China‘s Communist Party has infiltrated various levels of America’s infrastructure and is working to destroy the values of the United States, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said during a speech Saturday, while also warning state governors to be wary of China’s infiltration.

“We can’t ignore China’s actions and strategic intentions,” he said while addressing the National Governors Association winter meeting. “The Chinese government has been methodical in the way it’s analyzed our system… it’s assessed our vulnerabilities and it’s decided to exploit our freedoms, to gain an advantage over us at the federal level, the state level and the local level.”

“Competition with China is happening. It’s happening in your state,” Pompeo added. “In fact, I’d be surprised if most of you in the audience had not been lobbied by the Chinese Communist Party directly.”

He said groups loyal to communist China are operating out in the open in Virginia, Minnesota, Florida and dozens of other states all around the country. Other Chinese groups, however, practice their nefarious actions in the shadows in an attempt to exercise influence over U.S. citizens and lawmakers.

(more…)

Donald Trump visited Congress this week to declare the state of the union “stronger than ever before.” Speaker Nancy Pelosi concluded the evening by highlighting the state of the Democratic Party: Intensely—perhaps fatally—divided.

That’s the prism through which to view this week’s headlines: The Iowa debacle, Democrats’ State of the Union theatrics, the president’s impeachment acquittal. Division has coursed through Democratic politics for at least the past four years. The media tries hard to present this split as nothing more than the usual intraparty tension. It’s significantly deeper than that, and Democratic hopes for the 2020 election hinge on it.

The Iowa derailment didn’t begin Monday afternoon or even in the months leading up to the failure of the results-reporting app. This train went off the tracks right after the 2016 Democratic primary contest, as a bitter progressive wing of the party stewed over Bernie Sanders’s defeat. They accused the Democratic establishment of rigging the process for Hillary Clinton—starting with Iowa, where the results were close, and where Mr. Sanders’s supporters outright challenged the legitimacy of Mrs. Clinton’s victory.

Hoping for peace, and in the name of “transparency,” party officials adopted the wildly complicated system on display Monday. The delayed results continue to be riddled with errors, making the outcome even less credible than in 2016. Sanders allies are already crying foul. They’re also pointing to new Democratic National Committee rules for debates, and nominations for convention spots, as evidence that one side of the party is again trying to deny the other side a victory.

That there are two, extremely polarized sides is also the one clear takeaway from the Iowa muddle. While the Sanders and Pete Buttigieg campaigns argue over how many state-delegate equivalents can dance on the head of a pin, the bigger point is that they ended the final vote with near equal numbers. Overall, the two candidates unapologetically pushing Medicare for All (Bernie and Elizabeth Warren) took 47% of the final vote, while the three more “moderate” contenders (Mr. Buttigieg, Joe Biden and Amy Klobuchar) took 51%.

The chasm in the party has been on display particularly under Speaker Pelosi’s leadership. It brewed in the bitter spring fights over which wing got its way on how to sanction Rep. Ilhan Omar for anti-Semitic comments; which wing spoke for the party on climate and health care; which wing set its antigun agenda. And most consequentially, which wing won the day on impeachment. Mrs. Pelosi ultimately gave in to threats against her speakership and allowed her firebrands to serve as the face of the party in a weak and doomed impeachment proceeding.

Utah Sen. Mitt Romney is basking in positive headlines after voting to convict, but the more immediately consequential votes remain those cast by Democratic moderates—who were sacrificed to the passions of Mrs. Pelosi’s liberal wing. Thirty-one House Democrats are on the ballot this year in districts won in 2016 by Mr. Trump—who has climbed to a personal-high 49% Gallup approval rating. Sen. Doug Jones (D., Ala.) voted to convict a president who won his state by 28 points last time around. Sen. Gary Peters (D., Mich.) is facing uneven polling numbers. Sen. Joe Manchin (D., W.Va.) is spared an election this year but hasn’t helped his future election prospects.

(more…)

While many Americans were focused on Washington this week, I was paying special attention to Fort Bend County, Texas. What took place in that Houston suburb may reveal more about the 2020 election than the impeachment trial in the Senate does.

Fort Bend held a special runoff election to fill a vacant state House seat left open by the resignation of the Republican incumbent, who took a job with the University of Texas. Sensing an opening, state and national Democrats decided a win in House District 28 would give them a head start on flipping the nine seats they’d need to control the Texas House and boost their efforts to overturn GOP state legislative majorities from Arizona to Florida, Wisconsin to Pennsylvania and a dozen states in between.

Think the fog of partisan Trump investigations will lift once the President leaves office, either in 2021 or 2025? Not if Elizabeth Warren has anything to say about it. With the Iowa caucuses approaching and her campaign fortunes flagging, Senator Warren now says that as President she’d launch an open-ended criminal investigation into her predecessor and anyone who worked for him.

Ms. Warren’s latest “anti-corruption” plan says she would create “a Justice Department Task Force to investigate corruption during the Trump administration and to hold government officials accountable for illegal activity.” She would order Justice to look for violations of “federal bribery laws, insider trading laws, and other anti-corruption and public integrity laws” as well as immigration-enforcement offenses.

“This will be no ordinary transition between administrations,” the document says ominously. Team Warren won’t be satisfied with taking control of the executive branch in an election. They also want scalps of choice ex-officials. The plan links to news articles about Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, White House Adviser KellyanneCon way and Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson.

If there is evidence of a crime by a former Administration official, it should be investigated through the normal channels. Ms. Warren is proposing something different: A law-enforcement task force dedicated to searching for wrongdoing only by political opponents. This would be familiar in Latin American dictatorships where the party that loses an election may be jailed as retribution.

Pundits said Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign threat to investigate Hillary Clinton for her email mismanagement was a chilling breach of democratic norms. We opposed such an investigation but at least the alleged misconduct was limited to specific conduct by one official, whereas Ms. Warren wants investigations of all Republican officials for any political offenses.

Despite all the apocalyptic think-pieces and high-minded books, America has not become an “autocracy” three years into Donald Trump’s Presidency. The opposition party won the House in the midterms, proceeded to impeach the President, and its leading candidates are ahead in the head-to-head 2020 presidential election polls.

Yet in polarized times the temptation to criminalize political differences is stronger than ever. It will be especially strong for Democrats once they are back in control of the Justice Department. Down Senator Warren’s road lies a real threat to liberty.

Political figures have long used their families to route power and benefits for their own self-enrichment. In my new book, “Profiles in Corruption: Abuse of Power by America’s Progressive Elite,” one particular politician — Joe Biden — emerges as the king of the sweetheart deal, with no less than five family members benefiting from his largesse, favorable access and powerful position for commercial gain. In Biden’s case, these deals include foreign partners and, in some cases, even US taxpayer dollars.

The Biden family’s apparent self-enrichment involves five family members: Joe’s son Hunter, son-in-law Howard, brothers James and Frank, and sister Valerie.

When this subject came up in 2019, Biden declared, “I never talked with my son or my brother or anyone else — even distant family — about their business interests. Period.”

As we will see, this is far from the case …

(more…)