JW Sues for Refugees Information, Breaks Border Security News
As I previously reported
to you, Barack Obama would admit thousands of refugees from the center
of the terrorist storm in the Middle East without any serious background
security checks rather than listen to the American people, who oppose
the refugee proposal in large and bipartisan numbers. Obama's plan to
spend your tax money to bring 10,000 refugees from Syria to the United
States is moving full speed ahead. Congress, which went through the
motions of showing outrage but today, with overwhelming Republican
support, voted to fund fully this dangerous policy.
As
both Congress and this president betray the safety and security of the
American people, you can trust Judicial Watch to step into the breach as
best we are able. To that end, JW just filed a lawsuit
in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia seeking records
between the U.S. Department of State and its "voluntary agency"
partners about the controversial refugees arriving in the United States.
The Judicial Watch Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit seeks
documents that detail much of the federal spending and other details
about the refugee program.
The lawsuit was filed after the
State Department failed to respond to two comprehensive FOIA requests
submitted on May 22, 2015, and September 14, 2015.
The FOIA request submitted on May 22, 2015, seeks records of:
•
All Cooperation Agreements for the years 2014 and 2015 between the
Department of State and the voluntary agencies involved in providing
reception and placement services to refugees arriving in the United
States.
• All Reception and Placement abstracts for the years
2014 and 2015 furnished to the Department of State by voluntary
agencies, entities subcontracting to voluntary agencies, or entities
affiliated with voluntary agencies regarding the provision of reception
and placement services to refugees arriving in the United States.
•
All transcripts of hearings held in 2014 and 2015 by the Department of
State with representatives from voluntary agencies, entities
subcontracting to voluntary agencies, entities affiliated with voluntary
agencies, the Department of Health and Human Services, and/or the
Office of Refugee Settlement regarding the provision of reception and
placement services to refugees arriving in the United States.
• All comments submitted to the State Department by members of the public at the hearings identified in Bullet 3 above.
•
All records reflecting the number of refugees, their countries of
origin, and destinations in the United States in which they were settled
by the Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration (PRM) through
R&P programs for the years 2013, 2014, and 2015.
The second FOIA request, submitted September 14, 2015, seeks records of:
•
All records regarding a meeting held on August 25, 2015 in Spartanburg,
South Carolina between representatives from the State Department's
Office of Refugee Resettlement and/or Bureau of Population, Refugees and
Migration, and representatives from the non-profit organization known
as World Relief. Records sought shall include, but not be limited to,
notices of the meeting, meeting agenda, transcripts, recordings,
materials presented by World Relief, multimedia presentations,
abstracts, contracts and any other materials.
I
provide these details to show that your JW aims to leave no stone
unturned in our investigation of the Obama administration's Refugee and
Resettlement program which plans to bring an additional 10,000 Syrian refugees
to the United States in 2016, and even more in 2017. Obama is pressing
ahead with his plan even as Syrian refugees have been implicated in the
Paris terrorist attacks in which 129 people were killed and 350 were
wounded.
The Obama administration is working in conjunction with
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to
settle these individuals all across the U.S. The federal government
contracts with non-profits and other entities to settle and provide
financial payments to refugees. Many states are refusing to participate
in this refugee resettlement program after the world learned how
vulnerable they were to terrorist/refugees in the Paris terrorist
attack. To see if your state is on the list of objectors, click here for a map.
We
are also asking about World Relief, who is one of the federal
contractors that settles refugees in South Carolina. South Carolina's
governor and other elected officials recently objected to any attempt to
settle Syrian refugees there. A number of Somalian refugees or their
children have left the United States to fight for ISIS. One of these
refugees is reportedly tied to the San Bernardino terrorist attack and many refugees have already been arrested on terrorism charges.
The U.S. plans to spend $1.56 billion
on resettlement in fiscal 2015 - up from $587 million a decade ago.
Among other benefits, each refugee will receive $1,000 in spending money
once they are here.
The Obama administration doesn't want
Americans to know about how it places refugees from terrorist states in
their local communities. The fact we had to file a federal lawsuit to
obtain basic information about Obama's dangerous refugee plans should
tell Americans (and Congress) that the Obama administration has
something to hide about refugees, terrorism, and national security.
On
a related note, we broke news of a concerning story that suggests that
politics seems to always trump public safety in the Obama
administration. Our Corruption Chronicles blog broke another major
border security story this week. I share it below in full:
A
Middle Eastern woman was caught surveilling a U.S. port of entry on the
Mexican border holding a sketchbook with Arabic writing and drawings of
the facility and its security system, federal law enforcement sources
tell Judicial Watch.
The woman has been identified as 23-year-old Leila Abdelrazaq, according to a Customs and Border Patrol (CPB) report
obtained by JW this week. Abdelrazaq appeared to have two accomplices, a
31-year-old man named Gabriel Schivone and a 28-year-old woman named
Leslie Mcafee. CBP agents noticed the trio "observing the facilities" at
the Port of Mariposa in Nogales, Arizona on December 2. Schivone was
first noticed inside the entrance of the pedestrian area while the two
women stood outside by the entry door, the CPB document states.
When
federal officers asked Abdelrazaq why she was drawing sketches of the
facilities she "stated because she's never been to the border,"
according to the CBP report. Abdelrazaq resisted showing officers the
sketchbook, citing personal reasons, but subsequently handed it over.
"During the inspection of the Abdelrazaq sketching book, CBPOs noticed
the book contained writings in English and Arabic language," federal
officers write in the document. "There were drawings of what appeared to
be vehicle primary inspection area and an additional drawing of
pedestrian turn stile gate depicting video surveillance cameras above
the gate." The report proceeds to reveal that the drawings were "partial
and incomplete."
This distressing information comes on the heels
of two separate-and equally alarming-incidents in the same vicinity. A
few weeks ago JW reported
that five young Middle Eastern men were apprehended by the U.S. Border
Patrol in Amado, an Arizona town situated about 30 miles from the
Mexican border. Two of the men were carrying stainless steel cylinders
in backpacks, alarming Border Patrol officials enough to call the
Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for backup. DHS officially denies
this ever occurred, but law enforcement and other sources have confirmed
to JW that the two men carrying the cylinders were believed to be taken
into custody by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
Of
interesting note is that only three of the men's names were entered in
the Border Patrol's E3 reporting system, which is used by the agency to
track apprehensions, detention hearings and removals of illegal
immigrants. E3 also collects and transmits biographic and biometric data
including fingerprints for identification and verification of
individuals encountered at the border. The other two men were listed as
"unknown subjects," which is unheard of, according to a JW federal law
enforcement source. "In all my years I've never seen that before," a
veteran federal law enforcement agent told JW.
A week earlier six
men-one from Afghanistan, five from Pakistan-were arrested in nearby
Patagonia, a quaint ranch town that sits 20 miles north of the Mexican
border city of Nogales. Federal authorities publicly confirmed those
arrests after local media learned about them. JW has broken a number of
stories involving serious terrorist threats on the southern border that
have been disputed on the record by various Obama administration
officials. Among these is an April report-confirmed
by high-level Mexican authorities-about ISIS operating camps near the
U.S. border in areas known as Anapra and Puerto Palomas west of Ciudad
Juárez in the Mexican state of Chihuahua.
Last fall JW was the first to report
on an Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS) plot orchestrated
from Ciudad Juárez to attack the U.S. with car bombs or other vehicle
borne improvised explosive devices (VBIED). As a result of JW's
reporting Ft. Bliss, the U.S. Army base in El Paso, increased security.
The threat was imminent enough to place agents across a number of
Homeland Security, Justice and Defense agencies on alert. A few weeks
later JW reported that four ISIS terrorists were arrested by federal authorities and the Texas Department of Public Safety in McAllen and Pharr.
JW
supporters should be proud this week. Through its lawsuits and
independent investigations, Judicial Watch is doing the work of
Congress, the media, and - yes - even the Executive Branch in the key
areas of border security, national security, and counter-terrorism.
Email Records Show Hillary Clinton Ignored Concerns About Security of Internet Devices
The
Clinton machine and its media mouthpieces would have you think that a
presidential debate or primary contest is only the "trial" Hillary
Clinton has to face. Incredible new documents this week show that she
ought to face another sort of trial for her email games and related
national security breaches at the State Department. This week,
Judicial Watch released new documents, obtained as the result of a federal court order,
containing more than 50 State Department internal emails from 2009 and
2011 warning of serious security concerns involving the use of "highly
vulnerable" Blackberries by then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and
her staff in the executive offices of the Foggy Bottom headquarters.
Keep
in mind what this means for our nation's security. An un-secured
Blackberry or other Internet device (iPhone, iPad, etc.) are vulnerable
to all sorts of hacking that could create opportunities for hostile
foreign powers and non-state actors.
The new State records included a March 2, 2009, internal memorandum
from Assistant Secretary for Diplomatic Security Eric Boswell entitled
"Use of Blackberries on Mahogany Row," in which he strongly advised that
the devices not be allowed. According to the Boswell memo, sent to
then-Secretary of State Clinton and her Chief of Staff Cheryl Mills,
"the vulnerabilities and risks associated with the use of Blackberries
in Mahogany Row [seventh floor executive offices] considerably outweigh
their convenience." Clinton has admitted she used a Blackberry during her early days in office despite Boswell's memo with explicit written objections.
When Boswell's internal memo
was issued on March 2, 2009, it strongly warned of the security risks
involved in the use of Blackberries by Clinton and her staff:
INFORMATION MEMO FOR CHERYL D. MILLS - S
FROM: DS - Eric J. Boswell
SUBJECT: Use of Blackberries in Mahogany Row
Our
review reaffirms our belief that the vulnerabilities and risks
associated with the use of Blackberries in the Mahogany Row [REDACTED]
considerably outweigh the convenience their use can add to staff that
have access to the classified OpenNet system on their desktops.
[RECACTED] We also worry about the example that using Blackberries in
Mahogany Row might set as we strive to promote crucial security
practices and enforce important security standards among State
Department staff.
I cannot stress too strongly, however, that any
unclassified Blackberry is highly vulnerable in any setting to remotely
and covertly monitoring conversations, retrieving e-mails, and
exploiting calendars.
Leaving no doubt that Clinton was fully aware of the deep security concerns surrounding the Blackberry security issue early on, a March 11, 2009, email reads,
"After this mornings 'management meeting' with the A/Secys, Secretary
Clinton approached Ambassador Boswell [United States Assistant Secretary
of State for Diplomatic Security] and mentioned that she had read the
IM and that she 'gets it.' Her attention was drawn to the sentence
that indicates we (DS) have intelligence concerning the vulnerability
during her recent trip to Asia." [Emphasis in original]
The
internal State Department debate over the use by Clinton and her staff
of "Electronic Devices on the 7th Floor" emerges again in a February 9, 2011, email
from an unidentified source to State Department Director of the Office
of Physical Security Programs Gentry Smith and Senior Coordinator for
Security Infrastructure, Bureau of Diplomatic Security Donald Reid, in
which the source advised: "I wanted to share with you, back channel, a
little insight into current thinking in the Secretary's inner circle on
technology issues..." That same day, Reid responded by acknowledging the
"vulnerabilities of portable devices" and saying he would expand the
discussion to include Clinton chief of staff Cheryl Mills who wanted "to
correct urban myths... re other agencies." Reid did not clarify what
"urban myths" Mills apparently wanted to clear up.
March 2, 2011
Reid writes: "We have a DS Memo to S re malicious cyber activity
directed toward Dept seniors that is circulating in final clearance...."
By
the way, we first asked for these documents way back in March, soon
after the New York Times first reported on Clinton's email shenanigans.
We wanted to know who approved her use of an iPad or iPhone for
government business and we wanted the back and forth about the use of
"unauthorized" electronic devices for government business. Rather than
comply with the law, the State Department stonewalled us. So we sued on April 29 and a federal court ordered the documents produced to us. We only received these key documents last month.
These
new State Department emails are devastating. The emails show Hillary
Clinton knew about but ignored national security warnings concerning the
use of Blackberries and other unsecure computing systems. These new
emails ought to be of interest to the FBI and federal prosecutors, as
the emails show that her mishandling of classified information and
violations of federal records laws was far from innocent.
As you can see in the next story, Judicial Watch will be keeping the pressure on.
Judicial Watch Sues for Info on Team Hillary at State Department
Earlier this week, we announced the filing of a lawsuit
in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia seeking ethics
and employment records of Cheryl Mills and Huma Abedin, the longtime and
ethically-challenged aides of former Secretary of State Hillary
Clinton.
The lawsuit was filed after the State Department failed
to comply with a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request submitted on
August 18, 2015. Judicial Watch is seeking access to the following
records on Mills:
• All SF-85s and 85Ps; SF-86s;
SF-450s; certificates of divestiture; individual waivers or any other
applicable ethics statues, regulations, guidelines or agreements.
A
separate FOIA request, submitted on August 19, 2015, seeks access to
Abedin's and Mills' OF-109 forms, which are signed, under penalty of
perjury, by departing government employees stating they have turned over
all official documents and records to the State Department. The OF-109
form records are not limited to classified material. It requires that
all records must be left in the hands of the State Department, including
emails.
The other documents Judicial Watch requests, such as
the SF-85 form, are filled out by incoming government employees,
detailing past work history, education, and references. Other Judicial Watch litigation
forced Clinton to admit that Abedin used Clinton's email system to
conduct government business, leading to both Abedin and Mills turning
over thousands of emails from non-governmental accounts to the State
Department for review and disclosure to Judicial Watch. Emails
uncovered from Abedin's account described Clinton as "often confused."
And Hillary Clinton's cover-up expert Cheryl Mills is in the middle of another major Hillary Clinton scandal. Judicial Watch previously released documents
revealing that between 2009 and 2011 former President Clinton spoke to
more than two dozen leading international investment firms and banking
institutions, many of them on more than one occasion. At least one of the documents shows that Mills used a non-governmental email account for the Clinton ethics reviews. Mills reportedly negotiated
the "ethics agreement" on behalf of the Clintons and the Foundation
that required the Clintons to submit to rigorous conflict-of-interest
checks. Despite this, and in apparent violation of Obama administration ethics rules,
the documents reveal that Bill Clinton's requests for speaking
engagement approval were invariably copied to Mills, who was involved in
ethics reviews as chief of staff for Mrs. Clinton at the State
Department.
The Washington Post
reported that Mills was unpaid for her first few months at the State
Department, "officially designated as a temporary expert-consultant - a
status that allowed her to continue to collect outside income while
serving as chief of staff." Isn't that convenient, especially as the
Post notes that Mills work involved a project funded by the foreign
government of Abu Dhabi and:
is another example of
how Clinton as secretary allowed close aides to conduct their public
work even as they performed jobs benefiting private interests. Another
key Clinton aide, Huma Abedin, spent her last six months as Clinton's
deputy chief of staff in 2012 simultaneously employed by the Clinton
Foundation, the family's global charity, and a consulting company with
close Clinton connections. Similarly, Mills remained on the Clinton
Foundation's unpaid board for a short time after joining the State
Department.
Mills confirmed
her "unpaid" arrangement at the State Department to the Benghazi
Committee, which included acting as an Envoy to Haiti (another nation
repeatedly plundered by Clinton corruption).
Separate Judicial Watch FOIA litigation
raised questions about whether Abedin received an illegal patronage job
from Clinton's State Department. Records forced out of the State
Department reveal Abedin failed to produce important financial and
employment information as required by law before obtaining her position
as a special government employee (SGE) in 2012.
Our new FOIA lawsuit is making news. This is how the Daily Caller reported on these latest developments:
Freedom
of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuits against the Department of State are
piling up fast thanks in part to non-profit transparency cop Judicial
Watch, which said Wednesday
it is going to court to force release of federal employment documents
of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's two closest aides.
This
new lawsuit should be news. The State Department is breaking federal
transparency law to provide cover for Mrs. Clinton and those who are now
working for the Clintons: Huma Abedin, vice chairwoman of the campaign; and Cheryl Mills, Clinton's counselor and a member of the board of directors for the Clinton Foundation.
It shouldn't take untold months and a federal lawsuit to get the Obama
administration to turn over a dozen forms about top officials. This is
another cover-up.
Until next week...
 Tom Fitton President
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