Collins receives more donations from Texas fossil fuel industry than from Maine residents

Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) received nearly $50,000 in campaign donations last quarter from the Texas oil and gas industry, a number more than five times the number of donations she received from Maine residents.

In the first quarter of the 2019 funding year, the senator, who is up for reelection in 2020, snagged roughly $49,300 from Texas-based fossil fuel donors, including the president of Hunt Oil Co. and his wife, and Stephen Chazen, president and CEO at Magnolia Oil and Gas Corporation.

Collins raised just over $1.4 million total this quarter.

Many of the fossil fuel executives who donated maxed out their contributions along with their spouses at $2,700, while others donated the max amount to both Collins’ primary and general election campaigns.

For example, according to Federal Election Commission (FEC) filings, oil and gas investor Patrick O. Rayes of Dallas donated $5600 total to both of Collins’ campaigns. Ralph J. Ellis Jr., an executive at Belmont Petroleum Corp in Irving, Texas gave a total of $5400.

A handful of political action committees (PACs) linked to big-name fossil fuel companies also contributed to Collins’s reelection in the first quarter, according to filings.

Exxon Mobil Corporation PAC, based out of Irving, donated $1000 to Collins, another Irving company, Pioneer Natural Resources, gave the Mainer $2700, and Houston-based Kirby PAC gave her $2500.

Support from the oil and gas industry to Collins didn’t come just from Texas. The Senator also received $5000 from General Electric’s PAC and $2,500 from nuclear electric power generation giant Exelon Corporation’s PAC.

The donations amounted to a sizable sum for Collins, a senator who has served since 1997 and is often considered a swing vote on many political issues. Collins hasn’t formally announced her reelection campaign but is expected to do so. She is expected to be a Democratic target in 2020, largely thanks to her support for the confirmation of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

In comparison, donations Collins had from individuals and corporations based in her home state of Maine were much less substantial.

Collins received just $9,200 in 17 itemized donations from Maine residents in the same quarter –less than a fifth of the amount of money she hauled in from Texas’s oil and gas leaders.

A spokesperson for Collins’s office did not return a request for an explanation on the high level of donations from the single energy sector in the Lone Star state.

Last week Collins voted in favor of confirming President Trump’s controversial pick to head the Interior Department, David Bernhardt. Bernhardt, a former energy lobbyist, is currently playing a vital role in expanding drilling on public lands in the U.S. and is leading efforts to draft a new offshore drilling plan in the Atlantic.

Collins said she voted for Bernhardt after getting assurances from him in a letter that the offshore drilling plan would not likely include oil extraction off the coast of Maine.

"It was instrumental in my vote. It was a reassuring letter in which he said that the position of the governor, the congressional delegation, and the legislature would be a determining factor and he recognized the coastal management act and the impact that that would have and that it's binding on the Department," Collins told The Hill last week.

https://thehill.com/business-a-lobbying/439145-texas-fossil-fuel-industry-bests-maine-residents-for-donations-to-susan

WTF Texas….

African Migrants At Texas Border Monitored For Ebola: Official

A Laredo, Texas public health official said that 20 migrants from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) were monitored for Ebola and other diseases.

"We have 8 Congolese right now in one of our shelters and a dozen in Nuevo Laredo," said Dr. Hector Gonzalez during an April 4 meeting of the Laredo City Council. Gonzales is the director of the Laredo Health department, according to Breitbart.

"For them, my concern was Ebola," said Gonzalez, who added "But, we're on alert to check that."

The current Ebola outbreak in the DRC is the second deadliest in history, with 772 dead out of 1,220 confirmed cases since the outbreak was declared on Aug. 1, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Of the latest fatalities, 24 people died in their communities and 18 died at Ebola treatment centers.

That said, WHO on Friday announced that the current outbreak does not yet constitute a "Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC)."

Doctors without Borders and at least one Red Cross official disagree.

"Whatever the official status of this outbreak is, it is clear that the outbreak is not under control and therefore we need a better collective effort," said Doctors without Borders emergency manager Gwenola Seroux in a written statement. "What is most important now if we want to gain control of this epidemic is to change the way we are dealing with it."

Top Red Cross official Emanuele Capobianco told NBC News on Friday that he is "more concerned than I have ever been" over the current Ebola outbreak.

Another factor in the current Ebola outbreak is active skirmishes between local militant groups, while health workers have also come under attack. Many locals in the DRC also don't trust Western medicine, and many think that Ebola is a scam, or experiment. Reports have surfaced of villagers breaking their loved ones out of Ebola quarantine wards, and taking the infected bodies of their dead back home for burial.

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-04-16/african-migrants-texas-border-monitored-ebola-official

If an African comes to the border with Ebola, THE RED CROSS is involved with getting them here…

Michael Avenatti rushed to make his mentally-ill paraplegic client sign a glowing testimonial

Michael Avenatti made his mentally-ill paraplegic client sign a positive testimonial about him when he realized the man would soon learn about the claim that he had stolen his $4 million settlement, later using the statement as proof he didn't steal from him, a lawyer has exclusively told DailyMail.com.

Avenatti was indicted for 36 criminal offenses last week including charges that he stole the multi-million dollar settlement from Geoffrey Johnson, who had hired Avenatti to fight a case against Los Angeles County after he was poorly treated in a county jail.

After negotiating the $4 million settlement in 2015, Avenatti allegedly hid the cash from Johnson, pretending the money couldn't be paid out and doled out as little as $1,000 per month as 'advances'.

It was revealed by DailyMail.com that Avenatti had allegedly defrauded Johnson in a debtor's examination hearing last month, where the lawyer was grilled by a partner at his former firm over his assets.

Immediately after the hearing - knowing that the story would get out - a panicked Avenatti drove to Johnson's house to try to cover up the alleged fraud, making him sign the testimonial that praised his services, Johnson's lawyer told DailyMail.com.

The embattled attorney then tweeted out a copy of the testimonial when the indictment dropped on April 11 as proof of his innocence in mishandling clients' money.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6924035/Michael-Avenatti-paraplegic-client-sign-testimonial-realized-learn-theft.html

WTF to even say…

A glimpse of deployments to come? Largest bomber rotation since start of Iraq War comes home

Six B-52 Stratofortresses and more than 450 personnel returned from a short-term deployment to RAF Fairford in the United Kingdom on April 11 — one that allowed it to practice how Air Force units might deploy in the future.

The month-long deployment was in support of U.S. Strategic Command’s Bomber Task Force in Europe, and was the largest deployment of a single bomber platform since the beginning of the Iraq War in 2003. The airmen and bombers were from the 2nd Bomb Wing at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana.

Maj. Gen. James Dawkins, commander of the Eighth Air Force and Joint-Global Strike Operations Center, said in a Monday release that the deployment of a modified wing structure — not just a squadron — will help “set the stage for future operations” by helping improve the wing’s agility and lethality.

“It’s different than what we’ve done at say, Al Udeid [Air Base in Qatar], where we just bring airplanes, aviators and maintainers on to a base that is fully built-out,” Dawkins said. “Yes, there is a good support network here [from Fairford’s 501st Combat Support Wing], but we are bringing that wing construct and bringing all the support organizations together and fighting as an entire unit at a much broader level.”

“To be lethal right now, we need to be agile," Dawkins continued. "That’s agile combat support, agile deployability, and that’s deploying in small units like a six-ship that we did here.”

Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Dave Goldfein said last year the Air Force would need to practice deploying in different ways to prepare for the possibility of a fight against a peer or near-peer adversary. In recent years, the Air Force has become accustomed to deploying a handful of airmen to fill slots on well-established bases, Goldfein said in an interview at the Air Force Association’s conference last September.

But in a fight against a peer adversary, Goldfein said, the Air Force will need to deploy whole squadrons or even wings — and they might not be able to count on finding support airmen in their war zone. If the enemy cuts off that deployed Air Force unit at their newly established base, they must be able to continue operating on their own and maintain momentum in the fight.

https://www.airforcetimes.com/news/your-air-force/2019/04/16/a-glimpse-of-deployments-to-come-largest-bomber-rotation-since-start-of-iraq-war-comes-home/