Oct. 19, 2017, Fairfax, Va.—Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning today issued the following statement urging the Justice Department to clear the FBI informant now alleging corruption in the Uranium One deal to be cleared to testify:

“The FBI informant must be allowed to testify. The initial reports of a delay of the investigation of the Russian bribery nuclear fuels transfer scandal involving former FBI directors Robert Mueller and James Comey, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and former Attorney General Eric Holder to help grease the wheels of the Uranium One deal during the Obama administration could irreparably shake the confidence of the American people in the entire Justice Department. The first step Attorney General Jeff Sessions must take is to clear the whistleblower to testify about the corruption that he or she is alleging. Only through that testimony and subsequent thorough investigation led by Sessions, not involving any of the accused, can the interests of the U.S. government and its people be served. If the Russians exerted influence at the highest levels of the Justice Department and the FBI in order to obtain approval of the takeover of 20 percent of the U.S. uranium reserves, then that sale should be nullified and the people who facilitated it should be imprisoned.”

Interview Availability: Please contact Americans for Limited Government at 703-383-0880 ext. 100 or at media@limitgov.org to arrange an interview with ALG experts.

###

Oct. 17, 2017, Fairfax, Va.—Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning today issued the following statement on the idea of reinstating the $7 billion a year cost-sharing program under Obamacare bailing out insurers in exchange for very little:

“President Trump’s original decision to withhold the $7 billion a year health insurer cost-sharing should provide the necessary leverage to pass real, structural reforms of Obamacare, along the lines of Graham-Cassidy. President Trump and Speaker Ryan hold the keys to making this a reality and given their most recent statements there is reason for hope that the Republicans in Congress will finally find the votes to keep their Obamacare repeal and replace promise. Both the President and the Speaker seem to recognize that bailing out the health insurers via cost-sharing reinstatement was never part of anyone’s campaign pledge. However, if some short-term subsidization is needed to politically cross the finish line on repeal and replace, while nauseating, that is the art of the deal that might be necessary to lift the Obamacare burden off of the American public and our national economy.”

Interview Availability: Please contact Americans for Limited Government at 703-383-0880 ext. 100 or at media@limitgov.org to arrange an interview with ALG experts.

###

Oct. 16, 2017, Fairfax, Va.—Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning today issued the following statement in response to Sen. Joe Manchin’s call for Rep. Tom Marino (R-Pa.) to step aside from consideration as President Donald Trump’s appointment to the Office of Drug Control Policy over legislation that Manchin supported when it came up in the Senate:

“Joe Manchin’s political grandstanding calling for Rep. Tom Marino to step aside from consideration as head of the Office of Drug Control Policy could be taken seriously if Manchin himself resigned, due to his supporting the Marino bill in 2016, which passed both the House and Senate unanimously. Manchin either supported the legislation or was too incompetent to know that it was on the floor of the Senate. Either way, under his own standard, Manchin should step down because he is clearly not up to the task of representing the people of West Virginia in the U.S. Senate.

“Joe Manchin had an opportunity to stop the legislation featured on 60 Minutes that gives the Attorney General a role in suspending drug distributor licenses in 2016. He failed. His failure wasn’t due to putting up a good fight and losing. Instead, it was in allowing the passage of the bipartisan legislation — unanimously. The truth is, the bipartisan legislation merely protected the due process rights of pharmacies against arbitrary license suspensions without senior Department of Justice oversight. The suspensions are still allowed under law. And there is no correlation between the license suspensions and the opioid crisis.

“The insanity of the politicization of everything in Washington, D.C. will be demonstrated as politicians who allowed the legislation to become law seek to score political points against their colleagues. We are in a new era of faux outrage based on fake news and everything is about the narrative with truth rarely interceding. President Donald Trump needs to stand firm with Marino and just say no to this shameless and baseless demagoguery.”

Interview Availability: Please contact Americans for Limited Government at 703-383-0880 ext. 100 or at media@limitgov.org to arrange an interview with ALG experts.

###

Oct. 16, 2017, Fairfax, Va.—Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning today issued the following statement in response to a 60 Minutes and Washington Post report linking the opioid crisis to a bill passed unanimously by Congress in 2016:

“60 Minutes and the Washington Post once again have proven an unwillingness to let facts get in the way of a good headline. The opioid crisis began more than a decade prior to the 2016 passage of the law by Congress governing DEA license suspensions, which merely puts in place a 30-day process for the Attorney General to approve license suspensions of drug distributors recommended by the DEA in a considered manner.

“The 60 Minutes segment contends DEA immediate license suspensions are the ‘most potent tool in fighting the spread of dangerous narcotics.’ Yet, according to Centers for Disease Control data, opioid related deaths caused by commonly prescribed opioids peaked in 2011 and has remained relatively constant since that point. That covers the very period the original Washington Post story notes the slowdown of license suspensions by the Obama Justice Department. Apparently, the Justice Department’s new approach to enforcement away from immediate license suspensions had no bearing on the overall crisis. The same amount of deaths related to prescription overdoses occurred with the immediate license suspensions as without.

“Given these basic facts, the 60 Minutes and Washington Post report appears as nothing more than a political hit job on Tom Marino and Marsha Blackburn. Why weren’t the Democrat cosponsors in the House, Peter Welch and Judy Chu, mentioned? Or the Senate sponsors for that matter, Republican Orrin Hatch and Democrat Sheldon Whitehouse? This bipartisan law was passed unanimously in 2016 without objection by both the House and Senate and promptly signed into law by then-President Obama. It is despicable that 60 Minutes and the Washington Post are so cynical as to want to politicize the pain and suffering of so many Americans, as if this was a partisan issue, and they should be ashamed of themselves.

“The opioid crisis is serious. Families are being ripped apart as their sons and daughters fall in to this private hell. The 60 Minutes and Washington Post do a grave disservice to everyone when they engage in the trivialization and political misrepresentation when discussing this issue.”

Attachments:

Overdose Deaths Involving Opioids, United States, 2000-2015 at https://www.cdc.gov/drugoverdose/data/index.html

Interview Availability: Please contact Americans for Limited Government at 703-383-0880 ext. 100 or at media@limitgov.org to arrange an interview with ALG experts.

###

Oct. 13, 2017, Fairfax, Va.–Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning today issued the following statement praising President Donald Trump for reinstating sanctions against Iran’s nuclear ambitions:

“President Trump has reinstated sanctions on Iran and rightfully called on Congress to make these sanctions permanent under law, taking away future presidents’ discretion to unilaterally lift them without Congressional assent. This effectively ends the pretense of Obama’s ill-conceived money-for-any-deal-with-Iran approach. It’s clear that Iran has been at the forefront of funding terrorism around the world as well as accelerating the development of its nuclear weapons capability. At a time when the world faces one crazy dictator in North Korea with a bomb due to Obama’s acquiescence, it would truly be insane to allow Obama’s Iran deal to similarly remain in place, allowing another dictatorship to get the bomb. What’s worse about Iran is that they have a network of similarly crazy surrogates more than willing to use nuclear weapons in acts of terrorism around the world. Let’s be clear, allowing the number one sponsor of terrorism in the world to get nuclear weapons is effectively national suicide, and President Trump is right to try to correct Obama’s Iranian nuclear terror error.”

Interview Availability: Please contact Americans for Limited Government at 703-383-0880 ext. 100 or at media@limitgov.org to arrange an interview with ALG experts.

###

Oct. 13, 2017, Fairfax, Va.—Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning today issued the following statement in response to the tragic murder of Diana Martinez-Gonzalez by Daniel De Jesus Rangel-Sherrer in South Carolina:

“The sad truth is, many of the 800,000 classified by Obama as ‘dreamers’ are nothing but nightmares to their communities. Daniel De Jesus Rangel-Sherrer should have never been here, and Diana Martinez-Gonzalez should still be alive. No one should be granted the privilege of being a legal resident of the United States without passing basic background screening. This screening must include criminal background checks and a determination if they violated other U.S. laws such as voting illegally or applying illegally for Social Security cards and other government documents.

“To be clear, DACA recipients have no legitimate claim to any of the benefits of U.S. residency, let alone citizenship, and President Trump should not open the doors to their illegitimate claims. Before the immigration debate moves one step further, there must be at least a consensus that criminal aliens who join gangs and engage in violence need to be excluded and deported rather than rewarded with the benefits of the American system. And until that vetting is done, no legislative compromise should even be contemplated. The dream has become a nightmare for at least one family.”

Interview Availability: Please contact Americans for Limited Government at 703-383-0880 ext. 100 or at media@limitgov.org to arrange an interview with ALG experts.

###

Oct. 13, 2017, Fairfax, Va.—Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning today issued the following statement in response to the Trump administration decision to end cost-sharing for insurance companies under Obamacare:

“After the Senate failed twice to replace Obamacare, President Trump decided to tip over the table by denying health insurers subsidy payments that were not authorized by Congress. President Trump is right constitutionally. Since Congress never authorized these bailouts, they should have never been paid in the first place. Politically, Trump’s decision to follow the Constitution and deny unauthorized payments changes everything. While the American people were Obamacare losers, the health insurers through their subsidies and guaranteed customers had the game rigged in their favor. By eliminating the insurance company bailout, one of the few Obamacare winners will now desperately seek changes in the law. This altered political dynamic breathes new life into an honest replacement bill that ends the individual and employer mandates, increases state flexibility and lowers premiums. Just when everyone thought the Obamacare repeal effort was dead, President Trump has changed everything simply by following the U.S. Constitution. What a concept.”

Interview Availability: Please contact Americans for Limited Government at 703-383-0880 ext. 100 or at media@limitgov.org to arrange an interview with ALG experts.

###

Oct. 12, 2017, Fairfax, Va.—Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning today issued the following statement praising President Donald Trump for issuing an executive order directing the Department of Labor to examine new regulations that will allow for the sale of association health plans across state lines:

“President Trump has wisely asked the Department of Labor to examine the law and body of regulation to determine whether new regulations can be put into effect allowing for the sale of association health plans across state lines. The vast majority of Obamacare was written by federal bureaucrats interpreting the law via the regulatory process. President Trump’s direction to the Department of Labor will now use that same process, created by Congress, to inject competition into the health care markets. The great news is that this competition promises to allow more Americans more choices at an affordable cost, truly providing affordable health care options, unlike Obamacare.”

Interview Availability: Please contact Americans for Limited Government at 703-383-0880 ext. 100 or at media@limitgov.org to arrange an interview with ALG experts.

###

Oct. 11, 2017, Fairfax, Va.—Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning today issued the following statement on the Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s decision to end the so-called “blue slip” process that can block judicial nominees from receiving Senate Judiciary Committee consideration:

“We are encouraged that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is ending the archaic blue slip process that allows Senators to arbitrarily block judges from their home states from receiving Senate Judiciary Committee consideration. This move should free up about 9 judicial nominees from states with Democrat senators to be considered by the committee, assuming they were all blue-slipped. However, there are presently 10 judicial nominees who have already cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee and other relevant committees who are simply awaiting floor action. And then there’s another 35 judicial nominees from red states with only Republican senators who couldn’t have possibly been blue slipped by Senate Democrats, for which there is no ready excuse for why they have not gotten moving through the process.

“Either way, to keep pace with the modern historical average of Presidents filling about 163 federal judicial vacancies per term, the Senate will need to speedily confirm all of the President’s 54 pending judicial picks. It’s time to get the process moving. One of the reasons Republicans rallied to President Trump in 2016 was because he said he would even the balance of federal courts away from Democrat control. With a Republican Senate, no more judicial filibuster and no more binding blue slips, there is simply no reason this process should be all gummed up.

“Ending the blue slip process is a good first step by McConnell. He should follow up by killing any other Senate rules in due speed that slow down floor consideration of nominees and otherwise get this process moving.”

Interview Availability: Please contact Americans for Limited Government at 703-383-0880 ext. 100 or at media@limitgov.org to arrange an interview with ALG experts.

###

 

Oct. 10, 2017, Fairfax, Va.—Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning today issued the following statement reminding everyone why the Iran deal went through in the first place:

“Bob Corker is the Iran deal, he owns the Iran deal. He offered the legislation that authorized the removal of the sanctions against Iran in the first place, and then he went out and pretended he opposed lifting sanctions, providing political cover to the Obama administration. The Iran nuke deal made the world a much more dangerous place. The pallets of cash delivered to the Iranian regime are likely funding rogue state nuclear weapons development around the world in violation of the NPT. The Iranian nuclear program is not even allowing basic inspections under the agreement and the only people who seem to be profiting are well-connected companies like Schlumberger. Corker’s career in the Senate should make every Tennessee Republican glad he’s retiring. Let’s hope that Senator Corker doesn’t botch anything else up in his remaining months in office.”

Attachments:

“After authoring bill that OKed Iran nuclear deal and lying about it, Sen. Bob Corker should retire,” By Robert Romano, Sept. 12, 2017 at http://netrightdaily.com/2017/09/authoring-bill-oked-iran-nuclear-deal-lying-sen-bob-corker-retire/

“Sen. Bob Corker moans about Iran deal his bill authorized,” By Robert Romano, Aug. 20, 2015 at http://netrightdaily.com/2015/08/sen-bob-corker-moans-about-iran-deal-his-bill-authorized/

“If Trump decertifies the Iran nuclear deal, he doesn’t need Congress to reinstate the sanctions, he can do it himself,” By Robert Romano, Oct. 9, 2017 http://netrightdaily.com/2017/10/trump-decertifies-iran-nuclear-deal-doesnt-need-congress-reinstate-sanctions-can/

Interview Availability: Please contact Americans for Limited Government at 703-383-0880 ext. 100 or at media@limitgov.org to arrange an interview with ALG experts.

###