Tag: speech

President Trump on Thursday signed an executive order to promote free speech on college campuses by threatening colleges with the loss of federal research funding if they do not protect those rights. "We’re here to take historic action to defend American students and American values," Trump said, surrounded by conservative student activists at the signing ceremony. A senior administration official said the order directs 12 grant-making agencies to use their authority in coordination with the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to ensure institutions that receive federal research or education grants promote free speech and free inquiry. White House officials have said it will apply to more than $35 billion in grants. "Even as universities have received billions and billions of dollars from taxpayers, many have become increasingly hostile to free speech and the First Amendment," Trump said. Trump had announced that such an order was forthcoming at the Conservative Political Action Conference last month, where he said the directive would require colleges and universities to support free speech in exchange for federal research dollars. He brought on stage Hayden Williams, a conservative activist who was attacked while working a recruitment table on campus at the University of California-Berkeley. The video quickly went viral, with conservatives citing it as further evidence of the stifling and sometimes-violent atmosphere that conservatives face on campus. He’s going to be a wealthy young man.” “If they want our dollars, and we give it to them by the billions, they’ve got to allow people like Hayden and many other great young people and old people to speak,” Trump said. “Free speech.

Congressional negotiators revealed Monday evening that they've reached "an agreement in principle" on border security funding that includes more than $1.3 billion for physical barriers along the U.S.-Mexico border. When asked if they had an agreement that President Trump would approve, Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., the chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, told reporters: "We think so. We hope so." Sources tell Fox News the $1.3 billion can be used only for new construction that would cover approximately 55 miles of border territory in the Rio Grande Valley. The White House had requested $5.7 billion for the border wall and the administration had dangled the possibility that Trump would declare a national emergency and divert money from the federal budget for wall construction, but that move almost certainly would be challenged in Congress as well as in the courts. Talks nearly collapsed over the weekend after Democrats pushed to reduce funding for detention beds to curb what they've called unnecessarily harsh enforcement by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Shelby told reporters Monday night that the bed issue had been worked out, but declined to give details. With that in mind, sources tell Fox News the total number of beds could go as high as 52,000, though there is no technical limit on the amount. At a campaign-style rally Monday night in El Paso, Texas, Trump said he was told lawmakers were making progress in their bid to avert another shutdown. However, the president told his staff that he didn't want to hear about it and that it was important to speak "to my people from Texas" first.

- Students and parents in Holliston say a speech given Friday by school shooting survivor and activist David Hogg was too political for a school setting. The speech entitled, "Engage in the Change: Our Generation Must Own Democracy," was expected to be an apolitical discussion, focusing on youth engagement. But 16-year-old sophomore Daniel Biundo, who was sitting with his classmates in the auditorium, told Boston 25 News Monday the second half of the speech took a turn. "It was billed as kind of a speech on civic engagement and trying to get the youth active," Biundo said. Biundo presented a petition signed by dozens of people to school administrators requesting a conservative speaker come to the school to allow students to hear both sides of the gun debate. Biundo said. "Apparently, toward the end of [Hogg’s] presentation, he kind of veered off into his other focus, which had more of a political tone to it, as has been told to me, despite assurances otherwise," Jackson said by phone Monday. Jackson said Hogg has a connection to a Holliston family and a group of students invited him to the school. Parents also expressed outrage on Facebook about what some said was a lack of sufficient notice about a controversial speech. "If this is a controversial speaker and he's coming to Holliston and he's going to give a speech, there should be a considerable notice," Biundo said.

Strong suspicions that Senator Amy Klobuchar would run for president in 2020 were confirmed on a freezing Sunday afternoon in Minneapolis, just 11 miles from her hometown of Plymouth, Minnesota. “For every worker, farmer, dreamer, and builder, I am running. Democratic senator Amy Klobuchar announces 2020 run for president Read more The weather provided a steady, sticky snowfall but a relatively temperate 17F that brought supporters out by the thousands, undeterred. “The Mississippi River – all our rivers – connect us to one another, to our shared story. Serena Pitala, 32, of Chisago City has supported Klobuchar in her Senate races because “she is a workhorse… somebody who’s going to get things done.” Klobuchar became the state’s first woman elected to the Senate with her 2006 win and was re-elected in both 2012 and 2018. “She seems no-drama, just straight working for the people of Minnesota, which I can appreciate,” says Amanda Nelson, 27, of Minneapolis. She stumbled a little, mid-sentence, just before saying she stood before the people to “announce my candidacy for president of the United States”, to whoops from the crowd, many of whom waved placards saying: “Amy for America”. Klobuchar is a liberal as well, but a liberal of the midwest, or upper midwest, which can be seen as a liberalism that’s less extreme,” Goren said. “I’ve been in Minnesota for over a dozen years. “She’s been on the national scene and been there for a while.

His calls for conciliation -- which did not address his role in inflaming partisan divisions -- were met with mostly stone-faced silence from Democrats, who bitterly oppose most of his agenda and whose memories are still fresh with the 35-day government shutdown. But the President's address was a tale of two speeches, with appeals to bipartisanship giving way to divisive policy pitches and stern warnings aimed at discouraging Democratic investigations into his administration. Even as he declared that the "state of our union is strong," the President once again sought to portray the situation on the southern border as an "urgent national crisis" that he said threatened the security of "all of America." After a 35-day government shutdown triggered by his demand for a border wall, the President once again called on Congress to fulfill his request for border security, including a wall, and flicked to the next government funding deadline in 10 days. Beyond immigration and border security, Trump also homed in on the issue of abortion with rhetoric that White House aides previewed as an attempt to jolt enthusiasm among his evangelical base. Northam was referring to the decision between a physician and parents about whether to resuscitate an infant in that condition. And he touted the peace talks in Afghanistan to end the US' longest-running war, saying he has "accelerated" negotiations to reach a political settlement. Pointing to the conflict spanning nearly two decades, Trump said the US must at least try to reach a peace settlement. But there were no signs he is backing off his demands during Tuesday's speech. Aides debated whether to announce the move during the State of the Union but ultimately decided against it.

NEW YORK (The Borowitz Report)—MSNBC will preempt Donald Trump’s national address on Tuesday night by airing Barack Obama’s keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, network officials have confirmed. Harland Dorrinson, an MSNBC spokesperson, said that the network elected to air the Obama speech “in order to best serve our audience.” “Based on the data gathered by our research department, the number of MSNBC viewers who were planning to watch the Trump speech was approximately zero,” Dorrinson said. “This seemed like a better way to go.” Since the Obama speech has a running time of only sixteen minutes, MSNBC plans to air it “over and over” until Trump has finished talking, Dorrinson said. “We’ll air it all night if we have to,” he said. The network spokesperson said that the White House had contacted MSNBC to argue that the network could not preëmpt a national address by Trump. “We had three words for them,” he said. “Yes we can.”

The guidelines that emerge from these meetings are sent out to 7,500-plus moderators around the world. Facebook has been accused of accelerating violence in the country. In many countries, extremism and the mainstream are blurring. The company never set out to play this role, but in an effort to control problems of its own creation, it has quietly become, with a speed that makes even employees uncomfortable, what is arguably one of the world’s most powerful political regulators. A 2016 document on Western Balkan hate groups, still in use, incorrectly describes Ratko Mladic as a fugitive. And Google Translate can be unreliable: Mr. Mladic is referred to in one slide as “Rodney Young.” The guidelines, said Mr. Mujanovic, the Balkans expert, appear dangerously out of date. Several months after Facebook said it had banned praise for Ma Ba Tha, a Myanmar supremacist group accused of encouraging ethnic cleansing, the company’s Myanmar guidelines stated that the group was allowed. Facebook users are prohibited from posting content that is deemed to support or praise them. Facebook says that any such practice would violate its rules, which include contingencies for reviewing posts in unfamiliar languages. But at company headquarters, the most fundamental questions of all remain unanswered: What sorts of content lead directly to violence?

Jeb Bush lamented the current state of politics in the United States — and the lack of civility — during a speech Wednesday night at the 37th Annual Law Enforcement Appreciation Dinner and Children's Charity. Jeb Bush joined governor-elect Kristi Noem, Gov. Dennis Daugaard, Sen. John Thune and Attorney General Marty Jackley in making remarks at the dinner, which honors South Dakota law enforcement and has raised millions of dollars for children. Bush's speech focused primarily on returning to civility in the country's political discussions, warning that we'd reached a point where people we disagreed with weren't just people with different opinions. "They're becoming enemies," Bush said. That means finding politicians that act respectfully and don't disparage others, he said -- and while he never said the name "Trump," the implication was clear. "Today in American politics," Bush said, "there are very few rewards for doing things right." While Bush headlined the speech, South Dakotans spoke before him, including Thune, who said he'd met Bush more than 30 years ago, and said that no other American family more exemplified public service. And standing in front of the massive crowd filling the Ramkota Exhibit Hall, Daugaard told attendees "banquets are not enough" to thank them for all that they do in the name of public service. More: Billie Sutton turned much of the state blue, but not deep blue

Democratic activist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez becomes the youngest woman ever elected to Congress. FOX News Channel (FNC) is a 24-hour all-encompassing news service dedicated to delivering breaking news as well as political and business news. The number one network in cable,…