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U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison(Photo: Charles V. Tines / The Detroit News)Buy Photo

Ten candidates vying to lead the Democratic National Committee into the future will gather Saturday in Detroit, where theyll outline their plans to reshape the party following a string of crushing electoral losses.

It was supposed to be 11 candidates. Vincent Tolliver, a former congressional candidate from Arkansas, was booted from the DNC Future Forum this week after he reportedly criticized the Muslim faith of a competitor, U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison, a Detroit native who now represents Minneapolis and parts of its suburbs in Minnesota.

The Democratic Party welcomes all Americans from all backgrounds. What we do not welcome is people discriminating against others based on who they are or how they worship, interim chair Donna Brazile said in a statement provided to The Detroit News.

Tolliver reportedly told The Hill newspaper that DNC voters should not back Ellison because Muslims discriminate against gays. Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress, has described himself as a tireless advocate for equality and campaigned against a proposed Minnesota gay marriage ban in 2012.

Saturdays forum, scheduled to run from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. at the Wayne State University Community Arts Theater, is a chance for party loyalists and activists to hear directly from candidates seeking to fill the positions of chair, vice chairs and other offices of the Democratic National Committee. The event will also be streamed online at Democrats.org.

Ellison is a top contender for the chair post, along with former U.S. Labor Secretary Tom Perez of Maryland.

Other candidates include New Hampshire Democratic Party Chairman Raymond Buckley, South Carolina Chair Jaime Harrison, Idaho state party executive director Sally Boynton and Pete Buttigieg, mayor of South Bend, Indiana.

Former Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz resigned from the post in late July after WikiLeaks published a series of emails suggesting DNC staffers had inappropriately aided eventual presidential nominee Hillary Clinton in her primary battle against U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont.

Clinton lost the general election to President Donald Trump, who scored a narrow and surprising victory in Michigan en route to his Electoral College victory. Trump was the first Republican to win Michigan since 1988.

The forum lets Democrats hear what candidates have to say about rebuilding the party and winning back power in both Washington and state capitols across the country, said Michigan Democratic Party Chairman Brandon Dillon.

I think theres an emerging consensus that weve got to get back to basics, a kind of grassroots block-to-block organizing, not just during a campaign seasons, but during the off years to start reconnecting with voters.

Dillon, who has endorsed Ellison in the race, is expected to offer introductory remarks during an afternoon session that will include forums with candidates for chair and other party positions.

Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan is also expected to speak during a morning session, along with Kansas City Mayor Sly James, Ohio Rep. Alicia Reece and United Steelworkers Local 1999 President Chuck Jones.

The Detroit candidate forum is the third of four similar events planned by the DNC. A final forum is scheduled for Feb. 10 and 11 in Baltimore.

joosting@detroitnews.com

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Democrat booted from 'future' forum in Detroit - The Detroit News

In this Jan. 19, 2017, file photo, police stand guard outside the Trump International Hotel on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington.(Photo: John Minchillo, AP)

Top Democrats on the Senate homeland security panel have sent a letter to the inspector general of the General Services Administration asking her to review the agency's management of a lease involving the Trump International Hotel, owned by President Trump and his adult children.

Sens. Tom Carper, D-Del., and Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., announced Thursday that they are seeking a review of the lease with the Trump Old Post Office LLC, which leases the downtown Washingtonbuilding on Pennsylvania Avenue, just blocks from the White House.

McCaskill is the senior Democrat on the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. Carper is the senior Democrat on the panel's permanent subcommittee on investigations.

"As you are aware, recent events have raised important questions about GSAs management of the Old Post Office lease," the senators wrote in a letter dated Monday to Inspector General Carol Ochoa. "In 2013, GSA negotiated a lease agreement with Trump Old Post Office, LLC a private company owned by now-President Donald Trump and his adult children. Since President Trump took the oath of office, the Trump Old Post Office, LLC appears to be in breach of the plain language of the lease agreement."

According to the lease, "No member or delegate to Congress, or elected official of theGovernment of the United Statesor the Government of the District of Columbia, shall be admitted to any share or part of this Lease, or to any benefit that may arise therefrom."

Democrats have been saying since last year that Trump must fully divest himself of all financial interests in the lease to be in compliance with the legal agreement.

The General Services Administrationsaid in December that the agency could make no definitive statement about the lease.

"GSA does not have a position that the lease provision requires the President-elect to divest of his financial interests," the agency said in a Dec. 14 statement. "We can make no definitive statement at this time about what would constitute a breach of the agreement, and to do so now would be premature. In fact, no determination regarding the Old Post Office can be completed until the full circumstances surrounding the President-elects business arrangements have been finalized and he has assumed office. GSA is committed to responsibly administering all of the leases to which it is a party."

The senators complained that the GSA has still not taken any action "despite the warning signs from members of Congress and ethics watchdogs."

"Your office is in a unique position to review GSAs management of the lease of the Old Post Office Building and identify any potential missteps," the senators wrote to Ochoa.

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USA TODAY

GSA reserves judgment on Trump hotel lease

USA TODAY

The first 100 days of the Trump presidency

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Democrats ask inspector general to review Trump's hotel lease - USA TODAY

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Donald Trump is the gift that keeps giving. The week is still in its infancy, but the president has already made Chucky Schumer cry, fired Acting Attorney General Sally Yates within hours of her acting up, and caused the Forgotten Man to go even harder for their president. This Trump accomplished by inadvertently exposing the Democrats as firmly in the camp of Hollywood harridans, tech execs, the immigration lawyers lobby, the global refugee industry; and in the grip of the international human rights octopus.

The Democratic constituency can no longer hide. Its as though all these ghastly people are wearing the pussy dunce-caps adorned by the Madonna and Ashley Judd protesters.

The first moment of joy came when, flanked by swaddled Muslim women, the sanctimonious Schumer, a politician to his fingertips, choked up because of President Trumps executive order to temporarily halt the U.S. refugee program and ban entries from seven Muslim-majority nations for 90 days. The president campaigned on this promise, was elected based upon it, and is now fulfilling it, a novel concept to a shyster like Schumer.

Then, before Sally Yates could use her perch, as a public servant at DOJ, to crusade for a centralized value systemthe POTUS fired her, promptly ending Yates two-hour insurrection at the Department of Justice.

Heres the Yates fit of pique that so energized CNNs Alpha Females (Anderson Cooper, Erin Burnett, Brianna Keilar, Don Lemon, David Gergen):

I am responsible for ensuring that the positions we take in court remain consistent with this institutions solemn obligation to always seek justice and stand for what is right. At present, I am not convinced that the defense of the executive order is consistent with these responsibilities nor am I convinced that the executive order is lawful.

And I thought the DOJ was charged with implementing the laws of the land, in accordance with its mission statement. To wit, The Department of Justice is a cabinet-level agency responsible for enforcing the laws of the United States federal government. DOJ ensures public safety against foreign and domestic threats, including terrorism, and preventing crime.

Whether it was borne of insubordination, incompetence or both, Yates virtue-signaling press conference was about feelingsher own. It was bereft of legal argument. Clearly, this activist was chosen by Barack Obama not for her analytical, legal mind, or her understanding of the plenary power the legislative and the executive branches possess, vis-a-vis immigration.

In her mind, the job of the countrys top cop is to police our values (or enforce her own).

Not in dispute is Professor Alan Dershowitzs analytical acumen. The liberal lawyer called Yates posturing holdover heroism. Its so easy to be a heroine when youre not appointed by this president and when youre on the other side, he admonished, deriding Yates for resorting to political posturing, while failing to offer a nuanced legal analysis of the Executive Order [to Protect] The Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry Into The United States.

Mercifully, Yates conniption didnt last long. In doing whats right for the country, President Trump exposed the Justice Department as a politicized fiefdom, controlled by a feeble-minded female.

He had been gone for only eight, jam-packed days, but Barack Obamas reappearance was likewise blissfully brief. The cable girls were destined to be disappointed. Again. After releasing a short, woolly statement to say how heartened he was by the level of engagement taking place in communities around the country, Obama retreated, neutralized, too, by President Trumps decisive actions.

If its not a muscular mobilization of the race-based community; its a sit-in or a boycott: Dunce-cap Democrats are currently boycotting committee votes on the presidents cabinet picks. Indirectly does The Donalds creative destruction provide good stagecraft (and statecraft), in showcasing the Democrats Third-World politics.

ILANA Mercer isa paleolibertarian writer and thinker based in the US. Her weekly column was begun in Canada in 1999. (Articles Archive.) Ilana is the author of The Trump Revolution: The Donalds Creative Destruction Deconstructed (June 2016) and Into The Cannibals Pot: Lessons for America From Post-Apartheid South Africa (2011). Formerly syndicated by Creators Syndicate, Ilana is a fellow at the Jerusalem Institute for Market Studies(an award-winning, independent, non-profit, free-market economic policy think tank). Follow Ilana on Twitter, Gab, Facebook, and subscribe to Ilanas YouTube channel.

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President Trump Vs. The Democrat Dunce-Cap Lobby - Daily Caller

Viorica Dncil during a plenary session | EP

Ileana Grigorescu makes the news after correcting Viorica Dncils email on Romanian protests.

By Harry Cooper

2/2/17, 8:32 PM CET

Updated 2/2/17, 8:33 PM CET

Controversial plans in Romania to decriminalize some corruption cases, which led to mass street protests this week, have found their way into the hallways of the European Parliament.

Romanian MEPViorica Dncil, a member of the ruling Social Democrats, last week emailed her 750 colleaguesto explain why concernsabout the new laws were unfounded.We believe it is helpful to know the actual facts in order to correctly interpret the current situation, saidDncil.

Not everyone was convinced.

You have inspired me to perform a public service myself by making some corrections to your description of the status quo, as I felt that your briefing can be quite misleading, saidIleana Grigorescu, an assistant to U.K. Conservative MEP Andrew Lewer, in an email to the entire Parliament.

She proceeded to dissectDncils document, pointing out where she felt the MEP had given an incorrect interpretation of the facts.

For example, where Dncil described the government as having launched a public debate on the new laws, Grigorescu pointed out that the debate is just an email address where you can write your opinion.

Her intervention triggered uproar in Romania, with a reporter fromalocal TV station, regarded as close to the Social Democrats, contacting Grigorescuto ask why she was so poorly informed about the reforms. Grigorescu hung up the phone.

The station then ran the story as breaking news, accusing her of tampering with official documents.

Asked why she decided to criticize the MEPs document, Grigorescu told POLITICO: Protesting in Romania is the new social gathering. Every few months were out into the streets, or so it has been for the last few years.

I didnt expect it to have such an impact, she said.Lucky me for having a platform to reply and be read on.

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MEP's assistant trolls Romanian Social Democrat - POLITICO.eu (blog)

VICE News

Supreme Court choice Neil Gorsuch draws Democrat opposition BBC News Leading Democrats have come out in staunch opposition to Donald Trump's nomination of Neil Gorsuch for the vacant position on the Supreme Court. The court has the final say on such divisive issues such as abortion, gun control and gay rights. If ... Senate Democrat admits fight against Gorsuch is just politicsNew York Post Democrats face a choice: resist Trump or face the rage of "The Resistance"VICE News Gorsuch Pick For Top Court Fulfills Trump Campaign Pledge, Confirms Democrats' FearsNPR Huffington Post -Washington Post -CNN -Politico all 3,606 news articles »

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Supreme Court choice Neil Gorsuch draws Democrat opposition - BBC News