Declarations of Truth
Politics • Culture • News
Tariffs, trade, and taxes
April 03, 2025
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Yesterday President Donald J. Trump implemented a sweeping regime of reciprocal and baseline tariffs with all America’s trading partners. Or rather, with the countries who have willingly sold America many more goods and services than they have bought, and in the process racked up an untold amount of “receivables.” When a seller lets you rack up a high tab and never duns you, you must ask why. Donald Trump said America will stop running up the tab. That has “free trade” sophists of all stripes crying “Foul!” Now is another reason to ask why, and to rebut the most common free-trade arguments.

What Trump has done on tariffs

Yesterday Donald Trump proclaimed “Liberation Day” – liberation, that is, from going ever deeper into trade debt. He announced a ten-percent baseline tariff with all trading partners, beginning this Saturday (April 5). Furthermore, he imposed “reciprocal tariffs” on countries who charge greater than ten percent.

Not one country on earth, other than the United States today, charges less than a ten percent baseline tariff. To show this, Trump posted to Truth Social a four-part table, in image form, showing:

  1. Tariffs charged to the USA, and

  2. New baseline and “discounted reciprocal” tariffs the USA will now start charging.

https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/114270396482753269

https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/114270397111664712

https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/114270397827085442

https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/114270398531479278

Again, every country charges a baseline tariff of ten percent, at least. Israel, at the time Trump made his posters, charged a 33 percent total tariff. The highest tariffs are for sales into the former French Indochina, especially Cambodia, which charges the highest tariffs. The Trump tariffs are ten percent, or half the total tariff any given country charges, whichever is higher. (Trump will charge Canada the baseline tariff only, regardless of reciprocal tariffs. Already Doug Ford, Prime Minister of Ontario Province, announced his proposal to eliminate all tariffs on both sides. But he lacks the authority to promise that.)

Rollbacks, etc.

Before day’s end, several countries had already announced rollbacks of their tariffs, in direct response or anticipation. Israel specifically announced cancellation of any remaining tariffs on U.S. imports. India has already begun negotiating a new regime to reduce their current tariffs. Switzerland has now eliminated tariffs on 99 percent of U.S. goods.

But the U.S. Senate seems to have broken with the Trump administration regarding the charging of any tariffs to Canada. The Senate passed a resolution in opposition to the tariffs – and four Republicans joined all Democrats to support that resolution. They are Senators:

  • Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.),

  • Rand Paul (R-Ky.),

  • Susan Collins (R-Maine), and

  • Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska).

Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) proposed the resolution, which no one expects to pass the House. Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kansas) did not vote on the resolution; why he missed that vote is unclear.

McConnell, Collins, and Murkowski all have reputations as spiteful opponents of Trump and everything he does or stands for. But Rand Paul, unlike the other three, has some principled grounds for opposition, however misguided. Like all libertarians, he believes that tariffs are inherently inimical to human liberty. Furthermore, if one country imposes a tariff on another, it does nothing except to deny purchase opportunities to its own citizens, subjects, or lawful residents. Libertarians simply do not recognize any national economic or even strategic interest. “Unilateral economic disarmament” has always been the libertarian by-word regarding international trade.

Trump offers an explanation

In announcing his new tariffs, Trump offered an explanation that went back to the first century of American history. (Source: Fox News.) From the Inauguration of President George Washington to the first year of Woodrow Wilson, tariffs financed the federal government.

From 1789 to 1913, we were a tariff-backed nation. And the United States was proportionately the wealthiest it has ever been. So wealthy, in fact, that in the 1880s they established a commission to decide what they were going to do with the vast sums of money they were collecting. We were collecting so much money so fast, we didn’t know what to do with it. Isn’t that a nice problem to have?

But in 1910, a group of wealthy bankers met at Jekyll Island, which was the Martha’s Vineyard of its day. This claque invented the Federal Reserve Banking System. Since then, Americans have used debt, not precious metals, to settle their own debt. Also in that year, the States ratified (maybe) Amendment XVI – the income tax.

In his announcement, Trump expanded on his notion of “liberation” from a one-sided trade regime:

American steel workers, auto workers, farmers and skilled craftsmen – [of which] we have a lot … here with us today, [have] really suffered, gravely. They watched in anguish as foreign leaders have stolen our jobs, foreign cheaters have ransacked our factories, and foreign scavengers have torn apart our once-beautiful American dream. We had an American dream that you don't hear so much about. You did four years ago, and you are now. But you don't too often.
Now it’s our turn to prosper, and in so doing, use trillions and trillions of dollars to reduce our taxes and pay down our national debt. And it will all happen very quickly. With today’s action, we are finally going to be able to make America great again, greater than ever before. Jobs and factories will come roaring back into our country, and you see it happening already. We will supercharge our domestic industrial base.

Trump further explained how he calculates the total tariff burden. It includes not only direct monetary tariffs but also regulatory and other barriers to market entry.

For decades, the United States slashed trade barriers on other countries, while those nations placed massive tariffs on our products and created outrageous non-monetary barriers to decimate our industries. And in many cases, the non-monetary barriers were worse than the monetary ones. They manipulated their currencies, subsidized their exports, stole our intellectual property, imposed exorbitant taxes to disadvantage our products, adopted unfair rules and technical standards, and created filthy pollution havens.

That last touches on a supreme irony of the tariff debate. For decades, the same Democrats who now complain about the tariffs, complained about other countries’ inattention to the natural environment, as well as the slave wages most employers in these countries paid their labor force. “Filthy pollution havens” doesn’t half say it in many cases.

Finally Trump reminded everyone of the simple way to avoid tariffs: build manufacturing capacity in America. Elon Musk’s Tesla does just that: builds factories in, or close to, the markets into which they wish to sell.

The case for tariffs

Aside from Sen. Paul, Erick-Woods Erickson makes the typical case for “free trade.” He starts with the observation that the Standard and Poor’s 500 index lost nine percent of its valuation from late February to the present. That could reflect the beginnings of Trump’s aggressive trade policy – but Erickson does not substantiate that. Besides, Trump announced his new policies after the stock markets closed.

Then he asserts without warrant that:

A trade deficit is … not actually a bad thing, and more often than not, countries running trade deficits are those that are wealthier and healthier economically.

He cites Vietnam as an example. Labor and production costs in Vietnam are lower, he says, because the country is poor. So making things “over there” is cheaper. Therefore, all other things being equal, Americans might prefer to buy cheaper goods.

But many of those same Americans are out of jobs because someone is buying clothing and other goods from Vietnam. How are Americans supposed to be able to afford anything if they can’t work?

Nor is Vietnam the only example. In fact, America has a net trade deficit with all the rest of the world. An individual who “runs a trade deficit” with everyone else in the economy, is a spendthrift, or a deadbeat. If his surpluses with some do not balance his deficits with others, he is spending money. Such accounting applies equally to nation-states as to individuals. Any suggestion to the contrary, constitutes magical thinking – or a pack of lies.

Finally, if you doubt the existence of non-tariff barriers, the U.S. Trade Representative dropped an eleven-post thread explaining them.

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569779503689792

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569781764464834

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569783312155084

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569785074016595

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569786839617560

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569788404007154

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569789997908041

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569791633858606

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569793353351416

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569795085594845

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569796528365867

Rebuttals to the case against tariffs

Erickson tries in vain to make a case against the Trump policy. To begin with:

We are told an American business can now and should build a manufacturing base in the United States. However, these businesses do not know how long the tariffs will last, and, in the worst-case scenario, they could end in four years with a new president. So do you think they want to invest the capital in new factories with higher labor costs that won’t be finalized for more than four years in the United States when the tariffs could go away within four years?

What prospect have the Democrats to take back the White House in four years?

Never underestimate the predilections of the winning political party fixing the problems of the losing political party. Trump’s tariffs have given the Democrats an economic message that silences their cultural activists and elevates their economic pragmatists.

Oh, really? Last CNAV heard, their cultural activists are still screaming bloody murder. Susan Crawford won her Justicial election in Wisconsin by campaigning as The Abortion Justice. Democrats are still

the party of illegal aliens, … murderers[, violators of women,] and gang members in [law-abiding Americans’] communities.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas)

If Erick-Woods Erickson seriously expects the Democrats to stop advocating for illegal aliens, he should lower his expectations. Those aliens are how they stole seats in the House from red States and hope to flip those red States.

Every single developed nation on planet earth has a baseline tariff of less than 10%, and most of those nations, contrary to what you might believe, exempt the United States from paying tariffs due to trade agreements Trump just scuttled.

That’s a lie, as Donald Trump demonstrated with his posters.

Israel not only has a free trade agreement with the United States, which means virtually every American good has no tariff, but it also scrapped the few remaining tariffs with the United States. Nonetheless, it will be hit with a 17% tariff, and some Trump officials, on background this afternoon, slandered the Israelis as intellectual property thieves to justify the tariffs.

That’s what negotiations are for. CNAV will not comment on an accusation that appears only in Mr. Erickson’s article.

Essentially, they took a country's trade deficit with us as a numerator in an equation with the denominator being that nation’s exports to the United States, then multiplied by 100.

That’s another lie. Trump clearly outlined the basis of his calculations, and that is not it.

Then there is Australia. We run a trade surplus with Australia because Australia does not have a massive manufacturing base but is very wealthy, so it can afford American imports. Nonetheless, Trump is imposing a 10% tariff on Australian imports, claiming Australia, which has a free trade agreement with us, imposes a tariff on us. That is not true.

Where are your links, Mr. Erickson? And that last accusation is very rich coming from a columnist who has told two lies already.

Many American manufacturers moved their businesses to places like Vietnam, which are actually not pro-China. Now, Trump is smacking these countries, Taiwan included, with steep, steep tariffs. In addition to hurting those economies, he risks driving many of them towards China.

Mr. Erickson knows better than that. Those manufacturers have an obvious alternative: come back home. In fact, Taiwan Semiconductor has already announced plans to build new plant in the United States.

Roughly 50% of the vehicles sold in this country under $40,000.00 are imports, and that, too, will hit the working class.

All in good time. We will rebuild our manufacturing base. Ask the President of the United Auto Workers’ Union.

Worse, this will most likely lead to a recession.

No, it won’t. Not when Americans get back the jobs the free-trade sophists gave away.

Summing up

In sum, President Trump makes an ironclad case for his economic nationalism in the form of tariffs. The case against them begins with magical thinking and continues with outright lying and dissembling.

America will now stop being the spendthrift and deadbeat nation in the world. So the elites, who wanted all along to take America down with a big delayed dun, will have to find another way.

Link to:

The article:

https://cnav.news/2025/04/03/news/tariffs-trade-taxes/

Video:

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Tariff announcement, reactions, and repercussions:

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2025/04/trump-unleashes-10-baseline-tariff-all-u-s/

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2025/04/winning-trumps-reciprocal-tariffs-trigger-global-response-multiple/

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-finmin-seeks-immediate-end-remaining-tariffs-us-imports-2025-04-01/

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/business/india-business/india-us-trade-deal-modi-government-eyes-tariff-cuts-on-more-than-half-of-us-imports-worth-23-billion-says-report/articleshow/119473879.cms

https://www.reuters.com/world/swiss-minister-stresses-countrys-contribution-us-avoid-trump-tariffs-2025-03-23/

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2025/04/breaking-senate-votes-sabotage-president-trumps-canadian-tariff/



Trump’s Truths (posters of other countries’ tariffs):

https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/114270396482753269

https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/114270397111664712

https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/114270397827085442

https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/114270398531479278



Trump’s explanation:

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/trump-touts-return-american-dream-historic-tariff-announcement



U.S. Trade Representative’s thread:

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569779503689792

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569781764464834

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569783312155084

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569785074016595

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569786839617560

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569788404007154

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569789997908041

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569791633858606

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569793353351416

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569795085594845

https://x.com/USTradeRep/status/1907569796528365867



Declarations of Truth:

https://x.com/DecTruth



Declarations of Truth Locals Community:

https://declarationsoftruth.locals.com/



Conservative News and Views:

https://cnav.news/



Clixnet Media

https://clixnet.com/

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Birthright citizenship is headed to SCOTUS!

CBS News confirmed Friday (December 5) that the Supreme Court of the United States will revisit the birthright citizenship question. Four Justices, at least, have decided that the Court must reexamine an issue many thought the Court had settled. Their vote to grant review is the more remarkable, because panels in two Circuit Courts of Appeals both upheld the status quo on birthright citizenship. When the circuits don’t split, the Institutionalists are reluctant to move against them. Four Justices are ready to do so. The question now becomes, how can the Trump administration find a fifth Justice to agree with these four? And: can they do it without Congressional action?

Review of the birthright citizenship question

Once again, Amendment XIV Section 1 reads in relevant part:

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.

In U.S. v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649 (1898) the Supreme Court first broke the ground on this issue. Recall: never once, before this case, did Congress define what subjects a person to the jurisdiction of the United States. So the Supreme Court had to “wing it.” The Court held:

The question presented by the record is whether a child born in the United States, of parents of Chinese descent, who at the time of his birth are subjects of the emperor of China, but have a permanent domicile and residence in the United States, and are there carrying on business, and are not employed in any diplomatic or official capacity under the emperor of China, becomes at the time of his birth a citizen of the United States, by virtue of the first clause of the fourteenth amendment of the constitution.

After citing several features of English common law, the Court states:

For the reasons above stated, this court is of opinion that the question must be answered in the affirmative.

The English common law to which the Court referred, recognized jus soli – the Law of the Soil. By that rule, any child born on lands over which the king held dominion, became a subject of the king. That became the accepted practice in the original British colonies. When America won her independence, she continued the tradition. But she also recognized a tradition deriving from Roman law: jus sanguinis, the Law of the Blood. By that rule – as Emmerich de Vattel would articulate – a child inherits the citizenship of his parents.

Now if jus soli is absolute, a child born in one country to citizens of another, would have a choice. He might even hold dual citizenship by birth. For that reason, Vattel (The Law of Nations) held that only those born in a country, to citizens of that same country, should be considered “natural born citizens.” And for that reason, John Jay prevailed on his fellow Framers to make this kind of natural born citizenship a requirement for Presidential eligibility.

Whom is Trump trying to exclude?

Presidential eligibility is not at issue here. The issue involves children born to a set of parents, both of whom are:

  • Not lawfully present in the United States, or

  • Holders of temporary residence visas or tourist visas.

Accordingly, President Trump put forth his Executive Order Protecting the Meaning and Value of American Citizenship. His order declares that the following children would no longer enjoy birthright citizenship:

Among the categories of individuals born in the United States and not subject to the jurisdiction thereof, the privilege of United States citizenship does not automatically extend to persons born in the United States: (1) when that person’s mother was unlawfully present in the United States and the father was not a United States citizen or lawful permanent resident at the time of said person’s birth, or (2) when that person’s mother’s presence in the United States at the time of said person’s birth was lawful but temporary (such as, but not limited to, visiting the United States under the auspices of the Visa Waiver Program or visiting on a student, work, or tourist visa) and the father was not a United States citizen or lawful permanent resident at the time of said person’s birth.

This order does not apply to the children of lawful permanent residents. Thus the President must now ask the Supreme Court to distinguish the Wong case. Its basic holding can remain intact even if the Executive Order stands.

In addition, Rep. Brian Babin (R-Texas), on the day after the Inauguration, introduced the Birthright Citizenship Act of 2025. This Act (HR 569) would amend Title 8, U.S.C., Section 1401, by adding this definition of “subject to the jurisdiction”:

(b) DEFINITION .—Acknowledging the right of birthright citizenship established by section 1 of the 14th amendment to the Constitution, a person born in the United States shall be considered “subject to the jurisdiction” of the United States for purposes of subsection (a)(1) if the person is born in the United States of parents, one of whom is—
(1) a citizen or national of the United States;
(2) an alien lawfully admitted for permanent residence in the United States whose residence is in the United States; or
(3) an alien with lawful status under the immigration laws performing active service in the armed forces (as defined in section 101 of title 10, United States Code).

That bill has languished in the House Judiciary Committee to this day. So at present, that phrase subject to the jurisdiction has no definition. No doubt various District Courts consider that anyone with two feet on American soil is “subject to the jurisdiction of the United States,” unless he is:

  • An “immune” diplomat, or

  • A foreign military service member under a Status of Forces Agreeement with the United States.

Obviously the Trump administration disputes that.

Birthright citizenship in the courts

The minute Trump signed his Executive Order, the American Civil Liberties Union filed suit, at first in New Hampshire. Separately, eighteen Democratic State Attorneys General filed their own lawsuit. From their complaint:

The President has no authority to rewrite or nullify a constitutional amendment or duly enacted statute. Nor is he empowered by any other source of law to limit who receives United States citizenship at birth.

On January 23, Judge John C. Coughenour of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington State (Seattle Division) issued the first Temporary Restraining Order at issue. Four particular Attorneys General (of Washington, Oregon, Illinois and Arizona) brought this action. State of Washington v. Trump, 2:25-cv-00127. According to NewsNation, the judge became terrifically angry with the Justice Department attorneys for trying to defend the EO.

Trump vowed to appeal. Normally one does not appeal Temporary Restraining Orders, but Trump didn’t have to wait long. On February 6, Judge Coughenour issued a preliminary injunction, which is appealable. Trump did appeal. State of Washington, et al., v. Trump, et al., 25-807, in the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Judicial Circuit. Then a three-judge panel (William C. Canby, Milan D. Smith, and Danielle J. Forrest) voted 3-0 not to grant an emergency stay of Judge Coughenour’s injunction. In her concurrence, Judge Forrest agreed that emergency relief was not appropriate. But she encouraged the Court to expedite the hearing and oral argument process. She further observed that she and her colleagues constituted a motions panel, not the merits panel that alone could do the case justice.

Separately, a judge in the New Hampshire case has issued his own injunction. A similar injunction has come down in Massachusetts.

A new case in New Hampshire

Late in June 2025 the Supreme Court curtailed the use of “universal injunctions.” The Court held that, if the plaintiffs in the New Hampshire case wanted a universal injunction, they should file a class action. That ruling virtually destroyed the original New Hampshire case, but left the Washington case standing. (States can ask for universal injunctions, if they have Article III standing.)

So the American Civil Liberties Union filed a new case on behalf of five babies named Barbara, Susan, Sarah, Matthew and Mark. The case alleged harm from the denial of birthright citizenship and also asked for certification as a class. Barbara v. Trump, 1:25-cv-00244. The case came before the same judge (Joseph N. LaPlante) as the original New Hampshire case.

As before, Judge LaPlante issued a preliminary injunction against Trump’s EO. Because he now had a class action before him, the injunction stood. His order came down on July 10.

The Trump administration appealed on September 10 to the Court of Appeals for the First Circuit. Barbara v. Trump, docket 25-1861. But the administration didn’t wait for the Appeals Court to act. Instead they filed a petition for review-before-judgment with the Supreme Court on September 26. Three days later they filed for review in the Washington case.

The latest Supreme Court action

Now the Supreme Court has granted review in the Washington case and the new New Hampshire case. Trump v. Washington, 25-364, and Trump v. Barbara, 25-365.

D. John Sauer, Solicitor General of the United States, filed the petition on September 29, 2025. In his filing he cited 8 USC Section 1401, which states who are “nationals and citizens of the United States at birth.” Sauer bases his case on paragraph (a):

a person born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof.

8 USC 1401 does not define the phrase “subject to the jurisdiction thereof.” But paragraph (b) gives a clue:

a person born in the United States to a member of an Indian, Eskimo. Aleutian, or other aboriginal tribe: Provided, That the granting of citizenship under this subsection shall not in any manner impair or otherwise affect the right of such person to tribal or other property.

In modern parlance “Indian” means “Beringian” and “Eskimo” means “Inuit.” Such a person is subject to the regulatory reach of U.S. law. But if any Beringian, Inuit, or Aleut were subject to U.S. jurisdiction, why bother listing them separately?

Sauer goes on to say:

The Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment was adopted to grant citizenship to newly freed slaves and their children—not to the children of temporary visitors or illegal aliens.

Sauer cites two cases to back this up: Slaughter-house Cases, 16 Wall. 36, 71-74 (1873), and Elk v. Wilkins, 112 U.S. 94, 101 (1884). He acknowledged the Wong finding that children of lawful permanent residents were citizens. But he then said:

[L]ong after the Clause’s adoption, the mistaken view that birth on U.S. territory confers citizenship on anyone subject to the regulatory reach of U.S. law became pervasive, with destructive consequences… [I]n the 20th century, the Executive Branch came to misread the Clause as granting citizenship to nearly everyone born in the United States—even to children of temporarily present aliens or illegal aliens.

Judges Coughenour and LaPlante clearly believe that “subject to the jurisdiction” means “within regulatory reach.”

Scope of opinion on birthright citizenship

Happily, Sauer includes, as appendices to his petition, the full opinions of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, and of Judge Coughenour. (Sauer’s filing in the Barbara case contains only Judge LaPlante’s order; the First Circuit has not definitively acted.)

The Ninth Circuit opinion flatly repeats the error judges, and Presidents, have been making since the Sixties. Actually, error might be too charitable a word, especially as regards leftist judges – and the Presidents who appoint them. Lyndon Baines Johnson was certainly a loyal servant of the Deep State – or an opportunistic one. One might say of him, more accurately, that he thought he was the Deep State, the same as King Louis XIV of France thought he was the State itself.

In any event, LBJ is the first President to promote the absolutism of jus soli. Or he is the best candidate for that dubious distinction. Either way, the motives are plain: to replace the hard-working native-born demographics with a class of mendicants. Alexis de Tocqueville warned that our republic would fail when the people discovered they could vote themselves government largesse. But even he never dreamed that corrupt Presidents and Congresses would import a new electorate who would vote that way!

Sauer describes all the harms of birthright citizenship:

  1. Incentive for illegal migration,

  2. National security threat,

  3. Birth tourism, and

  4. Degradation of the meaning of citizenship.

Then he presents the contrary opinions. All he need do in the end is say to the Court: “See what I mean?”

Court alignment

The Barbara docket has a clear indication that the Supreme Court granted review on December 5, 2025. The Washington docket has no such entry. But the CBS Report says the Court did grant review in that case; their source for that assertion remains unclear. Both cases did come before the same administrative conference.

By the Supreme Court’s rules, four Justices can force the rest of the Court to accept a petition for review. Grants of review normally go unsigned, as did this one. CNAV ventures to guess that all three Originalists (Alito, Gorsuch and Thomas JJ) voted to grant review. Likewise, all three Equitarians (Jackson, Kagan, and Sotomayor JJ) voted not to.

That leaves Roberts CJ and Barrett and Kavanaugh JJ. Which of these voted for the petition? CNAV believes Brett Kanavaugh voted for it. Amy Coney Barrett has a tendency (not absolute) to sympathize with families with small children, in a belief in their inherent innocence. But she’s still the one who publicly chastened Ketanji Brown Jackson for her apparent support of an “imperial judiciary.”

And Roberts? He might be reluctant to upend nearly a century of Court practice. Alito and Thomas JJ almost had to drag him kicking and screaming to acceptance of their reasoning in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s.

Sauer clearly knew whom he had to impress. Roberts, Barrett and Kavanaugh run that Court, because they almost always cast deciding votes Alito, Gorsuch and Thomas will take his side; Jackson, Kagan and Sotomayor never will.

Next arguments on birthright citizenship

Immediately after Sauer filed his dual petitions, several organizations submitted friend-of-the-court briefs. They include:

  • Federation of Americans for Immigration Reform (which always has wanted to slow immigration down),

  • Christian Family Coalition of Florida,

  • The Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence at the Claremont Institute, and

  • America’s Future.

All these briefs support the petition, on the grounds that Solicitor General Sauer stated. Specifically, “subject to the jurisdiction” means more than “subject to the regulatory reach of the law.” It primarily means subject to political, not merely regulatory, jurisdiction. Political jurisdiction requires permission to stay (a paraphrase of language in Wong), and domicile. Domicile means a place of permanent residence, and implies a full intent to stay, with permission.

Every civilization has had some form of banishment as either a punishment or a default relationship between that civilization and any given individual. Ancient city-states banished people all the time. Consider, for example, Athenian ostrakons or Roman orders “forbidding fire and water within x hundred miles.” So no “natural right of immigration” can exist.

The Texas Nationalist Movement will no doubt be watching. They haven’t said a word; it’s too soon. But basic sovereignty lies at the heart of the sentiment for Texas independence. If the Supreme Court actually upholds unrestricted birthright citizenship, they will fuel that fire. But that’s a political question, not a legal one.

This case, even more than the entire 2021 Term, will be an intellectual feast for civics students at all levels.

Link to:

The article:

https://cnav.news/2025/12/08/foundation/constitution/birthright-citizenship-headed-scotus-2/

Video:

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Reportage:

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/supreme-court-trump-birthright-citizenship/?ftag=CNM-00-10aab7e&linkId=885482793



The Wong case:

https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/united_states_v._wong_kim_ark



The EO:

https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/protecting-the-meaning-and-value-of-american-citizenship/



Dockets:

Washington v. Trump:

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69561931/state-of-washington-v-trump/

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69621321/state-of-washington-et-al-v-trump-et-al/

https://www.supremecourt.gov/search.aspx?filename=/docket/docketfiles/html/public/25-364.html



Barbara v. Trump:

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70651853/barbara-v-trump/

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/71319932/barbara-v-trump/

https://www.supremecourt.gov/search.aspx?filename=/docket/docketfiles/html/public/25-365.html



Sauer’s massive petition filing in Washington:

https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/25/25-364/378054/20250926163913772_Trump%20v.%20Washington%20with%20appendix.pdf



Declarations of Truth:

https://x.com/DecTruth



Declarations of Truth Locals Community:

https://declarationsoftruth.locals.com/



Conservative News and Views:

https://cnav.news/



Clixnet Media

https://clixnet.com/

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Election 2020 – vindication

We now have a definitive statement that President Donald J. Trump was right the first time about the 2020 election. A foreign actor or actors did steal that election, to install a Democrat in the White House. Of course the close divide of the American people made the cheat possible. But those who deny that the cheat occurred, are either naive or lying. The story comes from an independent conservative journalist who also reveals, or suggests, an unlikely hero of the 2024 election.

Enter Emerald Robinson

Emerald Robinson was chief White House correspondent for Newsmax and the One America News Network during the “Trump One” administration. With the installation of joe Biden, she became a thorn in the side of Biden’s first press secretary, Jen Psaki. In November of 2021, Twitter (now X) suspended her account after she disclosed the secret ingredients in Moderna’s mRNA “vaccine” against coronavirus. With the purchase of Twitter by Elon Musk, she got her account privileges back.

Today she publishes a newsletter, The Right Way, on Substack.com – but has registered her own personal domain. (Naturally she registered it in Tuvalu, whose domain lists as “.tv”, as in “television.”) She has a regular hour-long program that airs weekdays at 4:00 p.m. ET on Frankspeech.com.

Emerald Robinson covers more than coronavirus. She also covers the bad effects of unchecked migration, especially of Muslims and Hindus, neither of whom wish to assimilate into any uniquely American culture. But she also covered the Election of 2020 – and how Trump’s worst failing is lack of imagination. That, and an appalling naivete when it came to making Presidential appointments. Paul Sperry recently covered how Trump’s own people engineered the Russia Hoax and threw the election to Biden in 2020. Emerald Robinson charges that Trump still might not have learned any lessons from that experience. (Or has he? Rumors have him shaking up his Cabinet next January.)

The Election of 2020 – and of 2024

Less than two weeks before the Election of 2024, X influencer Col. Conrad Reynolds posted this video to X.

🚨⚠️ This is a must-watch before the 2024 presidential election.
My friend Gary is whistleblower with deep connections to DOJ, FBI, DEA, and Homeland Security and he exposes shocking details about foreign involvement in U.S. elections. Allegations suggest foreign regimes, including Venezuela and China, are controlling key election systems.
Learn about the claims surrounding election software and foreign manipulation.

https://x.com/ColonelReynolds/status/1849227043520520274

Reynolds’ subject, Gary Berntsen, accuses Nicolás Maduro, President of Venezuela, of supporting drug cartels in his country. More to the point he accuses Maduro and his late predecessor, Hugo Chavez, of engineering the founding of SmartMatic, the key subsidiary of Dominion Voting Systems, and responsible for their scanner-tabulator algorithms. SmartMatic, according to Berntsen, ensured that Chavez would survive his attempted recall. After that, Chavez would aim for bigger game: elections in the United States.

SmartMatic entered the U.S. election market in Cook County, Illinois (seated in Chicago). A corporate shell game followed – with an obscure Toronto, Canada company buying SmartMatic. That company’s name: Dominion Voting Systems.

Dominion Voting Systems manages the elections in almost all the swing States. This determines who wins the [Presidential] election.

Berntsen then asserted that the source code for scanner-tabulators from Smartmatic and Dominion is under Venezuelan control. (He also refers to “other companies” whom he does not name.) The hardware comes from Mainland Chinese factories, with final touches applied in – of all places – Taiwan. Then he dropped this key fact: Dominion Voting Systems moved their cybernetic servers to their offices in Belgrade, Serbia. There, Venezuelan, Cuban, and Communist Chinese intelligence agents stood guard – and had administrative user roles in the “swing States.”

Further evidence

Berntsen maintains a Web site – Stolen Elections Facts – explaining the above. He also maintains that Fox and Newsmax need never have settled with Dominion, because they had truth on their side. Why they chose to pretend that they defamed Dominion, is a different question, to which others have suggested possible answers.

The site does list the “other companies” to which Berntsen alluded:

  • Sequoia Voting Systems

  • Bizta Corporation

  • Software Softer and Bizta R&D

The name Election Systems and Software does not appear at the Stolen Elections Facts website. ES&S are the company to which many Registrars of Election switched after Dominion Voting got such a nasty reputation. In fact that company describes itself as established in 1979, long before the events Berntsen describes. Of note is that ES&S builds a Ballot Marking Device that can accept input from a voter having any of a large number of handicaps. It produces a ballot card with human-readable text. In sharp contrast, Dominion’s BMD produces a Quick-read Code containing what are ostensibly a voter’s choices. But the voter can’t read it, so he cannot know whether the ballot is correct or not.

Nor does the name KnowInk appear. KnowInk specializes in electronic pollbooks. Their product consists of specially equipped tablet devices, connecting to one another (but not to the Internet) in a peer-to-peer network.

Bear the above in mind as you read on.

Why the steal of Election 2020 stood

Emerald Robinson reposted Col. Reynolds’ sixteen-minute video clip shortly after Reynolds posted it.

The Election of 2024 happened – and Donald Trump won. No one – at least no one with good heart and better evidence – disputes that. But according to Ms. Robinson, it almost didn’t work out that way.

On January 22, 2025, she started a thread of more than 100 posts on X.

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1882074856730300718

Space does not permit sharing the entire contents, or even all the links. But a careful roll-through of the thread reveals these key insights:

  • Bill Barr, Trump’s second Attorney General, blocked any effort to investigate whether the Election 2020 returns were false.

  • Several National Security analysts briefed the White House and several key Senators that enough evidence existed to warrant an investigation. Again, no one acted.

  • White House Counsel Paul Cipollone, late in 2020, stopped anyone from telling President Trump about the National Security analyst briefing.

  • Key agencies, among them CISA, declared the election fair. CISA figures prominently in the infamous Intercept story about social media organs as State actors.

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  • Rudy Giuliani and Sydney Powell had the goods on Dominion Voting Systems and Smartmatic, much as Gary Berntsen described it. Again, nothing happened.

  • The January 6 Event was definitely a false-flag pseudo-operation. FBI “crowd embeds” even had a prearranged visual signal to start inciting.

  • The court handling the defamation case by Dominion and Smartmatic against Fox and Newsmax showed clear bias in pre-trial discovery.

An illegal regime, and unconstitutional acts

Ms. Robinson goes on, detailing how:

  • The Biden administration gave the Chinese access to the American power grid, and

  • The January 6 Committee made several unfriendly legislative recommendations – like a bill to change the Electoral Count Act.

She covers the Steve Bannon indictment, and how the January 6 Committee behaved like a Star Chamber. But she devoted much space to the relationships among Dominion, Smartmatic, Sequoia, and the other firms Gary Berntsen named. Much of what we now know about Smartmatic came when Juan Andres Bautista, chief elections officer in the Philippines, got involved in a nasty divorce. His wife, quite simply, ratted him out. He faced impeachment and arrest for bribery – Smartmatic was bribing him – and fled to the United States.

Robinson goes on to detail the clumsy effort in Colorado to destroy evidence. That’s why Tina Peters, County Clerk of Mesa County, Colorado, made a forensic image of a key computer server.

At the end of that thread (which didn’t end until March!), she revealed another key fact. An anonymous man, of Japanese heritage, tracked the Internet traffic among Dominion and its offices in Serbia and Hong Kong. For a donation of twenty dollars, he gave it all to a still-anonymous group investigating the steal of Election 2020. That information would prove vital to the prevention of another steal in 2024.

Who saved Election 2024?

The exact details have waited until this week for Emerald Robinson to reveal them. Why she delayed, she hasn’t said. She did not make a thread of each post as a reply to another. So to get the full thread, one must copy all the links. Here they are:

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993025276696035356

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993027066900742497

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993028491596759207

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993030403410854309

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993033602066690348

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993037667928621498

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993047630415626669

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993058316566905325

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993061239887741230

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993077307762745491

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993089400230887530

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993101594347684116

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993108774639607835

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993306981839536201

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993310039923458499

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993313727857520977

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993321954510598517

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993350631344816559

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993379671950422210

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993385078987350105

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993388493956170175

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993404845097939280

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993415092319535541

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993421655654437170

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993424636780965924

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993432602653368474

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993444343601152394

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993482523528380844

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993710146523124102

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993721585711386632

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993747397261054290

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993751016005882027

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993821358418190342

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993826465067225302

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993870405988180442

So, to summarize the key points, in case these posts become unreadable:

Emerald Robinson credits the following people with saving the Election of 2024:

  • Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.)

  • Fmr. Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.)

  • Elon Musk

  • The Three Musketeers, including:

    • Gary Berntsen,

    • Patrick Byrne (then owner of Overstock.com), and

    • The anonymous Japanese man, who shared his data with Musk – and thereby convinced him.

After hearing this man, Musk called a member of his staff:

We have a problem. It’s true.

Then he singled out Dominion Voting Systems at a Trump rally in Pennsylvania.

Sen. Mullin arranged for this man to brief key staff at Mar-A-Lago. Then he evidently recruited a cybersecurity team to attack the Internet servers at the other end of the IP addresses the anonymous man had furnished. Three days before the election, Dominion’s servers in Belgrade were suddenly useless.

And none of the men responsible have gotten any credit for this.

What next?

First, Donald Trump does know what went on, and whom to blame – on the international front. He has decided to wage a secret war against Nicolás Maduro. That explains the drug boat strikes, and could explain Trump’s curious dissatisfaction with the operation thus far. Furthermore, if Trump does send an amphibious assault force to Venezuela, it’s partly in revenge, and partly in recognition that Venezuela, under Hugo Chavez and now Maduro, have been rigging elections in 72 countries for years.

Second, this could explain why Dominion Voting Systems is no more. Scott Leiendecker, former Election Director in St. Louis, Missouri, bought the company in an apparent fire sale. He renamed it Liberty Vote. Leiendecker also runs KnowInk, the electronic pollbook maker described above.

Leiendecker promises to produce systems with “verifiable paper records.” But convincing aggrieved voters to accept any electronic scanner-tabulator, or even an electronic poll book, could prove impossible.

Realities of the election system landscape

Again, all the attention focuses on Smartmatic, Dominion, Sequoia, and Bizia. No one has said a word about Election Systems and Software (allegedly in existence for decades), or KnowInk, the dedicated pollbook maker. Nevertheless, election-integrity advocates, including some who work today as Officers of Election, are convinced that Smartmatic and ES&S get their software from the same source. They have shared that suspicion directly with CNAV. To date, none has furnished proof positive of that suspicion. But no one has asked ES&S, either, where they get their own source code, or whether they developed it in-house.

With their total, unshakable distrust of any electronic voting system, these activists will accept nothing less than paper pollbooks. That will require separating voters into two lines: the A-Js and the K-Zs, or with some other alphabetical division.

At least one activist wants to forbid absentee voting completely. The only exception he will willingly make is for U.S. service members stationed abroad. Even regular Officers of Election, in his view, must sacrifice their right to vote to accept assignment out-of-precinct. But CNAV reminded him that seven percent of votes cast in the French system, are by proxies for registered voters who could not vote in person. To that, he made no answer – so perhaps the French proxy-voting system can substitute for absentee ballots.

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Which costs more? Storing, securing, and using electronic pollbooks and scanner-tabulators? Or hiring “closing officers” (high-school civics students, perhaps?) to count the ballots after close-of-polls? No one knows – yet.

One more thing

One last item bears mention. Donald Trump has consistently suffered from a lack of imagination, and poor judgment of people. His own people stopped his investigation of the steal of Election 2020, just as they aided and abetted the Russiagate plot.

Whoever replaces Trump as a candidate in 2028, must have the skills to hire the right people. Furthermore, he should share the Three Musketeers/Emerald Robinson findings, as his real reason for going to war with Venezuela. (For that matter, this election interference beats the Zimmerman Note of 1918 as legitimate casus belli.)

Scott Leiendecker should simply conduct the fire sale, turn State’s evidence, and join the effort to replace hard-to-count Australian ballots (that list every race and public question) with secure individual “bulletin” ballots that lend themselves to a manual count. Make election work – especially the ballot count – an extra-credit activity in high-school civics. (Or for cadets in the Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps.) By all means, install the proxy system. That way, anyone who can’t vote in person, can trust another to vote in his stead.

This is how you achieve not only accountability but also deterrence. Make it not only expensive but impossible to steal another election as the Venezuelans did (likely for the Chinese). If one good thing can come out of these revelations, this is it.

Link to:

The article:

https://cnav.news/2025/11/27/accountability/executive/election-2020-vindication/

Video:

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Emerald Robinson’s home page and other Internet home:

https://www.emerald.tv/

https://frankspeech.com/



Col. Reynolds’ video:

https://x.com/ColonelReynolds/status/1849227043520520274



Gary Berntsen’s site:

https://stolenelectionsfacts.com/



Emerald Robinson’s long thread (anchor post).

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1882074856730300718



The Intercept piece about CISA, and CNAV’s coverage of it:

https://web.archive.org/web/20221102022321/https://theintercept.com/2022/10/31/social-media-disinformation-dhs/

https://cnav.news/2022/11/02/foundation/constitution/state-actor-real/

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Emerald Robinson’s recent thread, all links:

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993025276696035356

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993027066900742497

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993028491596759207

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993030403410854309

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993033602066690348

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993037667928621498

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993047630415626669

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993058316566905325

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993061239887741230

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993077307762745491

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993089400230887530

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993101594347684116

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993108774639607835

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993306981839536201

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993310039923458499

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993313727857520977

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993321954510598517

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993350631344816559

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993379671950422210

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993385078987350105

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993388493956170175

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993404845097939280

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993415092319535541

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993421655654437170

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993424636780965924

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993432602653368474

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993444343601152394

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993482523528380844

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993710146523124102

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993721585711386632

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993747397261054290

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993751016005882027

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993821358418190342

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993826465067225302

https://x.com/EmeraldRobinson/status/1993870405988180442



Liberty Vote home page and FAQ link:

https://libertyvote.com/

https://libertyvote.com/assets/files/LV-FAQ.pdf



The French system of all-paper voting:

https://cnav.news/2023/06/24/editorial/talk/france-votes-paper/

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Trump’s people aided Russiagate:

https://cnav.news/2025/11/21/accountability/executive/russiagate-trump-own-appointees-aided-plot/



Declarations of Truth:

https://x.com/DecTruth



Declarations of Truth Locals Community:

https://declarationsoftruth.locals.com/



Conservative News and Views:

https://cnav.news/



Clixnet Media

https://clixnet.com/

Read full Article
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Redistricting, Republicans’ latest weapon

The Republicans are either following President Donald Trump’s lead, or, like bullied kids suddenly discovering their own power, fighting back. Or perhaps they’re doing both. Either way, Republicans have discovered a new weapon, which forum-shopping Democrats inadvertently taught them how to use. That weapon is mid-decade redistricting. So powerful is it, that Democrats are trying any and all means, legal and illegal, to thwart it. The only certain outcome of this escalated war, is that Democrats have shown the American people their hand. Like the Israelites in Joshua’s day, the American people will now choose, this fall and next, the kind of polity in which they wish to live.

All about redistricting

Technically the word district never appears in the Constitution, except in the context of “the District constituting the seat of government of the United States.” (Article I Section 8 Clause 17a; Amendment XXIII.) But the Constitution does make these two provisions for representation in the House of Representatives:

  1. The Clerk of the House apportions seats in the House among the several States according to population. (Which population, “excepting [Native Americans] not taxed,” is subject to debate.) And:

  2. State legislatures determine the “times, places and manner of holding elections of Senators and Representatives.” But Congress has full authority to “make or alter such regulations.” (Exception: places for electing Senators. Amendment XVII, providing for popular election of Senators, did not change this.)

Such redistricting normally happens every ten years, after the Census, which takes place in every year that starts a decade. To be specific:

The actual enumeration shall be made within three years after the first meeting of the Congress of the United States, and within every subsequent term of ten years, in such manner as they shall by law direct. (Article I Section 2 Clause 3.)

But sometimes redistricting has occurred mid-decade. The Voting Rights Act is an example of “making and altering regulations” for holding federal elections. It singles out certain southern States that, early in the twentieth century, did everything imaginable to make sure that American blacks could never elect members of their own race. That law is a “regulation” for a time long past. Congress could and should repeal it. But getting to that pass, requires a new Congress dedicated to honor and social integrity, not social revenge. (Justice is scarcely the word for discrimination among the several States in this or any other regard.)

Republicans discover redistricting and are ready to use it

In 2020 the country took its decennial Census, under difficult circumstances that Democrats used to their advantage. The alleged need for “social distancing” during the “Pandemic” of “The Virus That By Moderational Rule Remained Nameless on Social Media” forced the introduction of on-line self-reporting of residency and co-residency for Census purposes. That was bad enough, facilitating as it did the inflation of some population counts – and deflation of others. But then the Democrats, and their allies, sued to force the Census Bureau to count illegal aliens in the Census.

The first Trump administration fought that case – but the Biden administration settled it. That settlement might – or might not – contain a “poison pill” forbidding even a successor administration to exclude illegal aliens in a future Census. President Trump has announced plans to take a Census, before this decade is out, and without counting illegal aliens. Trump’s response to any legal precedent, especially one with dubious authority, is to say, “Oh, yeah? We’ll see about that!” Call it “testing the authority.”

But while we’re waiting for the inevitable court case, Trump has urged Republicans in Republican-controlled States to employ mid-decade redistricting. He hopes enough States will prepare new maps in time for the 2026 Midterms. Texas Republicans have taken up the challenge, and Florida might do the same.

The Texas quorum fight

Texas Republicans revealed new proposed maps last month, that in theory could let Republicans take five seats from Democrats. One of their targets, Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-South Dallas), has complained bitterly that the new map draws a line for her present District that excludes her residence. That’s not even a strict Constitutional disability. The Constitution requires only that a Representative “reside in the State from which (s)he shall be chosen.” State, not district – because States could by law award Israeli Knesset-style mandates or “slots” in proportion to a State-wide vote. (No State does that today. But Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., has proposed that each State elect multiple Representatives from a handful of mega-districts.) Famously, Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) does not reside, and never has resided, in the District she represents.

As may be, the rules of the Texas State House specify that a supermajority constitutes a quorum. (The U.S. Constitution requires only a bare majority. Article I Section 5 Clause 1.) So Democrats have employed a strategy called quorum breaking. On August 3, the Texas State House was to vote on approving a mid-decade redistricting map and sending it to the Texas Senate. Not a single Democrat showed up – therefore, no quorum. Most Democrats have fled the State to avoid the redistricting vote, this after Rep. Dustin Burrows, the House Speaker, threatened them all with arrest. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has echoed that threat.

Precedent – and current moves

Compulsion of attendance is a regular staple of legislatures. The U.S. Constitution provides that “a smaller number” may, as either chamber directs, compel the attendance of absent members. Indeed the United States Senate, in a rule that James Stewart paraphrased in his famous 1939 political movie, specifically states:

Whenever … a quorum is not present, a majority of the Senators present may direct the Sergeant at Arms to request, and, when necessary, to compel the attendance of the absent Senators,…

The Texas House has the same rule, and has acted accordingly. Gov. Greg Abbott (R-Texas) has gone further. He vowed to remove absent State House members from office. Already, Attorney General Paxton has gone to the Texas Supreme Court for a writ of quo warranto to remove the apparent “ringleader” of the quorum fight. (That Court has ordered the offending member to answer the lawsuit.) In addition:

Mr. Paxton threatened to move to vacate all Texas House Democratic offices if their holders did not return to duty. Speaker Burrows had set a deadline of Friday afternoon – and the Democrats didn’t show up. So Mr. Paxton carried out his threat. In addition Burrows slapped his Democratic colleagues with more penalties, including:

  1. Suspension of direct deposit of salary and per diem checks,

  2. Requirement that members show up in person to collect travel reimbursement or take any office personnel action,

  3. Fines of $500 per day per members, and

  4. Freezing of 30 percent of members’ monthly budgets.

“Beto’s Bribes”

In an interesting development, thirty Texas Democrats “fled” to Illinois. Gov. J. B. Pritzker (D-Ill.) allegedly is having them put up in expensive hotels his family owns. Whether that’s true or false, we now learn how they got to Illinois – aboard an expensive private jet. Former Senate candidate Robert F. “Beto” O’Rourke paid for that junket, using money from his Political Action Committee, “Powered by People.” He also pledged to pay those Democrats’ hotel, meal, and other bills.

Attorney General Paxton has responded swiftly and decisively. He is suing O’Rourke and his PAC to claw back the money. In a post on X, he said:

BREAKING: I sued Robert Francis O'Rourke for “Beto Bribes” to Democrat runaways to impede the Texas Legislature.
I will not allow failed political has-beens to buy off Texas elected officials. I’ll see you in court, Beto.

https://x.com/KenPaxtonTX/status/1953913485576003592

On Friday evening, The Gateway Pundit reported that a court granted the Temporary Restraining Order Paxton had sought against O’Rourke. That Order forbids O’Rourke or his PAC to spend, raise, or offer funds to any absent Texas legislator for purposes of quorum breaking. It also sets Tuesday, August 19, for a hearing on a temporary (that is, preliminary) injunction to the same effect.

Perhaps in response to that order, a thoroughly angry O’Rourke addressed a rally in Fort Worth – the same city where Paxton sued him – and vowed that Democrats would “win, whatever it takes.”

“F**k the rules, we are going to win whatever it takes.” – Beto O'Rourke, dude who can’t win an election no matter what it takes.

https://x.com/TheKevinDalton/status/1954319711199760881

Democrats know that deportations and an end to illegal immigration are popular with the public and yet they can’t help but campaign on “we’re gonna let them all in and give them citizenship.”
What a gift to us for the midterms. Thanks Beto!

https://x.com/robbystarbuck/status/1954309853360410732

Retaliatory redistricting?

The governors of California, New York, and Massachusetts have all threatened to retaliate in kind with their own redistricting. But each State has a problem:

  1. Massachusetts already sends no Republicans to the House of Representatives. So the Massachusetts General Court (their name for their legislature) can do nothing beyond what they’ve done already.

  2. New York would have to amend its Constitution to get rid of the independent districting commission that draws districts in that State. That would take time Democrats don’t have; they’d never get it done by Midterms.

  3. California has an independent redistricting commission of its own, which came about through a voter initiative.

To work around this last problem, Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-Calif.) has announced his intention to place on the ballot for this November’s election, a referendum to bypass that commission. But such bypass would be temporary and contingent on Texas finishing its redistricting law.

In reply, Rep. Kevin Kiley (R-Calif.) has introduced a federal bill to forbid mid-decade redistricting in any State. That, of course, is a weapon of last resort – but one that Article I Section 4 Clause 1 makes available.

Republican heavyweights like Arnold Schwarzenegger and Charles Munger, Jr. have pledged to campaign to defeat the referendum. The sheer brazenness of Newsom’s action might cause enough voters to recoil in horror and vote against it.

Summary

Texas is not the only “red State” to consider mid-decade redistricting. Consider this:

🚨BOOM 🚨
GOP could permanently CRUSH the Democrats… if they grow a spine 💀
Ned Ryun [head of American Majority] says Republicans could pick up to 40 HOUSE SEATS by 2030 if they get rid of all the CORRUPTION.
@NedRyun: Democrats have been gerrymandering Republicans out of existence in these blue states. It is time Republicans stepped up to the plate and did EXACTLY what Democrats have been doing to us for YEARS.

https://x.com/JesseBWatters/status/1953990856383320126

Gov. Newsom thinks he can take five or six seats from Republicans in his State, if his referendum passes. But that will be of no moment if other States follow suit. And again, Massachusetts can do nothing, for the same reason one cannot obtain blood from a turnip. New York State won’t have time to act by Midterms. By the time they do act, Census time will come again.

We now know that the Biden administration sought to skew the Census to Democrats’ political advantage. They might even have had more nefarious plans: to cast ballots in the names of those illegal aliens. By far the best remedy the Trump administration has used, is to remove as many of these aliens as possible. And that remedy has been effective. Emergency room visits are down. Government “social programs” have shut down for lack of clients. Crime has declined to a manageable level. All this is taking place in “sanctuary cities” and other places to which illegal aliens once flocked.

Mid-decade redistricting shows that Republicans have come out swinging. Democrats, for their part, aren’t even pretending to any even-handedness. So the one fraud Democrats once perpetrated easily – that theirs was the voice of reason and help for the “working stiff” – has lost its effectiveness. Shortly, voters, in California and elsewhere, will have their most stark choice.

Link to:

The article:

https://cnav.news/2025/08/10/foundation/constitution/redistricting-republicans-latest-weapon/

Video:

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Ken Paxton’s “see you in court” post:

https://x.com/KenPaxtonTX/status/1953913485576003592



Application for TRO – and granted TRO:

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/wp-content/plugins/pdfjs-viewer-shortcode/pdfjs/web/viewer.php?file=https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/beto-bribe-lawsuit-redacted-filed-1.pdf&attachment_id=1434966&dButton=true&pButton=true&oButton=false&sButton=true&pagemode=none&_wpnonce=314f4557e2

https://www.texasattorneygeneral.gov/sites/default/files/images/press/Beto%20Bribes%20TRO.pdf



Two posts covering Beto’s angry speech in Fort Worth:

https://x.com/TheKevinDalton/status/1954319711199760881

https://x.com/robbystarbuck/status/1954309853360410732



Jesse Watters’ interview with Ned Ryun:

https://x.com/JesseBWatters/status/1953990856383320126

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2025/08/ned-ryun-predicts-huge-gains-republicans-through-redistricting/



Declarations of Truth:

https://x.com/DecTruth



Declarations of Truth Locals Community:

https://declarationsoftruth.locals.com/



Conservative News and Views:

https://cnav.news/



Clixnet Media

https://clixnet.com/

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