Canada, Mexico Angry over Biden’s Support for Electric Vehicle Tax Credits, Citing Trade Agreements

Penny Starr19 Nov 2021

I bet they are missing Orange Mad Bad, by now

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador came to Washington to meet President Joe Biden this week angry about his backing the Democrats’ plan to give tax breaks to Americans who buy electric vehicles.

Politico reported:

Canada and Mexico strongly oppose the electric-vehicle tax credit, which the countries warn would damage their auto sectors and undermine the new United States-Mexico-Canada trade agreement. For Trudeau, warning U.S. officials about the fallout of Biden’s electric vehicle proposal was a top objective during his two-day visit to Washington.

“We underlined to what point this would be a big problem for auto production in Canada,” Trudeau said at a news conference late Thursday after trio met. “We very clearly underlined our position.”

Politico reported that the tensions between the “three amigos” overshadowed the first meeting of the North American leaders since 2016.

When Biden was asked about the electric car tax credit, he said it might not survive in Congress.

“We don’t know what will happen in the Senate, but there’s a lot of complicating factors,” Biden said when he was asked by reporters about the proposal. “We’re going to talk at length about it, I’m sure.”

Politico reported:

The provision would provide consumer tax credits of $4,500 for electric vehicles made with union labor in the U.S., on top of other credits for the clean cars. That would disadvantage a number of foreign automakers, like Toyota, Volkswagen and Honda, which operate in nonunion states and have loudly opposed the measure. But it would allow Biden to deliver a tangible victory for organized labor, one of his major constituencies, as well as workers in Midwestern states like Michigan that will be crucial for his reelection.

Chrystia Freeland, Trudeau’s deputy prime minister, told reporters Wednesday that the proposal had the potential to become the “dominant issue” in the Canada-U.S. relationship. She said Trudeau told top Republicans and Democrats from the House and Senate on Wednesday that Canada is “certain” that the incentives, as currently formulated, would violate the USMCA.

“Do you really want to violate it in such a significant way so soon after its passage?” Freeland said. “That was one of the points we made. I think they heard us.”

Speaking on behalf of the Biden administration, White House press secretary Jen Psaki defended the policy proposal.

“We don’t view it that way [as a violation of USMCA],” Psaki told reporters. “In our view, the EV tax credits are an opportunity to help consumers in this country. It’s not the first time there have been incentives and tax credits for consumers, to lower prices for consumers [and] help incentivize a move toward a clean energy industry.”

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2021/11/19/canada-mexico-angry-over-bidens-support-for-electric-vehicle-tax-credits-citing-trade-agreements/

‘Baffling Error:’Joe Biden Removes Nigeria from Religious Oppressor List Despite Christian Persecution

Edwin Mora19 Nov 2021

Church members carry placards reading "self defence is now the answer" "the jihad will not work", as they take part in a protest against the killing of people by suspected herdsmen in Makurdi, north-central Nigeria, on April 29, 2018. - On April 24, 2018, at least 18 people, including two …

EMMY IBU/AFP/Getty Images

4:55

Secretary of State Antony Blinken removed Nigeria from the U.S. list of countries that engage in severe religious freedom violations, drawing the consternation of an international Christian persecution watchdog group this week.

David Curry, CEO of Open Doors USA, a group that monitors Christian persecution across the globe, declared in a statement Wednesday:

We’re deeply alarmed at today’s decision by the U.S. State Department to end the designation of Nigeria as a Country of Particular Concern (CPC). This is not only a baffling error, it’s likely in direct violation of the International Religious Freedom Act, the law that requires these designations to be made in the first place.

On November 15, Blinken made the CPC and “Entities of Particular Concern (EPC)” designations.

The latter refers to non-state actors who have also engaged in particularly severe violations of religious freedom.

About a week before Blinken put together the list, Nigerian authorities arrested a reporter for the anti-communist China newspaper Epoch Times who criticized the African government’s failure to protect Christians from deadly persecution at the hands of Fulani jihadis.

Communist China has developed close ties to Nigeria through its “Belt and Road” colonization initiative. Still, there is currently no evidence to suggest Beijing played a role in the reporter’s detention.

Blinken listed jihadis from Boko Haram and the Islamic State (ISIS) branch that operates in the West African country as top violators of religious freedom, but he omitted the Fulanis.

In 2018, fatality figures indicated that the Fulanis were growing deadlier than Boko Haram, also known to target Christians.

Ofter referred to as herdsmen, the Fulani jihadis have massacred Christians in north-central Nigeria. Some analysts suggest that the violence began as tension over resources between the mostly-Muslim Fulani herdsmen and mostly-Christian farmers in Kaduna and neighboring states. However, Fulani attacks have evolved into a campaign of persecution against any Christian who crosses their way. The State Department has identified the Fulanis as terrorists.

Per the International Religious Freedom Act (IRFA), Blinken designated the governments of Burma, communist China, Eritrea, Iran, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan as “Countries of Particular Concern” for engaging in or tolerating “particularly severe violations of religious freedom.”

The law defines particularly severe violations as “systematic, ongoing, egregious violations of religious freedom,” including transgressions “such as torture; prolonged detention without charges, forced disappearance, or other flagrant denial of life, liberty, or security of persons,” according to the State Department.

Notably absent from Blinken’s CPC designations list is Nigeria, ranked on the lower end (number nine) of the top ten countries on Open Doors’ 2021 World Watch List of nations where Christians face extreme levels of persecution over their faith.

https://www.breitbart.com/africa/2021/11/19/baffling-error-joe-biden-removes-nigeria-from-religious-oppressor-list-despite-christian-persecution/

https://twitter.com/JackPosobiec/status/1462066179267338248?s=20

>>15043083

Chrystul Kizer, sex trafficking victim accused of killing alleged abuser, wins appeal in Wisconsin

a couple of people sitting at a table: Chrystul Kizer is pictured during a hearing in the Kenosha County Courthouse on November 15, 2019.

An appellate court in Wisconsin has ruled that Chrystul Kizer, a child sex-trafficking victim charged with killing her alleged abuser, may be able to use a state law intended to help trafficking victims accused of crimes.

The law, known as the affirmative defense, will give Kizer, now 20, a chance to present evidence to a Kenosha judge, and possibly a jury, that her actions were a “direct result” of the trafficking she experienced. If successful, she could be acquitted of some or all of the charges against her,rather than face a mandatory life sentence— and could break legal ground for trafficking victims accused of crimes.

Read The Washington Post investigation into the case of Chrystul Kizer

The court’s decision, which has been pending for over a year, comes as legislatures and judges across the country are reevaluating how the unique abuse trafficking victims experience should be taken into consideration in the legal system.

The majority of states have laws that offer protection to people who can show that a crime they committed — such as prostitution, drug possession or fraud — happened because they were being trafficked.

But when the crime in question is a violent offense, anti-trafficking advocates and prosecutors are divided over how much leeway these victims should be offered.

In Kenosha, prosecutors argue that when Kizer was 17, she planned the 2018 murder of 34-year-old Randall Phillip Volar III in order to steal his BMW. Kizer says she was defending herself after Volar, who had been filming his abuse of her since she was 16, pinned her to the floor when she refused to have sex with him.

The two sides have been at odds over the meaning of Wisconsin’s affirmative defense law, which is somewhat similar to laws around self-defense. It states that trafficking victims have a legal defense “for any offense committed as a direct result” of being trafficked.

Prosecutors argued that “any offense” did not include homicide and that even if it did, Kizer’s charges should only be lowered to lesser ones. But the appeals court agreed with Kizer’s lawyers, who argued “any offense” did indeed mean “any offense.”

If Kizer and her attorneys can prove to a judge that there is “some evidence” her crime was a “direct result” of her trafficking, then she will probably go before a jury. If that jury agrees that her charges were a “direct result” of her victimization, she would be found not guilty.

Kizer’s case gained national attention after a Washington Post article showed that Kenosha police and prosecutors knew that Volar, a White man, was abusing Kizer and other underage Black girls before his death.

Three months before Volar’s death, a 15-year-old was found fleeing from his home after she called 911 to say he had drugged her and was going to kill her. Police raided the house and found “hundreds” of child pornography videos and more than 20 “home videos” of Volar abusing girls who appeared to investigators to be as young as 12 years old. While the investigation unfolded, Volar remained free.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/chrystul-kizer-sex-trafficking-victim-accused-of-killing-alleged-abuser-wins-appeal-in-wisconsin/ar-AAKFPdP

>>15043318

More of the article:Graveley is the DA that assigned Binger and Kraus

Kizer told The Post that Volar had been paying her for sex since she was 16 and drove her to hotel rooms where she was sold to other men who sexually abused her. On June 5, 2018, Kizer allegedly shot and killed Volar, set his house on fire and fled in his car.

Kenosha County District Attorney Michael Graveley, who waited to charge Volar for sex crimes, then charged Kizer with first-degree intentional homicide, an offense that carries a mandatory life sentence in Wisconsin.

An online petition asking Graveley to free Kizer amassed more 1.4 million signatures and support from the advocates and celebrities behind the #MeToo movement.

But Kizer remained behind bars until last summer, when the nationwide protests following the death of George Floyd brought renewed interest to her case. The Chicago Community Bond Fund, an advocacy group that was flooded with support as it worked to free jailed protesters, used donations to pay Kizer’s $400,000 bail so she could live in Milwaukee with her mother while awaiting trial.

Chrystul Kizer, accused of killing her alleged sex trafficker, freed on bail after two years

By summer’s end, Graveley was in the spotlight again after a Kenosha police officer was filmed firing seven shots into the back of Jacob Blake, leaving the 29-year-old Black father partially paralyzed. In the midst of the protests that followed, Kyle Rittenhouse, a White 17-year-old, allegedly shot and killed two demonstrators and wounded a third.

In January, Graveley announced that he would not bring charges against the officer who shot Blake, saying there was not enough evidence to outweigh the argument that the officer was trying to protect himself. Rittenhouse is expected to go before a jury in November.

Nearly three years after she was arrested, there is no jury trial scheduled in Kizer’s case. The attorneys have been awaiting a decision from the appeals court since December 2019, when Judge David Wilk ruled that in his view, Kizer did not have access to the affirmative defense.

The proceedings could be delayed further if prosecutors decide to appeal the new ruling to Wisconsin’s Supreme Court, a process that could take a year or more.

a man in a suit and tie: Prosecutor Zachary Brost, left, and District Attorney, Michael Graveley are pictured during the hearing in the Kenosha County Courthouse on November 15, 2019.

© Sarah L. Voisin/The Washington Post Prosecutor Zachary Brost, left, and District Attorney, Michael Graveley are pictured during the hearing in the Kenosha County Courthouse on November 15, 2019.

Graveley contends that the case is not about trafficking, but about an intentional homicide. Revealing some of the evidence he would present to a jury, Graveley has stated in court that in days before the murder, Kizer told a friend that she would soon be the owner of a BMW.

Once at Volar’s home, Graveley said, Kizer sent texts that appear to show she was waiting for the right moment to use the gun she brought to the home, saying “I’m finna do it.” She posted a selfie from the house captioned “My Mug Shot.” In the minutes after a neighbor heard the sound of a gunshot coming from the house, Graveley said, Kizer appeared to download a police scanner app on her phone.

“None of that, judge — none of that — is self-defense,” Graveley argued at a February 2020 hearing. “All of the motives I’ve just described are motives consistent with a person who is committing an intentional homicide.”

Alexis Martin: The state of Ohio vs. a sex-trafficked teenager

Kizer also has the possibility of taking a plea deal, something she has previously indicated to the judge that she would be willing to do.

“I’m not looking to walk out of your courtroom with nothing. I come to you and Randall’s family with a sincere heart of apologies for what I have done,” Kizer wrote to Wilk from jail in March 2020.

But the appeals court ruling gives her attorneys more options moving forward, and increases her chances of being acquitted.

>>15043318

>>15043341

Chrystul Kizer, sex trafficking victim accused of killing alleged abuser, wins appeal in Wisconsin

Jessica Contrera 6/3/2021

DAs assigned by Graveley

a man in a suit and tie: Prosecutor Zachary Brost, left, and District Attorney, Michael Graveley are pictured during the hearing in the Kenosha County Courthouse on November 15, 2019.

© Sarah L. Voisin/The Washington Post Prosecutor Zachary Brost, left, and District Attorney, Michael Graveley are pictured during the hearing in the Kenosha County Courthouse on November 15, 2019.

>>15043318

Graveley Kenosha DA let the guy stay on the streets after finding all of this months before Krystul killed him

>Three months before Volar’s death, a 15-year-old was found fleeing from his home after she called 911 to say he had drugged her and was going to kill her. Police raided the house and found “hundreds” of childpornography videos and more than 20 “home videos” of Volar abusing girls who appeared to investigators to be as young as 12 years old. While the investigation unfolded, Volar remained free

>>15043389

==Blm didnt revolt when chrystal Kizer killed the sex trafficker anused her for years and she killed him=. Blm and Antifa are not about minorities or protecting them, they want yo destroy Americans, white people and the rule of law, along with 2A