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Huckabee To Lesbian Mayor: Keep Your ‘Filthy Gov’t. Hands’ And ‘Gestapo Actions’ Off Churches

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Probable GOP presidential candidate Mike Huckabee spent the weekend attacking Houston Mayor Annise Parker, and didn’t mince a single word.

In repeated and stunning attacks on Houston Mayor Annise Parker, Mike Huckabee spent the weekend positioning himself as the defender of religious freedom in America. The former Arkansas governor has been at the top of nearly every poll of likely GOP presidential candidates this year, thanks no doubt to his not infrequent attacks on the LGBT community and his consistent “religious liberty” flag-waving. 

(By the way, Clinton consistently beats Huckabee by an average of nearly 10 percentage points.)

Thursday morning, Huckabee, the host of the Fox News show that bears his name, appeared on “Fox & Friends” to slay the great Democratic, fire-breathing Parker dragon. 

On Thursday evening, Huckabee visited with Fox News Business anchor Lou Dobbs and unleashed his fury and outrage over the city of Houston issuing subpoenas to a handful of local pastors. Pastors in Houston have been exceptionally active in attempting to derail HERO, the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance, which finally passed in May. The City issued subpoenas to just five pastors, requesting communications with their congregations, emails, and yes, sermons, surrounding Houston’s attempts to pass an anti-discrimination bill, and their subsequent efforts to place the law on there November ballot via a petition drive in which nearly two-thirds of the signatures gathered were invalid.

Why did the pastors get subpoenaed?

“All officials want to know is what kinds of instructions the pastors gave out with respect to collecting petition signatures, and whether what they said agrees with what they’re arguing in court while appealing the referendum,” New York Magazine succinctly explains.

But Huckabee charges Mayor Parker with trying “to stop speech, stop religion, stop the free assembly” by issuing the subpoenas. Of course, subpoenaing documents is not an attempt “to stop speech, stop religion, stop the free assembly,” and subpoenas are issued every day in America as a means to obtain information and evidence. It’s an integral part of the legal system, not an assault on the First amendment.

“I would say, ‘Earth to Mayor, there’s something called the First Amendment,'” Huckabee quipped. 

And that’s where Huckabee’s comments took a decided turn into Falsehood Land.

An ordained Southern Baptist minister himself, Huckabee strongly suggested that Mayor Parker was telling pastors what they can and cannot say from the pulpit — which of course she never did. “You don’t get to run the churches of your city,” Huckabee insisted.

“Separation of church and state has never meant that the church is to shut up, be still, and go away,” he clamored.

And then Huckabee got even more heated.

Calling the subpoenas “an unbelievable outrage,” the church, Huckabee insisted, should “say to the government, ‘Keep your filthy government hands off of religious liberty.”

Mayor Parker has been a favorite target of Huckabee’s for years. In May, he slammed Parker’s Equal Rights Ordinance on Facebook. In 2011 he attacked her for wanting churches to be included in paying a nominal tax for a street and drainage improvement program. And Media Matters has detailed Huckabee’s repeated attacks on non-discrimination ordinances around the country.

Dobbs disgustingly claimed that it was “pertinent” to point out that “the mayor of Houston is the first openly-gay mayor to serve in that office.” 

Actually, Mayor Parker being a lesbian has nothing to do with the lawsuit, as much as Fox News would like to presume.

Dobbs then wrongly characterized the non-discrimination ordinance as “very restrictive of those who would express an opinion about the LGBT community.”

Houston’s Equal Rights Ordinance (full text) protects against discrimination in employment, public accommodations, and housing. 

Speech has nothing to do with the ordinance, as much as Lou Dobbs might like his audience to believe.

Huckabee vented his outrage from morning to night on Thursday.

Meanwhile, on Friday the City of Houston removed the request for sermons from the subpoenas.

But on his Fox News “Huckabee” show on Saturday, the likely Republican presidential candidate went one step further.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYdNBahWrmw

Totally ignoring the fact that Houston amended the subpoenas to exclude sermons, Huckabee continued to drive deep into Falsehood Land.

“Should the government demand that pastors hand over their sermons, sermon notes and even correspondence with their members?,” Huckabee asked as an opener to his Fox News show. “Sure it happens in North Korea, China and Iran, but should churches in America just sit back and shut up when their religious liberty, free speech, freedom of assembly and freedom of religion is directly threatened?”

What ever happened to “thou shalt not bear false witness“?

“The Houston mayor and her ilk, like mayors in Chicago and Boston who tried to prevent businesses opening in their cities because the business owners were Bible-believing Christians, well, she needs to apologize, start respecting all citizens, or at least have the integrity to resign,” Huckabee continued.

“They shouldn’t expect the taxpayers to fund their hate-filled, Gestapo-like actions to openly attempt to shut down the free exercise of religion and their attempt to establish a religion of godless secularism.”

Oh dear God.

 

 

Image: Screenshot via Fox News

 

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‘They’re Coming After Our Children’: Watch Casey DeSantis’ Dystopian Fear-Mongering Ad

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The imagery is dark. The words are defiant. The message is dystopian. An ad for Republican Governor Ron DeSantis‘s presidential campaign, currently “in turmoil,” features the First Lady of Florida, Casey DeSantis, issuing a warning: “They’re coming after our children.”

The ad never quite says who is coming after the kids, but the video (below) includes clips of President Joe Biden and former Dr. Anthony Fauci, the face of the war on COVID and the now-retired Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

While it was first released over the summer, it received little attention. Casey DeSantis on Friday reposted her “Mamas for DeSantis” ad. It comes in the wake of the alleged ménage à trois sex scandal involving an unnamed woman who has accused Christian Ziegler, the head of the Florida Republican Party of rape. His wife, Moms for Liberty co-founder Bridget Ziegler, who reportedly confirmed the consensual three-way sexual relationship, is Casey DeSantis’ “best friend,” according to Florida Politics publisher Peter Schorsch.

“In America, we’ve witnessed a lot and put up with enough,” Casey DeSantis says in a voiceover at the start of the two-and-a-half minute video.

“We’ve been forced into silence,” she charges, amid a baby crying and a COVID mask being put over a child’s face. “Into compliance.”

“Told that we must ‘trust the science,'” DeSantis continues, in a direct attack on Dr. Fauci, showing him speaking during the height of COVID in the Trump administration.

READ MORE: ‘Significant and Imminent Threat’: Trump Gag Order Largely Upheld by Appeals Court

And in an attack on LGBTQ children and adults, she says: “We’ve been told that we must deny truth. Back down. And look the other way.”

“Enough is enough. When you come after our kids, we fight back. Because there’s nothing we won’t do to protect our children,” she says.

Seconds later, the video shows President Joe Biden declaring, “Our nation’s children are all our children.”

“We will not allow you to exploit their innocence to advance your agenda. We are no longer silent,” Casey DeSantis declares. “We are united. We have finally found our fighter.”

Casey DeSantis praises her husband, saying he will do for America what he did for Florida: “Schools: opened. Parents’ rights: defended. School choice: universal. Critical race theory: prohibited. DEI: stopped. Child mutilation: illegal. Girls’ sports: saved. Communities: protected. Our economy: growing. And freedom: guaranteed.”

READ MORE: ‘Dystopian’: Potential Trump Cabinet Picks Send ‘5-Alarm’ Shock Waves of Terror

In the section where President Biden says, “Our nation’s children are all our children,” Casey DeSantis doesn’t explain that those words came from a White House celebration honoring Teachers of The Year from across the country. The President was praising an Oklahoma Teacher of the Year whose district includes students who speak 62 different languages, so she had to work hard to ensure everyone felt included. She had said, “There’s no such thing as someone else’s child.”

Nor did DeSantis acknowledge that Governor DeSantis’ performance for children has been poor.

The Florida Policy Institute, which says it is “an independent, non-partisan, and non-profit organization,” in September warned “368,728 youth aged 20 and younger” have been cut from Medicaid. “Because Florida has not expanded Medicaid, the vast majority of those losing insurance during this time have been children, parents, young adults, and new mothers.”

Florida ranks 35th in child well-being (with 1 being the best), according WUSF, citing the Kids Count Databook from the Annie E. Casey Foundation.

Some critics on social media blasted Casey DeSantis’ remarks.

“Republicans refused to extend child tax credits that pulled 2 million children out of poverty. They resist the idea of free school lunches. Yet they come up with bullshit about their opponents ‘coming after our children.’ Yes, we’re coming after them, to give them a sandwich,” wrote former Chicago Tribune editor Mark Jacob.

READ MORE: Jobs Report Forces Fox News to Admit Biden Economy ‘A Lot Stronger Than Anybody Understands’

Watch the Casey DeSantis video below or at this link.

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‘Significant and Imminent Threat’: Trump Gag Order Largely Upheld by Appeals Court

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A Washington, D.C. federal appeals court Friday afternoon largely upheld and reinstated U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan’s very narrow and limited gag order on Donald Trump for his trial on charges related to his alleged efforts to subvert the U.S. Constitution and overturn the results of the 2020 election.

“We agree with the district court that some aspects of Mr. Trump’s public statements pose a significant and imminent threat to the fair and orderly adjudication of the ongoing criminal proceeding, warranting a speech-constraining protective order,” reads Judge Patricia Millett unanimous three-judge panel ruling, posted by Lawfare’s Anna Bower. “The district court’s order, however, sweeps in more protected speech than is necessary. For that reason, we affirm the district court’s order in part and vacate it in part.”

The judges upheld the gag order “to the extent it prohibits all parties and their counsel from making or directing others to make public statements about known or reasonably foreseeable witnesses concerning their potential participation in the investigation or in this criminal proceeding.”

READ MORE: Jobs Report Forces Fox News to Admit Biden Economy ‘A Lot Stronger Than Anybody Understands’

They also upheld the gag order “to the extent it prohibits all parties and their counsel from making or directing others to make public statements about (1) counsel in the case other than the Special Counsel, (2) members of the court’s staff and counsel’s staffs, or (3) the family members of any counsel or staff member—if those statements are made with the intent to materially interfere with, or to cause others to materially interfere with, counsel’s or staff’s work in this criminal case, or with the knowledge that such interference is highly likely to result.”

The judges removed from the gag order “speech beyond those specified categories.”

“We do not allow such an order lightly,” the judges added. “But Mr. Trump is also an indicted criminal defendant, and he must stand trial in a courtroom under the same procedures that govern all other criminal defendants.”

Bower explains, “Chutkan’s order would have prohibited statements that refer to special counsel Jack Smith as a ‘thug’ or ‘deranged.’ But the appeals court order does not apply to speech about the special counsel himself.”

CBS News congressional correspondent Scott MacFarlane sums up the ruling: “Much of the gag order in Donald Trump’s 2020 election conspiracy criminal case in DC is *REINSTATED*.”

READ MORE: Peter Doocy Admits No ‘Concrete Evidence Joe Biden Personally Profited’ From Hunter’s Business

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Peter Doocy Admits No ‘Concrete Evidence Joe Biden Personally Profited’ From Hunter’s Business

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In a report focused on House Republicans’ plan to vote on a resolution to open an official impeachment inquiry of President Joe Biden, Fox News White House correspondent Peter Doocy told viewers there is no evidence of impeachable offenses.

“The House Oversight Committee has been at this for years, and they have so far not been able to provide any concrete evidence that Joe Biden personally profited from his son Hunter’s overseas business but they are going to try again with this impeachment inquiry set to start next week,” Doocy, who often criticizes President Biden in White House press briefings, said Friday on Fox News Business.

Other news outlets this week have also stressed Republicans have come up empty-handed.

The right-leaning news outlet The Hill, reporting on the resolution Thursday, noted Republicans’ current investigation “has struggled to connect President Biden to the activities of his son, and they’ve failed to prove their most salacious allegation — and the one that would be most key for impeachment: that the president accepted a bribe.”

READ MORE: Jobs Report Forces Fox News to Admit Biden Economy ‘A Lot Stronger Than Anybody Understands’

One of the main pillars of Republicans’ allegations against President Biden, the “narrative that President Biden pushed Ukraine to fire its prosecutor to help his son, who served on the board of Ukrainian energy company Burimsa, has largely been refuted,” The Hill also reported.

“Republicans have engaged in wide-ranging inquiry into Mr. Biden for months,” The New York Times reported Tuesday, “hunting for evidence to back up their allegations that he corruptly profited from his family members’ overseas business dealings and accepted bribes. To date, they have failed to deliver compelling evidence to back up their boldest claims.”

Watch Doocy below or at this link.

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