Prince George’s Police Chief Hank Stawinski, Amb. John Bolton and Sen. Jim DeMint joined WMAL on Tuesday!

Mornings on the Mall

Tuesday, December 6, 2016

Hosts: Brian Wilson and Larry O’Connor

Executive Producer: Heather Hunter

 

5am – A/B/C Are You Concerned About Ivanka Coming to DC?

• Ivanka Trump and husband Jared Kushner are househunting in Washington, D.C.: Closer to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue! Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, are househunting in Washington, D.C., CNN reports. The couple’s possible move indicates that Kushner may have a role in father-in-law Donald Trump’s administration. Although the 35-year-old businessman served as a close adviser to the president-elect during his campaign, an antinepotism law passed in 1967 could prevent the ex–Apprentice host, 70, from hiring his daughter’s husband.
• Al Gore: ‘I Felt Good’ About Trump Meeting, Ivanka Is ‘Very Committed’ on Climate Policy. Former Vice President Al Gore appeared on MSNBC tonight to further discuss his meeting with President-elect Donald Trump and Ivanka Trump. Hayes asked him, “Did you come away encouraged, terrified, or somewhere in between?” Gore said it was “very interesting” and productive.” And while he would not divulge specific details, he made it clear he “felt good” about the meeting overall. Hayes asked him if he’s concerned about climate change progress being rolled back under a Trump administration, and Gore ended up striking a more optimistic tone.

5am – D         Recount News:

• Texas elector says he will not cast his vote for Donald Trump. Washington (CNN)A Texas elector said Monday that enough is enough — he will not cast his vote for President-elect Donald Trump as part of the Electoral College process on December 19. Christopher Suprun, a paramedic from Texas who served as a firefighter during the Sept. 11 attacks, wrote in an editorial published in The New York Times that even though he is a Republican elector, he will not vote for Trump. Suprun will cast his vote along with the other electors (538 in total) from every state and the District of Columbia on December 19 as part of the Electoral College process. “Fifteen years ago, I swore an oath to defend my country and Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic,” he wrote. “On Dec. 19, I will do it again.”
• Michigan GOP Files Appeal To Stop Election Recount. The Michigan Republican Party filed notice that it plans to appeal a U.S. District Court decision to start the recount Monday, arguing the effort should not be decided by the federal courts system. “This is a Michigan issue, and should be handled by the Michigan court system,” Michigan Republican Party Chairman Ronna Romney McDaniel said in a press release. McDaniel also asserted that Green Party candidate Jill Stein waited too long to file a recount request. Attorneys for the Michigan GOP filed a Notice to Appeal with the Eastern District Court of Michigan Monday, with plans to eventually appeal the ruling with the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati, Ohio, according to the Detroit Free Press. The Michigan Court of Appeals has scheduled oral arguments for Tuesday at 4 p.m., according to a press release from the Michigan GOP.
• Florida voters sue for recount. TALLAHASSEE — Three central Florida voters are mounting an unlikely bid to overturn the presidential election result in the Sunshine State. In a lawsuit filed Monday in Leon Circuit Court, they assert that Hillary Clinton, not Donald Trump, actually won Florida. The plaintiffs, who live in Osceola and Volusia counties, say the state’s official election results were off because of hacking, malfunctioning voting machines and other problems. They’re asking for a hand recount of every paper ballot in Florida, at the expense of defendants including Trump, Gov. Rick Scott and the 29 Republican presidential electors from Florida.
• Stein escalates recount push in face of criticism, goes to federal court in Pennsylvania. Green Party candidate Jill Stein escalated her quixotic campaign for a presidential recount Monday in several battlegrounds where Donald Trump narrowly beat Hillary Clinton, vowing at a press conference outside Trump Tower not to “give in” as she seeks federal court help to force statewide tallies in the face of bipartisan criticism. Stein and her Green Party allies are seeking recounts in three states: Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan.

5am – E         Pentagon buries evidence of $125 billion in bureaucratic waste. (Washington Post) — The Pentagon has buried an internal study that exposed $125 billion in administrative waste in its business operations amid fears Congress would use the findings as an excuse to slash the defense budget, according to interviews and confidential memos obtained by The Washington Post. Pentagon leaders had requested the study to help make their enormous back-office bureaucracy more efficient and reinvest any savings in combat power. But after the project documented far more wasteful spending than expected, senior defense officials moved swiftly to kill it by discrediting and suppressing the results. The report, issued in January 2015, identified “a clear path” for the Defense Department to save $125 billion over five years. The plan would not have required layoffs of civil servants or reductions in military personnel. Instead, it would have streamlined the bureaucracy through attrition and early retirements, curtailed high-priced contractors and made better use of information technology.

6am – A/B/C Speed limits could drop in Montgomery Co. WASHINGTON — Montgomery County residents can weigh in this week on bills that would drop speed limits on certain county roads. Montgomery County Council member Hans Riemer has been working with several state delegates from the county to introduce legislation during the 2017 General Assembly session. Public hearings are scheduled for 7 p.m. Monday and Wednesday to get community feedback on various bills, but Riemer told WTOP he believes Wednesday is the night to weigh in on the speed limit bills. One bill would drop the top speed on county roads with no posted limits from 30 to 25 miles per hour. The second would allow 20 miles per hour to be the lowest possible speed limit in Montgomery County. If this bill passes, it would not mean an automatic speed limit decrease on county roads. “When I had originally proposed it, I had just requested that here be no particular floor and that we should just be allowed to set the county road speeds at whatever we would like,” Riemer said. “However after some negotiations, we came to agreement that we would just set a new floor of 20, rather than 25, which is the current floor.”

6am – D         Couple Rewrites Christmas Classic ‘Baby It’s Cold Outside’ to Emphasize the Importance of Consent. Minnesota-based couple Lydia Liza and Josiah Lemanski bonded over their mutual distaste for the lyrics of Frank Loesser’s classic Christmas tune, “Baby It’s Cold Outside.” The 1944 original version of the song alludes to non-consensual sex with lyrics including, “What’s in this drink?” and more, as a woman tries to leave an all-too-persistent man during a snowstorm. (Despite the controversy, the song is considered a Christmas classic and has been covered many times since its release.) So, Liza and Lemanski decided to give it a 2016 update.

7am – A         INTERVIEW — Prince George’s Police Chief HANK STAWINSKI

• Discuss the impact of the opening of the MGM National Harbor casino this week
• Opening of MGM National Harbor casino could mean traffic headaches for commuters. NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. – The MGM National Harbor casino will open its doors on December 8th. The opening will be perfectly timed for the holiday season – but could also mean for traffic headaches if you’re commuting in and around the area. Prince George’s County police admit there will be congestion when the casino finally opens. In October, the department and other county officials met with residents to reveal their plan to ease traffic.

7am – B         Trump Meetings:

• GORE MEETING WITH TRUMP: Al Gore: ‘I Felt Good’ About Trump Meeting, Ivanka Is ‘Very Committed’ on Climate Policy
• Al Gore says he had a “productive” meeting today with Trump, calls it a “sincere search for areas of common ground”
• Ivanka Trump and husband Jared Kushner are househunting in Washington, D.C. Closer to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue! Ivanka Trump and her husband, Jared Kushner, are househunting in Washington, D.C., CNN reports. The couple’s possible move indicates that Kushner may have a role in father-in-law Donald Trump’s administration. Although the 35-year-old businessman served as a close adviser to the president-elect during his campaign, an antinepotism law passed in 1967 could prevent the ex–Apprentice host, 70, from hiring his daughter’s husband.
• D.C. Mayor Bowser to meet with Trump in New York on Tuesday. D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) will travel to New York on Tuesday to talk privately with President-elect Donald Trump, a meeting the mayor said she requested to discuss how the two could “work together to continue Washington D.C.’s growth.” But growing the nation’s capital is opposite of what Trump promised to voters when he was campaigning for the White House. With pledges to “drain the swamp,” Trump suggested a hiring freeze for federal workers and wants to make it easier to fire bureaucrats, many of whom live in the District.

7am – C         Some IRS refunds to be delayed until Feb. 15. Attention holiday shoppers: You might not be able to count on receiving a federal tax refund in January to pay for those gift bills. In a congressionally-approved change aimed at battling tax refund fraud and identity theft, the IRS must hold tax refunds until Feb. 15 for the millions of Americans who claim the Earned Income Tax Credit or the Additional Child Tax Credit. “This is an important change as some of these taxpayers are used to getting an early refund,” IRS Commissioner John Koskinen cautioned in an announcement as the year-end giving season approached. “We want people to be aware of the change for their planning purposes during the holidays. We don’t want anyone caught by surprise if they get their refund a few weeks later than in previous years.”

7am – D         INTERVIEW — AMB. JOHN BOLTON – former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations

• China lodges formal protest after Donald Trump’s Taiwan call
• Bolton on Trump’s Taiwan Call: China Doesn’t Tell Us Who We Can Talk To
• Trump widens Secretary of State search

• Secretary of State John Bolton Would Be the Anti-John Kerry.

7am – E         Amazon opening convenience store with no checkout lines. (Bloomberg News) — Amazon.com Inc. unveiled technology Monday that will let shoppers grab groceries and completely bypass the checkout process. The company is testing the new system at what it is calling an Amazon Go store in Seattle, which will open to the public early next year. Customers will be able to scan their phones at the entrance using a new Amazon Go mobile app. Then, the technology will track what items they pick up or even return to the shelves and add them to a virtual shopping cart in real time, according a video Amazon posted on YouTube. Once the customers exit the store, they will be charged on their Amazon account automatically. Amazon has been experimenting with the grocery business since 2007, when it started AmazonFresh in the Seattle area, where the company is based. The service offers doorstep delivery of a limited selection of groceries in 16 U.S. markets, including Los Angeles, New York, and Boston, as well as London. Amazon is also building facilities that let shoppers pull in and pick up groceries ordered online. Now the company, which already operates a few brick-and-mortar book and college-campus stores, is testing a kind of convenience store.

8am – A         INTERVIEW — SEN. JIM DEMINT – President of The Heritage Foundation, former U.S. Senator (R-S.C.) and author of “Falling in Love with America Again.”

• Heritage President Jim DeMint on Nomination of Dr. Ben Carson for HUD Secretary
• House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif: Ben Carson is ‘disturbingly unqualified’ for Cabinet position

8am – B           College News:

•  DC university professor calls student protest groups’ demands ‘political correctness run amok’ WASHINGTON – A George Washington University professor is crediting school administrators for standing up to student protest groups and and not giving in to their “outrageous demands.” The Progressive Student Union and several other on-campus student organizations have made a list of demands in a three-page later to school administrators calling on them to make a public acknowledgement that white privilege exists in the country and for the university to create a “sanctuary” for Muslim refugees fleeing the Middle East. Other demands include asking the university to take steps to re-channel its resources and money to protect students from racism and sexism. They also want the university to divert students’ tuition money to fund homeless facilities, job training and community centers. These groups also believe that the Fraternal Order of Police’s endorsement of Trump is an “act of violence” against them and are threatening their safety when they provide security at their protests. In an op-ed piece penned by George Washington University law professor John Banzhaf, he credits the school for taking a stand to stop what Banzhaf has termed “political correctness run amok” that has overtaken college campuses across the country.
• Princeton University President: The Term ‘Sanctuary Campus’ Has No Basis in Law. The President of Princeton University may find himself in hot water with the left very soon. He dared to question the validity of sanctuary campuses. The president of Princeton University, Christopher L. Eisgruber, has taken a different tack, observing in a campus-wide letter in recent days that the concept of the “sanctuary campus” “has no basis in law, and that colleges and universities have no authority to exempt any part of their campuses from the nation’s immigration laws.”
• GOP bill defunds schools that ban the American flag. Dozens of House Republicans have introduced legislation that would prevent federal funds from being used to fund schools and colleges that ban the American flag. The bill was introduced the same week that Hampshire College in Massachusetts decided to remove the American flag from the campus. Initially, the college lowered the flag to protest President-elect Trump’s election victory, and student protesters burned the flag the next day. The flag was removed entirely as a form of further protest, and eventually raised again Dec. 2. That started a petition asking asking that federal funds be removed for any college that takes down the flag. And on Friday, Rep. Mike Turner, R-Ohio, and 52 other House Republicans put forward legislation to accomplish that. “I am proud to introduce legislation that will protect the American flag from censorship across the country,” Turner said in a statement to the Washington Examiner. “The American flag is a symbol of freedom throughout the world and should be respected as such. Recent action by Hampshire College to remove the American flag from its campus was a blatant act of censorship. Furthermore, Hampshire College’s decision disrespected our servicemembers, veterans, and the liberties our flag embodies. We must work to ensure that such acts of censorship are not supported by the government in the future.” Their bill, the Protect the Flag Act, holds that: “Federal funds may not be made available to an institution of higher education … that, pursuant to an official policy of the institution to prohibit the display of the flag of the United States by the institution, removes, censors, takes down, prohibits, or otherwise halts display of a flag of the United States.”

8am – C         Biden in 2020? With a smile, he says he’s not ruling it out. WASHINGTON (AP) — It’s more than a month before Donald Trump even enters the White House, but Joe Biden says he’s running for president in 2020. Maybe. “I’m going to run in 2020. For president. So, uh, what the hell, man,” the departing vice president told reporters Monday with only a slight smile on his face. Given a chance to walk it back, he did — but only a bit. Asked if he was joking, he said: “I’m not committing not to run. I’m not committing to anything. I learned a long time ago, fate has a strange way of intervening.” Biden, who turned 74 last month, will turn 78 shortly after the 2020 election. Ronald Reagan was just a few days short of turning 78 when he left office in January 1989, making him the oldest person to serve as president.

8am – D         Nationals, taken aback by Bryce Harper’s contract demands, set to move on after ’18. NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. – Perhaps it’s a matter of semantics whether the proposed contract extension was formally discussed, or simply mentioned in casual conversation, but the Washington Nationals made it clear Monday they have no intention of meeting Bryce Harper’s request for a record-setting contract to avert free agency in two years. Harper is seeking at least a 10-year contract that will likely pay him a minimum of $400 million, a high-ranking Nationals executive told USA TODAY Sports. The executive spoke to USA TODAY Sports on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly about the negotiations.

8am – E         Va. woman desperate to find her dog has renewed hope. Arlington woman desperate to find missing dog. ARLINGTON, VA (WUSA9) – She has spent tens of thousands of dollars and invested countless hours over the last three years on a search for a loved one. Now, an Arlington woman has renewed hope after a recent sighting. Who is she looking for? Her 7-year-old rottweiler, Havoc. That’s three years of hope, frustration and sheer resolve talking. Janet Mihalyfi has spent more than $40,000, countless hours, sweat and tears in search of her missing dog Havoc. But, as you can tell, to Janet, Havoc is more than just a dog. It’s a love that only deepens with distance. Three years ago, Havoc wandered off while they were at Rock Creek Park.