State Department
July 10, 2026 — Bill Glahn
Every now and again, justice prevails. As John noted earlier, Tou Lue Vang, pardoned child rapist and Laotian national, has been deported: Some backstory here. There are a handful of southeast Asian men who arrived in Minnesota as refugees decades ago who went on to be convicted of serious felony crimes. As a result, they lost their legal immigration status and were ordered deported back to their home countries. But
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February 24, 2026 — Bill Glahn
I missed the significance of this story when scrolling headlines yesterday. From the Associated Press (AP), France moves to bar US Ambassador Charles Kushner from direct government access. Based on the headline, I thought it was just some anti-Trump pettiness. It goes much deeper. The AP reports, France’s top diplomat Monday requested that U.S. Ambassador Charles Kushner no longer be allowed direct access to members of the French government after
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July 13, 2025 — John Hinderaker
Bill Glahn noted yesterday that the Trump administration has laid off a modest number of State Department employees, totaling less than two percent of State Department staff. Yet the wailing and gnashing of teeth on the Left were extraordinary: The fact the State Dept. can’t go through a two percent staff reduction without making a scene and patting each other on the back about fighting “fascism” should be nauseating to
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July 4, 2025 — John Hinderaker
Marco Rubio is doing a brilliant job as Secretary of State. A prime example of his implementation of an America First foreign policy is the abolition of USAID and relocation of aid programs inside the State Department. On the State Department’s Substack, Rubio lays out the rationale for this change, putting to shame the Democrats’ absurd “millions will die” mantra: Every public servant has an obligation to American citizens to
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June 3, 2025 — John Hinderaker
If you listened to liberals, you would never cut any government spending, because all spending cuts cause people to die. How anyone ever survived before the modern era of behemoth government is a mystery. The Trump administration’s pause on dispensation of USAID grants is a case in point. We know that many USAID programs were money-laundering operations for the global Left that needed to be shut down. Happily, that is
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April 11, 2025 — John Hinderaker
Secretary of State Marco Rubio is one of my favorite people in politics. On Tuesday of this week, he was the guest of Donald Trump, Jr. on Trump’s podcast. They had a great conversation that covered a number of foreign policy topics. Rubio’s comments on Venezuela and Mexico, among others, are noteworthy. The State Department’s web site posted a transcript of the podcast, which I encourage you to check out.
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March 11, 2025 — John Hinderaker
I don’t pretend to understand what is going on here, but employees at USAID, a key DOGE target, have been instructed to shred and burn their documents: A senior official at USAID instructed a number of the agency’s remaining staff to convene at the agency’s now-former headquarters in Washington on Tuesday for an “all day” group effort to destroy documents stored there, many of which contain sensitive information. The materials
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February 15, 2023 — John Hinderaker
This is real, not parody: Are Afghans familiar with #BlackGirlMagic and the movement it inspired? Do Afghan girls need a similar movement? What about Afghan Women? Teach me, ready to learn. #BlackHistoryMonth @Beyonce @lizzo @ReginaKing — Chargé d’Affaires Karen Decker (@USAmbKabul) February 15, 2023 Where to begin? First, Ms. Decker is in fact the U.S. Chargé d’Affaires in Kabul. I was surprised to learn that we still have a diplomatic
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November 16, 2019 — Scott Johnson
Former United States Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch was the star witness served up by the Democrats in the show trial that is to preface their adoption of impeachment articles against President Trump. The Democrats are bound and determined to impeach Trump over something. The Russia hoax was foiled. Although it is not invented out of whole cloth, the Democrats’ current impeachment production looks to me like Russia hoax 2.0.
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February 13, 2019 — Scott Johnson
Ilhan Omar questioned Special Envoy for Venezuela Elliott Abrams at a House Foreign Relations Committee hearing. As Max Boot observes elsewhere on Twitter, she doesn’t seem to realize that Abrams is a leading advocate of human rights and democracy–not a promoter of genocide. She does seem to know, however, that Abrams is a supporter of Israel and the member of a suspect “faith tradition.” Related: The Spectator USA’s Dominic Green
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December 9, 2018 — John Hinderaker
Royce Lamberth is an outspoken and sometimes controversial federal judge. Appointed by President Reagan, he has shown no partiality in going after litigants he considers to be malefactors. This time, it is the State Department and the Department of Justice. Judge Lamberth is presiding over the lawsuit brought by Judicial Watch against the State Department, asking for emails relating to the Benghazi talking points that were promulgated after that attack.
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September 18, 2018 — Scott Johnson
I have repeatedly observed here that if the so-called Steele dossier commissioned by the Clinton campaign is what it purports to be, it disseminates intelligence supplied by Russian authorities and, further, the intelligence is highly likely to constitute Russian disinformation. Eric Felten comes at the related issues from different angles in articles carried in the past two issues of the Weekly Standard. In “The Romanian ruse” Eric traces the origin
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March 13, 2018 — John Hinderaker
Erica Werner is the Washington Post’s congressional reporter. I think we can assume she speaks for the Democratic Party. This is her tweet in response to President Trump’s announcement that he is appointing Mike Pompeo Secretary of State and Gina Haspel CIA Director: A Benghazi bomb-thrower will be SecState and a torture overseer will be CIA director — IF CONFIRMED BY THE SENATE — Erica Werner (@ericawerner) March 13, 2018
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March 13, 2018 — Paul Mirengoff
President Trump has removed Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and plans to nominate CIA Director Mike Pompeo to replace him. The move has been talked about for months. Relations between Trump and Tillerson have never been good. Unnamed officials say they reached a breaking point recently, though they haven’t said why. There is speculation that Tillerson’s statement that he believes Russia is responsible for the poisoning of a Russian ex-pat
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July 22, 2017 — Scott Johnson
When it comes to apologetics and confusion about the endless campaign of Palestinian Arab terrorism against Israel, the Associated Press has nothing on the Department of State. See, for example, Adam Kredo’s two recent Washington Free Beacon accounts, “State Dept. blames Israel for terrorism, claims Palestinians rarely incite attacks” (July 20) and “Trump State Dept. unsure why Palestinian terrorists kill Israelis” (July 21). The source documents related to Kredo’s stories
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January 26, 2017 — Paul Mirengoff
Josh Rogin of the Washington Post reports that “the entire senior level of management officials resigned Wednesday, part of an ongoing mass exodus of senior Foreign Service officers who don’t want to stick around for the Trump era.” The departing officials are Patrick Kennedy, the Department’s long-serving undersecretary for management; Assistant Secretary of State for Administration Joyce Anne Barr; Assistant Secretary of State for Consular Affairs Michele Bond; and Ambassador
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