Jashanpreet Singh caused the deaths of three people and injured several more by rear-ending them at high speed. He has been charged with three counts of gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated and one count of driving under the influence of a drug.

Prosecutors allege that this 21-year-old, which is the minimum age for receiving a CDL for interstate trucking, was driving at a high speed in his truck. He has pleaded not guilty while his supporters demand the return to him of his Sikh turban as he sits in jail.

This Singh’s understanding of English is so poor that he has requested an interpreter at court hearings to translate into his native tongue of Punjabi for him. Punjabi is a language spoken in the Punjab region of India and Pakistan, and it is estimated that 316,000 Indian migrants into the U.S., about half of whom have settled in California, speak this language.

Sean Duffy, Trump’s DOT Secretary, has pulled $160 million in federal funding from California due to its failure to comply with federal standards in issuing CDLs to illegal aliens, many of whom cannot read our road signs. Earlier, Secretary Duffy pulled an additional $40 million in funding.

“It would have never happened if Gavin Newsom had followed our new rules,” Duffy explained. “California broke the law and now three people are dead and two are hospitalized. These people deserve justice. There will be consequences.”

New regulations issued by the Trump Administration on Sept. 26 required California and all states to verify a driver’s status in the U.S. before granting an application for CDL privileges. Despite this, California ignored the Trump Administration’s regulations by expanding Singh’s driving privileges for interstate trucking on Oct. 15, which was apparently his 21st birthday.

As Trump’s Department of Homeland Security responded on X, “This tragedy follows a disturbing pattern of criminal illegal aliens driving commercial vehicles on American roads, directly threatening public safety.”

A 20-year-old American is considered too inexperienced to receive an

interstate trucking license, and a young driver typically needs to be 25 to rent a car. Secretary Duffy should suspend California’s authority to license interstate truckers until it stops licensing 21-year-old illegal aliens unable to understand English.

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.

Conservative Triumphs Worldwide

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

Called “ultraconservative” by the liberal media, Japan’s new prime minister is its first woman ever in that position. But a Japanese feminist author told NBC News that Japan attaining its first female prime minister “doesn’t make me happy.”

Sanae Takaichi takes the reins of power in Japan with strongly conservative positions on gender and marriage. She’s much more like Phyllis Schlafly than Hillary Clinton or Kamala Harris.

Takaichi opposes same-sex marriage and is against allowing married woman to keep their maiden name as their last name after marriage. She favors the Japanese tradition of male-only succession in its imperial family.

She is unlikely to support DEI. She will strengthen the Japanese military which would help us by creating a buffer against communist China, and she’ll meet next week with President Trump during his Asia trip.

She has supported tougher immigration policies in Japan. Like Trump, she is an advocate of hard work: “I myself will throw out the term ‘work-life balance.’ I will work and work and work and work and work,” she said.

Her election was made possible by support from the Japan Innovation Party, called Ishin, which the liberal media describe as far-right. The same childless Japanese feminist author, Chizuko Ueno, complained that Takaichi “sees herself as the Japanese version of Margaret Thatcher.”

The issue of women’s rights pales in comparison with the crisis in Japan of its vanishing birth rate. Its population is contracting, falling from 127 million in 2015 to only 123 million today, a trend that will soon be nearly impossible to reverse.

Japan’s population is declining at a rate of 0.5 to 1.5% annually now. That leaves fewer young workers supporting its vast elderly population.

The median age in Japan is 50 years old, meaning that half of its people are aging out of the workforce. By comparison, the median age in Florida as the place of retirement for many Americans is only 43 years old, and in booming Texas, the median age is only 36.

There cannot be economic growth without young workers, and Japan’s real gross domestic product decreased by an annualized 0.2% between the last quarter of 2024 and the first quarter of this year. Japan is burdened by the highest debt-to-GDP ratio of any developed country, a whopping 240%.

The number of childbirths in Japan dropped in the first half of 2025 by 3.1% from a year ago. A record-low 340,000 babies were born there in the first six months of this year, far too few to sustain its future.

The decline in births there is plummeting even faster than projections. While some blame male traditions in the country, the Japanese people are turning to a conservative woman to try to save them.

Takaichi’s election is part of a trend worldwide which also recently resulted in the first conservative president of Bolivia in 20 years. Rodrigo Paz won a stunning upset against Leftist control of that South American country, and he vows to establish a better relationship with the United States.

This is terrific news as Bolivia is the third-largest producer of illegal cocaine in the world. In 2023 alone, 33 tons of cocaine were seized by anti-drug efforts in that country.

The recent Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to an anti-communist in Venezuela, María Corina Machado, who was forced into hiding after the Leftist dictator Nicolás Maduro stole the election from her last year. Machado is widely considered to have won that election for president of Venezuela while campaigning on a platform of getting tough against illegal drugs and improving relations with the U.S.

When the Norway committee awarded the Nobel Peace Prize to Machado, she immediately praised Trump and called him to let him know that he should have won. Machado’s conservative positions are popular in Venezuela, and her campaign rallies drew large crowds just as Trump’s did.

The left-wing political party ruling Great Britain today – the Labour Party – has fallen to a rock-bottom 19% in public support, according to recent polling. This is less than half of its support at the beginning of last year, and the liberal media are distressed at this without understanding why.

Trust in the liberal President of France, Emmanuel Macron, fell to a record-low 14% this month according to a poll funded by the business daily Les Echos. President Trump’s approval rating in the United States is three times higher than that.

In June, Trump-endorsed conservative Karol Nawrocki prevailed in Poland over the liberal Warsaw Mayor Rafał Trzaskowski. The conservative Prime Minister of nearby Hungary, Viktor Orbán, cheered this “fantastic victory.”

Back home, liberals are perplexed by Trump’s growing popularity during the Democrat-induced partial shutdown of the government. To understand better, they should take note of conservative victories sweeping the globe.

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.