> "Senator Padilla chose disrespectful political theatre and interrupted a live press conference without identifying himself or having his Senate security pin on as he lunged toward Secretary Noem," DHS said. "Mr. Padilla was told repeatedly to back away and did not comply with officers’ repeated commands. @SecretService thought he was an attacker and officers acted appropriately.
If you watch the second video you'll notice that officers never told Padilla to back away.
> Speaking outside the Federal Building in LA's Westwood area, Noem said Padilla appeared to be "lunging" toward her and "nobody knew who he was."
There's no other evidence that Padilla "lunged" at Noem, and a lot of evidence that he didn't (skim [1], and watch 6:04-6:48 of the second video to draw your own conclusions).
> "If he had requested a meeting, I would have loved to have sat down and had a conversation with him that coming into a press conference like this is political theater," Noem said.
A Senator of California walks into a press conference about the administration's deployment of thousands of members of two different military forces to (one city in) California. Why would it be abnormal (never mind political theater) for a Senator to join a press conference?
Something I initially missed: Padilla claims that the FBI escorted him to the press conference [2][3]. The FBI could put out a follow-up tweet to confirm or deny, but I doubt that it will. Contrary to Noem's claim that "nobody knew who he was", the FBI knew, and there's a chance that Noem knew.
Another reminder that this administration does not want people to know about their freedom of the press [1]:
> A video shared by Padilla on social media then shows he was pushed facedown on the ground by three officers who then handcuff his hands behind his back. The video stops after an officer tells Padilla’s staffer there is no recording allowed “per FBI rights.”
> It seemed to me like most of the opposition was to the mandate rather than to letting people take the vaccine if they chose to.
That's how it seems to me too, but somehow the people with that perspective are not the ones being represented in HHS. Instead, we have Robert F. Kennedy Jr. who has chosen to "approve" a COVID-19 vaccine while restricting most currently-healthy adults from using it (even though vaccines are supposed to prevent currently-healthy people from getting an infection or as severe of an infection).
The National Guard is managed by states, so states can use the National Guard to enforce state laws [1]. However, when the president calls on National Guard members, the members become part of the Army and Air Force [2]. Trump is violating the Posse Comitatus Act which prohibits anyone from using the Army or Air Force for law enforcement [3][4]. Exceptions to the Posse Comitatus Act include authorization from Congress and the Insurrection Act (which Trump has not invoked yet) [3][4].
> Trump is violating the Posse Comitatus Act which prohibits anyone from using the Army or Air Force for law enforcement
... It only prohibits this veing done without specific statutory authority. In addition to provisions of the Insurrection Act, specific statutory authority for Presidential use of the National Guard specifically for, among other purpose, executing the laws of the United States is found in 10 USC § 12406 regarding federalizing the Guard [0], which is the basis cited for the recent mobilization. So, the argument that it is violating Posse Comitatus requires arguing as well that the invocation of § 12406 is invalid. There is an argument for that, as § 12406 explicitly requires orders for its purposes shall be issued through the Governors of the states involved, so the argument is that, by bypassing the Governor, Trump is acting outside of the cited statutory authority of § 12406, and therefore also violating Posse Comitatus.
The problem with that technical argument is that it probably achieves nothing in practice even if it works, as the conditions for invoking the Insurrection Act encompass those for § 12406, allow federalizing any of the universal militia (including the Guard) and not just the Guard, and do not require orders through the Governor of the State [1], so if there were found to a legal issue, a new order with the same effect founded in 10 USC § 253 instead of 10 USC § 12406 could immediately be issued.
For pay scales GS-05 and above, applicants have to write short essays for four questions, the third of which is:
> How would you help advance the President’s Executive Orders and policy priorities in this role? Identify one or two relevant Executive Orders or policy initiatives that are significant to you, and explain how you would help implement them if hired.
As House Representative Stephen F. Lynch pointed out [1], a question about adopting a particular president's priorities is at odds with the federal employee's oath and puts a loyalty test in the hiring process:
> Every federal worker is legally required to take an oath of office that they will “support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic.” The oath does not require federal workers to swear to protect and defend executive orders or policy initiatives. It does not require that workers have loyalty to a President or to a political party. In fact, the very ethos of our civil service is that it serves the Constitution and the American people. That mandate transcends any political position or capriciously signed executive order.
There are multiple DOGE employees [2][3] who would be unlikely to pass a good faith execution of the "merit and competence" guideline of the new hiring process.
Propublica and The Texas Tribune co-published this article, and I originally used the Propublica link. On Propublica, both the regular title and the HTML title are too long, so I shortened and slightly modified the HTML title from
> Why Texas Won't Force Private Companies to Use E-Verify to Check Employment Authorization
to
> Why Texas Won't Force Companies to Use E-Verify for Employment Authorization
HN automatically changed the link (or someone at HN manually changed it) to the same article co-published by The Texas Tribune [TFA] with the title:
> Texas won't force private companies to use E-Verify to check workers' immigration status, despite leaders' tough talk
AT&T, Comcast, and CenturyLink financially contribute to Utah Taxpayers Association, the dark money group in question [1]. AT&T's 2024 financial disclosure records include contributions to UTA [2]. Comcast and CenturyLink/Lumen are or have been among the UTA's conference sponsors [3][4].
If you watch the second video you'll notice that officers never told Padilla to back away.
> Speaking outside the Federal Building in LA's Westwood area, Noem said Padilla appeared to be "lunging" toward her and "nobody knew who he was."
There's no other evidence that Padilla "lunged" at Noem, and a lot of evidence that he didn't (skim [1], and watch 6:04-6:48 of the second video to draw your own conclusions).
> "If he had requested a meeting, I would have loved to have sat down and had a conversation with him that coming into a press conference like this is political theater," Noem said.
A Senator of California walks into a press conference about the administration's deployment of thousands of members of two different military forces to (one city in) California. Why would it be abnormal (never mind political theater) for a Senator to join a press conference?
Something I initially missed: Padilla claims that the FBI escorted him to the press conference [2][3]. The FBI could put out a follow-up tweet to confirm or deny, but I doubt that it will. Contrary to Noem's claim that "nobody knew who he was", the FBI knew, and there's a chance that Noem knew.
Another reminder that this administration does not want people to know about their freedom of the press [1]:
> A video shared by Padilla on social media then shows he was pushed facedown on the ground by three officers who then handcuff his hands behind his back. The video stops after an officer tells Padilla’s staffer there is no recording allowed “per FBI rights.”
[1] https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/padilla-noem-lu...
[2] https://www.mediaite.com/media/news/sen-alex-padilla-tells-m...
[3] https://www.msnbc.com/the-beat-with-ari/watch/first-on-msnbc...