Rashida Tlaib

Rashida Tlaib In Hot Water for Paying HERSELF Nearly $50K With Campaign Funds

Newly-elected Democrat congresswoman Rashida Tlaib has earned mounting scrutiny for a series of controversial statements made during her brief political career, which now includes criticism for allegedly paying herself nearly $50K in campaign funds.

According to information obtained from Federal Election Commission filings, Tlaib paid herself nearly $4,000 a month from campaign funding which was heavily financed by billionaire political investor George Soros.

Tlaib’s finances, including the ownership of property, has been cause for much concern since her election in the 2018 midterms, with critics speculating that the Democrat lawmaker may have violated ethics rules.

From The Washington Free Beacon:

Freshman Democratic representative Rashida Tlaib (Mich.) paid herself tens of thousands of dollars from her campaign’s funds during the midterm elections, filings with the Federal Election Commission show.

Tlaib, who was elected to the House last November, began paying herself on May 7, 2018, from Rashida Tlaib for Congress, her campaign committee, and averaged $4,000 per month outside of August, which included two checks of $3,000 each.

From May 7 until the general election on Nov. 6, Tlaib paid herself a total of $28,000 in payments from the campaign committee, which first-time candidates are permitted to do up until the day of the general election if they so choose.

“If the candidate wins the primary election, his or her principal campaign committee may pay him or her a salary from campaign funds through the date of the general election, up to and including the date of any general election runoff,” FEC provisions state. “If the candidate loses the primary, withdraws from the race, or otherwise ceases to be a candidate, no salary payments may be paid beyond the date he or she is no longer a candidate.”

An FEC spokesperson said that a candidate can pay themselves after the general election only for activity that occurred up to the day of the election.

Following the general election, Tlaib cut herself a $2,000 check on Nov. 16 and disbursed $15,500 to herself on Dec. 1, which was well above the average of what she was paying herself during the campaign.

“On its face, it looks like the $2,000 payment on November 16 might be for the candidate’s salary for the first two weeks of November,” an election law and government ethics lawyer told the Free Beacon when asked about the payments. “But given that the election occurred on November 6—i.e., part-way through the first November pay period—I am surprised that this last payment wasn’t prorated. In other words, Tlaib stopped being a candidate halfway through this period, but it appears that she kept collecting her full salary as if she was still a candidate throughout the full first two weeks of November.”

“The $15,500 payment is interesting. It’s not 100% clear what she’s doing, but what she may have done is to low ball her earlier payments for political purposes (at $2k), knowing full well that she would make up any difference at the end by giving herself a lump sum payment,” the lawyer continued. “That would let her skirt negative publicity, of the sort that Alan Keyes generated when he paid himself a sizable salary. An after-the-fact, lump sum payment cuts against the purpose of the rule, which is to help the candidate pay for daily living expenses while campaigning.”

Tlaib’s campaign did not respond to requests for comment on the payments.

During the campaign, Tlaib said that she had taken a leave of absence from her job at the Sugar Law Center, a Detroit-based economic and social justice organization, and cut her hours down to seven per week. The now-congresswoman was paid $28,712.79 from the law center up until May of last year—when the payments from the campaign started—and collected $42,500 salary in 2017, according to her financial disclosure forms.

Tlaib also reported a $68,307 salary for a “Leadership in Government Fellowship” in 2017 but did not disclose the name of the organization who provided the funding for the fellowship, as required by the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Ethics.

The Washington Free Beacon reached out to George Soros’s spokesperson in December and were provided copies of tax forms for all entities that are run by the liberal billionaire and make up his Open Society network.

On page 97 of the 321-page tax form for the Open Society Institute, the legal name for the Open Society Foundation, an expenditure of $85,307 is shown to Tlaib for a “leadership in government fellowship,” the Free Beacon reported.

The amount that Soros’s group reported paying out to Tlaib on its tax forms, $85,307, differs from the amount Tlaib reported on her financial disclosure—$68,307—for her leadership in government fellowship.

“Rashida Tlaib was awarded a Leadership in Government fellowship from the Open Society Foundations in the fall of 2016,” Jonathan Kaplan, Soros’s spokesperson, told the Free Beacon at the time. “Her project: to focus on increasing the civic participation of disenfranchised urban communities of color. When Ms. Tlaib informed us that she was planning to run for Congress, we mutually agreed to suspend her fellowship and no further payments were made.”

Kendra Arnold, the executive director of the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust, a government watchdog group, said that the payment was “problematic” given that candidates are required to disclose the source of their income.

“Identify the source by naming the organization, corporation, or other entity making the payment. It is not necessary that individual clients of a business be named, only the business itself,” the manual states. Tlaib did not report that it came from Soros’s Open Society Foundation.

Tlaib ultimately collected $225,180 from Soros’s organization throughout 2016 and 2017, according to the group’s tax forms.

Published 40 mins ago
Rashida Tlaib wants police facial recognition software run only by African-Americans

By Evie Fordham | Fox Business

U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib, the Michigan Democrat among four freshmen congresswomen known as "the Squad," says Detroit police should hire only black people to manage their facial recognition technology because other races "think African Americans all look the same."

Tlaib made the statement to James Craig, the city's police chief, during a tour of his department's Real Time Crime Center, the Detroit News reported. Detroit police invited Tlaib to tour the facility after she criticized the agency for using facial recognition technology to identify suspects in August.


Detroit Police Dept.

@detroitpolice
@RashidaTlaib Before you criticize the software, come to our Real Time Crime Center to see how we @detroitpolice responsibly use it in efforts to identify criminals involved in violent crimes. Let’s set a date.
https://twitter.com/RashidaTlaib/status/1163669419802996736 …

Rashida Tlaib

@RashidaTlaib
.@detroitpolice You should probably rethink this whole facial recognition bulls**t.
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/wjw8ww/bernie-sanders-is-the-first-candidate-to-call-for-ban-on-facial-recognition …

"Analysts need to be African Americans, not people that are not," Tlaib told Craig during the tour, which was "tense," according to The Detroit News.

"It's insulting," Craig told the Detroit News afterward. "We have a diverse group of crime analysts, and what she said -- that non-whites should not work in that capacity because they think all black people look alike -- is a slap in the face to all the men and women in the crime center."

Craig pointed out that implicit-bias training instruction is required for all officers and civilian employees. "To say people should be barred from working somewhere because of their skin color?" he asked. "That's racist."

Tlaib spokesman Denzel McCampbell told the Detroit News that the congresswoman's position is based on studies showing people are better at identifying members of their own race.

"Detroit has a black population of more than 80 percent, so that is where her basis came from and what she was trying to convey when it comes to accurate identification," McCampbell continued.

Facial recognition, widely used in American police departments, has prompted a backlash as it makes the stuff of science fiction a reality.

Amazon, for example, is crafting proposed regulations to govern the technology after enduring widespread criticism over its entry into the field, company CEO Jeff Bezos said last week.

A black guy I know said Alls yalls crackuhs looks da same.

Rashida Tlaib participated in a pro-Jihad terror rally in Detroit where there were hundreds of Palestinian flags but not one American flag in sight.

Video and comments at https://twitter.com/EddieDonovan/status/1213833161504952320

Published 1 hour ago
Rashida Tlaib to speak in Missouri at event for American Muslims for Palestine
By Dom Calicchio | Fox News

Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., has never been afraid to voice her opinion. From her calls to shut down U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to her push to impeach President Trump, take a look back at her most controversial statements over the past two years.

U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., is scheduled to speak Saturday in Missouri at the annual gala of the state’s chapter of American Muslims for Palestine (AMP), according to the group’s website.

The event will be held at the Crowne Plaza St. Louis Airport Hotel in Bridgeton, northwest of St. Louis.

AMP is considered an anti-Israel group that has expressed support for the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement against the Jewish State, the Jewish News Syndicate reported.

Tlaib, 43, a native of Detroit, is a daughter of Palestinian immigrants who became the first Palestinian-American woman elected to Congress in November 2018. She and her congressional ally, U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., a Somali immigrant who was also elected that year, together became the first Muslim women elected to Congress.

Since arriving in Washington in January 2019, both Tlaib and Omar have been accused of expressing anti-Semitic views and taking anti-Israel stands, including backing the BDS movement.

Both members of Congress have denied any hostility toward the people of Israel, saying instead that their criticism is directed at Israeli government policies that they claim have adversely affected Palestinians.

Supporters of Tlaib and Omar note that both congresswomen have endorsed Sen. Bernie Sanders, who is Jewish, for president.

Tlaib previously spoke at the AMP’s national conference last November, where she compared the crisis at the U.S.-Mexico border to the situation between Israel and Gaza, the Jewish News Syndicate reported.

According to the report, AMP was founded by Hatem Bazian, a co-founder of Students for Justice in Palestine and a lecturer at the University of California at Berkeley.

Jewish and pro-Israel students at UC Berkeley have claimed that he promotes “hatred and intolerance” and have called in the past for his removal from the faculty.

Another scheduled speaker at Saturday’s event in Missouri is Osama Abuirshaid, AMP’s national policy director, who has expressed support for BDS as well as Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, the report said.

Rashida Tlaib declines to back Biden amid tough House reelection fight: report
“If the ultimate goal is to get rid of Donald Trump, that doesn’t have to involve me actually endorsing Biden,” the former Bernie Sanders supporter says
By Dom Calicchio | Fox News | one hour ago

Endorse Joe? Rashida Tlaib says no.

The Michigan congresswoman and far-left “Squad” member said this week she won’t back Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic nominee for president.

“He hasn’t directly called me or anything, but no,” Tlaib told Newsweek magazine about a Biden backing.

“Right now I’m focused on my election, my constituents and my residents,” she added.

One reason, said Tlaib – who backed Bernie Sanders for president before he ended his primary run, and who faces a primary election of her own next Tuesday – is that she doesn’t want to get into debates with people in her district on whether Biden deserves their vote.

“Residents come up to me and say, ‘Rashida, I don’t know. I hear Joe Biden this, Joe Biden that’,” she said.

“If the ultimate goal is to get rid of Donald Trump, that doesn’t have to involve me actually endorsing Biden,” she added. “My constituents don’t need to be bogged down in, ‘Is he the best candidate?’ That’s not what you have to convince my residents.”

Right now, Tlaib’s residents – aka Michigan’s 13th Congressional District -- are also considering whether she deserves to continue representing them in Congress.

As she seeks election to a second term, Tlaib is facing Detroit City Council President Brenda Jones in next week's primary.

The district was held for more than a half-century by John Conyers Jr., a co-founder of the Congressional Black Caucus, who died last year. When Conyers stepped down in 2018 amid accusations of sexual harassment, Jones briefly held the seat after narrowly edging Tlaib in a special election to fill the rest of Conyers’ term.

But Tlaib won a separate election for the new two-year term, starting in 2019. That election included six candidates. Jones, who is Black, now enjoys the support of the other four candidates from the 2018 election.

Jones has argued that Tlaib has ignored her district and become too preoccupied with national issues.

“You can be vocal, but the things that were being done — like calling the president a ‘MF’ or booing Hillary — every time something like that happened, I was getting calls from people saying ‘You’re more professional than this,’” Jones told The New York Times. “I’m not interested in being a rock star. I’m just interested in bringing home the money, working for the people of the 13th district and uniting the community.”

Tlaib pushed back against such arguments – saying her opponents are highlighting just a few high-profile moments and overlooking her legislative achievements. This year she’s teamed up with fellow lawmakers to shield constituents from high water bills and water shutoffs, which many argue disproportionately hurt people of color.

Fox News’ Paul Steinhauser contributed to this story.

Rep. Rashida Tlaib Wins Democratic Primary Challenge In Michigan
Daniel Marans, HuffPost, August 5, 2020


Rep. Rashida Tlaib, an outspoken Michigan progressive, defeated Detroit City Council President Brenda Jones in the Democratic primary for Michigan’s 13th Congressional District on Tuesday. Her primary win in one of the most Democratic House districts in the country all but officially confirms that Tlaib will be returning to Washington.

“I’m confident in the movement that we started,” Tlaib told supporters on a video livestream as results came in Tuesday night. “Our country is ready ― is ready for someone like me and others that are saying, enough, enough with corporate greed, enough with the assault on our families.”

Tlaib’s victory dashes the hopes of some moderate Democrats, who were eager to humble the activist left by unseating a member of the progressive “Squad” of freshman House women.

The first-term congresswoman, a Palestinian American, also overcame some constituents’ skepticism that she could adequately represent a majority-Black seat held for decades by the late civil rights leader John Conyers.

“She’s smart, she’s a fighter and most importantly, she’s the incumbent,” said Dr. Jimmy Womack, a Detroit pastor, physician and former state representative.

Womack, who does not live in Tlaib’s district and counts both Tlaib and Jones as friends, noted that local Democratic Party institutions, including the 13th Congressional District Democratic Party, rallied to Tlaib’s side.

“Clearly they feel she’s served the community in a capacity that would allow them to endorse her reelection,” he said.

In two short years, Tlaib, an attorney and former Michigan state representative, has gone from an upstart contender who took advantage of a crowded 2018 primary field to an established force in local and national Democratic politics against whom future adversaries will likely think twice about running.

Tlaib barely won in the August 2018 Democratic primary that ensured her control of the seat. She bested Jones by a single percentage point, even as Jones won a special election on the same day to fill out the final weeks of Conyers’ term. (Conyers resigned in December 2017 amid sexual harassment allegations from former aides.)

But rather than keep a low profile, Tlaib almost instantaneously developed a reputation as an unabashed progressive brawler. The day she was sworn into office in January 2019, she made waves for declaring her intention to “impeach the motherfucker” ― a reference to President Donald Trump. More recently, she raised eyebrows with her refusal to explicitly endorse former Vice President Joe Biden in a Newsweek interview (she also said that by focusing on turnout in her own race, she would help “deliver Michigan for Joe Biden”).

Many of the qualities that have prompted those from the political center to criticize Tlaib have endeared her to a base of working-class Detroiters and progressive activists.

Tlaib, the first Palestinian American woman in Congress and one of the body’s first two Muslim women, has steadfastly defended her support for the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel and the creation of a single, binational state in Israel-Palestine.

Those stances cost Tlaib the support of J Street PAC, a liberal pro-Israel group. But when the Israeli government publicly denied her entry to the country based on its blanket prohibition of BDS proponents, even many of her critics took her side.

In a May interview, Tlaib told HuffPost that she sees the fight against racism and poverty in Detroit as part of a struggle for dignity taking place across the globe, including in the occupied Palestinian territories where her grandmother lives.

“I just have this connection of what’s happening in Detroit and what’s happening in Palestine,” she said. “And for me, it just makes me more of a warrior when it comes to these issues and speaking the truth about it.”

Tlaib has worked hard to improve public health and living standards in her high-poverty district. She successfully sponsored an amendment to a July spending bill that would increase federal funding for lead pipe replacement from $20 million a year to $1 billion. The bill passed in the Democratic-controlled House and now heads to the Republican Senate for consideration.

She has also erected four neighborhood service centers across the district to handle requests from her constituents. Those centers became triage hubs when Detroit and its surrounding communities got hammered by the COVID-19 pandemic in March and April.

“Unless there’s voting and committee hearings, I’m here at home and staying as close to my residents as possible,” Tlaib told HuffPost. “I actually think that it makes sure that I don’t become numb.”

Tlaib’s attention to her district apparently lessened donors’ appetite to fund a challenge against her. Unlike their mobilization against Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), right-leaning pro-Israel groups have not bundled significant cash for Jones.

In the end, Tlaib out-fundraised Jones by a margin of 18-to-1. The Working Families Party also spent just under $33,000 on a paid phone-banking operation in support of Tlaib.

Jones did have the support of a super PAC, Concerned Citizens for Michigan, which spent over $87,000 on pro-Jones digital ads and campaign literature. The super PAC is funded in part by Donald Foss, the founder of one of the country’s most notorious subprime auto lenders, who typically gives to Republicans. Foss contributed $100,000 to a super PAC supporting the unsuccessful 2018 Senate bid of Republican John James.

What a waste of humanity: