Cal Thomas, Immigrant advocate Gabriela Kahrl, Josh Kraushaar, Tom Dupree and Diamond & Silk joined WMAL on Wednesday!

Mornings on the Mall

Wednesday, May 2, 2018

Hosts: Mary Walter and Vince Coglianese

Executive Producer: Heather Hunter

5am – A/B/C MODESTY PONCHOS FOR PROM:

• School to hand out ‘Modesty Ponchos’ for teens dressed inappropriately for prom (Fox Detroit) — Female students at a Dearborn Catholic high school who are deemed to be dressed ‘inappropriately’ for prom will be handed Modesty Ponchos by the school to wear over their dresses. Students at Divine Child High School say they’re being shamed by their own administration before they even walk in the door for prom: If they’re not dressed appropriately enough by the school’s standards, they’ll be handed Modesty Ponchos to wear over their dresses.
• After Much Ridicule, a Catholic School Won’t Give Out “Modesty Ponchos” at Prom (Patheos) – Well, that didn’t take long. Administrators at Dearborn Catholic High School, a private school in Michigan, have now announced that they will no longer hand out “Modesty Ponchos” at prom to girls wearing anything even remotely revealing. Mary Pat O’Malley, the theology teacher who came up with the idea, said earlier that, “We are trying to focus on the inner beauty and not draw attention to something that doesn’t need attention drawn to it.” Which was really just another form of slut-shaming. Were bustier girls unable to display their inner beauty? Tonight, though, the principal of the school sent this message to parents, as reported by Ann Zaniewski of the Detroit Free Press. On Tuesday, the Archdiocese of Detroit released a letter Principal Eric Haley sent out to parents: “Our intention with displaying the poncho was never to make students feel uncomfortable, but to remind all students and parents of our formal Prom dress policy, which has not changed for several years,” Haley said. “To be clear: The poncho will not be passed out at Prom. It was on display to proactively remind students of our dress code policies and eliminate any confusion prior to this special event.” Haley said Divine Child, like many other private and public schools, is simply asking students and parents to follow the dress code when selecting prom outfits.

5am – D/E     West Virginia GOP Senate candidates spar over credentials, support for Trump in Fox News debate. (Fox News) — The top tier candidates in West Virginia’s Republican Senate primary sparred in Tuesday’s Fox News Channel debate over who is most conservative and more closely aligned to President Trump, while blasting Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia probe. U.S. Rep. Evan Jenkins denied being a creature of the swamp, despite enjoying the backing from Washington Republicans. He emphasized his support for Trump. “You know, I proudly endorsed President Trump in the May primary, 2016,” Jenkins said. “The only one up here on the stage who did that and have been standing with him each and every day.” Jenkins attacked West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey for past comments saying Trump wasn’t his first choice in the 2016 primary. But Morrisey boasted of his eventual backing of Trump at the convention and his opposition to former President Barack Obama’s policies. “We have a great relationship,” the attorney general said of Trump. “We work together. I was proud to run ads with the president and supported him at the convention.” Meanwhile, former coal executive Don Blankenship portrayed himself as the true outsider in the race, saying he wouldn’t go to Washington to get along with people in the GOP leadership, like Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. “I’m not going to D.C. to get along, so that will be a failure because I don’t intend to get along,” Blakenship said. “I intend to make sure that we make a difference.” Ahead of the debate, Blankenship made waves for airing a campaign ad referring to McConnell, R-Ky., as “cocaine Mitch.” The origins of “cocaine Mitch,” according to the campaign, are rooted in accusations of drug smuggling on Chinese ships associated with the family of McConnell’s wife, Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao. The West Virginia Senate race is considered a toss-up in the midterm elections. Republicans hope to unseat incumbent Joe Manchin, a Democrat who first won the seat in a 2010 special election.

6am – A/B/C Montgomery Co. residents divided over providing legal aid to immigrants. Should Montgomery County set aside $373,000 for legal aid for low income immigrants who are facing deportation? Dozens signed up to speak at a public hearing on the issue on Tuesday night. ROCKVILLE, Md. — Dozens signed up to speak and seats were hard to find at a hearing on Tuesday night for a plan to set aside $373,000 in legal aid money for low income Montgomery County immigrants facing deportation. “The resolution specifies that no county dollars will be used to fund representation for county residents that have a final criminal conviction for certain serious felonies,” County Council President Hans Reimer explained. “We are working closely with the State’s Attorney’s office, the Capital Area Immigrants Rights (CAIR) Coalition (and) the Office of the Public Defender on this list of restrictions and it will continue to be refined.” There was loud applause and cheers for people sharing their views both in favor and against the plan. Gabriela Kahrl spoke in support, on behalf of the University of Maryland School of Law Immigration Clinic. “By now the council is well aware of the dangerous and inhumane policies issued by Mr. Sessions under Trump (sic), such as ramping up detention and enforcement at the border and in our communities,” Kahrl said to jeers from some in the audience before Reimer interrupted to ask people to quiet down. Wei Wong, who described herself as a legal immigrant and county resident, opposes the plan. “Is just like telling people who respect U.S. immigration laws, ‘You are dumb. You are gullible for following our laws,’” Wong said. Claudia Cubas with the CAIR Coalition described the people she sees in detention centers where immigrants facing deportation proceedings are held. “I’m seeing Dreamers being detained despite … having approved DACA paperwork. I’m seeing parents without any criminal histories whatsoever arrested at home, worried about how their U.S. citizen children will cope when they find out that they are gone.” Cubas said. “I am seeing your neighbor, that nice guy who’s daughter plays with your child and who works hard every day to provide for his family being arrested after having paid, in a timely fashion, his traffic violation ticket.” An opponent of that view, Amy Waychoff, called it “morally wrong to take money out of the hands of U.S. citizen taxpayers and give it to illegal immigrants who should not be in the county in the first place.”

6am – D         INTERVIEW – CAL THOMAS – Syndicated columnist – discussed Nancy Pelosi wanting to run again for House Speaker.

• Pelosi says she’ll run for speaker, as more swing-district Democrats look for alternative. CHARLOTTE — House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi reiterated Tuesday that she will run for speaker of the House if her party wins a majority in the 2018 midterm elections, telling the Boston Globe that it’s “important that it not be five white guys at the table” in negotiations between Congress and the White House. “I have no intention of walking away from that table,” Pelosi said.

6am – E         65% of Public School 8th Graders Not Proficient in Reading; 67% Not Proficient in Math (CNSNews) – Sixty-five percent of the eighth graders in American public schools in 2017 were not proficient in reading and 67 percent were not proficient in mathematics, according to the National Assessment of Educational Progress test results released by the U.S. Department of Education. The results are far worse for students enrolled in some urban districts. Among the 27 large urban districts for which the Department of Education published 2017 NAEP test scores, the Detroit public schools had the lowest percentage of students who scored proficient or better in math and the lowest percentage who scored proficient or better in reading. Only 5 percent of Detroit public-school eighth graders were proficient or better in math. Only 7 percent were proficient or better in reading. In the Cleveland public schools, only 11 percent of eight graders were proficient or better in math and only 10 percent were proficient or better in reading. In the Baltimore public schools, only 11 percent were proficient or better in math and only 13 percent were proficient or better in reading.

6am – F         MUELLER NEWS:

• Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump: So disgraceful that the questions concerning the Russian Witch Hunt were “leaked” to the media. No questions on Collusion. Oh, I see…you have a made up, phony crime, Collusion, that never existed, and an investigation begun with illegally leaked classified information. Nice! 3:47 AM – 1 May 2018
• Mueller Has Dozens of Inquiries for Trump in Broad Quest on Russia Ties and Obstruction. WASHINGTON — Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel investigating Russia’s election interference, has at least four dozen questions on an exhaustive array of subjects he wants to ask President Trump to learn more about his ties to Russia and determine whether he obstructed the inquiry itself, according to a list of the questions obtained by The New York Times. The open-ended queries appear to be an attempt to penetrate the president’s thinking, to get at the motivation behind some of his most combative Twitter posts and to examine his relationships with his family and his closest advisers. They deal chiefly with the president’s high-profile firings of the F.B.I. director and his first national security adviser, his treatment of Attorney General Jeff Sessions and a 2016 Trump Tower meeting between campaign officials and Russians offering dirt on Hillary Clinton.
• ‘So disgraceful’: Trump lashes out at publication of special counsel questions
• Mueller raised possibility of presidential subpoena in meeting with Trump’s legal team. (Washington Post) — In a tense meeting in early March with special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, President Trump’s lawyers insisted he had no obligation to talk with federal investigators probing Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential campaign. But Mueller responded that he had another option if Trump declined: He could issue a subpoena for the president to appear before a grand jury, according to four people familiar with the encounter. Mueller’s warning — the first time he is known to have mentioned a possible subpoena to Trump’s legal team — spurred a sharp retort from John Dowd, then the president’s lead lawyer. “This isn’t some game,” Dowd said, according to two people with knowledge of his comments. “You are screwing with the work of the president of the United States.”
• Mueller team asks for second delay in Michael Flynn sentencing hearing (Fox News) — Special Counsel Robert Mueller on Tuesday delayed the sentencing of former national security adviser Michael Flynn for a second time “due to the status” of the investigation, raising questions as to what the development means for the direction of the Russian election-meddling probe. “Due to the status of the special counsel’s investigation, the parties do not believe that this matter is ready to be scheduled for a sentencing hearing at this time,” Mueller’s team and Flynn attorneys Robert Kelner and Stephen Anthony wrote. On Feb. 1, both sides filed a first “joint status report” to federal Judge Emmet G. Sullivan, requesting more time. Sullivan gave them a 90-day deadline (by May 1) to submit an updated status report or a sentencing date.
• Mueller hasn’t called on Ivanka Trump yet
• ‘The Department of Justice is not going to be extorted’: Rosenstein responds to impeachment threat Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein took aim Tuesday at Republican lawmakers who have drafted articles of impeachment against him, saying that he would not comment on documents “that nobody has the courage to put their name on” and asserting that he will not change his behavior in the face of threats.
• DID TRUMP’S TEAM LEAK THE QUESTIONS? Michael Zeldin, a CNN legal analyst and former assistant to Robert Mueller, said Tuesday he believes President Trump leaked the list of nearly 50 questions the special counsel allegedly wants to ask Trump. “I think these are notes taken by the recipients of a conversation with Mueller’s office where he outlined broad topics and these guys wrote down questions that they thought these topics may raise,” Zeldin said on CNN’s “New Day.

7am – A         INTERVIEW – GABRIELA KAHRL – (pronounced Carl) – with University of Maryland Carey School of Law — Gabriela has been very involved in this process, working with  the Capital Area Immigrants’ Rights Coalition, or CAIR Coalition

• Montgomery Co. wants to give $373K to help nonprofit’s fight in immigration court
• Montgomery Co. residents divided over providing legal aid to immigrants. Should Montgomery County set aside $373,000 for legal aid for low income immigrants who are facing deportation? Dozens signed up to speak at a public hearing on the issue on Tuesday night.

7am – B/C     INTERVIEW – JOSH KRAUSHAAR – Politics Editor at National Journal – recapped the West Virginia debate.

7am – D         TRAYON WHITE UPDATE:

• DC Jewish community leader demands action from council members for anti-Semitic remarks.  Tensions boiled over at the Wilson Building Tuesday morning as a leader of the Jewish community interrupted a City Council breakfast and demanded that elected leaders take action against one of their own. This comes days after a member of the Nation of Islam called a Jewish member of the council, Elissa Silverman a “fake Jew” at a rally. Rabbi Shmuel Herzfeld with Ohev Sholom, The National Synagogue in Northwest, D.C. was so upset over the lack of action by the council that he barged into a breakfast meeting Tuesday and told the leaders not only to denounce the hate, but also take action, including against a D.C. councilmember.
• “Why are not all the council members not willing to censure Trayon and call for Mr. Lopez to resign?” said Rabbi Herzfeld
• YESTERDAY: Josh Lopez, former campaign hand to Mayor Bowser, has resigned from board of housing authority after organizing rally to defend Trayon White where a speaker called a lawmaker a “fake Jew”
• Bowser appointee resigns after organizing rally where a lawmaker was called a ‘fake Jew’  (Washington Post / May 1) – The city official who organized an event on the steps of the District government building where a speaker directed anti-Semitic slurs against a Jewish lawmaker resigned Tuesday, just hours after a volatile council meeting where members debated how to respond to the ­incident. JOSHUA LOPEZ, whom Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) paid as a consultant in her 2014 campaign and appointed to the board of the public housing authority, faced scathing criticism over a “unity rally” he organized last week to defend D.C. Council member Trayon White Sr. (D-Ward 8). White has been at the center of controversy for the past month after it was reported that he repeated anti-Semitic conspiracy theories on his Facebook page and in a meeting with the mayor and council. The event organized by Lopez sparked an uproar after a representative of the Nation of Islam called D.C. Council member Elissa Silverman (I-At Large) a “fake Jew” for criticizing Farrakhan.
• WORTH NOTING: Trayon White, whose conspiracy mongering started the anti-Semitism controversy in DC politics and hasn’t said anything about a supporter calling a colleague a “fake Jew,” is the only lawmaker absent from this DC Council breakfast (via Washington Post report  Fenit Nirappil @FenitN)

7am – E  KANYE UPDATE:

• Unhinged Rapper Tells Crips to ‘F*ck Up Kanye’ for Supporting Trump // A former member of Snoop Dogg’s rapping entourage is calling for gang members to assault Kanye West for his recent support of President Donald Trump. Daz Dillinger, who recorded several successful hip hop records as part of Tha Dogg Pound duo in the 1990s, made the apparent threat in a video posted to his Instagram, which was later removed.
• On TMZ Live, Kanye West and Candace Owens discuss free thought and call slavery “a choice”

8am – A/B/C INTERVIEW – THOMAS DUPREE – Former Dep Asst Attorney General – in studio

• BIO: Thomas H. Dupree, Jr. is a partner in the Washington, DC office of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher.  He is a member of the firm’s litigation department and its Appellate and Constitutional Law practice group. He has argued more than 80 appeals in the federal courts, including in all thirteen circuits as well as the United States Supreme Court.  He has represented clients throughout the country in a wide variety of trial and appellate matters, including cases involving punitive damages, class actions, product liability, arbitration, intellectual property, employment, and constitutional challenges to federal and state statutes. In 2007, Mr. Dupree was appointed Deputy Assistant Attorney General.  He served in the Civil Division at the U.S. Department of Justice from 2007 to 2009, ultimately becoming the Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General.

MUELLER NEWS:

• Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump: So disgraceful that the questions concerning the Russian Witch Hunt were “leaked” to the media. No questions on Collusion. Oh, I see…you have a made up, phony crime, Collusion, that never existed, and an investigation begun with illegally leaked classified information. Nice! 3:47 AM – 1 May 2018
• Mueller Has Dozens of Inquiries for Trump in Broad Quest on Russia Ties and Obstruction
• ‘So disgraceful’: Trump lashes out at publication of special counsel questions
• Mueller raised possibility of presidential subpoena in meeting with Trump’s legal team. (
• Mueller team asks for second delay in Michael Flynn sentencing hearing
• Michael Zeldin, a CNN legal analyst and former assistant to Robert Mueller, said Tuesday he believes President Trump leaked the list of nearly 50 questions the special counsel allegedly wants to ask Trump. “I think these are notes taken by the recipients of a conversation with Mueller’s office where he outlined broad topics and these guys wrote down questions that they thought these topics may raise,” Zeldin said on CNN’s “New Day.

8am – D/E     INTERVIEW – DIAMOND & SILK – YouTube sensations and President Trump supporters … DIAMONDANDSILK.COM

• Diamond and Silk’s take on Kanye’s evolution into becoming a Trump supporter
• Unhinged Rapper Tells Crips to ‘F*ck Up Kanye’ for Supporting Trump
• Maxine Waters Reacts to Kanye’s Praise of Trump: He ‘Sometimes Talks Out of Turn’. California Rep. Maxine Waters is going after a new target: rapper Kanye West and his praise for President Donald Trump, according to remarks obtained by Politico. Waters, a Los Angeles Democrat who has called for Trump to be impeached, attended an event in Oakland, Calif. with members of the Congressional Black Caucus. Politico reported that they asked Waters about Trump’s claims of record low black unemployment figures and of praise the president has been receiving from West. Waters said West is a “creative young man” and credited him with creating “revolutionary material” for African-Americans. But, she warned that West “talks out of turn” and “sometimes needs some assistance in helping him (sic) to formulate some of his thoughts.”
• Also, Diamond and Silk’s take on their visit to Capitol Hill last week