Fentanyl Crisis Rattles Dems

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

Only four states share a common border with Mexico, but the millions who crossed that border illegally since Joe Biden took office didn’t stay there. Some of those unlawful migrants brought the lethal illegal drug fentanyl to unsuspecting customers across Middle America.

Fentanyl is 50 times more deadly than heroin, which used to be the most feared addictive drug. In much of the country fentanyl has become the leading cause of premature death, outpacing accidents and homicide.

On Friday, a bust in Florida seized enough fentanyl to kill 2.7 million people, some of it hidden in a Cinnamon Toast Crunch cereal box. On Monday in York County, South Carolina, authorities announced their seizure of a cache of fentanyl—more than 30 kilograms—that was enough to kill every person in the entire county.

In Mesa, Arizona, a shop owner and employee are accused of selling thousands of fentanyl pills from a Mexican drug cartel for many months. The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has warned against brightly colored fentanyl pills, called “rainbow fentanyl,” which look like candy and attract kids.

A month ago Biden’s own Attorney General, Merrick Garland, admitted that “across the country, fentanyl is devastating families and communities.” He identified the source as the outlaw drug cartels operating in northern Mexico, yet Biden has done nothing to disrupt their operations or close our border to the traffickers who bring their deadly product to our country.

The Department of Justice describes the Mexican drug cartels as “ruthless, criminal organizations that use deception and treachery to drive addiction with complete disregard for human life.” But instead of matching its actions to those strong words, the DOJ spends its resources on political investigations of Americans who oppose the Biden regime.

Open borders and defunding police are what Democrat politicians stand for, and for a while it seemed they would get away with it. Now the fentanyl crisis may be turning undecided voters against Democrat candidates.

Polls have shown a steady decline in support for Democrat candidates as the public wakes up to the fentanyl problem, and how Democrat policies have made it worse. A political ad for Trump-endorsed Dr. Oz in Pennsylvania reminds voters that his opponent “John Fetterman supports decriminalizing dangerous drugs like fentanyl and heroin.”

In the first year of the Biden Administration, there was a sharp increase of 15% in overdose deaths to a new record of 107,000. Much of that was due to fentanyl that flooded across the southern border soon after Biden opened it to illegal immigrants and the criminal cartels who profit from them.

Communist China ships precursor chemicals to Mexican drug cartels who produce the fentanyl, according to the DEA, and the cartels then send it across the border that Democrats refuse to close. The deadly fentanyl is everywhere now, and continues to pour into our country.

This is a top campaign issue in many of the races that will determine who controls the U.S. Senate. In addition to Pennsylvania, races in Arizona, Nevada, and Ohio are turning on the problem of fentanyl as allowed by Democrats’ open border and soft-on-crime policies.

In Ohio, Trump-endorsed JD Vance has described illegal fentanyl as a weapon of mass destruction. Vance points out that his opponent Tim Ryan, who has been a Democrat congressman for two decades, “has done nothing to stop the flow of fentanyl.”

As sparks flew in their debate earlier this month, JD Vance explained that the Democrat Ryan “talks about wanting to support a stronger border. … Well, Tim, you’ve been in Congress for 20 years, and the border problem has gotten worse and worse and worse.”

Even Gov. Ron DeSantis made fentanyl an issue in his debate against Charlie Crist in Florida Monday night. “If you’re trafficking that garbage, that poison, you’re killing people in our state and we’re going to treat you like the murderer that you are," DeSantis said.

The Democrat Crist “has endorsed the idea of 'reallocating funding away from the police,' I guess to give to social workers. But if someone’s robbing your house, you don’t want a social worker coming to help you, you need the police,” DeSantis declared.

In the deep blue state of New York, the Republican Lee Zeldin has surged in the polls as he is endorsed by the Fraternal Order of Police and making crime the top issue. Repeated headlines and surveillance footage showing people being pushed onto the subway tracks have New Yorkers on edge.

The historic advantage that Democrats used to enjoy with Hispanic Americans has dropped by almost half since the last midterm elections. According to a recent Economist/YouGov poll, Biden’s approval rating among Hispanic voters has fallen to 46%, and a remarkable 61% of this group now say that our country is headed in the wrong direction.

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.

Arizona’s Kari Lake is 2022’s breakout political star

Rich Lowry in the NY Post:

Kari Lake is this campaign season’s breakout star.

The “Stop the Steal” die-hard and political novice who is running for governor of Arizona looked like a no-hoper, but now has to be favored to win in November.

Lake is a new politician who is reminder of the oldest of conventional political adages: Candidate quality matters. The exceptionally poised former news anchor is a stand-out performer on the campaign trail.

She is in a line of women champions of a grassroots, right-wing populism that runs from Phyllis Schlafly to Sarah Palin to Marjorie Taylor Greene, spanning the 1950s to today.

These are wildly divergent figures — Schlafly was one of the most consequential leaders of post-war conservatism; Greene hopes to finagle a seat on the House oversight committee should Republicans take back the majority.

Yet there are common threads in this line of “momma bear” populists: a fervent opposition to the elite; a disdain for the Republican establishment; a hatred for the press; a dark or frankly conspiratorial view of the world; a fervent base of support from activists and ordinary voters; and a fearlessness and instinctive combativeness that made or makes these women even more hateful to their opponents and admirable to their supporters.

What’s new about Lake and Greene is that loyalty to Donald Trump and the insistence that the 2020 election was stolen are now the litmus tests for this populism. When Schlafly got her start, the intensity of someone’s anti-communism was the measuring stick.

Herschel Channeled Reagan in Winning Debate

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

Republican Herschel Walker was not expected to win the much-anticipated debate with the glib Leftist pastor, Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA). Democrats usually win such debates as the moderators come off the sidelines to take swings at the Republican, and Walker is just a self-described country boy from rural Georgia.

Instead, Walker decked Warnock and the liberal moderator with charismatic zingers that remind some old-timers of Ronald Reagan. In early 1980, a debate moderator turned off the microphones to try to silence Reagan in New Hampshire, and he famously protested by shooting back, “I paid for this microphone, Mr. Green!”

The moderator’s real name was Joe Breen, not Green, but no one cared about that. Applause erupted in support of Reagan, and that episode launched his successful two-term presidency and defeat of communism.

During Friday’s Walker-Warnock debate the forked-tongue preacher Warnock made the snarky remark that “I’ve never pretended to be a police officer.” That was a cheap shot at Walker, whom liberals have criticized for supposedly overstating his work with law enforcement after his spectacular football career.

Most other Republican candidates would have gotten defensive and responded with a stuttering answer that left viewers thinking the dig hit a nerve and was onto something. But that was not Reagan’s effective style, or Walker’s.

Walker responded by holding up his five-pointed gold star, clearly recognizable as a law enforcement badge. The audience erupted into spontaneous applause at the spirited, dramatic response by Herschel to the cheap shot by Warnock.

But then the liberal moderator improperly jumped in, perhaps dismayed that Walker captured the moment so perfectly. Trump also encountered a one-sided moderator in 2020, prompting Trump to tell Chris Wallace, "I guess I'm debating you, not him" and "I'm not surprised."

“Mr. Walker, you are very well aware of the rules tonight. And you have a prop that is not allowed. Sir, I asked you to put that prop away,” the moderator declared with authority.

Herschel dealt with the moderator as he did so successfully with fearsome NFL linebackers, by running over their attempt to tackle him. “This is not a prop. This is real,” Herschel retorted.

Now liberals are trying to turn the episode into some kind of “badge-gate” kerfuffle, as they have harped on Herschel’s five-star badge ever since. But the Johnson County sheriff told NBC News that he gave Walker the badge and has no objection to Walker’s use of it in his campaign and during the debate.

Other Republicans should have similar badges, now that headlines of mass killings are nearly daily and police departments have been emasculated by Democrats. Violent crime has increased sharply while progressives have been waging a war on our valiant officers in blue who struggle to maintain law and order.

On Thursday, a mere 15-year-old in Raleigh, North Carolina, went on a shooting spree in a peaceful neighborhood that killed a dog and five people including two veterans, one of whom was an off-duty police officer. The assailant was dressed in camouflage as some teenage boys addicted to violent video games like to do when they turn their gaming into reality.

Meanwhile, across the country in Stockton, California, an example of what appears to have been a type of profiling enabled apprehension of a suspected serial killer while he was hunting at 2 a.m. for another victim to murder. This illustrates what good police work can accomplish if the Left is stopped from interfering with their work.

Police arrested a black man dressed in all-black clothing as he was thought to be driving around to look to murder his seventh random victim in Stockton in the past few months. He donned a mask around his neck and was driving in a wandering pattern after midnight in the city.

Progressives have objected to effective policing by insisting it is based on profiling, and have blocked the “stop and frisk” policy that was so effective in reducing crime in New York City until liberals ended it in 2014.

When the debate moderator brought up the issue of abortion, Herschel had another zinger for the Leftist preacher Warnock: “Instead of aborting those babies, why are you not baptizing those babies? If Black Lives Matter, why are you not protecting those babies?”

When Warnock blustered that a “patient’s room is too small” for the government, Herschel retorted that “there’s a baby in that room as well. And he’s asking the taxpayers to pay for it, so he’s bringing the government back into the room.”

Even the liberal media felt compelled to admire Herschel’s debate performance, as the Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s headline was that “Herschel Walker’s debate performance scores points for his campaign.” Herschel’s Reaganesque performance boosts the entire Republican field as the race for Senate control goes down to the wire.

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.

Weaponized Prosecutions Create a Biden Police State

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

As many as 20 top Republicans have reportedly been targeted by Democrat prosecutors in Fulton County, Georgia, a county that voted 3-to-1 for Biden in the last election, according to a recent report in the New York Times. Specious allegations of racketeering and conspiracy are part of the arsenal in this and other political prosecutions being unleashed against Trump and his advisors.

Last week Fulton County prosecutors misled the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit by pretending that the signatures on the Georgia mail-in ballots were twice verified. Instead, as confirmed in data posted by the non-partisan Ballotpedia, Georgia opened the floodgates to mail-in ballots in 2020 without maintaining normal verification and rejection rates.

Ballotpedia’s table of mail-in or absentee ballots in the last three elections show that Georgia increased its allowance of mail ballots by a record 1.1 million (from 213,000 in 2016 to 1,316,000 in 2020). At the same time, its rejection rate fell from 6.4% in 2016 to a rock-bottom 0.4% in 2020.

Those mail-in “votes” were overwhelmingly for Biden, without meaningful verification of their authenticity. Every percentage point reduction in the rejection rate likely meant 11,000 more votes for Biden in a state he reportedly won by only that slim margin.

Ballotpedia charts all the states by the change in rejection rates of their mail-in or absentee ballots from 2016 to 2020, and Georgia ranks as the very worst in the country by that crucial measure. Georgia decreased its ballot rejections by 30 times the national average reduction in ballot rejections between the last two presidential elections.

Yet not only do prosecutors in Georgia fail to acknowledge this disparity, they reportedly plan to indict the Trump advisers and ultimately Trump for daring to criticize the malfeasance of Georgia election officials in allowing questionable ballots to be counted. A worse political misuse of prosecutorial power is difficult to imagine, and on Monday the Fulton County prosecutors even filed court papers to compel testimony by a police chaplain from the small town of Montgomery, Illinois.

Texas courts have already stood up against the Fulton County travesty by properly rejecting Georgia’s attempt to haul Texans before the Democrat-stacked process in an Atlanta courtroom. A Texas appellate court expressed its strong doubts that the Fulton County proceeding is even legitimate, as it ruled that a Texas resident can ignore Fulton County’s subpoena.

Ballotpedia data show that the rejection rate of only 0.15% in Georgia of invalid signatures on mail-in/absentee ballots in 2020 was far less than in many other states, and comparable to the national average rejection rate for ballots failing to contain any signature at all.

For nearly two years, Fulton County prosecutors have been unable to find any real crime committed by any Trump supporter or Republican in criticizing Georgia’s improper election procedures. Now in the Eleventh Circuit, Democrats are pleading a belated urgency as they demand immediate testimony by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC).

In Nevada on Saturday, campaigning for Republican Adam Laxalt for U.S. Senate, while polling indicates a GOP recapture of the Senate if he wins, Trump lambasted the weaponizing of prosecutions. “The Democrats are locking up their political opponents, spying on their political rivals, silencing dissent and using the full force of government law enforcement and the media, the fake media, to try and crush our movement,” Trump said.

“Every freedom-loving American needs to understand the time to stand up to this growing tyranny is right now in this election,” he added. No president has ever campaigned so hard for others, and by doing this Trump makes the Republican Party Great Again.

“We don't have the luxury of waiting. The only way evil will triumph is for good men and women to do nothing,” Trump said in channeling the great conservative statesman Edmund Burke, who courageously defended the American colonies as a member of the English Parliament.

Georgia Democrats should not be allowed to stuff the ballot box with unverified votes again this election, or misuse prosecutorial power such that Republicans are deterred from criticizing this form of election fraud. The entire country is affected by an improper election process in Georgia, and more states in addition to Texas should start ruling against attempts by Fulton County to haul non-Georgians to Atlanta.

The Fulton County proceeding is creating a split between states in a way that our country has not seen in a long time. Traditionally the courts in one state are quick to comply with requests by a prosecutor in another state, but political prosecutions are ending that “comity.”

“Biden and his Left-wing handlers are turning America into a police state," Trump properly declared in Nevada. He decried what he describes as “weaponizing” of prosecutions by Democrats.

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.

New Court, New Senate

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

The new U.S. Supreme Court, with Biden’s Senate-confirmed appointee Ketanji Brown Jackson, began its Term with oral arguments on Monday. Control of the U.S. Senate is to be decided in just five weeks, and our federal judiciary teeters on the edge.

Some might wonder why it is so important for Republicans to win the Senate, while Democrats continue to control the White House. Two words sum up why: federal judges.

Biden has already stuffed the federal judiciary with 84 new Leftist judges, more than any recent president at this stage, and another 57 Biden nominees are pending before the equally divided Senate. Only a GOP-controlled U.S. Senate can stop Biden’s mad dash to change our laws through activist judges, as the GOP did in 2016 when Obama tried to replace Justice Scalia with Merrick Garland on the Supreme Court.

Roe v. Wade could even be reinstated if Biden and Democrats get their way in this election, and Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg just gave the ACLU $3 million toward that goal. Democrats have an immense fundraising advantage in the four states on which the next Senate depends: Pennsylvania, Arizona, Nevada, and Georgia.

As polls show a dead heat in the Georgia U.S. Senate race, the pro-abortion side just ambushed NFL great Herschel Walker with a scurrilous accusation from more than a decade ago. This is on top of the attempts by Georgia’s Fulton County prosecutor to bring specious charges against top Republicans, including Trump, for daring to question the election results reported there last time.

Democrats are masters of the “October surprise,” as they attempted to smear Trump in October 2016. That liberal tactic did not work against Trump in 2016, and it should not work against Walker this year either.

Herschel Walker’s opponent Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA) supports abortion-on-demand, and wants to force taxpayers to pay for it, too. Warnock repeatedly votes to confirm Biden-nominated federal judges who want to reinstate Roe v. Wade.

Walker, who frequently cites the Bible, opposes Roe and could be the deciding vote against confirming federal judges who want to reinstate that mistake. Preferring Walker over Warnock is an easy choice for anyone who believes the issue of abortion should be “returned to the people and their elected representatives,” as the Supreme Court properly held in the Dobbs case.

Prior to early voting, ambush by the liberal media of Republican candidates occurred the week before Election Day. George W. Bush was hit by the liberal media with something from his distant past, a DWI conviction, the Thursday before Election Day in 2000.

Polling suggested that this tactic cost him a few percentage points, erasing his several-point lead. For the next six weeks our nation was convulsed in political chaos until December 12, when the Supreme Court stepped in to stop the one-sided Florida recount.

Similar Supreme Court intervention should be forthcoming to shut down ongoing attempts by politicized prosecutors to file charges against Trump and top Republicans. On its first day of its new term, the High Court ducked an issue central to the Mar-a-Lago raid concerning whether federal prosecutors can get away with using “filter teams” to rifle through private documents seized from someone’s residence.

With its 6-3 Republican-appointed majority, this Supreme Court should not be dodging these issues. This Court may be at its zenith in conservative strength, but that will not mean much unless it welcomes Trump’s appeals, including Trump’s emergency request Tuesday afternoon for the High Court to intervene concerning the Mar-a-Lago raid.

Trump campaigns tirelessly for Republican candidates in the swing states, and if the GOP retakes control of the Senate it will be thanks to Trump. This Sunday Trump returns to Arizona for a massive rally to boost Republicans there.

Private property depends on this election, too. On its first day of oral argument, the Supreme Court heard why the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) should stop controlling water located on private property.

Many farmers and homeowners are unable to determine if a lake on their private property is subject to federal regulation and control merely because of its potential connection to a separate navigable waterway. This federal interference blocks improved management of surface water during droughts.

Private property owners face criminal prosecution if they improve their own wetlands that the feds later claim are regulated by the EPA. Enormous fines can be imposed against private property owners who merely build around their own surface water, and litigation drags on for more than a decade as this pending case has.

At oral argument, Biden’s Justice Jackson sought continuation of EPA authority over private surface water. Under her Leftist view, it should not even matter whether a bit more than a puddle is actually connected to a navigable waterway, such that the federal government would control many private lakes and marshes.

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 Woman Wins by a Landslide

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

Conservatives romped to victory in Italy on Sunday and their charismatic leader, Giorgia Meloni, becomes Italy’s first female prime minister. Earlier this year she declared in perfect English that “the only way to be rebellious is to be conservative.”

“Our individual freedom is under attack, our rights are under attack, the sovereignty of our nation is under attack,” she declared. “The prosperity and well-being of our families is under attack, our children’s education is under attack.”

Though her party garnered only 4.4% of the vote in Italy’s last election in 2018, Meloni just led the Brothers of Italy to a landslide victory with its platform of “God, country and family.” This party is called “far right” for taking a strong stance against immigration and for an economic program that supports families with children.

Giorgia Meloni is as blunt-talking as Donald Trump, and is similar to American conservative women such as Marjorie Taylor Greene and Kari Lake. Unlike Republicans who immediately run to the center after conservatives elect them, Meloni boldly declared after her election that “this is a starting point, not a finishing line, from tomorrow we have to prove our worth.”

Trump adviser Steve Bannon is one of Meloni’s biggest fans, as Bannon recognized years ago her potential to take charge. Raised by a single mom in a gritty portion of Rome, Meloni was inspired by “The Lord of the Rings,” the Christian fantasy novel by J.R.R. Tolkien, as well as writings by the English Christian essayist G. K. Chesterton.

In less than 40 days the midterm elections here will reveal how far the United States will move to the right as Europe is doing. Like Italy, inflation here has been near 10%, and last week the Federal Reserve Bank jacked up interest rates by another 75 basis points.

Rapid increases in interest rates preceded the elections of 1980 and 2008, and the incumbent party was routed by election landslides. This year’s polling shows a recapture of the House by Republicans, while recent trends point to a possibility of recapture of the Senate also.

Most notably in Nevada, long associated with the machine politics of the late Sen. Harry Reid, the Republican challenger Adam Laxalt has opened up a lead over the Democrat incumbent. While National Democrats abandon working class Latinos in order to appeal to college-educated women, Laxalt wins over the blue collar workers who make Las Vegas function.

Laxalt is running hard against Biden’s open border and this is resonating with Nevada voters, including Hispanics. “Joe Biden and Democrats have dismantled border security, causing a crisis of human trafficking, crime, and lethal opioids,” Laxalt’s latest television ad declares.

The ad features his opponent falsely claiming “First of all, there’s no open borders” while Vice President Kamala Harris absurdly declares “Our border is secure.”

Nevada has never been a bastion of conservatism, and Republicans have struggled there in recent years. But a populist message against illegal immigration and other liberal plagues can oust an entrenched Democrat senator in the Silver State.

Like much of our country, Nevada has a worsening water shortage with no viable plan to overcome it. As Nevada’s Attorney General, Laxalt joined other Western states in a lawsuit that successfully challenged a federal rule that would have kept residents from drawing water from their own private property.

Laxalt is running against the anti-energy positions of his opponent, who supports phony green energy rules that cannot possibly keep the tourist hotels air conditioned on the famous Las Vegas Strip. Nevada was the fourth-best state in the country last year in terms of few power outages (West Virginia was the best), while next-door California was the third worst as radical environmentalists ruin that state.

In Pennsylvania, Trump-endorsed Dr. Oz is charging ahead and narrowing the lead by the Leftist Democrat John Fetterman, who had a disabling stroke earlier this year but refuses to release his medical records as Dr. Oz has. Fetterman has ducked debating Dr. Oz but finally agreed to an 11th hour debate in late October, after many Democrats will have their ballots harvested in early voting.

Republicans carry most of Pennsylvania’s counties, but the Democrat political machine in Philadelphia often yields more votes than expected. Republican legislators in Pennsylvania have failed to end election fraud, which makes Dr. Oz’s task more difficult than it should be.

The energy issue boosts Republican Senate candidate J.D. Vance in next-door Ohio, which should play well for Dr. Oz. Fetterman once pledged to ban fracking, on which Pennsylvania’s economy depends, and he backpedals on that issue.

Now Fetterman is campaigning for federal pro-marijuana legislation, even though most states outlaw it. As a highly respected physician, Dr. Oz can educate the public about how harmful that would be.

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.

Court Slams Big Tech

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

A spectacular ruling against Big Tech censorship emerged Friday afternoon from our nation’s finest court, which presides in New Orleans over federal appeals from Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit upheld a new Texas law defended by the conservative Attorney General of Texas, Ken Paxton.

As enacted last year by the Texas legislature, HB20 requires social media platforms such as Twitter, Google (including YouTube), and Facebook, all headquartered in California, to stop censoring viewpoints they don’t like. Twitter banned President Trump in January 2021, and has been excluding many other conservatives ever since.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott declared last year when signing HB20 into law, “There is a dangerous movement by some social media companies to silence conservative ideas and values. This is wrong and we will not allow it in Texas.”

When criticized for their bias against conservative viewpoints, these California behemoths pretend they are like newspapers, who enjoy the freedom to print (or not print) whatever they like. By a 2-1 vote, the Fifth Circuit flatly rejected that comparison, along with the notion that censorship by social media monopolies is itself a form of speech deserving protection.

“Today we reject the idea that corporations have a freewheeling First Amendment right to censor what people say,” held Judge Andrew Oldham, one of many superb judges appointed by President Trump. He was joined by Edith Jones, who has long been recognized as perhaps the finest jurist in the Nation.

In May, by a narrow 5-4 vote, the Supreme Court temporarily blocked this good Texas law from going into effect pending appeal. Big Tech promises to make another trip to the Supreme Court, but this well-reasoned decision by the Fifth Circuit seems likely to survive.

The brilliant Judge Edith Jones, who has often been on the short list for appointment to the Supreme Court, wrote in concurrence that “it is ludicrous to assert, as NetChoice does, that in forbidding the covered platforms from exercising viewpoint-based ‘censorship,’ the platforms’ ‘own speech’ is curtailed.” The Texas law does not require the platforms to censor their own speech, and they hide their shadow-banning algorithms anyway.

Ken Paxton, who is certain to win reelection in November after soundly defeating a Bush family member in his primary, trumpeted his victory. Now “#BigTech CANNOT censor the political voices of ANY Texan!”

A partial dissent was authored by Judge Leslie Southwick, an appointee of George W. Bush. In a similar case from Florida reaching the Supreme Court later this week on a petition for certiorari, the inadequate Bush approach of allowing Left Coast Big Tech monopolies to abuse the rest of our country will be up for review.

Television networks are not allowed to censor speech in advertisements by political candidates, so why have social media monopolies gotten away with their censorship of conservative viewpoints? Emails uncovered in another case showed how Big Tech censored critics of Democrat policies, in order to pander to demands by the Biden Administration.

Far from banning dangerous users, as Big Tech and its supporters pretend in court, they have instead been banning conservatives, including Trump, for the political goal of helping Democrats. Yet mass shootings have been broadcast live over social media, sometimes apparently motivated by that publicity, and threats of violence have been posted by shooters on their accounts without being timely censored.

On Jan. 2, 2022, Twitter permanently suspended the account of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) because Twitter and Democrats on Capitol Hill opposed what she was saying about Covid-19. She had tweeted about the government-run Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, which posts data on deaths and injuries reported after receiving a Covid vaccine.

Twitter was not acting to prevent violence or trying to combat any hate speech when it halted the personal account of this popular congresswoman. She was subsequently reelected by a landslide in her primary in Georgia, yet Twitter falsely pretended that her tweets were somehow a menace to society.

Big Tech is beholden to liberals in government and has been taking orders about what to delete from Democrats on Capitol Hill. Biden himself has demanded that Big Tech exclude statements he dislikes from appearing on the internet, declaring in January that “it has to stop!”

In court Big Tech pretends it must have an unlimited right to exclude fringe groups and postings, or else so-called hate speech will overrun their platforms. But the internet developed just fine without an Orwellian Ministry of Truth based in California.

HB20 applies only to platforms having more than 50 million active monthly users, which means they are akin to public accommodations disallowed to discriminate based on viewpoint. Telephone companies and other common carriers are not allowed to prohibit comments based on their content, and neither should social media monopolies.

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

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

Fighting Back Against the Deep State

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

For ordinary mortals, a raid conducted by the Department of Justice against your home would be career-ending. But President Trump again exceeds expectations by fighting back and winning against the tactics of the Deep State.

A federal judge in Florida dramatically ruled in Trump’s favor last week, granting his request to retrieve the documents taken from his home, and transfer them to an independent special master for review. More significantly, the judge ordered the Justice Department to stop its overzealous investigation of Trump until the document review is completed.

The Deep State is hopping mad, joined by allies in the liberal media. A chorus of unjustified criticism has reverberated from Never-Trumpers, including former Attorney General Bill Barr, against Judge Aileen Cannon’s well-reasoned ruling in favor of Trump.

“As a function of Plaintiff’s former position as President of the United States, the stigma associated with the subject seizure is in a league of its own,” Judge Cannon found. “A future indictment, based to any degree on property that ought to be returned, would result in reputational harm of a decidedly different order of magnitude,” she added.

Instead of accepting the judge’s wise ruling, the Biden Administration immediately filed a motion demanding that it be suspended during the appeal that Biden’s Justice Department plans.

On Monday, Trump’s attorneys pushed back hard. “In what at its core is a document storage dispute that has spiraled out of control,” they wrote, “the government wrongfully seeks to criminalize the possession by the 45th President of his own presidential and personal records.”

Trump’s attorneys rightly object to how the Justice Department, which is stocked with diehard political enemies of Trump, seeks to “proceed straight to a preordained conclusion” against him.

The unprecedented FBI raid on Donald Trump’s home (not his “country club” as former AG Barr sneeringly called it) is one of several ways the Deep State is trying to destroy Trump’s reputation. Another way is its relentless harassment of Trump’s supporters.

Stephen Miller, one of Trump’s finest advisers who was with him for all four years of his presidency, has reportedly been hit with a subpoena to appear before a grand jury. Other top Trump aides have also been required to testify before a grand jury apparently convened to try to indict Trump.

Even Trump’s attorneys have been targeted for retaliation by the Deep State. The sick joke today is that MAGA means “make attorneys get attorneys,” which is what many of Trump’s attorneys have had to do as they get harassed by the Deep State.

Even the federal judge who ruled for Trump has received death threats from someone who apparently hates Trump. Although concealed by the liberal media, a woman who left three voicemails threatening the judge was arrested last week in Houston.

The Biden Administration continues to abuse its investigatory powers by conducting a surprise seizure of cell phones belonging to Trump supporters. The cell phones of Boris Epshteyn and Mike Roman, both prominent supporters of Trump, were recently seized by the Justice Department.

It also reportedly issued dozens of broadly worded subpoenas in just the past week demanding information about the activities of Trump and his supporters in late 2020. This is an unprecedented assault against the top contender for the presidency in 2024.

Fortunately, Trump will regain his pardon power when he is reelected to the White House. But some weak Republicans are criticizing his promise to use it generously, including pardoning those prosecuted for joining the political rally at the Capitol on January 6.

These Republican critics of pardoning the victims of the Deep State fail to appreciate where the divide has developed in our country. It is no longer North versus South, but the D.C. elite versus the rest of the country.

Federal prosecutors have virtually unlimited resources without accountability, in contrast with local prosecutors. Federal Judge Aileen Cannon was right to hold that “the investigation and treatment of a former president is of unique interest to the general public, and the country is served best by an orderly process that promotes the interest and perception of fairness.”

The power brokers in D.C., through misuse of the Justice Department, wrongly attempt to decide for the entire country whether Trump will be our next president. The Deep State is going all out to do anything they can to block Trump from the White House and interfere with the Republicans gaining control of the House in less than two months.

Judge Cannon’s splendid ruling in favor of Trump was a flash of light amid this sea of darkness. From there it will go to the Eleventh Circuit, which hopefully by now recognizes how dangerous it is when the Justice Department insists on overzealous actions against the presumptive Republican nominee for president.

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.

Big Weed Stealing our Water and our Health

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

“Big Weed” is the $33 billion-dollar marijuana industry that prefers to go by its euphemistic term cannabis. It is spending hundreds of millions of dollars to pass ballot initiatives in 5 states, defeat Republican candidates for office this November, and bring a pot store close to you.

For the first time in history more Americans smoke pot than tobacco. The Gallup poll reports that 15% of Americans use marijuana, while only 11% smoke tobacco.

Big Weed is far worse now than the pot of a generation ago. Each year it becomes more potent and harmful, with its average delta‐9‐tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) level rising by 28.5 percent in the last half-century.

The medical journal Lancet Psychiatry has just reported on a new study that the higher the potency of the marijuana, the higher the risk of developing a psychotic illness known as cannabis use disorder. Despite this, recreational marijuana is lawful in 19 states and Washington, D.C.

The increased use of marijuana is linked to upticks in homicides and suicides, a rise in medical problems, and an increase in pot-related fatal traffic accidents. Legalizing pot does not end the black market for it, as proven on Friday by the bust of an illegal pot operation in the California Bay Area where $4 million-worth of plants were seized.

The Cannabis Research Center at the University of California in Berkeley reported last year that there are still more illegal cannabis farms than lawful ones, a half-decade after California legalized pot under the pretext of ending the illegality. Bills headed to its governor now for signature include legalizing marijuana use for animals, and prohibiting employers from firing workers for off-job pot-smoking.

Voters in Missouri, Arkansas, Maryland, North Dakota, and South Dakota should not want to become more like California where advertisements to buy and smoke pot are everywhere. The pungent stench of marijuana crops extends for more than a mile, and the odor from smoking the weed reeks far worse than tobacco.

The marijuana ballot initiative in Missouri is a confusing 38 pages of single-spaced fine print, which should not have been allowed on the ballot. This bill would never pass the Missouri legislature, and should not be approved by voters.

Marijuana became legal in New Mexico in April, and almost immediately 478 licensed retailers of pot littered that state. That is more than two-thirds the number of pot retailers in Colorado, which has a larger population.

Big Weed is causing a big water problem in areas of the country suffering from the summer drought. Marijuana plants soak up huge amounts of water, and often the pot growers steal that water from neighbors who need it.

Deer Creek in Oregon has run dry because of the theft of its water by marijuana growers. Cannabis needs the most water during dry summer months when water shortages have worsened for everyone else.

In Humboldt County, California, cannabis plants have been diverting so much water that the wells of neighbors are running dry. A settlement in 2019 to address this has not been successful, and people are being asked to create their own ponds to try to maintain enough water for themselves.

Estimates are that cannabis requires 100 to 200 gallons of water to grow merely one pound of it. That translates to 10 or more gallons of water wasted for every tiny ounce of pot.

Legalizing pot a decade ago in Colorado caused an explosion in pot-growing there, legal and illegal, which has drained water away from the Colorado River on which Arizona and Nevada depend. Water-wasteful marijuana farming is surging at a 16% annual increase, and will triple in size in the next eight years.

On top of that, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit just ruled that states may be prohibited by the Constitution from limiting importation of marijuana into their states. Already vans are illegally selling marijuana on the streets of New York City, which has become so troublesome there that the mayor instituted a task force to crack down against it.

Cannabis has a devastating effect on the soil, as pot-growers often deplete the nutrients of land and leave it barren while they move on to harm more soil elsewhere. Traditional agriculture rotates crops so the soil remains viable indefinitely.

On July 21, Senators from the East and West Coasts introduced the Cannabis Administration and Opportunity Act in the U.S. Senate to try to expand marijuana nationwide. The cannabis industry is complaining that it is not making enough money, but opportunity for that industry means harm for others.

Senators in the Midwest and flyover country should reject special legislation for the cannabis industry. Water in the Midwest is plentiful and let’s keep it that way for our legitimate crops and comfortable living.

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’s Botched Border

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

By opening our southern border to endless streams of illegal aliens, and planting them throughout the United States, President Biden has effectively nullified a vast swath of U.S. law. Last month the Supreme Court upheld an injunction against Biden’s lawless policy, in a case to be argued in December.

While that case entitled U.S. v. Texas was percolating through the lower courts, there were 2.2 million encounters with illegal aliens in the last reported nine months. This surpasses the record set by the entire first fiscal year of the Biden regime and “is the worst it’s ever been,” according to Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-TX), whose district includes part of the border.

Meanwhile, Biden blocks lawful visitors like tennis star Novak Djokovic from playing in the U.S. Open, merely for declining the Covid vaccine. Yet Biden allows millions of unvaccinated illegal aliens to pour over our southern border because they are presumed to be future Democrat voters.

A Republican delegation visited the problem firsthand last week after hearing complaints by the sanctuary New York City Democrat mayor, Eric Adams, about how Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has bused 1,500 of the migrants to the big city. “That’s but a small taste of everyday life on the border and they’re starting to realize it is overwhelming,” said Rep. Gonzales.

Overwhelming indeed. Crime statistics from Texas show in the last year 259,000 illegal aliens were charged with more than 433,000 criminal offenses, among which there were 800 arrests for murder and more than 10,000 charges for sexual offenses.

Texas border cities were initially reluctant to join Gov. Abbott’s bold busing of migrants to liberal northeast cities. But the continued lack of attention by the Biden administration to this crisis has prompted El Paso and others to give illegals showing up in their cities a long-distance ride on Gov. Abbott’s buses, too.

The Republicans visiting the southern border included two candidates for Congress from New York. They point out how their state’s Democrats have exacerbated the problem of illegal immigration by giving driver’s licenses to illegal aliens, along with welfare, housing, and other benefits.

Many of the illegal migrants hop off the bus in more desirable conservative regions along the way, like Tennessee, if they get a chance. But officials there do not want the illegals either, and ask Abbott to keep the migrants on the buses until their destination of the Big Apple.

Chad Wolf, the former acting Homeland Security Secretary, pointed out that Biden’s catch-and-release approach to illegal aliens is illegal. Wolf observes that Biden destroys incentives for lawful immigration now that one “can simply walk across the border in the middle of the desert and be allowed to stay in the United States.”

As declared by 19 state attorneys general in their amicus brief filed with the Supreme Court in U.S. v. Texas, “In the last 17 months, the volume of unlawful immigration has soared to levels unseen in the United States in decades – and, quite likely, ever. So too have the resulting burdens placed on the States.”

They add that “the current situation at the U.S.-Mexico border is an unmitigated disaster. The number of illegal crossings per month is at levels unseen in at least a generation.”

When referring to Republicans, Democrats talk about how no one is above law, yet Biden has acted unlawfully in letting illegal aliens in. He improperly set aside Trump Guidelines that blocked the unlawful border crossings by migrants.

New York City’s “Adams talked the talk about being a sanctuary city, welcoming illegal immigrants into the Big Apple with warm hospitality,” Texas Gov. Abbott points out. “Talk is cheap. When pressed into fulfilling such ill-considered policies, he wants to condemn anyone who is pressing him to walk the walk.”

“I hope he follows through on his promise of welcoming all migrants with open arms so that our overrun and overwhelmed border towns can find relief,” Gov. Abbott adds with a touch of humor. El Paso, a border city in Texas that prided itself as an Ellis Island of the southwest, is fully on board with Abbott now also.

New York City is flush with wealthy companies, many of the world’s richest people, and pompous politicians who promote its status as a sanctuary city. Yet it is reportedly straining under the influx of merely a tiny percentage of the illegals whom Biden is allowing to flood Texas, Arizona, and elsewhere.

Javier Villalobos, the Republican mayor of McAllen, Texas, observes about managing the illegals: “If we can do that, they can too. I know they can do it,” referring to New York City as it receives a relatively small handful of the overall total.

Biden halted work on President Trump’s border wall, and repealed Trump’s good “Remain in Mexico” policy. Biden deserves all the blame for this crisis.

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.

Court of Appeals Should Halt Anti-GOP Prosecutions

The Phyllis Schlafly Report
By John and Andy Schlafly

Liberal county prosecutors in heavily Democrat Fulton County, Georgia, are terrorizing a U.S. Senator, Lindsey Graham (R-SC), and the former U.S. Attorney and Time Man of the Year, Rudy Giuliani. The ultimate target of this politicized investigation is, of course, Donald Trump.

We are within 90 days of the midterm elections, when Department of Justice policy prohibits this kind of political mischief by prosecutors. Last week unhinged county prosecutors tracked down another Trump attorney, Jenna Ellis who resides in Colorado, and are forcing her to testify as they try to get at Trump.

To liberals, criticizing election fraud is a crime, and the heavily Democrat grand jury will recommend any indictments requested. Every Republican connected with Donald Trump who criticized the last election is at risk of being indicted by such Democrats, in violation of their constitutional right to speak out.

For a year-and-a-half no evidence of any crimes by these Republicans has surfaced, but as the midterm elections approach liberals rush for indictments. Last week the news was that Rudy Giuliani, Mr. Law and Order himself, is a target of the investigation.

The goal of this weaponized prosecution is two-fold. First, Democrats want something to swing the polls in order to hold onto their bare majority in the U.S. House, and second, Democrats want to make sure that no one dares question their fraud-prone elections ever again.

Billionaire Leftist George Soros, who has invested heavily in supporting radical prosecutors nationwide, must be giggling with delight. He may have found a way to turn the country blue with baseless prosecutions generating a stream of scandalous headlines against Republicans.

Sen. Graham was doing his job when he made inquiries about the reported unusual election results in Georgia in 2020, where signatures were never verified on hundreds of thousands of mail-in ballots. It is a constitutional right for all Americans to question and criticize elections, yet some liberals want to turn that into some kind of crime.

Sen. Graham should not have to answer intrusive questions under oath from a political opponent in a dusty county courtroom in Georgia, about legitimate inquiries he made concerning the election results more than a year-and-a-half ago. For liberals to spawn national biased headlines by making this an issue on the eve of the midterm elections is doubly wrong.

Sen. Graham appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit to defend his senatorial privilege under the Speech and Debate Clause. Incredibly, that court is allowing the circus in Fulton County to continue, although it temporarily delayed the process until the scope of questioning is narrowed.

Republicans should not have to answer questions by a partisan Democrat prosecutor about why and how they questioned a reported election result. No Republican is accused of fabricating votes, so there is no crime to be asked questions about.

The chilling of the First Amendment right to criticize election fraud is what Democrats want. Only a federal appellate court might stop their interference with the midterm elections.

Fulton County is overwhelmingly Democrat and it is impossible for a Republican to obtain a fair grand jury or trial there. The Georgia legislature recognized last year the likelihood of fraud in that county, and its election reform bill permits state intervention in county elections.

A retired federal judge is serving as the state election board chairman, and he said at its first board meeting that “accountability and knowing that there are people watching the processes and making sure that they are trustworthy ... that’s what we want and what the citizens want.” But that cannot happen if any Republican who criticizes the process gets harassed before a Democrat grand jury.

A Georgia state court judge shut down an attempt by the partisan prosecutor to haul a state legislator before the grand jury for hostile questioning under oath, after the revelation that the prosecutor hosted a fundraiser for his opponent. The court order prohibits the county prosecutor, Fani Willis, from publicly claiming that the legislator is a subject of the grand jury’s investigation.

After the Eleventh Circuit paused the attempt to question Sen. Graham, the Obama-appointed district judge gave him until only 9 a.m. on Wednesday to file a motion to explain how he wants the court to limit the scope of questioning. But no U.S. Senator should be subjected to any questioning by a county prosecutor of the opposing party on the eve of an election, or be put at risk of a politically motivated indictment.

The Supreme Court did not defer to a partisan recount of the 2000 presidential election in Florida, and unhinged Democrats in Georgia deserve no deference now. Their partisan attempt to interfere with the midterm elections should be stopped immediately by federal courts.

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.