The Daily Signal - Northwestern University May Have Violated Federal Law, Trump Team Rests Case, Democrats to Revive Border Bill | May 21

Starting point is 00:00:00 I'm Virginia Allen, and this is the Daily Signal Top News for Tuesday, May 21st. Here are today's headlines. Northwestern University may have violated a federal law by failing to report crimes on campus at least five times during recent anti-Israel protests. This comes as an exclusive report from the Daily Signals, Tony Kennett, who joins us now. Tony, thanks for being here. So like many universities recently, we have seen pro-Palestine protests, play out on the campus of Northwestern University. You found in your reporting that Northwestern may have violated federal law during these protests. What federal law are they suspected to have violated?

Starting point is 00:00:57 The Cleary Act of 1990 was founded after a young girl was killed on a private college campus. The private police department of that college did not report the crime on their website. So people were going around thinking, wow, this university has like no crime on it at all. and that's not allowed because they passed this law in her remembrance, which states that if you are a university with a private police force, like Northwestern, for example, they have to accurately report every single crime report that comes in. They can't change the kind of crime that was reported, and they cannot fail to report crimes that are reported. Otherwise, that, you know, kind of comes across as very fraudulent in reporting statistics. and it carries at least a $70,000 penalty per crime, but Liberty University got hit with us a couple of years ago

Starting point is 00:01:45 and paid over $9 million for just a few counts. So what do we know about these five times, these specific instances, when Northwestern University apparently violated this law? So it's kind of a smorgasbord of ways that you can violate the Cleary Act. I'm rather impressed, I can't lie, that Northwestern University failed to take reports,

Starting point is 00:02:07 of some of the anti-Israeli protesters and rioters crimes that were happening. So students were coming up and reporting. This crime just happened by this anti-Israeli protester, rioter, and the university police refused to take it. So that's one way. Number two, the police straight up refused to document the crime or retrieve stolen property at all. So a student had flags stolen.

Starting point is 00:02:33 They're like, there are the flags. Please go get my property, resolve this crime. and the police just refused completely to uphold the laws that they had set. That's a violation of the Cleary Act. And last, and perhaps the most egregious of these situations, is that Northwestern University may have changed the type of crime that was committed. So student reported that she was assaulted and battered, and the university later reported it as harassment or as another student,

Starting point is 00:02:59 which this did not make it into this particular story. She had reported vandalism and the university reported, reported it as an administrative notice. So you can't do that. Well, this news is breaking that you have reported just ahead of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce holding a hearing on Thursday in which Northwestern President Michael Schill will appear, has been asked to appear. What can we expect during that hearing? Hopefully you can expect to the university administrators to provide answers for why this apparent lack of upholding federal law had taken place, hopefully those answers are sufficient.

Starting point is 00:03:39 If not, I think that we should see the Department of Education go after universities, which may have sympathized with anti-Israel pro-Hamas protesters as strongly as they went after Liberty University or Michigan State in the last couple of years of Cleary Act violation cases. Tony, thank you so much for your reporting on this. Really appreciate it. My pleasure. Thanks, Virginia. The International Criminal Court and its chief prosecution have requested arrest warrants for the leaders of Israel and Hamas. And now, France, Belgium, and Slovenia announced that they support those arrest warrants. The court on Monday charged Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yuva Gallant, along with three Hamas leaders, with war crimes related to the war in Gaza.

Starting point is 00:04:32 France's foreign minister, Stefani Suzjane, said on Monday that according to the Jerusalem Post, France supports the International Criminal Court, its independence, and the fight against impunity in all situations. However, the French minister said on Tuesday that despite the court's warrants, there was no equivalency between Israel and Hamas. Suzane said, on one side, you have a terrorist group that congratulated itself on the October 6th. seventh attacks, and on the other side, you have a democracy, Israel, that must respect international law while conducting a war. It did not start. ABC News reported that Israel, foreign minister, Israel Katz, headed to France on Tuesday in response. President Joe Biden has called the court's actions outrageous. Former President Donald Trump's defense team rested their case today in the former

Starting point is 00:05:29 president's ongoing New York trial. They did so without calling on Trump to testify. The prosecution arrested its case on Monday following the testimony by former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen. The jury is going to be considering weeks of testimony in the case against Trump. You'll remember that Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg charged former President Donald Trump with 34 counts of falsifying business records in the first degree in a case that has been hotly contested by Trump, and his supporters. Cohen contends that Trump ordered him to pay porn star Stormy Daniels $130,000 in hush money. But the defense insists that Trump did not do so. Trump spoke to reporters before walking into the courtroom this morning, and he said we have

Starting point is 00:06:17 a phenomenal case per the post-millennial. Take a listen. It should be an easy ruling, and it should really be. I think it would be great from church, Marshaun, to rule from the bench and determine this which I'm. And it needs it. It really needs decisiveness. Every single scholar says there's been no crime, he's done nothing wrong. Judge Juan Mershan dismissed the jury until May 28th, the day after Memorial Day. So we'll keep you all up to date after the long weekend about what's next in the case. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said that the Senate will hold a second vote on the touted so-called bipartisan border bill this week. The bill failed in the Senate about three months ago, and it's expected to fail again this week. Three senators led the charge in crafting the bill, Oklahoma Republican Senator James Langford, Connecticut Democrat Senator Chris Murphy, and Arizona Independent Senator Kristen Sinema.

Starting point is 00:07:14 Schumer acknowledged in a letter to his colleagues on Sunday that he doesn't expect all Democrats to support this legislation, and he added, nor do I expect all Republicans to agree with every provision. So why exactly did this bill fail the first time? Well, Schumer puts the blame on former president Donald Trump for speaking out against the bill back in February. According to Schumer, Trump demanded congressional Republicans kill the legislation. On February 5th, which was two days before the Senate voted on the bill for the first time, Trump wrote on true social, only a fool or a radical left Democrat would vote for this horrendous border bill, which only gives shutdown authority after 5,000 encounters a day when we already have the right to close the border now, which must be done.

Starting point is 00:08:04 The bill does, as Trump said, allow up to 5,000 illegal aliens to cross the border daily. This means that 1.8 million illegal aliens per year would still be permitted to enter the United States under this bill. The Senate is slated to vote on the bill on Thursday, even if it does somehow manage to pass the Senate, House GOP leadership has already said that the bill is dead on arrival in the House. Are you hoping to buy a house this year? If so, you might be interested in this news. Housing affordability looks to be linked to the political leanings of your state. That's according to analysis by Realtor.com. According to Realtor.com, red states are more affordable and blue states are less affordable. Swing states, which Realtor listed as Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin were slightly more affordable than the country as a whole.

Starting point is 00:09:00 The red slash blue divide in housing prices has been a trend in Realtor.com findings since 2016. The analysis noted that lower population density in red states may be part of the reason for that discrepancy. The analysis also noted that housing in general has become short. sharply more expensive since 2021. Realtor.com senior economic data analyst Hannah Jones said all states across the U.S. experienced this deterioration in affordability. Mortgage rates and home prices have hovered around the same level over the last year, which means that nationally, affordability has not gotten significantly worse,

Starting point is 00:09:40 but it does not improve much either. With that, that's going to do it for today's episode. Thanks so much for being with us here at The Daily Signal for top news. If you haven't had the chance, make sure that you check out our morning show. Every weekday morning, we bring you interviews with lawmakers, experts, and of course, leading conservative voices. Tomorrow morning, I am looking forward to sitting down with the Heritage Foundation's Michael Cunningham to discuss the recent inauguration of Taiwan's new president.

Starting point is 00:10:08 Michael was at the inauguration, and he shares the inside perspective of how Taiwan's new president is going to navigate relations with China. Catch that conversation tomorrow morning. Also make sure to subscribe to the Daily Signal podcast wherever you like to listen to you never miss out on new shows. And if you would, take a minute to leave us a five-star rating and review. Thanks again for being with us today. We'll see you right back here tomorrow morning for my conversation with the Heritage Foundation's Michael Cunningham. The Daily Signal podcast is brought to you by more than half a million members of the Heritage Foundation.

Starting point is 00:10:42 Executive producers are Rob Louie and Kate Trinko. Producers are Virginia Allen and Samantha Asheras. Sound designed by Lauren Evans, Mark Geinney, and John Pop. To learn more, please visit DailySignal.com.

The Daily Signal - Northwestern University May Have Violated Federal Law, Trump Team Rests Case, Democrats to Revive Border Bill | May 21

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