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Angie’s List Cancels $40 Million 1000 Jobs Indiana Expansion Over Anti-Gay ‘Religious Freedom’ Law

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Popular local business review and search site Angie’s List is canceling its expansion plans in response to Indiana’s “religious freedom” law.

Since the year after its 1995 founding, Angie’s List has been headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana. The $315 million corporation which lets users review local businesses, especially home improvement professionals, has been planning a $40 million renovation of its own, moving its headquarters across town and adding 1000 new jobs over five years.

But thanks to state lawmakers and Republican Governor Mike Pence‘s new Indiana Religious Freedom Restoration Act, those expansion plans have been canceled.

“Angie’s List is open to all and discriminates against none and we are hugely disappointed in what this bill represents,” CEO Bill Oesterle said in a statement today, adding, the expansion is “on hold until we fully understand the implications of the freedom restoration act on our employees, both current and future.”

UPDATE: 
How’s This For Proof Mike Pence Is Lying When He Says His Anti-Gay Bill Isn’t About Discrimination?

The company’s statement noted it “will begin reviewing alternatives for the expansion of its headquarters immediately.”

The IndyStar adds that Angie’s list “hinted that moving some parts of the company out of state is ‘on the table.'”

Oesterle has said in the past that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, signed Thursday by Gov. Mike Pence, was non-inclusive and would make it harder for the state’s companies to attract top talent.

Oesterle is well known in Republican and business circles, and he was former Gov. Mitch Daniels’ campaign manager in 2004.

The decision by Angie’s List to pull back its investment in Indiana is part of a huge and growing negative response from businesses and other financial interests across the country that do business or are based in Indiana, and other public individuals and entities, including the world’s largest and most-respected corporation, Apple, Inc., the City of San Francisco, the White House, Broadway’s Audra McDonald, $4 billion software firm Salesforce, $50 million annual gaming convention Gen Con, Fortune 500 member Cummins, Eskenazi Health, Eli Lilly and Co., Yelp, Hillary Clinton, George Takei, Pat McAfee, Jason Collins, Ashton Kutcher, Miley Cyrus, James Van Der Beek, Sophia Bush, Dustin Lance Black, Mara Wilson, Jack Antonoff, the Mayor of Indianapolis, and the State of Indiana’s own tourism board.

 

Image by WFIU Public Radio via Flickr and a CC license
Hat Tip: TJ

 

 

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News

Trump Blasted Federal Prosecutors as ‘Weak’ for Not Targeting His Adversaries: Report

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President Donald Trump last week reportedly blasted a group of dozens of U.S. Attorneys for what he viewed as a lack of urgency in pursuing his political adversaries.

The federal prosecutors had traveled to the White House for a photo shoot, The Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday, but after Attorney General Pam Bondi introduced them to the president, “Trump criticized them as ineffective, saying the group was making it difficult for Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche to do their jobs.”

The exchange between Trump and the U.S. Attorneys “came a day before federal prosecutors sent grand jury subpoenas to the Federal Reserve on Friday, related to Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell’s testimony last summer about the central bank’s building-renovation project.”

READ MORE: Trump Declares Grocery Prices ‘Rapidly Down’ as Cost of Food Surges to 3-Year High

Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, was in attendance at the White House event, the Journal reported. The subpoenas reportedly were sought by prosecutors in her office.

One of Trump’s complaints to the U.S. Attorneys was that they were not acting fast enough and had yet to bring a case against U.S. Senator Adam Schiff (D-CA), a top Trump adversary.

The DOJ reportedly has been examining whether Schiff engaged in mortgage fraud, which has become a common allegation against other Trump critics, including New York Attorney General Letitia James. That case was dismissed, and subsequent grand juries have refused to indict her.

“The president criticized some specific prosecutors by jurisdiction and said he felt betrayed,” the Journal added.

On Monday, Pirro appeared to be quickly backtracking in her office’s investigation of Powell. The Federal Reserve Chairman announced on Sunday that he was being investigated by the Trump Department of Justice, sending markets — and prominent Republicans — spinning.

The Daily Beast reported that Pirro’s investigation is “an inquiry that even Republican lawmakers have blasted as a revenge plot against one of the president’s adversaries that threatens the independence of America’s central bank.”

READ MORE: Warning Signs Flash for GOP as CNN Analyst Predicts House Flip

 

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Trump Declares Grocery Prices ‘Rapidly Down’ as Cost of Food Surges to 3-Year High

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The price of food in grocery stores and restaurants surged to a three-year high last month, even as President Donald Trump on Tuesday insisted he had “defeated” inflation during what he described as “the greatest first year in history” of any president.

“Grocery prices are starting to go rapidly down,” Trump told an audience in Detroit on Tuesday. CNN’s Daniel Dale noted Trump made the claim “on the same day new Consumer Price Index data shows December had the biggest one-month spike in grocery prices, 0.7%, in more than three years.”

Despite the president’s claims, Axios reported that the cost of food in grocery stores rose “roughly 2.4% in December compared to the prior year.”

READ MORE: Warning Signs Flash for GOP as CNN Analyst Predicts House Flip

“But that masks double-digit price increases for a slew of household staples over the past 12 months, including coffee (+20%), beef (+16%) and candy (+10%).”

Delivering his speech on affordability — which as recently as last month he declared a “hoax” — Trump said on Tuesday, “Under our administration, growth is exploding, productivity is soaring, investment is booming, incomes are rising, inflation is defeated, America is respected again, like never before.”

On tariffs, which experts say could increase prices for American families by nearly $5,000 annually and push nearly one million Americans into poverty, Trump pushed back.

“The evidence shows overwhelmingly that the tariffs are not paid by American consumers,” he said, a claim not supported by experts.

The White House on Monday said that Trump has been “laser-focused on making America affordable” since taking office. Just one month ago, President Trump called affordability a “hoax” perpetrated by Democrats.

READ MORE: ‘Organized Gangs of Wine Moms’ Are Impeding Federal Agents Says Fox Columnist

 

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Warning Signs Flash for GOP as CNN Analyst Predicts House Flip

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As Republicans continue their exodus from the House, a CNN analyst reveals that Democrats hold an advantage in party identification over the GOP, Democrats identifying as liberal just hit a 50-year high, and Democrats — he predicts — will take back the House in the November midterm elections.

CNN analyst Harry Enten reported that “the self identified liberalness of this country is at a 50-year high.” And he noted that “more folks are identifying as liberal than at any point since the Gerald Ford administration.”

In 1976, 30 percent of Democrats said they were liberal, Enten said.

“Look at where we are today: 59 percent — 3 in 5 Democrats — say they are liberal.”

READ MORE: Trump ‘Laser-Focused’ on Affordability Says White House After Calling It a ‘Hoax’

“This Democratic party is a liberal — it is a liberal party. Fifty-nine percent of Democrats now identify as liberal,” he continued. “That is also a 50-year high.”

Enten noted that “that is not the only good news for liberals.”

“The party ID margin, Democrats versus Republicans. Now get this, in the latest reading according to Gallup last quarter, it is an eight-point advantage for Democrats.”

“That looks nothing like what we saw going into the 2022 midterms when Republicans had a five-point advantage, and of course, took back the House. This is even better than what we saw Democrats had back in 2017, in quarter four, when they had a six-point advantage, and, of course, Democrats easily took back the House then.”

READ MORE: Pirro Backtracks as Powell Investigation Rapidly Goes Off the Rails

“Democrats are gonna take back the House,” he said.

Enten also pointed to the prediction markets, which now say there is a 77 percent chance of Democrats taking back the House in November.

READ MORE: ‘Organized Gangs of Wine Moms’ Are Impeding Federal Agents Says Fox Columnist

 

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