Despite Transgender Crimes, Democrats Push Their Agenda

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

On Saturday a man with long blonde hair posted an image of himself wearing lipstick and make-up on social media, and then entered an AMC theater near Boston where he stabbed four girls watching a children’s movie. Jared Ravizza was allegedly “laughing the whole time” while he nearly killed them, the mother of three of them said.

From there, he drove to a McDonald’s in a different town, publicly urinated, and then allegedly stabbed two employees. He is also suspected of killing someone in Connecticut before going on his stabbing spree.

He was ultimately caught by police after crashing his expensive Porsche. His privileged background included living for several years among liberals on Martha’s Vineyard, while his Instagram account with 218,000 followers refers to himself as “she.”

A few weeks ago in Texas, a man who identified himself as a woman named Karon Fisher drove at high speed to strike an older man who was getting his mail, backed up over him, and then repeatedly stabbed him to death. This was caught on video and witnessed by multiple bystanders.

And in California Tremaine Carroll, a male prisoner who was relocated to a woman’s prison after he identified himself as a transgender woman, allegedly raped a woman there. Earlier this month a Biden-appointed federal judge dismissed a lawsuit brought by women inmates against this California policy, by which more than 1,600 men have sought to be housed in women’s prisons.

Last year the massacre of three children and three adults at a private Christian school in Nashville was perpetrated by Audrey Elizabeth Hale, who called herself Aiden Hale. In November 2022, five were murdered at a gay nightclub in Colorado Springs, Colorado, by Anderson Lee Aldrich who identified himself as nonbinary in court filings, and a transgender teen was convicted of murder after a Denver-area school shooting in 2019.

Not long ago transgender inclinations were considered to be gender dysphoria, and something to be outgrown or treated as a mental disorder. Now, however, the remake of the popular Nintendo “Paper Mario” video game includes “Vivian,” a character born male but exclaiming that “it took me a while to realize I was their sister… not their brother,” while other video games also push the transgender ideology.

Biden has bet his reelection campaign on fully supporting the transgender movement. The Biden Administration has created new causes of action for lawsuits against those who do not cave into transgender demands for preferred pronouns or special new rights.

Democrat-appointed federal judges are ruling in favor of transgender rights in every case. Two weeks ago Democrats on the Eleventh Circuit ruled that a transgender sergeant in a county sheriff’s office had a right to health insurance coverage at taxpayer expense for costly transgender surgery.

The Fourth Circuit, by a vote of 8 Democrat-appointed judges to 6 Republicans, held that West Virginia’s Medicaid and North Carolina’s teachers’ and state employees’ health insurance must fully cover transgender operations and treatment. A 3-judge panel of that same court recently held that parents have no right to opt out of public school coursework that pushes their own children toward accepting tenets of the transgender ideology.

Meanwhile, male-bodied student-athletes are winning state championships in girls’ sports, often by a wide margin, in states that allow such unfair competition. West Virginia enacted a law to protect girls’ sports, but it was blocked by a federal court and the Supreme Court declined a petition to review the case.

The transgender issue may explain why Trump leads Biden in the key swing state of Arizona, despite its Democrat governor. A poll last year showed that by an overwhelming margin of 63-20% Arizonans favor keeping transgender students out of girls’ sports, by 54-27% want them kept out of girls’ restrooms, and by 51-30% Arizonans want to ban transgender operations on children.

Hollywood actor Richard Dreyfuss disparaged the transgender movement during an appearance Saturday night in Beverly, Massachusetts, in honor of the megahit movie Jaws that shattered box office records in 1975, and afterward the venue issued an abject apology emphasizing “inclusivity and respect.” The talented Dreyfuss has criticized diversity and inclusion requirements at the Academy Awards by saying “they make me vomit.”

In an interview on PBS’s Firing Line last year, Dreyfuss asked “Are we really risking hurting people’s feelings? You can’t legislate that. You have to let life be life and I’m sorry, I don’t think there is a minority or majority in the country that has to be catered to like that.”

Hollywood movies today are plummeting in popularity just as Biden is, perhaps due to their same embrace of political correctness for the transgender movement and its demands for special rights. This Memorial Day weekend saw the lowest movie box office revenues since 1995, without even adjusting for inflation.

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.

More Immigration, More Inflation, More Bankruptcies

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

Bankruptcy filings increased by 16% in the first quarter of this year, compared with a year ago, and the familiar Red Lobster chain is shuttering 87 of its restaurants. Far from helping our economy, the 10 million new illegal aliens allowed in by Biden are driving up food and housing costs, while they cannot afford to keep Red Lobster in business.

Nearly thirty years ago, researcher John Lott published his influential book entitled, “More Guns, Less Crime.” In it he demonstrated how gun availability would decrease the overall crime rate, and that is what has happened as law-abiding citizens are allowed to keep and bear arms in nearly every state.

“More immigration, more inflation” should be a sequel to that classic work. We have been victimized by the worst inflation of any president since Jimmy Carter, and a cause is that Biden has allowed the greatest influx of illegal aliens in American history.

Migrants drive up costs for necessities of food and housing, and the spike in demand caused by their relocation here increases prices. The “Law of Demand” is a fundamental principle that economics students learn in their first course: greater demand for something results in higher prices for it.

Already this year, the popular Family Dollar store has had to close 620 of its stores. Rue21 has closed 543 of its locations, while 99 Cents Only Stores have had to shut down 371 of its outlets.

Texas is known for its affordability, but today has among the worst inflation in our country as Texas struggles with many millions of illegals allowed in by Biden. Texas residents suffer from some of the worst “inflation stress” of any state, as reported by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

Trump is far ahead of Biden in Nevada, which pundits struggle to explain in light of how Biden supposedly won that state easily last time. The “inflation stress” in Nevada is particularly high, and that flips voters against the man causing it: Joe Biden.

Inflation stress is also particularly bad among voters in Georgia, another key battleground state that has turned against Biden in polling. The inflation rate in Georgia is among the worst in our country.

Americans are having to spend more of their household budgets on food now than at any other time in more than 30 years. Housing prices have also spiked as 10 million illegals have picked up the more affordable locations, often with taxpayers footing their bills.

This is a replay of what happened in Poland last year, when an election was held after the incumbent political party allowed in millions of Ukrainian migrants. With a population merely one-tenth of the United States, allowing in so many migrants caused a shock to Poland’s economy which the ruling party apparently did not anticipate.

Inflation skyrocketed to nearly 20% last year in Poland, amounting to a terrible hidden tax that the voters would never have approved. Moreover, the adult migrants were more than 80% women, which creates a gender imbalance that will not straighten out for generations to come.

The result in the Polish election was predictable: the incumbent “Law and Justice” party lost by a wide margin, despite having enjoyed popular support since 2015. Now, with Leftists in charge, the mayor of Warsaw in that Catholic country has banned displays of the Crucifix and requires workers to recognize others by their preferred transgender pronouns.

In his recent speech in Minnesota, the strikingly fit and trim Trump laid out the immense harm caused by Biden’s inflation. With humor, Trump pointed out that he stopped eating bacon after it became so expensive under Biden.

Eggs also shot up in price as the illegals poured across our border. Breakfast is a never-skip meal in Mexico, which shattered the world record for egg consumption in 2021 with 409 eggs per person annually compared with only 281 per capita in the U.S.

Most of our country saw an increase in unemployment in the latest data, compared with a year earlier. California and Nevada, which are both destination states for illegals, have seen their unemployment increase to 5.3% and 5.2%, respectively.

The pivotal battleground states of Arizona and Wisconsin, both must-win states for Biden to return to the White House, had increases of nearly a half-percent in their unemployment rates. There is also an uptick in unemployment in Michigan.

Trump does not need to win all these states to prevail in November. Winning Minnesota would be mere icing on the cake, and Trump trails there by only a few percentage points.

Trump promised his audience in the North Star State that as president he would ensure "massive deportation" of those who are illegally in our country. Less illegal immigration will mean less inflation.

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 Blunders by Suing Iowa over Immigration

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

The bullies in D.C. have gone too far with Biden’s Department of Justice (DOJ) lawsuit last Thursday against Iowa. Suing this state of Midwestern farmers is as much a political blunder as a legal one, as Biden trails in all battleground states similar to Iowa, including neighboring Wisconsin.

Iowa enacted a reasonable law last month making it a misdemeanor for an illegal alien, who has already been ordered to leave our country, to remain in Iowa. At a town hall sponsored by a pro-immigration group and attended by dozens of immigrants about this new statute, an anonymous written question asked, “Should I leave Iowa?”

The host sighed and replied, “Entiendo el sentido.” That means, in this context, “I see your point.”

Although Iowa is a thousand miles from the Mexican border, Biden “has secretly flown illegal immigrants into our state in the dead of night,” observed Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird. “Those who come into our country illegally have broken the law, yet Biden refuses to deport them,” Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds stated.

This new statute, Iowa Senate File 2340, makes it an aggravated misdemeanor for someone to remain in Iowa after being denied admission or previously ordered to leave our country. Upon signing this bill into law, Gov. Reynolds observed that “the Biden Administration has failed to enforce our nation’s immigration laws, putting the protection and safety of Iowans at risk.”

Scheduled to take effect on July 1, this law authorizes Iowa officials to send illegal migrants to a border port of entry, allowing federal officials to deal with them there. Contrary to misleading claims by opponents of this and similar legislation in Texas, no state officials are authorized to deport anyone.

Biden’s DOJ relies on a Supreme Court decision against a 2010 Arizona law that created a state misdemeanor for violations of federal immigration law, and authorized police to arrest suspected illegal aliens who commit deportable crimes. Only two of the five Justices who joined that bad Arizona v. United States (2012) decision are still on the Court, and the three new Justices appointed by Trump would probably vote to overturn it.

The DOJ quotes that decision an astounding 14 times in its 19-page lawsuit against Iowa. As Justice Kennedy did so often during his 30 years on the Court, he resorted in that decision to vapid platitudes, saying that “the history of the United States is in part made of the stories, talents, and lasting contributions of those who crossed oceans and deserts to come here.”

The millions of illegals allowed in by Biden did not have to cross “oceans and deserts” to get here, but simply walked across our unguarded southern border. Courts should have retired the Arizona v. United States decision when Kennedy did, six years ago, because the Constitution protects the police power of every state to establish law and order within its own borders.

The Iowa law is similar to the good Texas law enacted last year. Biden has tied that one up in court, benefiting from an appellate panel assignment that includes one Biden appointee and one liberal Republican, who have blocked enforcement of Texas SB 4.

The DOJ’s recent lawsuit against Iowa was assigned to an Obama-appointed trial judge, who will presumably block its enforcement in June. But then this case will proceed quickly on an expedited appeal to the Eighth Circuit in St. Louis, where the judges are 16-to-1 Republican-appointed, so Biden and the DOJ will not have a friendly Democrat majority as in D.C.

Nothing in the Iowa statute interferes with the ability of Biden to enforce federal laws against illegal immigration, which Biden has utterly failed to do. Nothing in the Iowa law interferes with Biden’s ability to frame foreign policy, unless his policy is to invite the whole world to resettle in the United States.

Trump vows to allow states to enforce laws as enacted in Texas and Iowa. Immediately upon Trump’s taking office on January 20, all of this lawfare by the DOJ can be terminated, and states can begin to reduce the unlawfulness caused by illegal aliens.

Seizures of deadly fentanyl by border patrol shot up nearly 6-fold between 2020 and 2023. Counterfeit fentanyl produced in Mexico and China, which has increased in one year from 71 to 115 million pills seized in 2023, is designed to look deceptively like lawful medication.

Farmer Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA), who visits all of Iowa’s 99 counties annually while maintaining a perfect attendance record in the U.S. Senate, told Biden in 2021 that “border security’s essential in keeping out public safety threats, and a cartel-controlled border presents our greatest criminal threat.” The D.C. elite heads for defeat in the Eighth Circuit at the hands of Iowa farmers defending our nation against the invasion.

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.

RNC Steps Up for Election Integrity

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

Early voting for the presidential election begins in September, and election integrity needs to be a top priority. Trump leads in polls, but a slim margin can be unfairly overcome by last-minute drop-box ballot dumps or mailed-in ballots not received until after Election Day.

Fortunately, the Republican National Committee (RNC), which just wrapped up its spring meeting at and near Mar-a-Lago in Florida, steps up its efforts to combat election fraud. Led by Michael Whatley as its new chairman, along with the telegenic Lara Trump as co-chair, the RNC has filed dozens of lawsuits in swing states to ensure compliance with laws concerning mail-in voting.

Last Friday, the RNC sued to stop the counting of ballots after Election Day in Nevada. The U.S. Constitution requires that there be one election day, not a week’s or month’s worth of backroom ballot counting.

Whatley said about monitoring elections, “You got to have observers and attorneys in the room when the votes are being cast, and when the votes are being counted. So we’re in the process of recruiting tens of thousands of volunteers, thousands of attorneys all across the country so that when we get into the election season, we’re going to be in the room.”

Last week help surprisingly came from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, where three Democrat-appointed judges sided with Republicans to vote 10-4 to deny reconsideration of a good decision upholding the statute requiring signatures and dates on mail-in ballot envelopes in Pennsylvania. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court had already approved this, but this litigation in federal court had prevented it from being enforced, and even now the ACLU vows to seek further review.

Whatley, whose emphasis on election integrity in 2020 in North Carolina enabled Trump to win that hotly contested battleground state, applauds this ruling as “a crucial victory for election integrity and voter confidence.” Whatley has led the RNC to file additional lawsuits in 23 states to enhance election integrity as posted on protecthevote.com.

In 2020 Pennsylvania allowed 2.7 million mailed-in ballots without any verification of signature or requirement of a witness or notary. Even far-Left California at least ostensibly requires verification of signatures on mailed-in ballots.

Poll watchers traditionally safeguarded election integrity by watching what happens at precincts as people vote in person. Trump and other Republicans repeatedly win the in-person voting by landslides, only to have the elections taken away from them based on millions of ballots cast in a process that bypasses poll watching.

Ballot harvesting and drop-box ballot dumping, by which workers hired by Democrats bundle large numbers of ballots, combine with mostly unverified millions of mail-in ballots to overwhelm the voters who cast their ballots in-person on Election Day. There should be transparency as to who cast these mail-in ballots and what their alleged signatures look like, but candidates are denied any way to protect against fraudulent voting practices by opponents.

The RNC sued Arizona and Michigan to require them to perform signature matching on mail-in ballots. Without signature matching, Democrats can send in hundreds of thousands of mail-in ballots using hired operatives while bypassing the voters themselves.

Michigan and Nevada, two must-win states for both Trump and Biden this year, have been slow in purging their election rolls of people who died or moved away. The RNC compared census data to voter registration and found discrepancies, and sued to enforce the federal law that requires these states to eliminate the phony voters.

Overpaid consultants do not win elections; volunteers do. More than half of the fundraising by RNC and Trump for the month of April came from small donors, and these grassroots are who need to be mobilized to overcome the monetary and media advantages held by Democrats.

Liberals obtained numerous court orders in their favor in 2020 to invalidate good laws, and they are suing again this cycle in places like the pivotal must-win state of Wisconsin. A lawsuit by progressives there seeks to toss out a reasonable law that requires all ballots be counted by 8 pm the evening of Election Day.

The RNC sought to intervene to defend this law, stating that it establishes “appropriate safeguards and transparency while still offering voters ample opportunities to cast a ballot.” Lawsuits like this should not be decided without the full participation of the affected Republican Party, but a state court unjustifiably blocked RNC and the local GOP from intervening.

Some wonder if Republican polling leads will be enough to overcome a predictable repetition of ballot harvesting, drop-box ballot dumping, and unverified mail-in signatures by Democrats. In the key swing states of the last two election cycles, oversight was not allowed by poll watchers to monitor signatures on millions of mail-in ballots.

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.