Rep. Joyce Beatty scolds HUD’s Ben Carson for lack of response to her letters
WASHINGTON — They say you have to send a letter to get a letter, but at a congressional hearing Wednesday, it became evident that U.S. Rep. Joyce Beatty is not getting letters from Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson.
Instead, she complained that for the second time in a year, she has written to Carson questioning a policy being implemented at the Department of Housing and Urban Development, only for it to be ignored for months, with only a Carson aide eventually responding to her.
Ohioans relieved at Trump reversal on separating immigrant families
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s reversal of course on a policy that separated undocumented immigrant children from their parents elicited relief from lawmakers Wednesday, even as some wondered whether they should praise Trump for fixing a problem he created in the first place.
Though Trump had blamed the policy of separating children from their parents on existing law, it was Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ decision in May to invoke a “zero–tolerance” policy that sparked a flurry of images of children being held in detention centers. Trump, who initially said the problem could only be fixed by Congress, signed an executive order Wednesday that called for detaining families together, rather than separating them.
Purging our democracy
Former President Lyndon B. Johnson observed, “A man without a vote is a man without protection.”
More than six decades after LBJ’s historic declaration, his words still ring true. That’s because it doesn’t take a Supreme Court justice to understand that the right to vote is the lynchpin to the many rights, liberties and freedoms we all hold so dear as Americans.