Podcasts about foias

Dr. Brian Hooker is the senior director of science and research at the Children's Health Defense founded by Robert Kennedy Jr, and sits on the organization's  Advisory Council.  Dr. Hooker is also a former Professor of Biology at Simpson University in California. He has been active in vaccine safety since 2001 and has a vaccine injured son with autism. His analysis of the CDCs data about the Measle-Mumps-Rubella vaccine and autism was published in the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons.  For a few decades Brian has been investigating the scientific evidence for a vaccine-autism connection and the flaws in vaccine safety. Brian also has a  son with autism and has been active in the autism community for increasing public awareness about this epidemic. Over the years Brian has filed many FOIAs with federal health agencies and was in receipt of 1000s of pages of documents from a CDC informant, Dr. William Thompson who questioned the efficacy and safety of vaccination. Dr Hooker is the co-author with Bobby Kennedy of the recent New York Times bestseller "Vax-UnVax: Let the Science Speak", which undertakes a task our federal health authorities have refused to entertain: that is, to look at the published research to compare the health status and disease incidence between vaccinated and unvaccinated people. For more information, go to ChildrensHealthDefense.org Polly Tommey is the mother of a son injured from the MMR vaccine, an outspoken autism advocate and the founder of the Autism Trust in the UK and US. Polly is also the founding chief editor of the autism magazine The Autism File and co-founder of the Autism Media Channel. She has appeared in many media sources around the world and has gone head-to-head with various political leaders about vaccine safety and efficacy. She is also the producer of several documentaries including the three Vaxxed films -- the last being "Vaxxed 3: Authorized to Kill" which was released last week, and exposes the medical and pharmaceutical malpractice during the Covid-19 pandemic. 

In this episode, Lindsey Rogerson and Rachel Wolcott, senior editors for Regulatory Intelligence in EMEA discuss the UK Financial Conduct Authority's (FCA) approach to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) compliance.In the UK, most public bodies are subject to FOIA. That means members of the public can request information held by public authorities or by persons providing services to them. That includes the FCA, the Prudential Regulation Authority and the Bank of England. Lindsey and Rachel discuss the importance of using FOIA in their work to uncover information that helps readers and listeners better understand how the regulators work. They talk through several examples of information they've been able to request, including about whistleblowing, enforcement statistics, as well as bullying and harassment allegations made by FCA employees. Recently, however, many of their FOIA requests have been met with resistance from the regulator. Lindsey and Rachel talk about how they appealed the FCA's use of FOIA exemptions —and won. The process brought valuable insights into how the regulator manages FOIA compliance. LINKS FCA response to FOI on guidance for supervisors investigation allegations made by whistleblowers after ICO intervention June 2024: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/protocol_for_supervisors_when_in/response/2684994/attach/4/FOI10712%20Amended%20Response%2020240619.pdf?cookie_passthrough=1 Redacted FCA document: Supervision: Whistleblowing ‘How to Guide' for SPC & Authorisation Divisions: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/protocol_for_supervisors_when_in/response/2684994/attach/5/Annex%20A.pdf?cookie_passthrough=1 Article: FCA report shows "host" ACD compliance has not improved in a decade, s 166s imposed: https://word-edit.officeapps.live.com/we/FCA%20report%20shows%20%22host%22%20ACD%20compliance%20has%20not%20improved%20in%20a%20decade,%20s%20166s%20imposed Article on: UK FCA is still assessing more than 1,100 whistleblower reports from 2023/24: https://nam02.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fgo-ri.tr.com%2FO3tB1r&data=05%7C02%7Crachel.wolcott%40thomsonreuters.com%7Cba01669a1154474d690a08dcd2715851%7C62ccb8646a1a4b5d8e1c397dec1a8258%7C0%7C0%7C638616631473549097%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C0%7C%7C%7C&sdata=DODZq3z11tZ%2FDZsQvMvYSJWDHOs4gJi7eVZRLslaqGA%3D&reserved=0 H2O decision notice: https://www.fca.org.uk/publication/final-notices/h2o-am-llp-2024.pdf FCA warning notice on Woodford Investment Management Ltd and Neil Woodford: https://www.fca.org.uk/publication/warning-notices/warning-notice-statement-24-3.pdf First Tier Tribunal decision in Paul Carlier v ICO: https://www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKFTT/GRC/2024/257.htmlArticle on FOIA request about MiFID II recordkeeping investigations: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/rachelwolcott_mifid-enforcement-action-activity-7199352605670555649-BLwt/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktopArticle: FCA to merge FOIA, personal data disclosure unit into comms team: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/rachelwolcott_fca-to-merge-idt-fully-with-communications-activity-7163815206140239873-HFex/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktopUK FCA's FoIA request reputational risk assessments, guidelines for journalists' requests are inappropriate –expert (paywall): http://go-ri.tr.com/xqNUHXMeta FOIAsFOI6522, FOI9427, FOI9980 (scroll to the bottom for links. For two of them you may need to request access from the FCA) FCA's response to Lindsey and Rachel's questions: Is the FCA's approach to FOIA and DPA in line with its stated values of acting with integrity and delivering in the public interest? "Yes" Does the FCA still circulate FOI responses to large number of staff in the CEO's office and the COO for comments and sign off? "As we mentioned in our last response to you in March, our approach is in line with ICO guidance and the law." What are the latest IDT performance statistics? "Over the last 12 months from September 2023 to August 2024 (inclusive), we responded to 92% of FOIA requests and 98% of DSARs within the statutory deadline." Has the ICO asked the FCA to perform any remedial work on IDT? Has ICO advised/queried the FCA about safeguards for FOIA and DPA in the new combined IDT/press office arrangements? "No. When we answered your questions in March, we explained that it had been our intention that the information disclosure team would move to a different department within the communications directorate as part of a planned restructure later this year. That move has now happened." Has the FCA stopped internal circulation of lists of new FOIA requests with names of requestors? If not why not?"We continue to circulate the details of new requests, which generally include the names of the requesters, to a limited number of internal stakeholders. We are satisfied that our internal processes are appropriate and lawful, including that our processes are compliant with FOIA and data protection legislation." What further steps has the FCA taken to train IDT/comms staff about using FOIA exemptions?"All IDT staff and internal reviewers have received formal training on the application of the FOI Act and many members of the team are qualified FOIA practitioners. In addition, IDT works closely with our legal division, which provides expert guidance in the interpretation of the most complex aspects of the Act." Has the FCA reviewed its approach to labelling FOIA requests as vexatious following the First-Tier Tribunal case Paul Carlier v Information Commissioner and the FCA? If yes, how? "The FCA continues to consider each request on a case by case basis, in line with the requirements of relevant legislation, ICO guidance and case law. In this case, the ICO agreed with our view the requests were vexatious. The Tribunal, however, decided 'by a narrow margin' they were not, a conclusion it reached 'with some hesitation.' We have therefore been happy to reconsider the requests." From the evidence we have reviewed the FCA's approach to FOIAs and DPAs seemed to be top-down with many senior executives signing off requests and even correcting grammar errors. We are also aware from our own FOIs that there is often months-long delays in responding to requests and appeals. Given this, what is the FCA doing to ensure a more efficient process in line with the legislation? "We have improved our performance on the statutory deadlines for FOIAs and DSARs over the last year. We recognise that we need to do more to improve our performance in processing FOIA Internal Reviews and DSAR complaints. We are currently considering how the existing process can be streamlined to improve its efficiency. Our internal processes are focused on ensuring a clear and quality response, not preventing disclosure which is determined by the law."FOI6522: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/foi6522_request_for_further_info#incoming-2714347FOI9427: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/foi9427_request_for_information#incoming-2713882FOI9980: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/foi_9980_request_for_information#incoming-2711477 Compliance Clarified is a podcast from Thomson Reuters Regulatory Intelligence.Listen to wide-ranging, insightful discussions on all things compliance for financial services firms. We delve into the hot topics of the day, the challenges faced and offer up practical ideas for emerging good practice. We de-mystify regulation and explore the art, as well as the science, of the ever-expanding role of the compliance officer.  Enforcements, digital transformation, regulatory change, governance, culture, conduct risk – anything and everything impacting the compliance function is up for discussion.

One of the most tragic days in American history. A devastating terror attack that resulted in countless loss of life both domestically and abroad. And today, we're discussing the most remarkable stories of heroism, all the bizarre coincidences, and why there is so much controversy and conspiracy surrounding this event. I've invited by my friend Jon, a researcher and expert in the field who has given 9/11 tours in New York city for a decade and we're going into every story and theory from this fateful day. Welcome to CampCAMP NEWSLETTER HERE: https://linktw.in/RzJUFtTHANK YOU!Morgan & Morgan, Bashmouth and Bluechewfor making this show possible and paying these editors and stuff haha- Save 20% sitewide at BASHMOUTH com with Promo Code: GAGNON20Intro: Chifftie Edited and Produced: Christos Papastefanou00:00 Intro00:51 Tour guide in NYC + obsession with 9/115:08 FOIAs, transcripts of the calls + KSM is the mastermind10:22 Who were the hijackers? Living with FBI informant17:20 Where was United 93 heading? Almost everything was recovered26:05 Moments of heroism + the red bandana man39:18 Recording culture comes from 9/1144:54 Initially, people thought it was an accident49:02 Bizarre coincidences: Michael Jackson, Seth McFarlane + Steve Buscemi54:14 Dogs also were heroes too57:11 How long did a person survive in the rubble?59:54 The falling + 1 jumper had a camera1:05:21 Others that have passed1:11:36 Person that murdered on 9/111:15:41 Explanations & theories surrounding 9/111:21:54 Where did “jet fuel can't melt steel beams” come from”1:26:18 How high was the rubble? Explosives claim - where did it come from?1:29:08 Gelitin Art Project + E-Team conspiracies1:35:01 Empire State Building might withstand + Twin Towers had no supports1:39:38 Directed energy weapons conspiracy + cover for Port Authority1:42:11 WTC Building 71:49:01 Larry Silverstein insurance packages + “pull it”1:58:14 1st move was to deny medical coverage + More died since than on 9/112:04:28 Agencies in the building 2:07:05 The Pentagon + eyewitness accounts of explosions2:19:15 Donald Rumsfeld speech 9/10/2001 + recovered steel was sold2:25:13 Media that changed because of 9/112:34:27 George Bush Jr on 9/112:41:04 5 Israelis on 9/11 + Jewish victims that day2:50:14 Osama bin Laden's role & death3:00:48 How to get a tour with Jon3:05:45 Interesting interactions on the tours

Hello listeners! This took me three weeks to edit. I'm sorry it took so long, but here we are with an extra-long episode of CC as a thank you for your patience. ALSO, EPISODE 100! WOOT! Today, we are talking about the US government's secret experiments in the paranormal that began after the end of WWII and continue all the way up to this very day. A plethora of these secret programs have only recently been resurfacing thanks to FOIAs and the old rulers leaving and new ones coming in. So let's explore this weirdness, shall we? SOURCES: Phenomenon - https://www.amazon.com/Phenomena-Governments-Investigations-Extrasensory-Psychokinesis/dp/0316349356/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1696758879&sr=1-1 Journeys Out of the Body - https://www.amazon.com/Journeys-Out-Body-Out-Body/dp/0385008619/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1696758932&sr=1-1 CIA Classified Document - https://medium.com/accessible-foia/analysis-assesment-gateway-process-army-cia-foia-1983-human-consciousness-d7fa332ef404 Project Stargate - https://www.amazon.com/Project-Stargate-Remote-Viewing-Technology/dp/1939149983/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=stargate+project&s=books&sr=1-1

Grace and Scott Hounsell break down the bombshell reports about an NIH advisor who admitted to deleting emails and dodging FOIAs. Visit the Howie Carr Radio Network website to access columns, podcasts, and other exclusive content.

In this bonus pod, Kevin and Laura talk about FOIAs. You get to hear a few excerpts from the panel session Kevin moderated at the Digital Government Institute's eDiscovery, Records and Information Management Conference. Kevin was joined on stage with Michael Sarich of the VA and Michael Heise from EEOC.As the volume of digital information continues to grow, the scope of electronic records management has expanded exponentially and is an increasingly critical issue for government agencies, particularly as it relates to providing electronic access and retrieval of government records. Key government and industry experts gathered at the 21st annual eDiscovery, Records and Information Management Conference to discuss current technology solutions/requirements, policy updates/changes and review examples of successful electronic records, FOIA and e-discovery programs.Michael Sarich is the FOIA Director at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). He leads one of the federal government's most extensive FOIA programs, managing a team of 900+ FOIA and Privacy Act Officers dispersed across 151 facilities. Leveraging over a decade of expertise in FOIA and Privacy Policy at the VA, the Social Security Administration and the Bureau of Land Management, he specializes in navigating intricate requests, handling litigation, and ensuring rigorous regulatory compliance in FOIA. He also plays a pivotal role as the co-chair of the Chief FOIA Officer Council's Technology Committee, spearheading initiatives to revolutionize FOIA service delivery on a government-wide scale. Michael Heise is the Attorney Advisor at Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. He is an experienced FOIA analyst, and licensed attorney with a strong background in electronic discovery at all stages. He has a strong aptitude for explaining complicated legal principles in a straightforward and clear manner. He significant experience with project management and supervision after 9 years with CACI. 

“When someone lies to me . . . there's a reason they're lying. And for me, I think it's part of my ethical responsibility as a lawyer to expose someone.”In this episode of Voices of NCAJ, host Amber Nimocks interviews Alex Charns, a criminal defense attorney in Durham who has written a book about the FBI's secret tapes on the Supreme Court of the 1960s and his decades-long battles to access them. After being inspired by David Garrow's book on FBI tactics against Martin Luther King Jr., Charns has embarked on a career-spanning pursuit of uncovering hidden truths through FOIA requests and litigation against the FBI. His latest book, FBI Snitches, Blackmail, and Obscene Ethics at the Supreme Court, sheds light on his 13-year legal battle to release secret FBI files, revealing shocking revelations about unethical behavior and blackmail involving a Supreme Court justice.

FOIAing the FOIAs is a great “Well now this is happening!” thing to do.

"Lay Them to Rest" with author Laurah Norton Join the Morbidly Curious Book Club Today: themorbidlycuriousbookclub.com “This had been the thing that bothered me most from day one: Doe cases got the least coverage, even though they were the ones that needed it most. So, I filed a fresh batch of FOIAs on the unidentified dead, the ones whose case numbers I'd been tracking in NamUs and whose nicknames were set to Google Alerts: Julie Doe. Dennis Doe. Christmas Doe. When I got the very first file, I knew these were the cases I needed to write about, above all. There was no one out there advocating for them. No family holding a memorial for Jane Doe 1980. Or if there were, it was under a different name. But maybe their attention could be attracted and connected to the unidentified. After all, if you can construct a story with the pieces that death has left behind, someone might recognize the life that preceded them.” Welcome to the Morbidly Curious Book Club's Podcast! In this episode, we are discussing our February 2024 book pick, “LAY THEM TO REST: On the Road with the Cold Case Investigators Who Identify the Nameless” by Laurah Norton. About: A fascinating deep dive into the dark world of forensic science as experts team up to solve the identity of an unknown woman named “Ina Jane Doe,” exploring the rapidly evolving techniques scientists are using to break the most notorious cold cases, written by the host of the popular true-crime podcast, The Fall Line and One Strange Thing by Laurah Norton. Over the past six years, Laurah has worked tirelessly to cover unsolved murders, unidentified persons, and unexplained disappearances—-primarily those involving communities deprioritized by mainstream media or investigators. After she stumbled across the case of "Ina Jane Doe,” an unidentified woman whose decapitated head was found tucked in the brush of an Illinois park in 1993, Laurah has been more determined than ever to help this victim reclaim her identity so she can finally be laid to rest. Laurah Norton is a writer and former academic with 15 years in the fields of literary fiction, creative nonfiction, and archival and primary research. Her work includes creation, writing, research, and hosting of podcasts ONE STRANGE THING and THE FALL LINE. Current literary projects include the book LAY THEM TO REST, and she is currently working on a suspense-thriller novel set in the early 2000s and tying together the Appalachian foothills of Georgia, folk magic, and forensic science. Other literary publications include fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction in journals and anthologies. RESOURCES: Purchase Lay Them to Rest: https://www.laythemtorestbook.com/ https://namus.nij.ojp.gov/frequently-asked-questions#11-0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNx0drV5qhQ https://www.peterstrain.co.uk/ https://clarksvillenow.com/local/what-happened-to-susan-lund-family-revisits-mystery-30-years-after-clarksville-womans-disappearance-death/ https://redgraveresearch.com/ https://redgraveresearch.com/index.php/cases/ina-jane-doe-illinois-1993 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNx0drV5qhQ&embeds_referring_euri= https%3A%2F%2Fredgraveresearch.com%2F&source_ve_path=MjM4NTE&feature=emb_title https://www.wnct.com/on-your-side/crime-tracker/cold-case-files/cold-case-files-the-disappearance-of-asha-degree/ https://www.murderdata.org/ https://www.genome.gov/genetics-glossary/Centimorgan https://www.genome.gov/genetics-glossary/Centimorgan) Join the Patreon page here to donate: https://patreon.com/TheMorbidlyCuriousBookClub?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=creatorshare_creator&utm_content=join_link Inquiries: themorbidlycuriousbookclub@gmail.com

The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) is a federal law which gives the public the right to access records from any federal agency. Debbie Coffey is an expert in obtaining FOIAs, and has used her skills in aiding advocacy for the wild horses and burros with many organizations and for many lawsuits. She joins me this week to discuss the increasing complexity regarding obtaining FOIAs, the BLM's direct use of evasion, deception, and misrepresentation regarding wild horse population plans, and more.   Most importantly, listen in to find out how you can help, especially if you're a new advocate for wild horses and burros. Debbie offers a solid source for the history and next-steps of this ongoing journey into equine advocacy.   Get full show notes and more information here: https://www.wildhoofbeats.com/20

My buddy and regular Friday guest @realSteveFriend joins me to discuss: enforcing the FACE Act (the REAL reason people join the FBI), new FOIAs out from Judicial Watch, and who are we talking about when you hear about the "7th floor of the Hoover" building. A new article confirms what you might suspect. ____________________________________________________ Today's podcast supported by https://CatholicVote.Org Use PROMO CODE "KYLE" at these sites: EMERGENCY FOOD: https://4Patriots.com/KYLE SUSPENDABLES MERCH: http://The-Suspendables.com  http://PatriotCoolers.com/discount/KYLE http://MyPillow.com/Kyle

Outline00:00 - Intro01:50 - Running marathons 05:19 - The Center13:28 - On creativity15:24 - From algebraic system theory to moment problems43:39 - The gap metric58:33 - The longstanding friendship and collaboration with M. Smith01:11:30 - On causality and the arrow of time LinksTryphon's website: https://georgiou.eng.uci.edu/People in control interview: https://tinyurl.com/4nw5s9p6R. Kalman: https://tinyurl.com/mux93t32A. Tannenbaum: https://tinyurl.com/2pws6rzdMoment problem - https://tinyurl.com/3u38xy9fNevanlinna–Pick interpolation - https://tinyurl.com/3nw56kjPh.D. Thesis: https://tinyurl.com/3c5ba8frOn the computation of the gap metric: https://tinyurl.com/tamnufmaUncertainty in Unstable Systems: The Gap Metric - https://tinyurl.com/4w7sn73nVidyasagar's paper on the graph metric - https://tinyurl.com/5xn3rks6Optimal robustness in the gap metric - https://tinyurl.com/7axewjpyM. Smith - https://tinyurl.com/3ym2fbp9M. Vidyasagar - https://tinyurl.com/4fnwtjv7K. Glover - https://tinyurl.com/45zwpva9C. Foias - https://tinyurl.com/wxt378tjCommutant lifting theorem - https://tinyurl.com/bdfzxnf2D. Sarason - https://tinyurl.com/5n6n568fRobust Stability of Feedback Systems: A Geometric Approach Using the Gap Metric - https://tinyurl.com/bbv2hmy8Intrinsic difficulties in using the doubly-infinite time axis for input-output control theory - https://tinyurl.com/3cdbc9n2Erdős number - https://tinyurl.com/bdex5pf6Causal system - https://tinyurl.com/ythze2h7Feedback control and the arrow of time - https://tinyurl.com/2Support the showPodcast infoPodcast website: https://www.incontrolpodcast.com/Apple Podcasts: https://tinyurl.com/5n84j85jSpotify: https://tinyurl.com/4rwztj3cRSS: https://tinyurl.com/yc2fcv4yYoutube: https://tinyurl.com/bdbvhsj6Facebook: https://tinyurl.com/3z24yr43Twitter: https://twitter.com/IncontrolPInstagram: https://tinyurl.com/35cu4kr4Acknowledgments and sponsorsThis episode was supported by the National Centre of Competence in Research on «Dependable, ubiquitous automation» and the IFAC Activity fund. The podcast benefits from the help of an incredibly talented and passionate team. Special thanks to L. Seward, E. Cahard, F. Banis, F. Dörfler, J. Lygeros, ETH studio and mirrorlake . Music was composed by A New Element.

August 10, 2023 ~ Patty McMurray, contributor for The Gateway Pundit, talks with Kevin and Tom about the FOIAs the obtained regarding the 2020 election.

For nearly 30 years Judicial Watch has been holding successive governments and administrations to account. Tom Fitton has been at the helm as President since 1998 and is known as one of the most fearless conservative activists whose desire to seek truth makes him one of the biggest enemies to governments who cover up facts for their own benefit. No other organisation in America uses the Freedom of Information law in such a logical joined up way and is never afraid to use the courts to force the disclosure of hidden documents. Time and time again the veil is lifted and the public see the truth and often Judicial Watch are behind this reveal. It was an absolute honour to speak with Tom, so join us as he unpacks some of the requests they have made and how they often have to fight to see the truth exposed. Tom Fitton is the President of Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption. Founded in 1994, Judicial Watch seeks to ensure government and judicial officials act ethically and do not abuse the powers entrusted to them by the American public. With 20 years of experience in conservative public policy, Tom Fitton has helped lead Judicial Watch since 1998 and overseen its tremendous growth and success in recent years. Under Fitton's leadership, Judicial Watch was named one of Washington's top ten most effective government watchdog organizations by The Hill newspaper. Mr. Fitton provides Judicial Watch with strategic guidance and leadership on Judicial Watch's comprehensive efforts to fight government corruption. He is a nationally recognized expert on government corruption, immigration enforcement, congressional and judicial ethics, and open government. A former talk radio and television host and analyst, Tom is well known across the country as a national spokesperson for the conservative cause. He has been quoted in TIME, Vanity Fair, The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Associated Press, The Los Angeles Times, The New York Post, and most every other major newspaper in the country. He has also appeared on ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, FOX News Channel, C-SPAN and MSNBC. Mr. Fitton has authored numerous articles such as “Judicial Activism Hurts our Courts,” “What Bill Clinton Knew About bin Laden,” “Following Terrorism's Money Trail,” “Senate Abandons Judicial Nominees,” “Every Town is a Border Town,” “Obama's Records Problem” and “Jesse Jackson Exposed.” Judicial Watch also publishes the monthly 375,000+ circulation Verdict newsletter and runs the cutting-edge Internet site JudicialWatch.org, which includes the oft-cited Corruption Chronicles blog. Mr. Fitton gained national attention as a political analyst, previously working for America's Voice and National Empowerment Television. He is a former employee of the International Policy Forum, the Leadership Institute, and Accuracy in Media.Mr. Fitton holds a B.A. in English from George Washington University. A Republic Under Assault: The Left's Ongoing Attack on American Freedom (Judicial Watch) available from Amazon in hardcover, e-book and in audiobook... https://www.amazon.co.uk/Republic-Under-Assault-American-Judicial/dp/1982163658/ref=sr_1_3?keywords=tom+fitton&sr=8-3 Follow Tom and Judicial Watch... WEBSITE: https://www.judicialwatch.org/ TWITTER: https://twitter.com/JudicialWatch https://twitter.com/TomFitton?s=20 GETTR: https://www.gettr.com/user/JudicialWatch https://gettr.com/user/tomfitton TRUTH: https://truthsocial.com/@JudicialWatch https://truthsocial.com/@TomFitton TELEGRAM: https://t.me/JudicialWatch Interview recorded 4.5.23 *Special thanks to Bosch Fawstin for recording our intro/outro on this podcast. Check out his art https://theboschfawstinstore.blogspot.com/ and follow him on GETTR https://gettr.com/user/BoschFawstin and Twitter https://twitter.com/TheBoschFawstin?s=20  To sign up for our weekly email, find our social media, podcasts, video, livestreaming platforms and more... https://heartsofoak.org/connect/ Please subscribe, like and share! Transcript   (Hearts of Oak) Hello Hearts of Oak and welcome to another interview coming up in a moment with Tom Fitton, the president of Judicial Watch. I had the privilege of meeting Tom over in CPAC six weeks ago and we talk about many things. What Judicial Watch do is use freedom of information and I haven't seen it used so effectively as Judicial Watch do and Tom has been the president for 25 years and we go into a whole range of issues that, without Judicial Watch, the public would not be aware of the truth. So we go into Biden targeting Christians and an FOI that Judicial Watch have just put in on the FBI and they're targeting of Roman Catholic churches. Universities control from abroad. This is a story about a university receiving half a billion from Qatar. Is that good? Is that bad? And how does it influence the education sector. The growing power of the CCP, we look at CCP police stations in New York and you saw maybe six weeks ago there was an arrest of two people. Actually it was Judicial Watch that initially put in that FOI. Without their work you wouldn't have seen the arrest and the exposure of that. Election integrity, they put in many different FOIs in regards to states, and states have been forced to clean up their electoral rolls. They've just put an FOI on Trump raid records to reveal all of those. I think 8,000 records need to be revealed. Judicial Watch have put that in. Gain of function. Again, a lot of stuff has been exposed. Hunter Biden. There are so many issues which they address, and without them, these would not be exposed to the public. So Tom shares many of those stories and talks about how actually what they do can be used abroad and replicated because many countries around the world have an FOI system, certainly in the UK and Europe. And I think we need to be aware of what we can do as citizens and actually use the institution, the legal system that we have to force the government to account. So tune in, listen to Tom share his 25 years worth of experience heading up as President of Judicial Watch. And hello, Hearts of Oak. Today it is an honour to talk to the President of Judicial Watch, Tom Fitton. Tom, thank you for your time today.   (Tom Fitton) You're welcome, Peter. Thank you for having me. Not at all. And you can follow Tom on Twitter. All the handles are there on the screen, @TomFitton and judicialwatch.org, at @JudicialWatch on Twitter. And his latest book, just to give you an idea, published in 2020 is A Republic Under Assault, the left's ongoing attack on American freedom, which really addresses the deep state voter fraud, illegal immigration. And there's a lot packed into that. So I'd encourage our viewers after this, if they want to delve a little bit more deeply into some of the things that Tom has discussed, the book is available everywhere. Now, Tom, for our non-US viewers, could you maybe take a moment and introduce yourself before we get into the work of Judicial Watch?   Well, thank you, Peter, and I won't presume our fellow Americans here in the United States know who we are. So, we're a non-profit educational foundation. We're essentially a government watchdog group. We use often a law here in the United States, it's the bulk of our litigation, called the Freedom of Information Act, which is an open records law that allows federal level access to records. And of course, states do it as well. They have similar laws, so we sue there. So we've been able to uncover all sorts of records about corruption issues that the media isn't terribly interested in pursuing, the Congress is arguably incapable of pursuing, but the American people desperately want to know about. And one of the things we do is we represent whistle-blowers, those who've been victimized by the government for daring to blow the whistle on government misconduct, meaning government officials, and then of course the victims of government misconduct as well. And so in doing so, we not only advance the rule of law, but we educate Americans and and other concerned citizens across the world, frankly, about the importance of clean government, honest government, and transparent government. Well, I think just on you, one thing I read on your Wikipedia, which is always good fun to read, and that in 2022, researchers found that Fitton was the third most prolific purveyor of election misinformation on Twitter during the late months of 2020. That's quite a badge of honour, isn't it? I was hoping for at least a silver medal. Well, the left is obsessed with depicting anything they dispute or hate as quote disinformation and of course, the communist left, which is on the rise here in the United States. They really like compiling lists. So I'm all sorts of lists that I'm sure they'll go to if they advance the revolution far enough along, to put me in jail or worse, but these are serious times and I'm half joking, but I, that book title is prescient, isn't it? Republic Under Assault. I often confuse it because I can, it sounds like a Star Wars movie title to me, but our Republic is under assault. And we have this constitutional system here in the United States that the left has decided is not convenient to them anymore. And so they've let folks who don't follow the rule of law and don't care about protecting the institutions that protect our Liberty, they're running the show for, in my view, an entire political party with the acquiescence, if not too often the allegiance of the other political party, the Republicans. On your website, and I've worked with FOIs here, we have a similar system in the UK, but how you have used them is on another level. I think on the, on your website the document archive section there are 27,000 documents. I mean that is a huge resource of information and it really is a window on government corruption that you've just made available to the public to use as they see fit. Yeah, I don't, it would be difficult to overstate the nature of our work in terms of the scope in what we've been able to uncover. We have thousands of Freedom of Information Act requests, I could come up with a number which may or may not be correct, but it's thousands and it would be shocking if the actual number was certified for you. And I know it's hundreds of Freedom of Information Act lawsuits, so there's no one more, there's no one who does more litigation to uncover what the government's up to, not only here in the United States, but worldwide. And you know, I know it's this is more of an international audience is that, you know, we're kind of unusual here in the United States, given our work. Now, I'm pleased to say, because of our aggressive heavy lifting on FOIA, others now know about it as a way to get access to information. But it's relatively unique here in the United States to just have a group focused on uncovering and battling government corruption. And to me, it's a great testament. I know there there are a lot of issues here in America, but it's a great testament to the American way and our rule of law that allows a little Judicial Watch to go into court and the IRS or the State Department or the Treasury, FBI, DOJ, they need to go into court and answer to the court as to why they're not giving us documents and what they're withholding and justify it. And so that's a rarity here in the United States and I know worldwide, we just don't have that sort of accountability in a regular way. First of all, if you're doing it in most other countries, you face financial ruin, imprisonment, injury, death to you and your family potentially. And that's just in France.   Yeah. So true. You know, the point is, even in Western Europe, they don't like civic society. That's the term I use. They call it the non-governmental sector, which to me is just so communist in approach. It's the government, everything else, the government has to justify its role as a sector. The NGOs don't need their own little sector. We should be running the show, non-government entities. But as you, and I don't need to tell you in the United Kingdom, there are just few independent civic groups. Usually they're either creatures of the government or of the parties. And so it's hard for them to get the traction we're able to get here in the United States. And you see when a few of them do get traction or when there's more of a populist movement, how vociferous the reaction is by the state there in Europe and frankly in Canada and elsewhere. So thank God for America but you know this is this is a more than just a third world problem government corruption it's a first world problem.   Yeah no completely and what you're doing shines a light on that and expose the things the government obviously don't want people to see. But maybe I could just go through some of the freedom of information that you have done that gives people an idea of your work and an idea what's possible and shows the failures of government and institutions. I think one of the most recent ones just a few days ago was Biden's targeting of Christians and Judicial Watch have just filed a Freedom of Information Act along with Catholic vote civil action against the FBI and the Department of Justice. Why on earth are the government spying on Christians. Well, if you're a leftist, it makes sense, right? The church is an enemy of the state, unnecessarily. Certainly the left's cultural agenda here in the United States, whether it be abortion or radical transgender extremism. And so the FBI, they know who butters their bread, and they follow or they come up with things that they think will appeal, to their political masters, who are the left. And one thing this agency did in Richmond, Virginia, so the FBI, for those of you not here in the United States, and those of you here in the United States may not know this, you've got the FBI headquarters, but the offices of the FBI, the Richmond office and the New York office, they're kind of their own fiefdoms as well. And so they're substantial in terms of their power and influence. And Richmond's and the Richmond office decided that, you know, traditionalist Catholics could, be attractive to the terrorists they want to monitor domestically. And I mean, it's really laughable, Peter. It's worth reading. Everyone should read it. It just shows you how out of control the government is and how stupid it is. They do an analysis under the guise of this intelligence threat assessment of Vatican II and the debates in the church about Vatican II. So do you want the FBI analysing those who support the Latin mass versus those who think we should have a mass in the everyday tongue of the country? It's just incredible. But what's frightening is the document also makes it clear that they want to get sources in the Church. So what they were planning was spying onto the Catholic Church, using them as, using these sources as tripwires, right, to get the bad guys who are too pro-life or too extreme in terms of defending children from mutilation and such. So, you know, you shouldn't have to go to your, go to mass or go to church. In this case, obviously, the Catholic Church was being specifically targeted, but every Christian should worry and wonder if your pastor or or your priest is spying on you and watching what you're saying, or whether your fellow parishioner that you shared a sign of the peace with is, is it informant for the FBI? And now, of course, the FBI and the Justice Department run from that document once it became disclosed as a result of a whistle-blower disclosure to a former FBI agent. But I'm not confident that they've stopped this type of approach and, indeed the fact that they haven't given us documents about this scandal suggests there's more to, hide. That's why we're in court. Well, how does that spying on its own citizens and the understanding that being a conservative is somehow dangerous to society? Does that just happen as the FBI under a Democrat regime, or is it so ingrained, that hatred of conservatism, that actually that prevails whoever is in the White House? Oh, well, you know, the history of the FBI is one of an agency that is often used to either protect or target the enemies of the sitting president, and they don't need to be told to do it. They kind of, as I said, they instinctively know who butters their bread. But I think things changed a bit with Donald Trump. He came in, was seemingly hostile to virtually every institution in the country, the drain the swamp approach. And so they decided that he needed to be taken out. And so you had these mandarins in the FBI decide that they were going to be, and I think actually, I forget who mentioned it, referenced the Praetorian Guard of old. They started off as quote, defenders of the Republic, right? And instead they became their own power centre. And I think we're seeing that with the FBI and the Justice Department. I was looking at their budget documents the other day, 30, I think it's 35, 37,000 staff, 13,000, which includes 13,000 FBI special agents, you know, $10-11 billion budget, and, I suspect that's about the size of most countries' militaries. And they're not just checking out, you know, and when you've got a bureaucracy that big, they're not just looking for bank robbers. No, I can bet. One of the other recent, people can go up on the website, obviously, and see all the press releases and the many regular FOIs, but universities being controlled from abroad, and this was a document showing the Texas A&M, which is a university there, it appeared to to receive $500 million, that's half a billion dollars, in grants from Qatar regime. And that's something massively concerning. We've had concerns here in the UK about Chinese influence on our universities especially, but also there is money and influence coming from the Middle East that probably is opposed to anything you would want freedom-wise in your country. So tell us about that. Well, when you give someone $500 million, you usually want something. You either want recognition or something in the least, the most charitable interpretation is, you know, at the university level, major donors usually seek recognition or to advance a specific academic goal. And so the question is, what was the goal here? I think, again, what, you know, it's one thing to say, oh, look at this money, it's terrible. You know, you just can't draw a conclusion. Well, someone gave money a gift, therefore it's terrible. You have to see what the circumstances are. And here the circumstances are, it looks like there was underreporting of the amount that was given. And it also is only being disclosed after hard-fought litigation in state courts that went up and down the Texas courts against the Qatar Foundation, which is a front for the terrorist-linked regime there. And so, if everything was on the up and up, this would have been a straightforward request for information. Indeed, Texas A&M I don't think had any initial objection. We had to fight the government, the Qatar government in lawfare here in the United States. It was really quite incredible. And, to me, it's like an easy, it's easy pickings if you're a foreign government seeking the influence, you just give money to universities and such. And in the case of China, there's a kind of almost an inherent, there's a special interest group because forget about giving money directly through Confucius Institutes or whatever the latest version of their academic fronts are, but you have a half, let's say a half a million Chinese residents here in the United States going to school, most of whom are paying full tuition. So the universities all of a sudden become advocates for this, just potentially dangerous relationships that we develop with these foreign countries through our higher education system.   Another story that broke and I didn't realize that you had been involved in putting the FOI.   We're involved in everything.   Yeah, I get it. So we talked about the power of the CCP but actually the story broke I think a month ago and the headline was the Federal Bureau investigation misled and stonewalled Judicial Watch on legitimate public record requests involving illegal Chinese police station opening in New York. And then your FOI, actually the people who you had put that in about, they suddenly get arrested. That is really concerning that a foreign government would have a police presence in the US and it makes you wonder kind of what else else is happening. But that was, again, your FOI that you'd put in. Yeah, I mean, we, you know, the idea that there are police fronts operating in the United States is not a new issue. You know, the folks have noted it and it took forever and a day, it looks like, for the FBI to get on it. And, you know, we asked for the documents and we got the run-around or they pretended there was no issue and didn't have anything to give to us. But sometimes even a non-answer is, indicates government scandal and corruption, but think about having the goal to run a police agency, practically speaking, that not only targets Chinese residents who are foreign nationals here in the United States, but American Chinese citizens, American citizens of Chinese origin. What chutzpah? And but on the other hand, you have a regime that thinks low enough of the United States and has Biden evidently deep enough in its back pocket that they can send in a spy craft to attack our sovereignty and do figure eights with no repercussions, practically speaking, above our secure military installations in the heartland of our country. In the heartland of our country. You have to wonder, obviously, what the Chinese are concluding from our lack of seeming outrage, I wonder what all of our friends must think, too.They won't defend themselves. Well, how can we rely on them to defend us or to help us, if push comes to shove? Completely, and that one you'd put in, again in the UK, we put in FOI and they come back and say the information is too difficult to obtain and then you can put another FOI, but you then go down the legal route. That's intriguing. You're not without teeth that you're using the legal system, you're not simply requesting according to what your statutory allowed to receive, you're actually then going to the court. So you have that threat and it's often that threat or actually you in the courtroom forces the government to release the information. Yeah that's true, it's actually going to court that often gets a response and you can imagine it's the United States government, it spends more money than mine is, so and the bureaucracy is huge so that their resting state is incompetence or refusal to comply with the law since, there's little accountability on that and the only way to get their attention is through a federal court case often. But that also has, you know, thankfully thanks to Judicial Watch's well-known record for going to court, other FOIAs sometimes do get responded to that otherwise wouldn't. For instance, we've done a ton of FOIAs on and lawsuits on on COVID, its origins, the vaccine, et cetera. And it was just a separate FOIA that wasn't a lawsuit, but they knew we were sniffing around and had similar lawsuits on the same issue, that just disclosed recently that the Fauci Agency was funding in China through EcoHealth Alliance, which is a third party, a front or a pass-through for grants, the creation of literal mutant coronaviruses, And that's a quote. Mutants. To see how or if they could infect humanized mice. I never thought to call gain of function viruses mutants, but it's a rather obvious point. And of course, our government's figured out that's what they are too. And they've been lying to us about what they've been doing for years. And the conclusion from that, which to me is, to me, this is some of the biggest, the most important material, Peter, at least on this issue we've uncovered, it helps explain why there was this fanatic desperation to discount the lab leak theory. Because if it was, quote, a leak from a lab, and I don't know why we presume it was a leak if it came from a lab, it was either a natural virus in the lab that got out somehow, or it was an engineered virus. And what was the technique for engineering it, And what was the set of viruses that were engineered? Well, the answers to those two latter questions are it was the United States. And the gain-of-function technique was a US biological approach that we shared and exported to China. So, this COVID origin story isn't just about what the Chinese were doing, in my view. And that shows, because many conservatives have had big concerns at the government's role, institutions' role within that. But it's one thing to have concerns and suspicions, it's another thing to have the documentary evidence. Going through your FOI seems time and time again that you're providing the evidence to back up what the suspicions that have been there over time, but most other people are not doing that. It's you that are going in and actually delivering on the hard facts for the issues. Yeah, I know a lot of folks who have conspiracy theories, what is derided as, what are derided as conspiracy theories, and my view is actually the truth is usually worse than the conspiracy theory. It's worse once you know what they actually did, and it's usually folks with the conspiracy theories, they're usually in the right ballpark, but they've got the specifics and the mechanisms and the people involved wrong, and sometimes the motivation's wrong, but their suspicions generally are correct. Something went wrong with the way the vaccines were manufactured. That process was politicized and is untrustworthy, and how it was pushed out and information about the issues related to the vaccine were handled. Something went wrong about the vaccine, excuse me, the coronavirus and its origins. There was reason to suspect that what we were being told wasn't true. Or we should at least examine all sorts of possibilities, as opposed to just pretending some questions are you're not allowed to ask. I mean, this is the craziness of these days, Peter. It's not even saying this happened, or I believe this happened. You're not even allowed to ask the question. And I tell you, the wonderful thing about FOIA is we get to ask those questions. Well, we find, yeah, that's an area you don't touch on. And another area you don't touch on, which you've talked about, another, we're told, is a conspiracy, is election integrity. And that's also because we've seen some lawsuits going in favour of actually cleaning up the system within states. But one of the FOIs you'd put in was in Colorado. And it's, the statement was, Judicial Watch announced that Colorado's Secretary of State agreed to settle a lawsuit alleging that Colorado had failed to remove ineligible voters from its rules. As part of a settlement, Colorado, I love this, will report to Judicial Watch on its yearly progress in cleaning up its rules for the next six years. I love that they have to answer to you, but that's a state-by-state issue that needs to be addressed, and that's one state that you then had a victory on, and I guess that has to happen state-by-state. Yeah. Well, and we've been successful state by state. And that's not the FOIA. That's not Freedom of Information Act. That's a law that allows, under federal law, aggrieved parties to sue states and localities that aren't taking reasonable steps to clean up the voter rolls. And I think this translates internationally. If you have a list of people who are eligible to vote, you should make sure that list is as accurate and up-to-date as you reasonably can, because it invites fraud, right, if oh so-and-so moved and died or died I'm still getting their ballot or I know their their name is on the list I'm gonna vote in their name or do something other than something else nefarious which is why the law requires the list to be cleaned up it's not just Tom Fitton being worried that's the reason the laws there otherwise why would you have it, and of course at the federal level the leftist running the Justice Department have little interest in cleaning up voter rolls because I believe certainly here in the United States and I'm not naïve that both political sides, both sides of the aisle are often tempted to mess with election results. But they don't want cleaner elections here in the United States. And I think it's because, because I can't think of any other reason. They oppose voter ID, they oppose cleaning up the rolls. They want to expand the idea of voting from one day, through entire months. They want unsupervised voting, which is the way to think about mail-in balloting. And that's something that no one else does. And I don't like the point to say, oh, no other country does this, because usually most every other country does things wrong. But I don't think any sensible person thinks that having millions of ballots be mailed out, and people filling those ballots out And just mailing them back is any way to run an honest election. No completely, and I know we-   And necessarily undermines confidence in the election system. Even if people participate in it, they realize, boy, how do they make sure no one is being intimidated when they vote? How do they make sure no one is, that the actual voter who sends the ballot in is who the person says they are? Oh, if they collect ballots, how do we know those ballots are collected properly and there's certifications about their origin? there was no intimidation in the collection process. None of that is, practically speaking, checkable under the new systems that were set up under the pretext of the COVID pandemic. Completely. Well, I know we often look to the States for hope here in Europe, but we just had an election and maybe one thing the US can learn from the motherland is that we actually do paper ballots. It's all counted on the one day and we don't use any voting dominion systems and it's it's all done and dusted and by 3 a.m. the next day you've got a result.   Yeah I mean and there's no excuse for the United States not to be able to do that. You know people say well the United States a bigger country. Well we don't run elections nationally, it's state by state. So there's no reason any major state in this nation can't figure out who won on election day. And we've also had another breakthrough where they now require voter ID so the left have realized it's not actually racist to ask someone for ID so we've had another breakthrough.   Well it's funny you know the left used to not like vote by mail because it used to be used by elderly republicans to vote. And then they decided they liked it. And everyone used to understand vote by mail was a kind of a recipe and invited voter fraud until it became politically, until they realized well we kind of like that so let's do more of it.   One of the other big things has been that the Trump raid records and I know you put down FOI and I think last month you'd said that you'd, they had released, the National Archives had released 1,200 pages of 8,000 records about that unprecedented raid. Tell us about that because it's vital that the American public know what was behind that, the reasons, the conversations, and I guess that will be another case of you then going to court to force those release off the other what six and a half thousand documents. Well, let's take a step back here, Peter. Back in, it was like 10, 12 years ago, we found out that Bill Clinton had tapes of recordation's of his conversations with foreign leaders and members of Congress that he kept after he left office. Right? And we thought, well, isn't that a presidential record? You know, I don't need to explain, practically speaking, what that might mean. Talking to foreign leaders typically are, you know, those talks are almost always classified inherently. And we went to court and the Justice Department and the National Archives, which is the federal bureaucracy that handles presidential records, their preservation and such, they came to us and said, no, we can't, you can't force us to get these records. And the court said, you have to defer to the president. He gets to decide what's personal and what's not. And the Justice Department in a court hearing said, you know what, if he has records after he leaves the Oval Office, they're presumptively personal. So compare and contrast that with their new position, 180 degree difference, with President Trump. And so the same archives that went out of its way to protect Bill Clinton's right to keep whatever records he wanted, conspired against President Trump to try to nail him on this records dispute criminally. And, you know, it's basically a civil matter, even if it is a dispute and there's a basis for it. And now they don't want to tell us that, because to get the records, it's all about transparency, right? We got to know what the president was doing. Well, now we don't, they won't tell us what they were doing to go after the president. And to take a step further back, I'm kind of getting a little bit in the weeds there. But and in America here, the political media class, they like to talk about this as if it's serious and important. No one buys it. I mean, I tell you. There isn't a foreign leader who doesn't look at what America is doing and say, okay, the current president, his agencies are trying to jail the former president, and his number one opponent in the presidential campaign. They don't need the details. They don't need the, oh, oh, but this is why it's important. This is, this is the terrible crime. They see through it and they see America that's no better than anyone else internationally in the way they are supposed to follow the rule of law. And I think it's a terrible national security and international embarrassment to the United States because now our moral, you know, the moral weight we could throw when we talk about the concerns about having fair elections and accountable government and consent to the government. Well, all that's out the window. They're trying to jail Trump simply because he opposed the wrong people here in Washington, not because of any personal misconduct. And Putin and Xi and, you know, frankly, Macron and whoever the current office holder is in Downing Street, that changes, I know, every three months.   It does. It's Rishi Sunak today, but who knows who it will be tomorrow. You know, they see what's happening in the United States, and they also recognize that attitude is there in their home countries. I mean, there isn't a major politician in any Western country that doesn't sit there because of the lack of rule, because of this contempt for consent of the government that doesn't sit there at the the sufferance of the deep state. Which is, in my view, transnational in nature in terms of their attitude. It doesn't mean they're conspiring saying we got to put this person on this piece in this place on the chessboard. No, it's an approach and it's a shared approach. One other area, and we had Miranda Devine on a few weeks ago and the Laptop from Hell and looking at Hunter Biden and you'd filed an FOI for a gun owned by him and I thought someone who had such a drug issue, an alcohol issue, wouldn't be eligible to get a gun but somehow. So tell us about that because obviously Hunter Biden's background, all the the business dealings that leads directly to Joe Biden himself. Well there are a few things there and so he was dating the widow of his brother and they got into a fight or dispute and she allegedly took his gun and threw it in a dumpster across the street from a school. Law enforcement got involved and the political reporting, the reporting on it was that the Secret Service and the FBI came and went to the store from which he purchased the gun and vacuumed up documents. So, to me, that shows improper involvement by federal agencies to take care of a political problem for the son of a major political figure. But when you think about the petty nature of what he kind of had to come in and sweep up for, and of course, we've been suing about those records, right? It helps explain, well, if they're doing that for little stuff, can you imagine what they're doing for big stuff? And certainly they've had the so-called Hunter laptop for at least since 19, excuse me, 2019. It's like a Hamlet-style agony about whether to prosecute Hunter since then, even though they have him dead to rights in a series of crimes. But there's new information now that just came out here from senior members of Congress that the FBI had evidence that Joe Biden had specifically been involved in a bribery scheme with a foreign nationals vice president, and all the evidence that's out there from the laptop and other witnesses suggest and show that Joe Biden was a beneficiary of Hunter's business dealings. So he got a cut of the action, you know, the infamous 10% for the big guy approach. So Hunter, I mean, Biden, Joe was a ran his operation like a Rico operation, a racketeering operation, a mob operation. And I think the challenge for his Justice Department, which is first and foremost moving to protect him, is they can't get at Hunter without getting and raising issues about Joe. So that's why you have this stalling and this hemming and hawing about, what you're going to go, if you go after Hunter for failing to disclose money on his tax returns, what about all the money he was giving his father? Is it he's subject to the same type of scrutiny? And if he hasn't, why not? We're in a crisis here. And you know, and some of that money came from the mayor of Moscow's wife. So you've got the Putin connection, Burisma. At least that was a company. So. Burisma was a Russian leading company. And then of course, you have the Chinese who were who had Hunter in their back pocket as well, obviously, because of his name and the influence. And it wasn't like the vice president was involved in all of this as vice president. So when Putin's making decisions and Xi is making decisions, how is it that they're not calculating Biden's corruption in their decision-making? You know, they're compromised, right? He's obviously has cognitive difficulties. He's compromised by the very public figures the public figures or political figures in China and Russia making these dangerous decisions. And so, you know, maybe, oh, does it mean we invade Ukraine because Biden's in our back pocket? No, but I would suggest it's a factor. Does it mean we are more aggressive around Taiwan or generally in China because Biden's in our back pocket? No, it's not the only reason, but certainly it's a factor. Too me it's a national security issue and it would be for any other country worth it's salt. All the issues you kind of talk about seem to be the Democrat party behind institutions, and I'm wondering will it come to the point where organizations like Judicial Watch and others need to actually go after either those on Capitol Hill or those in the institutions, AGs, I mean will it have to be actually going after those within the party itself? Well, we don't go after them under law because they are Democrats. We don't go after someone because they're Republicans. We try to apply the law. Or, you know, apply our focus without regard to political party. Though generally speaking, big government usually means big corruption. So we have all that money being spent. There's usually a lot of money sloshing up over the sides, right? Or it's usually being directed to political supporters as opposed to those in the public interest. And so ideologically, if you support bigger government, you tend to be more involved in corruption. I mean, it's just kind of, to me, it just goes with the just, it's part of the package. Now, Republicans, they abuse government to target us. They refuse to take action against corruption too often because they think politically it's not feasible or won't work for them, which to me is also a form of corruption. And so this temptation is great among both Republican and Democrats to kind of abuse these powers entrusted to them, especially if they think no one's watching. And I think the problem's not insurmountable. there's always going to be, you spend $4 trillion, there's going to be corruption, okay? But let's avoid having a Justice Department that is just thrown out all semblance of being dispassionate. Let's maybe have an FBI that is significantly curtailed, or if not, radically repurposed, to focus more on traditional law enforcement than political targeting of individuals. Let's ensure that our elections are as clean as we reasonably can. You know, the temptation is great. I mean, North Carolina, they had the stay here in the United States. They had to redo a congressional election because a Republican, essentially was engaged in a massive fraud. So we just have to be constantly vigilant. That's the price of freedom. To finish off with, Tom, for 25 years you've been president of Judicial Watch. And I guess there are many stories that if Judicial Watch hadn't been there, then the truth would never be told. And I think what you're doing is a model for other countries. And I know your focus is on the US, but there are other countries across Europe that have a similar freedom of information system, but it hasn't been used as well as you have used what you have there.   Go ahead, I'm sorry.   You obviously raise money from the public, you've got a big team, and tell us about that because ideally what you've built there is something that actually could be rolled out and used in other countries.   Well, we're able to fundraise directly and the fundraising laws here in the United States are very friendly to grassroots groups and the non-governmental organizations, a phrase I hate, to be able to raise public support and that's much harder, my understanding is, in other countries. It's just more difficult to raise money directly from the public, as I said, outside the, you know, they usually rely on the government or the creatures of the party. But there's a growing conservative movement internationally to address this transnational left-wing threat. Our folks are there in Europe this week now for CPAC Hungary, right, and there are conservatives from all over Europe there hanging out, figuring out ways to oppose Lothiathan.   Yeah, and I know I'm watching CPAC Hungary. So, Tom, thank you for your time. It's fascinating. I've followed Judicial Watch for quite a while and it's exciting to see what you're doing. So thank you for coming along and sharing insights on what is happening there with Judicial Watch.   Well, best of luck to you, Peter, thanks for having me on.   Thank you.

Full Hour | In today's second hour, Dom returns to previewing tonight's State of the Union address, playing back clips from officials such as Chuck Schumer and Jen Psaki, who each offered their advice for the President, essentially telling him to ignore all the negatives of the Administration. Dom argues against the positivity the two exuded about Biden's performance, explaining huge downfalls, particularly centered in the economy and inflation. Then, Dom and Dan discuss whether or not Dan should take SEPTA into Center City to watch the Eagles game at a friend's house with the intention to descend upon Broad Street if the team wins. Then, Dom welcomes Elisabeth Messenger, interim CEO of Americans for Fair Treatment, discussing some concerning information that her organization discovered involving the United States Postal Service. Messenger tells us that AFFT has uncovered information after reading the small print, using FOIAs, that suggests the USPS has shared private information from 68 million households that requested free COVID tests, explaining that the information was given to labor unions that could potentially be used for political campaigns. Messenger takes us inside the investigation and tells what she hopes to learn by pushing for answers from the federal government. (Photo by Caroline Brehman - Pool/Getty Images)

Dom welcomes Elisabeth Messenger, interim CEO of Americans for Fair Treatment, discussing some concerning information that her organization discovered involving the United States Postal Service. Messenger tells us that AFFT has uncovered information after reading the small print, using FOIAs, that suggests the USPS has shared private information from 68 million households that requested free COVID tests, explaining that the information was given to labor unions that could potentially be used for political campaigns. Messenger takes us inside the investigation and tells what she hopes to learn by pushing for answers from the federal government. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)

Jackie & Brittany have been very active in their communities with the school boards and realized it would be really helpful for other Americans to be aware of how to contribute and fight the good battles toward freedom and transparency. We are joined with Paul & Rachel Elliot who have been monumental in the north Texas area for requesting FOIAs against the school board. This can be done in local and federal government as well. Listen in as we discuss how you can request information on anything that you may find questionable. Remember: Follow The Money! We hope this episode will help you and your fight against tyranny! Enjoy!Follow us:Instagram @prob.problematicTruthSocial @probablyproblematicEmail: prob.problematic.podcast@gmail.comRumble:  Probably ProblematicNEW MERCH: www.probablyproblematicpodcast.comUse Promo Code PROB22 to save 15% until June 30th!Support the showSupport the show

We are joined by: Shooting Gallery NE and The Rogue Banshee. We go over FOIA request from Anti-gunners Sponsored by: https://www.1776supplyco.com Listen Live: https://www.youtube.com/johncrumpliveHome Page: https://www.johncrumplivecomSupport the channel: https://johncrump.locals.comEmail Mailing List: https://crumpy.com/mailing-list/

May 23, 2022 ~ Lloyd Jackson tells Kevin and Tom about the FOIAs obtained in the Rochester schools lawsuit.

Russia Sleuths discussion of latest Durham filings, FOIAs and other news about the Russia Hoax and the Durham Investigations. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit efdouglass.substack.com/subscribe

The Vote Matt Podcast. Join Matt and Mike as they discuss Matts Quest to retrieve FOIA documents from multiple agencies all foiled by bureaucratic nonsense, some hot Crypto Tips, Mikes new crusade to put an end to the destruction of our public lands, your rights as a customer in a grocery store, and a few other topics. Please Like, Comment on, Rate, Review, Share the Show, and Consider Donating at www.anchor.fm/swampfoxnetwork Join us on Telegram at T.me/swampfoxnetwork Hit up Mike on Instagram @mike_swampfoxnetwork and join our Zello channel at The Swamp Fox Network #Liberty #FOIA #PublicLand #Pinestraw #VMP #Swampfoxnetwork #VoteMatt #Crypto #KnowYourRights --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/swampfoxnetwork/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/swampfoxnetwork/support

Some new information about William Thompson whistleblower confrontation with the CDC -- and a new study comparing adverse health conditions between vaccinated and unvaccinated children   Dr. Brian Hooker is an Associate Professor of Biology at Simpson University in California, and a senior consultant for ARES Corporation, specializing in environmental restoration design. His analysis of the CDCs data about the Measle-Mumps-Rubella vaccine and autism was published in the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons.  For years he has been investigating the scientific evidence for a vaccine-autism connection and the flaws in vaccine safety. Brian also has a  son with autism and has been active in autism community for increasing public awareness about this epidemic. Over the years Brian has filed many FOIAs with federal health agencies and was in receipt of 1000s of pages of documents from a CDC informant, Dr. William Thompson questioning the efficacy and safety of vaccination.  He has been a point independent researcher in the recent whistleblower case with Dr. Thompson from the CDC regarding vaccine dangers. For more information, go to ChildrensHealthDefense.org

With transitioning between legal aid organizations, this has been a great time for me to clean up the various clients that I am connected with through the CAF Unit at the IRS.  Before leaving Kansas Legal Services, I tried to sever ties with various clients by submitting withdrawals to the CAF Unit.  Following that, I did a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to find out which clients were still connected to me.  In this episode, I discuss more details and learned just how many of the clients I still had connections with over the years.  Tune it to find out more!  

June 10 2021 ~ The Detroit Free Press' Paul Egan talks with Kevin Dietz about the FOIAs he got on our Governor's office.

Thank you for listening to another episode of DWP! We welcome on The Deep Share Podcast's Host Andrew! He had a cool idea to get into disinformation from the government and secret agencies through FOIA requests and declassified docs. We often times get excited when the government tells us they were lying to us even though we never believe what they say. So why is declassification different? Check him out on IG, YouTube and anywhere you listen to podcasts https://instagram.com/thedeepsharepodcast?utm_medium=copy_link https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCQ5PCeJDenZtUlc0pAJuFsA https://open.spotify.com/show/6wKPxOvO8FxgiiaPxjN81D?si=COz_GO_1Qo6EtywYOlbuhw&utm_source=copy-link&dl_branch=1&nd=1&product=open&%24full_url=http%3A%2F%2Fopen.spotify.com%2Fshow%2F6wKPxOvO8FxgiiaPxjN81D%3Fsi%3DCOz_GO_1Qo6EtywYOlbuhw%26utm_source%3Dcopy-link%26dl_branch%3D1&~channel=copy-link&feature=organic&_i=dVGpq9E7hANIt87Jc1VEP79kf8BKoZM5tcaL0MOz2KfSe2f7ZmrEdUWLMDhtpr3n&_branch_match_id=923202770413310134 https://odysee.com/@Thedeepsharepodcast:a?r=6Ro71EV52pCsYTWKLFyE7zcqVkDqfY7G Support us on Patreon and chat with us next time we throw the party! Only $3 a month to get in and hear full length conversations. Come check out our new website and find a shirt you like! DangerousWorldStore.com $26 Tees and free shipping in the US. Worldwide shipping available at discounted rates! JadeCBD.co promo code “DANGER” for 10% off Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Thank you for listening to another episode of DWP! We welcome on The Deep Share Podcast’s Host Andrew! He had a cool idea to get into disinformation from the government and secret agencies through FOIA requests and declassified docs. We often times get excited when the government tells us they were lying to us even though we never believe what they say. So why is declassification different? Check him out on IG, YouTube and anywhere you listen to podcasts https://instagram.com/thedeepsharepodcast?utm_medium=copy_link https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCQ5PCeJDenZtUlc0pAJuFsA https://open.spotify.com/show/6wKPxOvO8FxgiiaPxjN81D?si=COz_GO_1Qo6EtywYOlbuhw&utm_source=copy-link&dl_branch=1&nd=1&product=open&%24full_url=http%3A%2F%2Fopen.spotify.com%2Fshow%2F6wKPxOvO8FxgiiaPxjN81D%3Fsi%3DCOz_GO_1Qo6EtywYOlbuhw%26utm_source%3Dcopy-link%26dl_branch%3D1&~channel=copy-link&feature=organic&_i=dVGpq9E7hANIt87Jc1VEP79kf8BKoZM5tcaL0MOz2KfSe2f7ZmrEdUWLMDhtpr3n&_branch_match_id=923202770413310134 https://odysee.com/@Thedeepsharepodcast:a?r=6Ro71EV52pCsYTWKLFyE7zcqVkDqfY7G Support us on Patreon and chat with us next time we throw the party! Only $3 a month to get in and hear full length conversations. Come check out our new website and find a shirt you like! DangerousWorldStore.com $26 Tees and free shipping in the US. Worldwide shipping available at discounted rates! JadeCBD.co promo code “DANGER” for 10% off --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/dangerous-world/support

LESSONS TO BE LEARNED FROM THE PAST FOR TRUSTING FEDERAL HEALTH AGENCIES    Dr. Brian Hooker is an Associate Professor of Biology at Simpson University in California, and a senior consultant for ARES Corporation, specializing in environmental restoration design. He is board director for Robert Kennedy's Children's Health Defense and serves on the board for Focus on Health. Brian's analysis of the CDCs data about the Measle-Mumps-Rubella vaccine and autism was published in the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons.  For years he has been investigating the scientific evidence for a vaccine-autism connection and the flaws in vaccine safety. Brian also has a  son with autism and has been active in autism community for increasing public awareness about this epidemic. Over the years Brian has filed many FOIAs with federal health agencies and was in receipt of 1000s of pages of documents from a CDC informant, Dr. William Thompson questioning the efficacy and safety of vaccination.  He has been a point independent researcher in the recent whistleblower case with Dr. Thompson from the CDC regarding vaccine dangers. Prof. Hooker received his masters and doctorate in biochemical engineering from Washington State University. For more information, visit ChildrensHealthDefense.org   Article: https://prn.fm/covid-vaccines-another-chapter-history-irresponsible-medical-practice-profit-greed/ 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 53 °F, and maybe a little rainy. You can expect the rain to taper off this morning and for temperatures to stay right where they are for most of the day. Cooler temperatures return tomorrow.Water coolerAs of this morning, the Virginia Department of Health reports 1,736 new positive cases of the coronavirus in the Commonwealthand 170 new deaths as a result of the virus. VDH reports 150 new cases in and around Richmond (Chesterfield: 58, Henrico: 57, and Richmond: 35). Since this pandemic began, 976 people have died in the Richmond region. That’s now seven days with a seven-day average of fewer than 2,000 new reported cases across the State. We’re now back at pre-Thanksgiving levels of new cases, and that certainly makes me feel some optimism. VDH continues to work through the backlog of winter death certificates, and locally the results are grim: Since February 19th, our region’s death toll has increased by 253 and now stands at 976. 26% of the deaths caused by COVID-19 in Richmond, Henrico, and Chesterfield were reported in the last nine days.In exciting vaccine news, over the weekend the CDC authorized the Johnson & Johnson vaccine for emergency use. That means we now have a third vaccine to use to fight this disease, and it means a small bump to our local supply, too. VDH says that the Commonwealth expects to receive 69,000 doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine this week, and that it will be “prioritized for mass vaccination clinics across the state.” Remember! The best vaccine for you is the first one you’re offered.Eric Kolenich at the Richmond Times-Dispatch reports that a freshman student at VCU “was found dead early Saturday after a fraternity rush event involving alcohol.” Just awful and terrible. Both VCU and the national Delta Chi fraternity have suspended the local chapter, and you can read the University’s full statement here.The RPS School Board will meet tonight and discuss three things I find interesting: Graduation rates (PDF), a reopening “Safety Dashboard” (PDF), and the results of the year-round school survey (PDF). About the first, the administration projects that the dropout rate across the division will drop by 13% this year. About the third, caregivers and teachers both are pretty split about a year-round school calendar.GRTC updated their Regional Public Transportation Plan page to include a handful of new and useful maps. They’ve now got both concepts—the ridership and coverage concepts—overlaid on poverty data and race/ethnicity data. Additionally, they’ve got a bunch of these cool neighborhood maps (PDF) comparing the new places, jobs, and residents that are accessible should we implement either the ridership or coverage concepts. The aforelinked map for Richmond Community Hospital shows how the ridership concept would unlock access to almost all of Northside—frequency is awesome! After you’ve finished tapping, zooming, and scrolling, make sure you fill out the survey to let them know which concept you prefer. Oh! Also! You can read a bit more about this regional plan over on Jarrett Walker’s blog.NBC12’s Hannah Eason reports that the City will install pedestrian hybrid beacons at 12 locations, beginning with one at Grove and Somerset in March (which I think I’ve written about before). These beacons aren’t just your typical flashing yellow light that drivers tend to ignore until you thrust your body in front of their vehicles hoping for the best. No! These have actual red lights and require drivers to stop. The list of planned locations is amazing and addresses some of the most dangerous street crossing for pedestrians, cyclists, and folks trying to catch the bus. Here are a few of my favorites: Belvedere Street at the War Memorial, Laburnum Avenue at Holton Elementary, and Main Street & 24th Street. I’ve nearly been hit by a driver at each of these locations, so to see the City doing something about it is pretty exciting.Tapping around City Council meeting agendas this morning, and I came across this presentation on “Deferred Facilities Maintenance and Fleet Replacement Planning” (PDF). It’s boring. But! Page seven says “The City does not have defined capital funding sources to address the aging [fire department] fleet…we recommend that the RFD work with Fleet Services to identify the aging fleet and to identify actions which need to occur in the Capital Improvement Program to replace apparatuses as they approach the retirement age.” Also boring! BUT! Fire truck access is a constant barrier to creating slower, safer streets for people. Big, huge fire trucks require big, huge streets, which results in other drivers flying around at fast and dangerous speeds. Smaller fire trucks do exist, and if we’re at a critical point for replacing the RFD’s fleet, we should replace them with smaller vehicles as part of the City’s ongoing equitable transportation work. P.S. Page four of this presentation also has a pretty comprehensive list of other important plans and documents if you wanted to add a few PDFs to your collection.The City has released one-pagers provided by each of the six operators who filled out the casino RFP. I couldn’t find the actual responses to the RFP, so maybe they’re Top Secret for now while negotiations are ongoing. I dunno, but I imagine some intrepid reporters are firing up their FOIAs as we speak. Also, the City has outlined the engagement process (PDF), which kicks off with a virtual citywide meeting on March 9th to talk about “1) the community engagement process and 2) the community benefits a resort casino may provide, how communities have used resort casino revenues, and how a resort casino may mitigate negative impacts.”The marijuana legalization bill working its way through the General Assembly almost died an interesting and sudden death over the weekend. Mel Leonor at the RTD reports that, as it stands, Virginia will create a new, regulated market by 2024, but “punted to next year key decisions on the regulatory framework for the market and the new criminal penalties that would go into effect when marijuana is legalized.” We’ll see if the Governor makes any tweaks this week.This morning’s longreadThe Lies Hollywood Tells About Little GirlsA good chaser to the Golden Globes by Mara Wilson.At 13, I already knew all about The Narrative. As an actor from the age of 5, who was carrying films by age 8, I’d been trained to seem, to be, as normal as possible — whatever it took to avoid my inevitable downfall. I shared a bedroom with my little sister. I went to public school. I was a Girl Scout. When someone called me a “star” I was to insist that I was an actor, that the only stars were in the sky. Nobody would touch the money I made until I turned 18. But I was now 13, and I was already ruined. Just like everyone expected.If you’d like your longread to show up here, go chip in a couple bucks on the ol’ Patreon.Picture of the Day

"[FOIAs] are vital to my work...we've written dozens of stories in the past months alone, based on emails between public officials or reports from universities," says Andrea Gallo about the hundreds of public records requests she's filed during her years as a journalist. Want to support 1A? Give to your local public radio station and subscribe to this podcast. Have questions? Find us on Twitter @1A.

To join The Fall Line Patreon and help us fund projects like refreshing the art on the Millbrook twins’ billboard in Augusta, GA and paying its monthly rent, please follow the link here. You will also help fund research, FOIAs, content advisement, and support for nonprofits and charities.  Created by Laurah Norton and Brooke Hargrove/Produced and Engineered by Maura Currie/Theme music by RJR/Special thanks to Angie Dodd. Subscribe to One Strange Thing now!   Find our sponsor links and promo codes here  Merch can purchased here  Monthly donations are currently going to Black and Missing Foundation--please consider supporting their work!   2021 All Rights Reserved The Fall Line Podcast, LLC Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This evening on the Progressive Commentary Hour, Gary engages in an in depth conversation with Dr. Brian Hooker about the global rush to bring a Covid-19 vaccine to market, the dangers of this new generation genetically engineered vaccines and the fundamental flaws in governments' handling of the pandemic. Dr. Hooker is an Associate Professor of Biology at Simpson University in California. For years he has been investigating the scientific evidence for a vaccine-autism connection and the flaws in vaccine safety. He has filed many FOIAs with federal health agencies and was in receipt of 1000s of pages of documents from a CDC informant, Dr. William Thompson questioning the efficacy and safety of vaccination.  Brian also has a  son with autism and has been active in autism community for increasing public awareness about this epidemic. Tune into PRN on Tuesday, November 17 at 7:00 pm ET for urgent information about the Covid virus and the flawed efforts to control it. 

Good morning, RVA! It’s 58 °F, and we now, apparently, live in Fogtown, USA. After the fog burns off, expect highs in the 60s and a generally pleasant day. We’ve got at least another one of these on deck before hurricane remnants move in and give us a pretty good chance of rain on Thursday.Water coolerAs of this morning, the Virginia Department of Health reports 904↗️ new positive cases of the coronavirus in the Commonwealth and 2↗️ new deaths as a result of the virus. VDH reports 93↗️ new cases in and around Richmond (Chesterfield: 49, Henrico: 20, and Richmond: 24). Since this pandemic began, 410 people have died in the Richmond region. Locally, the seven-day average of new reported cases sits at 113. I don’t think we’ve had a combined Richmond, Henrico, and Chesterfield seven-day average over a hundred since back in August. Mostly Chesterfield and Henrico have driven that increase, an increase which started around the second week of October when the local combined seven-day average was just 57. VDH’s pandemic dashboard (which updates on Mondays) reflects the local increases in case counts we’re seeing and puts the Central Region at “substantial community transmission,” the highest level, for the week ending October 24th. Keep in mind 1) the Central Region is massive compared to Richmond, Henrico, and Chesterfield, and 2) we’re just, just, just over the thresholds for substantial community transmission and the trend is fluctuating. I don’t love when I statdump like this without giving any guidance about how this new information impacts your life. So…keep wearing your masks?Here’s a weird article by Reed Williams at the Richmond Times-Dispatch about a new “External Advisory Committee” established by Richmond Police Chief Gerald Smith. The committee will focus on “community involvement, officer recruitment, and transparency.” However, Chief Smith “declined to name all but one of the new committee’s 15 members and balked when asked if a reporter could cover one of the meetings.” This is…not super transparent? The Chief say he has concerns about members of the committee getting doxxed and harassed for working with the police, which, I dunno. I’m sure the FOIAs are already flying. If the police want to create an external advisory committee—to help them with community involvement and transparency—maybe the first step is being transparent about who from the community is involved? We’ll see how this committee is used in future discussions about police procedures, but in no way should it replace or prevent the work to establish a Civilian Review Board.Wyatt Gordon at the Virginia Mercury writes about the increase in pedestrian deaths on Virginia’s streets over the last couple of years. Just last week a 16-year-old girl was killed by a driver on Richmond’s Southside. Maybe this happens—I have no idea—but every time someone dies or is seriously injured on our streets, the Department of Public Works should do an immediate investigation, figure out what happened, and deploy rapid-response infrastructure to address the problem. Cones, barrels, and signal timing can do a lot to narrow roadways, decrease speeds, and prevent a “6,000 pound Nissan Titan spiraling up and onto the sidewalk.”City Council meets today at 2:00 PM for a special meeting to decide what to do with the surplus funds from last year—and it’s a lot of surplus, something like $14 million. ORD. 2017–215 (PDF) takes a lot of the fun out of those decisions by boringly and automatically earmarking where any general fund surpluses end up: 50% goes into the Rain Day Fund, 40% to the Capital Maintenance Reserve, and 10% to special projects. It’s that 10% Council has been trying to figure out over the last couple weeks, while the Mayor’s administration has been trying to figure out exactly how much surplus exists. RES. 2020-R059 (PDF) sets out Council’s priorities: $780,000 for post-employment benefits, $110,000 for an equity study (described in RES. 2020-R013as costing $221,770), and $500,000 for COVID-19 contingencies. I think I said a million weeks ago that if it we’re me, I’d sock away the vast majority of any surplus to prepare for the upcoming and probably terrible budget season. Looks like that the City already has laws on the books to make that happen automatically!I don’t have much to say about the inevitable, under-the-cover-of-darkness swearing in of Justice Amy Coney Barrett. I am, however, looking for your smartest longreads on SCOTUS reform or expansion.This morning’s longreadBail Out ParentsI almost sent this article in the Atlantic about government issued per-child stipends (which were passed in the House as part of the HEROES Act yet never even given a vote in the Senate) to local early-childhood policy expert Elliot Haspel. But, turns out, he is the author of this very piece!Parents, taken collectively, are an underrecognized yet vital economic interest. According to the Brookings Institution, 41.2 million workers, a third of the entire workforce, have a child under age 18. Nearly 34 million have a child under age 14 who is likely to require some kind of supervision during virtual schooling, a task that disproportionately falls on mothers’ shoulders. COVID-19, unsurprisingly and infuriatingly, is already driving women out of the workforce. According to a recent Census Bureau report, “Around one in five (18.2%) of working-age adults said the reason they were not working was because COVID-19 disrupted their childcare arrangements,” with women three times as likely as men to report this barrier.If you’d like your longread to show up here, go chip in a couple bucks on the ol’ Patreon.

Sean and Joey name the NBA's new Young Sheldon and take a detour into Rivers Cuomo's soccer anthems. Then they are joined by good guy reporter Ken Klippenstein to learn how to solve some NBA conspiracy theories using the Freedom Of Information Act. Plus, Brett & Randy are back for another episode of the only podcast within a podcast within a podcast on a edition of new Slamm'd Up! this episode is packed!Be one of Ken's Sources here: https://kenklippenstein.com/contact/ and follow him on twitter @KenKlippensteinAlso join us in donating to the SELAH Neighborhood Homeless Coalition Here: https://donorbox.org/selahSUPPORT: www.patreon.com/roundrockpodTWITTER & IG: @RoundRockPodE-MAIL: RoundRockPod@gmail.comPHONE: 323-682-0342ALBUM: www.roundballrock.bandcamp.comSONG: "COVID In The Wind" by Sean Keane See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Virginia Heffernan talks to Buzzfeed senior investigative reporter Jason Leopold -- who with partner Anthony Cormier has broken several Trump stories -- about FOIAs, cultivating specific sources, media mistrust, insights into a checkered past, and of course, those Buzzfeed stories. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Virginia Heffernan talks to Buzzfeed senior investigative reporter Jason Leopold -- who with partner Anthony Cormier has broken several Trump stories -- about FOIAs, cultivating specific sources, media mistrust, insights into a checkered past, and of course, those Buzzfeed stories. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Senate Vote https://dailycaller.com/2019/03/14/senate-republicans-vote-against-trump-national-emergency/ Budget https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-11/trump-2020-budget-raises-military-spending-cuts-everything-else Rahm Emanuel https://dailycaller.com/2019/03/12/rahm-emanuel-socialist-dems-may-lose-trump-2020/ “Poor Bastard” Never Trumpers https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/03/12/exclusive-president-trump-mocks-amazing-breed-of-never-trumpers-slams-almost-deranged-poor-bastard-george-will/ Gun Confiscation https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/03/09/lindsey-graham-democrats-gop-can-come-together-for-gun-confiscation-law/ “Make Daylight Savings Great Again” https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-11/trump-making-daylight-saving-time-permanent-ok-me “Fire My Kids” https://dailycaller.com/2019/03/12/book-trump-john-kelly-fire-ivanka-jared-kushner/ Make Cheating Great Again https://dailycaller.com/2019/03/14/lori-loughlins-daughter-olivia-yacht-rick-caruso/ “Oh God, Right At the President” https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-10/oh-my-god-right-president-suv-almost-hits-trumps-motorcade Alita Wins https://www.breitbart.com/entertainment/2019/03/10/captain-marvel-opens-with-record-breaking-153m-debut/ https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-09/after-rotten-tomates-removes-93-reviews-captain-marvel-still-sucks South By South Cuck https://www.breitbart.com/the-media/2019/03/10/nolte-cnn-chief-jeff-zucker-conspiracy-theory-meltdown-sxsw/ https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-10/aoc-tells-bougie-tech-conference-attendees-capitalism-irredeemable INPEECH https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-11/hes-just-not-worth-it-pelosi-comes-out-against-impeaching-trump Zero Hedge is Great Again https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-12/facebook-reverses-zero-hedge-ban-says-it-made-mistake Immigration https://www.breitbart.com/border/2019/03/11/900-migrant-families-apprehended-daily-in-feb-in-two-border-patrol-sectors/ https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/03/12/ice-2287-migrants-quarantine-around-u-s-communicable-disease-outbreaks/ https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/03/12/study-migrants-using-nearly-2x-the-welfare-of-native-born-americans/ https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/03/11/exclusive-president-donald-trump-on-immigration-i-dont-want-to-have-anyone-coming-in-thats-on-welfare/ https://www.breitbart.com/border/2019/03/12/rep-chip-roy-introduces-bill-to-declare-specific-mexican-cartels-as-foreign-terrorist-orgs/ The Absolute State of Fox News https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-11/fox-issues-rare-rebuke-judge-jeanine-after-rant-against-rep-ilhan-omars-hijab https://www.breitbart.com/the-media/2019/03/11/tucker-carlson-refuses-to-apologize-over-media-matters-compilation-of-shock-jock-call-ins/ https://www.breitbart.com/clips/2019/03/11/tucker-carlson-we-will-never-bow-to-the-mob-ever-no-matter-what/ Tucker Carlson Tonight 3/11/19 | Breaking Fox News March 11, 2019 Plane Crash https://www.foxnews.com/politics/feinstein-blumenthal-lead-dem-pressure-on-boeing-after-deadly-ethiopian-airlines-crash https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-13/boeing-767-suffers-mechanical-failure-flight-beijing-seattle-forced-turn-around Leaks, FOIAs, and Spygate https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/it-exists-doj-finds-letter-ordering-scrutiny-of-uranium-one-hillary-clinton/ar-BBUzHJZ?ocid=st https://sputniknews.com/us/201903081073065999-steele-ohr-fbi-doj/ https://www.dailycaller.com/2019/03/14/collins-peter-strzok-testimony/ https://dailycaller.com/2019/03/12/lisa-page-testimony-stings-loretta-lynch/ https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/03/13/lisa-page-obama-doj-ordered-fbi-not-to-prosecute-hillary-clinton/ https://saraacarter.com/explosive-lisa-page-testimony-steele-timeline-contradictions-and-doj-interference/ https://m.theepochtimes.com/nellie-ohr-testimony-confirms-her-work-for-the-cia_2836812.html https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB117674837248471543

Projects reporter Morgan O'Hanlon and former Daily Texan reporter Will Clark discuss how UT responds to public information requests and how that affects their reporting. Music by Blue Dot Sessions.

Todd Bishop Todd Bishop and his colleagues at GeekWire have strategically blended business journalism with leading-edge media business practices to create a regional tech publication with worldwide readership. Todd is convinced that content marketers and other content strategists could benefit from bringing a journalistic approach to their content. With a research-based, journalistic approach "you're not just telling people what you want them to hear because it aligns with your business interests, but you're finding things that are really valuable out there that people would not have known otherwise." Even as GeekWire models modern media practices, Todd remains enthusiastic about old-fashioned shoe-leather journalism - filing FOIAs, digging through corporate IPO filings, and exposing business scams. We talked about: GeekWire's blend of editorial content and event production how journalists are to content strategy as fish are to water, completely immersed in it how GeekWire developed its position as an international source for tech news even as it stays regionally focused his approach to balancing the editorial needs and expectations of his readers with GeekWire's business goals GeekWire's own HQ2 experiment how GeekWire turns fun and engaging internal team-development activities into engaging stories the power of research - finding and sharing information that's in plain sight Todd's Bio Todd Bishop is co-founder and editor of GeekWire, a longtime technology journalist who covers subjects including cloud tech, e-commerce, virtual reality, devices, apps and tech giants such as Amazon.com, Apple, Microsoft and Google. A native of Orland, Calif., he has worked as a reporter for publications including The Philadelphia Inquirer, Puget Sound Business Journal and Seattle P-I. Video Here's the video version of our conversation (we spoke in-person and didn't record a Zoom video as I usually do, so this is just a YouTube version of the audio recording): https://youtu.be/2-xdsAFXNH0 Show Notes/"Transcript" [Not an actual transcript - just my quick notes on first listen-through] 0:20 - my intro 0:40 - Todd intro - longtime newspaper reporter and views content through that lens, with a modern twist - GeekWire is a national/international tech publication 1:40 - founding of GeekWire - origins in Seattle P-I - Jonathan Spasato sole invester and co-founder - bootstrapped from initial investment, and now profitable, has grown based on the business - big portion is events -10-14 a year - but also make money off of advertising and sponsored content - maintains news and advertising divide 3:#6 - content is the starting point for all - events, news, etc - people read GeekWire for all kinds of reasons - insights, tips, recruting, job hunting - reporters traditonally think of what they write as changing the world - not always Watergate or Pentatgon Papers - can be more local - would love to win a Pulitzer, but happy where they are now 5:00 - used Google satellite maps to find Amazon's secret drone testing site - also exposed a scam by Order Ahead, fake ordering service - try to do that kind of civic journalism - but also a lot of practical 5:45 - demise of enterprise journalism? 6:00 - everyone's a pulisher now, content marketing, establishing expertise - content marketers ofte struggle - as a journalist, my hypothesis is that you're so immersed in it (content strategy) that it is to you as water is to a fish 7:00 - did you take a strategic approach to, say, the beats that you choose to cover? 7:05 - yes, in some ways, more, though, about what they know is important - fascinating stuff happening here [in Seattle] - Amazon, MS resurgence, now, space - SpaceX and Blue Origin, due to Boeing aerospace heritage - Alan Boyle one of best reporters in the country on that beat - stumbled on to fact that local stuff resonates nationally and internationally - broke Amazon Fresh story with old-fash...

Todd Bishop Todd Bishop and his colleagues at GeekWire have strategically blended business journalism with leading-edge media business practices to create a regional tech publication with worldwide readership. Todd is convinced that content marketers and other content strategists could benefit from bringing a journalistic approach to their content. With a research-based, journalistic approach "you're not just telling people what you want them to hear because it aligns with your business interests, but you're finding things that are really valuable out there that people would not have known otherwise." Even as GeekWire models modern media practices, Todd remains enthusiastic about old-fashioned shoe-leather journalism - filing FOIAs, digging through corporate IPO filings, and exposing business scams. We talked about: GeekWire's blend of editorial content and event production how journalists are to content strategy as fish are to water, completely immersed in it how GeekWire developed its position as an international source for tech news even as it stays regionally focused his approach to balancing the editorial needs and expectations of his readers with GeekWire's business goals GeekWire's own HQ2 experiment how GeekWire turns fun and engaging internal team-development activities into engaging stories the power of research - finding and sharing information that's in plain sight Todd's Bio Todd Bishop is co-founder and editor of GeekWire, a longtime technology journalist who covers subjects including cloud tech, e-commerce, virtual reality, devices, apps and tech giants such as Amazon.com, Apple, Microsoft and Google. A native of Orland, Calif., he has worked as a reporter for publications including The Philadelphia Inquirer, Puget Sound Business Journal and Seattle P-I. Video Here's the video version of our conversation (we spoke in-person and didn't record a Zoom video as I usually do, so this is just a YouTube version of the audio recording): https://youtu.be/2-xdsAFXNH0 Show Notes/"Transcript" [Not an actual transcript - just my quick notes on first listen-through] 0:20 - my intro 0:40 - Todd intro - longtime newspaper reporter and views content through that lens, with a modern twist - GeekWire is a national/international tech publication 1:40 - founding of GeekWire - origins in Seattle P-I - Jonathan Spasato sole invester and co-founder - bootstrapped from initial investment, and now profitable, has grown based on the business - big portion is events -10-14 a year - but also make money off of advertising and sponsored content - maintains news and advertising divide 3:#6 - content is the starting point for all - events, news, etc - people read GeekWire for all kinds of reasons - insights, tips, recruting, job hunting - reporters traditonally think of what they write as changing the world - not always Watergate or Pentatgon Papers - can be more local - would love to win a Pulitzer, but happy where they are now 5:00 - used Google satellite maps to find Amazon's secret drone testing site - also exposed a scam by Order Ahead, fake ordering service - try to do that kind of civic journalism - but also a lot of practical 5:45 - demise of enterprise journalism? 6:00 - everyone's a pulisher now, content marketing, establishing expertise - content marketers ofte struggle - as a journalist, my hypothesis is that you're so immersed in it (content strategy) that it is to you as water is to a fish 7:00 - did you take a strategic approach to, say, the beats that you choose to cover? 7:05 - yes, in some ways, more, though, about what they know is important - fascinating stuff happening here [in Seattle] - Amazon, MS resurgence, now, space - SpaceX and Blue Origin, due to Boeing aerospace heritage - Alan Boyle one of best reporters in the country on that beat - stumbled on to fact that local stuff resonates nationally and internationally - broke Amazon Fresh story with old-fash...

The Heartland Institute is organizing a group of scientists to cast doubt on mainstream climate change science, and it has the ear of the Trump administration. Climatewire editor Evan Lehmann and deputy editor Robin Bravender describe the group's leaked emails. Climatewire science reporters Scott Waldman and Chelsea Harvey fact-check the claims. International reporter Jean Chemnick recounts the latest storm to hit a Trump coastal property. And Kevin Bogardus, Greenwire's federal agencies reporter and FOIA master at E&E News, shares some of his favorite stories and tips. "Skeptics suspicious of Pruitt plan to press him on red team" (Climatewire, 10/16/2017), by Niina Heikkinen and Robin Bravender: www.eenews.net/climatewire/stories/1060063693 "Some groups want more CO2. Here's what that means" (Climatewire, 10/17/2017), by Chelsea Harvey and Scott Waldman: www.eenews.net/climatewire/2017/10/17/stories/1060063815 "Trump resort spared from storm damage. He still wants a wall" (Climatewire, 10/17/2017), by Jean Chemnick: www.eenews.net/climatewire/2017/10/17/stories/1060063813 "'Terrified' employees, 'beyond gross' vandalism in troubled regional office" (Greenwire, 08/21/2014), by Kevin Bogardus and Sam Pearson: https://www.eenews.net/greenwire/stories/1060004793

Join host Michael Connelly as he discusses the disgusting SOTU (2015) address, FOIAs not answered and so much more!