Gardner Goldsmith

Greetings, fellow Conspirators!

I hope you are in fine fettle! I want to thank the great people at MicroSeconds, in Manchester, NH, for their help today, as their wisdom helped us be sure our tech was operative! Great, pro-freedom folks. And I want to thank our audience, and the fine journalists whose work we got to mention tonight! Join us, m-f 6 Pm on Rumble, X here, and for audio here at Substack or on Spotify! Here are some of the big items we discussed tonight on the program!

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The US Senate just paused on the budget because of the DHS funding in it

This is important, as the Trumpers continue to disregard court orders

Here is the report on DHS stopping payments to outside medical facilities to help the people it (and ICE, CBP) kidnap. From the headline: “ICE stopped paying for detainee medical care as population surged, Ossoff investigation finds widespread neglect” LINK This has been confirmed through investigative reporting and official documents, with the payment stoppage beginning on October 3, 2025, after the Department of Veterans Affairs ended its agreement with ICE due to political pressure and a lawsuit. A new private contractor system is not expected to process claims until at least late April 2026, creating a months-long gap that has led to providers denying services.
-ICE-DHS still is denying kidnap victims the right to consult with attys. LINK
-Rand Paul addresses the malicious claims by people like Bessent and Trump that people just “can’t bring guns to public rallies”

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Marco Rubio yesterday did what one might expect when thinking about him “testifying” before the Senate Foreign Relations Comm. He lied, he exhibited an almost bestial hunger for military adventurism and mass murder, he exhibited a hunger for becoming President, and he showed venal and childish contempt for the questions asked and for the people asking the questions. This is one of the key examples, which tells us that he either does not KNOW Trump already acknowledged that he spoke to oil execs prior to attacking Venezuela, killing over 100 people, and kidnapping Maduro and his wife, or he DOES know, and is lying.

This MAGA fan applauds Rubio for, essentially, acknowledging that he wants to use the illegitimate power of the US govt over us to illegitimately overturn the governments of other nations.

Rubio told the Senators on the committee that he and his pals in the fascist Trump Admin are delighted that nearly half of the money garnered from selling a “first batch” of Venezuelan crude is being “held” in private hands in Qatar. In other words, this Admin, which expressed anger over the VZ govt not allowing US and British oil companies to get full profits from their oil extraction and sales in VZ, and which expressed outrage that VZ might waylay the money, now is waylaying the profits from its own seizure of the oil. Here is one facet of that period of Rubio’s Senate “testimony.”

And Rubio says the US is “ready” to use MORE force on Venezuela if the government there doesn’t become the vassal state he wants it to be LINK

From ANTIWAR: “Netanyahu: Israel Will Have Control from ‘River to the Sea’ Including Gaza” LINK
-Trump also is threatening his adored al Shara to “make a deal” with Netanyahu, to facilitate Israel permanently holding the land it took in Syria after the US, Israel, and Sharaa overthrew Bashir al Assad. “Report: Trump Gives Netanyahu March Deadline to Make Deal with Syria - Following a call, Trump called Syria’s President “highly respected” LINK

As Trump continues to demand that Iran give up ballistic missiles — which would be suicide — and stop enriching uranium in-nation (they would need to get enriched uranium from other nations, even for medical machinery) the Iranians note that the US has not actually bothered to contact them “Iranian Foreign Minister Says There Has Been No Recent Contact With US - News From Antiwar.com” LINK

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Prof Wolfers hits key points to both refute Trump’s empty claims and to offer us reminders of the US economic slide that Trump has greased to facilitate faster downward travel.

Mr. Rattner has exhibited poor judgment in many areas of his work in politics, but he offers valuable information, here

And, as we showed on Liberty Conspiracy Last night, Peter Schiff is spot-on. This new economic collapse is going to be much worse than what people experienced between 2008 and 2011.

And Treas Sec Scott Bessent not only likes the idea of the US imposing embargoes on innocent civilians around the world, he dismisses the rise of gold, claiming that the Dollar is “not losing credibility”. Seriously. LINK
-And, Trump is clueless on economics, part nine-million

That’s it for tonight! Join us, m-f 6 PM, everyone!

Many thanks for supporting freedom, and for sharing the links! And remember, you can back us here by becoming a paid subscriber if you would like, and feel free to watch Liberty Conspiracy LIVE on Gardner’s X @gardgoldsmith and on Rumble! Spread the word! Thanks, again! Please feel free to SHARE the links, and join us every M-F at 6 PM on Rumble, and my X @gardgoldsmith — and you also can donate to help the Liberty Conspiracy, itself! Just visit PayPal to help out! You also can mail GG at:

Gardner Goldsmith
PO Box 581
Amherst, NH, 03031 :)

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LIBERTY CONSPIRACY NEWS NOTES:

Greetings, fellow Conspirators!

Immense thanks to author CS Lark, who joined us tonight for Wordsmith Wednesday to discuss her WWII novel and the process of writing, childhood trauma, and more, and many thanks to our great audience, for their powerful support of freedom! Thanks, also, to the excellent journalists we featured tonight! Join the Conspiracy for Freedom, m-f 6 PM on Rumble and X "at"gardgoldsmith! Subscribe to this here Gardner Goldsmith Substack for Daily News and research! Here are some of the key items we discussed tonight!

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IMMIGRATION POLICE STATE

Re his goons murdering Alex Pretti, Trump just told reporters this: “We take out 25 murderers, drug dealers, we take out of the whole group of people by the thousands, and if we get one person a little bit wrong, headlines.”

-We also see reporting on something that the murderous US kidnappers likely are doing in order to help them get away with their assaults, rapes, and murders of their kidnap victims - deporting the witnesses…

And they don’t like people OUTSIDE their prisons reporting on the crimes

This

Despite the feds claiming they do not monitor social media or use facial recognition to target protesters, more and more revelations reveal precisely the opposite.

And this is interesting. The Trumpers claim they are grabbing violent criminals in their unconstitutional invasions of states via ICE, Border Patrol, FBI, and, in some cases, Nat Guard. But the MN govt notes that these were TRANSFERS of people the state or local cops already had apprehended.

KRISTI NOEM FINANCES UNDER INTENSE SCRUTINY - MAJOR QUESTIONS

LINK and LINK - Kristi Noem, the current U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security and former Governor of South Dakota, has faced scrutiny over her financial disclosures in recent years, particularly as her reported family wealth and income sources have grown substantially. While there’s no evidence of her directly owning or operating a winery, her husband, Bryon Noem, holds significant stakes in one, which has been highlighted in her federal financial filings as a key contributor to their assets. This appears alongside other business interests amid broader questions about transparency, potential ethics violations, and the origins of income spikes tied to her political rise. Below, I’ll outline the key details based on available reporting, focusing on the winery aspect, income growth, and related controversies.
Noem’s family wealth has seen a marked increase since her time in Congress and as governor. Earlier estimates pegged her net worth around $5 million as of mid-2025, largely from her husband’s insurance agency (Noem Insurance, which generates over $1 million annually in salary and profits) and other assets like real estate, a car wash, livestock, and farming equipment. However, more recent federal disclosures filed after her appointment as DHS Secretary reveal a higher range, with her spouse’s investments—including stakes in a venture capital firm and a winery—valued collectively between $6 million and $30 million. These filings describe the winery and VC firm as primary sources of that wealth segment, though specifics like the winery’s name, location, or acquisition details aren’t publicly detailed in the reports.Her own income has also risen: from a congressional salary of $174,000, to a gubernatorial salary of about $113,000, and now $235,100 as DHS Secretary. Additional sources include book deals (e.g., her 2022 memoir Not My First Rodeo), speaking fees, and political consulting through her personal LLC, Ashwood Strategies. Bryon Noem’s business income jumped from $50,000–$100,000 in 2014 to $100,000–$1 million by 2015 and has remained elevated. Critics argue this growth coincides with her rising political profile, raising questions about whether public office influenced private gains.

Much of the scrutiny stems from allegations of incomplete or misleading disclosures, potential conflicts of interest, and the blending of political fundraising with personal income. Key issues include:

• Undisclosed Payments to Her LLC: In 2023, while still governor, Noem’s Ashwood Strategies received $80,000 from the dark money nonprofit American Resolve Policy Fund—a group she helped fundraise for, promoting her agenda on issues like border security. This was a 10% cut of $800,000 raised, but she failed to report it on federal ethics forms after becoming DHS Secretary, which experts called a “likely violation” of disclosure rules.
  In 2024, the LLC received another nearly $140,000 from a pro-Noem group.

  Questions focus on whether this violates South Dakota laws requiring full-time devotion to official duties and federal ethics standards, as well as the unusual practice of politicians pocketing cuts from donor funds.

• Ties to DHS Ad Campaign: Noem has been accused of steering a $220 million DHS advertising contract (for anti-trafficking and recruitment ads) to firms with close personal connections, including The Strategy Group, run by the husband of her chief spokesperson. The firm, which handled her past campaigns, received undisclosed subcontractor payments despite not being publicly listed. This bypassed competitive bidding under an “emergency” clause, prompting calls for investigations into waste and corruption. Similar issues arose in South Dakota, where she awarded an $8.5 million state contract to the same firm.

• Winery-Specific Questions: The winery stake hasn’t drawn the same level of standalone controversy as the above, but its high valuation in recent disclosures has raised eyebrows about the rapid wealth accumulation. Reporting notes it as part of Bryon Noem’s portfolio, but lacks details on how or when it was acquired, leading to broader questions about potential conflicts (e.g., if the winery benefits from state or federal policies influenced by Noem). No direct allegations of impropriety tied to the winery appear in major reports, though watchdog groups like CREW have flagged her overall finances for ethics reviews.

These issues have fueled calls for Noem’s resignation or impeachment from Democrats, amid her handling of DHS matters like immigration. Conservative outlets have been quieter, often framing criticisms as partisan attacks, but no substantive defenses of the disclosures were found in searches. Overall, the reporting substantiates concerns about transparency, though Noem has not publicly addressed the winery stake specifically.

WAR

As we mentioned on Liberty Conspiracy yesterday, families of two people murdered by Trump’s military are bringing suit LINK They are doing so under the “Death on the High Seas Act (DOHSA)” a U.S. federal admiralty law that provides a civil cause of action for wrongful deaths occurring on the high seas. It allows surviving family members, such as spouses, children, or dependents, to seek compensation for pecuniary losses (like lost wages or support) resulting from negligence, wrongful acts, or defaults leading to death, but it limits recovery to economic damages and excludes non-pecuniary losses like pain and suffering. DOHSA applies to incidents more than three nautical miles from U.S. shores and is commonly invoked in cases involving maritime workers, passengers, or others killed offshore. Justia -dot-Com notes that the act was passed by the U.S. Congress on March 30, 1920, to address a gap in common law where no recovery was available for deaths at sea. It is codified as a U.S. statute under 46 U.S.C. §§ 30301–30308 and is not an international agreement, though it interacts with maritime principles under international law. Regarding the families of two victims from U.S. boat attacks near Venezuela: In January 2026, relatives of two Trinidadian nationals killed in a U.S. military airstrike on a suspected drug-trafficking boat in October 2025 filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the U.S. government under DOHSA. The suit, brought in federal admiralty court, alleges that the strike violated DOHSA by causing unlawful deaths on the high seas through wrongful acts or negligence, and it also invokes the Alien Tort Statute to allow foreign citizens to sue in U.S. courts for international law violations. The families note that the men were innocent fishermen, not drug traffickers (even IF they were trafficking drugs, there is no constitutional or moral excuse for agents of the state taking our money to attack the men), and that the attack was part of a broader series of over 40 U.S. boat strikes in the region, which they describe as “manifestly unlawful” extrajudicial killings without due process. This is reportedly the first such federal lawsuit challenging these operations, seeking damages, transparency (including unedited footage and legal justifications), and accountability from the Trump administration. The case highlights criticisms of U.S. extrajudicial murders in international waters near Venezuela, with advocacy groups like the ACLU and Center for Constitutional Rights supporting the plaintiffs.

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THE US ECONOMY

Yes, Trump openly said that he thinks the US Dollar is doing well. Here’s one post of his statement, placed beside a valuable graphic Mr. Trump might want to see, or, if he has seen it, to acknowledge the shocking problem it shows us.

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Peter nails it

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That’s it for tonight! Join us, m-f 6 PM, everyone!

Many thanks for supporting freedom, and for sharing the links! And remember, you can back us here by becoming a paid subscriber if you would like, and feel free to watch Liberty Conspiracy LIVE on Gardner’s X @gardgoldsmith and on Rumble! Spread the word! Thanks, again! Please feel free to SHARE the links, and join us every M-F at 6 PM on Rumble, and my X @gardgoldsmith — and you also can donate to help the Liberty Conspiracy, itself! Just visit PayPal to help out! You also can mail GG at:

Gardner Goldsmith
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LIBERTY CONSPIRACY NEWS NOTES:

Welcome, fellow Conspirators!

I want to thank all the members of our audience who joined us tonight for the program, and thank the fine journalists whose work we got to feature... Here are some of the key news stories we investigated tonight!
Join us, m-f 6 PM on Rumble, X, and get the audio pod via Spotify or Substack! Be Seeing You!

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As we noted last night on Liberty Conspiracy Live, since Trump started his second term, approximately 65 people have been killed by or died in the custody of ICE/DHS/BP. Now, in the terror-riddled, occupied zone of Minnesota, and, specifically, in Minneapolis, we hear word of a few key breaking stories. First… US District Ct. Chief Judge Patrick J. Schlitz is ORDERING Acting Director of ICE, Todd Lyons, to appear personally in court, UNDER OATH, this Friday after ICE repeatedly ignored orders to grant bond hearings to detainees, including Juan Hugo Tobay Robles, as confirmed by multiple news outlets like NBC and CNN. The judge warned that he could be held in CONTEMPT for the agency’s repeated violations of court orders. Here are all three pages of the court document.

-Homan is in MN now. Joy. LINK
-As I mentioned on Liberty Conspiracy Live, last night, ICE is halting medical payments to “outside” providers LINK
-This, from Maine, is not cool

-Inside ICE, there is dissention. From the DailyBeast article: ‘A Fox News reporter claims staff morale within the Department of Homeland Security is at a “catastrophic” low after the public killing of Alex Pretti by an immigration officer.’ LINK
-Trump removed Greg Bovino from his command slot w Border Patrol and is relocating him, essentially giving him a golden parachute, rather than prosecuting him for heading up a homicide gang and kidnapping racket. From the article: ‘A source told Reuters on Tuesday that Bovino would be returning to his former job as the head of California’s El Centro sector of the US-Mexico border.’ LINK Trump (or someone close to him) also called for Bovino’s social media accts to go silent. LINK
-Let’s remember this, one of the 65…. LINK
-This woman was lucky to survive.

And…

-And Trump again claims you can’t attend a protest or really be on your neighborhood street while carrying a firearm.

-And CNN has put together a valuable set of clips showing US aggression on the streets via ICE, Customs and Border Patrol, and DHS (which is over all of them).

-Keep this in mind, if you will… The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) enacted budget for Fiscal Year (FY) 2026 is $191.02 billion, which represents the total funding including supplementals for that single fiscal year (October 1, 2025, to September 30, 2026). This is an annual appropriation, though some supplemental elements (such as those for border security and immigration enforcement) may draw from multi-year authorizations enacted in prior legislation. The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) enacted budget for FY 2026 is $74.85 billion, also for that single fiscal year.
Yes, the ICE budget is part of the overall DHS budget. In isolation:

• DHS total (including ICE and other components): $191.02 billion.

• ICE alone: $74.85 billion.

The U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP, which includes the Border Patrol as its primary operational component) enacted budget for FY 2026 is $64.73 billion, again for that single fiscal year.
Yes, the CBP budget falls under DHS as well. For comparison, the top two defense (military expenditure) budgets in the world apart from the U.S. are China’s ($314 billion) and Russia’s ($149 billion), based on the most recent comprehensive data for 2024 (the latest fully reported year; 2025-2026 projections are similar but not yet finalized). These are annual figures. The table below compares the FY 2026 U.S. agency budgets (including supplementals) to these foreign defense budgets for alignment on timeframe and scale:

-More on the effects Trump’s crackdowns are having on people who came to the US assuming that their actions not only were legal, but were applauded by the previous presidents… Most of Springfield’s 15,000 Haitians came here under the Amnesty Program. Now, they brace for deportations, and local churches train to resist ICE LINK
Is Noem headed to the unemployment line? LINK (BTW, check out the embedded video in that article to see obfuscation at its finest.)

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-This is stunning. Headline: Family trying to get to emergency room with their daughter detained by Border Patrol - LINK
- Hegseth is okaying the use of a MILITARY BASE to detain kidnap victims in MN LINK
-More aggression against peaceful people, an ICE goon threatening to harm or kill

-and, be sure not to record… That’s eeevil

-This, testimony from medical workers who have to interact with ICE goons, is stunning

-Again, Ex post facto via “change in policy” LINK
-More criminality

-And, again, good for GOA:

-ICE attacked people, using teargas, outside a MN PRESCHOOL this morning.

-And, while he has said he is going to withhold the already unconstitutional “funding” for “Sanctuary Cities” that don’t comply with his ICE commands, he also is promising state governments billions if they agree to build new detention facilities (the money promised by FEMA) Here is a reminder on the “withholding” info LINK and over half-a-trillion to build new detention centers LINK

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Trump has positioned the USS Abraham Lincoln and its flotilla near Iran. LINK
-more on the Trump threats and the “internal discussions” in the Defense-offense Dept LINK MORE, via ANTIWAR.

Meanwhile, the fakeness of the Israeli-backed “Iranian government slaughtered 30,000 protesters” narrative continues to be more widely exposed. An in-depth investigation revealing that Time’s reported 30,000+ death toll stems from Dr. Amir Parasta, described as a lobbyist for NUFDIran (a group backing Reza Pahlavi’s regime-change agenda) with indirect ties to U.S./Israeli intervention calls:

Check this out

-Daniel McAdams and Ron Paul covered this well, recalling previous false claims made by warmongers LINK
-Reacted spoke to Daniel Davis about the build up… LINK

-We will have a video report on this tonight, on Liberty Conspiracy LIVE at 6 PM on Rumble or X “at” gardgoldsmith. But recall that the Rand Corporation offered Trump a 2019 paper entitled “Extending Russia: Competing from Advantageous Ground,” explaining that he could help prop up the dying Federal Reserve note by making the EU Euro and the various European national currencies relatively less attractive.
-Thus, Putin has to remind people that the German politicians and others are hurting their OWN citizens
ISRAEL

Kills more in Lebanon LINK
AND, a major revelation from DropSite News re the “Peace” Board

-The US is setting up a CIA outpost in VZ LINK

UPS is cutting thousands more jobs. LINK
-More fascism LINK

That’s it for tonight! Join us, m-f 6 PM, everyone!

Many thanks for supporting freedom, and for sharing the links! And remember, you can back us here by becoming a paid subscriber if you would like, and feel free to watch Liberty Conspiracy LIVE on Gardner’s X @gardgoldsmith and on Rumble! Spread the word! Thanks, again! Please feel free to SHARE the links, and join us every M-F at 6 PM on Rumble, and my X @gardgoldsmith — and you also can donate to help the Liberty Conspiracy, itself! Just visit PayPal to help out! You also can mail GG at:

Gardner Goldsmith
PO Box 581
Amherst, NH, 03031 :)

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Welcome, fellow Conspirators!

Immense thanks to all the upbeat and energetic folks who joined us tonight, and to all the fine journalists whose work we got to mention in the program! Join us m-f 6 PM on Rumble, X . We hope you like the powerful information! Tonight, we offered a special focus on the federal government assassinating Alex Pretti in MN, focusing, after a brief update on new facets of the matter, on the debate over federal policing of immigration, the lame claims of federal power to invade states without any invitation by the states, themselves (as spelled out in Article Four, Section Four), and more. Here are some of the recent breaking facets of that big story.

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That’s it for tonight! Join us, m-f 6 PM, everyone!

Many thanks for supporting freedom, and for sharing the links! And remember, you can back us here by becoming a paid subscriber if you would like, and feel free to watch Liberty Conspiracy LIVE on Gardner’s X @gardgoldsmith and on Rumble! Spread the word! Thanks, again! Please feel free to SHARE the links, and join us every M-F at 6 PM on Rumble, and my X @gardgoldsmith — and you also can donate to help the Liberty Conspiracy, itself! Just visit PayPal to help out! You also can mail GG at:

Gardner Goldsmith
PO Box 581
Amherst, NH, 03031 :)

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1-26-26
PGG

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A few items to prepare for tonight’s Liberty Conspiracy LIVE - Most of which will focus on the DHS-BPS-ICE murder of Alex Pretti, and the Trump lies to cover for their own malfeasance.

This Substack is reader-supported. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Following-up our logical analysis of the federal assumption of power over “immigration and border control”, its practices of deportation and kidnapping, breaches of the Fourth Amendment, breaches of Article Four, Section Four, and breaches of deeper morality re freedom of association and the right to retain the fruits of one’s labor… Now, let’s look at the ethical and practical problems of any political institution claiming the power to handle “a border” or even define what or where it is, and to define who can associate with whom.

In our first two articles, we noted that the word immigration is not in the US Constitution, that Jefferson and Madison both correctly observed that the matter was a state issue, and that the feds cannot claim an “invasion” without a response of a Declaration of War or Letters of Marque and Reprisal for non-state “adversaries”. Likewise, Article Four, Section Four of the US Constitution requires state legislatures or the governor (if the legislature is not in session) to REQUEST federal military aid to protect their “republican form of government” against rebellion or violence before any federal military can enter, and, of course, that negates both the inferior “Insurrection Act” and the idea that the “necessary and proper” clause allows the feds to enter to “protect federal buildings” that cannot be federal buildings, since the Constitution only allows the feds to run three kinds of property (territories, military garrisons, and the national capitol).

But on the deeper philosophical and logical levels, one must ask (as one asks with any comparison between statist action and freedom): Even IF the Constitution were amended to allow for border definition and policing and for immigration control, would it be possible for anyone to claim there was any valuation involved, any VALUE, tied to the political process of the state determining where a border will be and how it will be “protected”?

The answer, of course, is “No.” Since all political actions are predicated on force, coercion, and intimidation, and since the money used to pay for the determination of the border and how it will be policed comes through the force of taxation, no one who pays for the “border” can be said to have willingly wanted it there. Even if a small cadre wants a border someplace, this is the Tragedy of the Commons, meaning that not all taxpayers will agree, yet they will be forced to pay, leaving them arguing. Similarly, the politicians are not using their own money, so they are not showing their own true preferences. And, of course, in most cases the land is taken via eminent domain, threats of seizure and force. And the arbitrary “payments” to see the polis acquire that land come from taxation, of course, so that is a double sin.

The only borders that reflect value or personal interest are those on private property. All political borders are established through illegitimate, coercive means. If there is no choice, there is no subjective-value-expression.

And what of the “economic impact” of “open borders”?

First, let’s reiterate the PHILOSOPHICAL axiom that no one has a right to tell other people they cannot peacefully associate, to do so is to become the criminal, the aggressor, the threat.

Second, let’s establish that one’s ability to associate with others is both an outgrowth of, and sourced FROM, division of labor, and that political obstacles blocking free association — be those inhibitions in the forms of import duties, bans on “outsourcing”, or immigration “limits” from the central political authority — all are arbitrary mandates and decisions over other people’s lives, all, forms of aggression, regardless of the vaunted “rationales” in the halls of government, unions, or any other special interest.

As such, they undercut, weaken, or abolish the ability of people to divide their labor, to trade money, time, and opportunities in order to let others take on tasks to which they might be better suited, and free oneself up to do something else.

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Labor is a key factor of production, and arbitrary, force-imposed decisions over, and restrictions on, the labor factor of production increase the cost of that factor of production, decreasing productivity, profitability, and the power of consumers to save and spend on or invest in other ventures.

As I noted in my book, “Live Free or Die”, referring to a brushfire debate over immigration in the early 2000s, there are many people of both major parties who push for federal curtailment of immigration. Here is a new version of part of my argument, found in “Live Free or Die”…

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On January 7, 2004, President George W. Bush announced what appeared to be a sweeping plan to grant de facto amnesty for millions of resident aliens working in the U.S. In fact, it was little more than a long-term worker visa program that barely increased the ability of employers to hire whom they wished and came nowhere near recognizing the right of individuals to move where their abilities could take them.
Nonetheless, this has not stopped profits ranging from conservative radio hosts Laura Ingraham and Michael Savage, to supposedly conservative writers such as Pat Buchanan and Mark Krikorian, from heralding the end of America as we know it.
Much like Kevin McCarthy in Invasion of the Body Snatchers, they seem wide-eyed and enervated, exhorting us to beware because, as he said with such conviction, “They’re coming! They’re coming!”
Though it might be easy to flippantly dismiss such exclamations, many of their arguments are substantive, important – and incorrect.
Due to the paternalistic nature of contemporary government, the proposal to accept the “illegals,” as they are called, and then accept them as legal, which they should be, is fraught with many problems. But apart from these practical day-to-day considerations, and separate from the debate over whether immigrants are a net gain or loss to the coffers of the federal government, there is a larger, timeless issue that lies at the heart of the conservative assertions.

It is the sweeping claim that immigrants suppress American wages and take American jobs. The argument is used to pander to blue collar workers and high-tech workers alike, and it is bandied about far too frequently by those who should know better. Perhaps the worst culprit in this regard is Krikorian, who has a deft and stylish way of selectively presenting arguments made by free trade advocates and using their words to bolster his own anti-free trade position. In his January 7, 2004 National Review online article about George W. Bush’s plan, Krikorian, then a visiting fellow at the Nixon Center and director of the Center for Immigration Studies, paints a rosy picture of an America which restricts immigration. According to Krikorian, if the U.S. government were to enforce more stringently the nation’s immigration policies, life for American workers somehow would improve. Employers would respond to this new tighter labor market in two ways.

One, Krikorian claims they would:

“offer higher wages, increased benefits, and improved working conditions so as to recruit and retain people from the remaining pool of workers. (Two) At the same time, the same employers would look for ways to eliminate some of the jobs they now are having trouble filling”.

This hopeful passage brings some nagging questions to mind. Foremost among them is where employers will get the expendable capital to offer higher wages, increased benefits, and improved working conditions. Are they operating on such high profit margins that they can absorb the new costs that Mr. Krikorian would dictate? He seems unconcerned with this minor problem and continues to tread along his utopian path.

“The result would be a new equilibrium,” Krikorian says, “with blue-collar workers making somewhat better money, but each one of those workers being more productive.”

One would assume that these workers would not age either because Krikorian would get them apartments in Shangri-La as part of their benefits package. It is interesting that he should feel so free to tell employers and workers how their businesses will operate and that they will achieve, as he says, a “new equilibrium”, which he prefers over the one the employers and workers could establish without his meddlesome help. Besides the fact that his assumption regarding wages is completely erroneous and reflects little understanding of profit, marginal cost, and the productive use of capital, Krikorian assumes employers can simply increase these wages without any consideration of the most important player in the free market economy, the consumer. Krikorian conveniently neglects to consider how consumers would respond to the forced higher costs of products. Perhaps this is because he believes the heady notion that costs just wouldn’t go up. As he says:

“Since all unskilled labor from Americans and foreigners in all industries accounts for such a small part of our economy, perhaps four percent of GDP, we can tighten the labor market without any fear of sparking meaningful inflation.”

Such arrogant assurances usually don’t sit well with people who understand why we work to decrease costs of production in the first place. This is a basic concept that nearly every consumer going to the market understands. The entire purpose of a productive economy is to make things easier, not harder to buy, to let us use less of our toil to get a product, not more of our energy and time. To embrace Krikorian’s naive notion would be to accept the idea that the farmer should take a wheel off his plow because, though the machine will move more slowly and he will have to work harder to get his produce, it will employ an American to carry the wheel-less side of the plow, or better yet, it will force the farmer to hire a team of experts to develop a new floating plow that may cost him too much to stay in business, but will employ high-skilled natives. This seems to be a very attractive line of thinking to Krikorian. For in his attempts to supersede the preferences of consumers and businessmen as reflected in the market, he cites one of the most legendary free market thinkers, Julian Simon, and his work on scarcity as inspiration. In Simon’s breakthrough 1981 publication, “The Ultimate Resource”, Simon revealed that most of the leftist fears regarding depletion of natural resources were unfounded. Simon found that the relative scarcity of resources led to greater human innovation, which led to greater productivity, greater market abundance of old and new resources and improving living conditions.

As Krikorian notes, Simon spelled it out clearly when he said:

“It is important to recognize that discoveries of improved methods and of substitute products are not just luck. They happen in response to scarcity and increase in cost. Even after a discovery is made, there is a good chance that it will not be part There is a good chance that it will not be put into operation until there is need for it due to rising cost. This point is important. Scarcity and technological advance are not two unrelated competitors in a race. Rather, each influences the other.”

This is absolutely correct. Unrestricted human ingenuity lets us thrive in a world of limited resources. But Krikorian seeks to use this observation to justify depletion of the U.S. labor force.

Citing raisin growers in the U.S. and Australia as comparative examples, Krikorian explains that in Australia, a nation with a small workforce, raisin growers were forced to develop new techniques to harvest their product. This innovation led to greater productivity, more raisins being harvested per worker. But, in the U.S., he argues, a surplus of low-wage immigrant workers suppressed this development, and thus U.S. raisin growers did not adopt the new productive methods that arose in Australia. But implicit in his argument is the fact that U.S. employers did not have to develop those new forms of harvesting in the first place because their relative costs were lower and labor was not scarce. According to Krikorian, the scarcity of labor in Australia led to technological progress, the kind of thing Simon would have applauded. and the surplus of labor in the US led to technological stagnation, which hurts an economy in the long run. By embracing the idea that scarcity leads to innovation, Krikorian assumes that a man like Simon would have welcomed greater scarcity, that Simon would have embraced the mock idea Frederic Bastiat put forward to “blot out the sun” in order to employ more candle-makers! Under Krikorian’s paradigm, we ought to eliminate as many resources as we can, be they labor resources or natural resources, because their scarcity will lead to technological innovation and greater productivity.
In other words, burn down the forests with eager dispatch. We will come up with new, more productive ways to harvest what is left.

Krikorian makes the dual mistakes of assuming better market knowledge than the U.S. raisin growers themselves and of confusing all technological innovation at all times with a greater productive use of capital. While the needs of Australian raisin growers led them to come up with new ways of harvesting their crops and these may have been more productive for them, U.S. growers made their own decisions based on their needs. To assume for U.S. growers the responsibility of how best to spend their money and invest in resources is not only arrogant, it stifles the cost analysis that leads to innovation in the first place. This may all seem academic at first glance, but it is important. As it happens, Krikorian’s argument has been widely disseminated, not only in the online and print versions of National Review, but also in the broadcast media, where Rush Limbaugh read his polemic on the air to millions of listeners. It is pervasive, and it is dangerous. Krikorian’s messy reinterpretation of Simon’s logic is really a tool to support his belief that immigration is not only unnecessary, but that it should be curtailed. At the core of his thinking, and of that of people such as Laura Ingram, is the sincere but mistaken belief that foreign laborers suppress native wages and harm the economy as a whole.

Perhaps not coincidentally, it was Julian Simon himself who conducted probably the most exhaustive survey of all economic data regarding these claims. And his work refutes Krikorian on every level.

In his landmark 1995 paper entitled, “Immigration, the Demographic and Economic Facts,” published by the Cato Institute and the National Immigration Forum, Simon looked at the available studies and concluded:

“The studies uniformly show that immigrants do not increase the rate of native unemployment in the aggregate. The reader need not go further if the conclusion is all that is desired.”

However, if one wanted to go further, he could discover that immigration also does not, in the aggregate, suppress wages for native workers. Immigration has a slight dampening effect on wages only in certain sectors of the economy, typically those sectors that depend on immigrant labor. These decreases in wages are often very slight and the wages rise over time as each sector sees economic improvement. As one of the studies reported:

“The evidence we have assembled for the nineteen eighties confirms the conclusions from earlier studies of 1970 and 1980 census data. In particular, we find little indication of an adverse wage effect of immigration, either cross sectionally or within cities over time. even for workers at the tenth percentile of the wage distribution, there is no evidence of a significant decline in wages in response to immigrant inflows.”

Data like these often go overlooked by commentators, which is a shame, since it would be much more productive to debate when informed by as many facts as possible. With such information on hand, readers would be able to dispel error and seek out the truth.

And in the political realm, this practice is not just an academic exercise. When codified, assumptions can cause great damage. Many people assume that an influx of immigrants will harm the bargaining power of the American worker, but they do not see that a decrease in immigrant workers would mean a decrease in the bargaining power of the consumer. Some claim that the low-wage jobs that immigrants fill would magically pay higher wages if we just got those pesky foreigners out of the labor pool. They never consider that the consumer would be forced to pay more and the businessman might not be able to attract the consumer to his product if he had to sell it at a higher price. Most of all, however, they do not see the dynamic effect that a few extra pennies in each person’s pocket can have on the economy as a whole.

The reason immigrants are not dangerous to the U.S. economy is that they allow consumers to be free, free to buy the best products they can for the lowest price. The labor factor of production goes down in cost. This in turn allows the consumer to have more expendable capital to use on another product, perhaps a new American product or business venture, which will employ more people and, in turn, help strengthen the economy, but which could not have the opportunity to start up without the savings consumers can achieve. Despite what the doomsayers claim, immigration helps us all better our lives. It’s what economic progress is all about, and it is why people come to this country in the first place.

WE WILL CONTINUE, TOMORROW! JOIN US TONIGHT AT 6 PM EASTERN TO DISCUSS THIS AND THE MURDER IN MN, IT WILL BE CLASSROOM BACK AND FORTH W YOU AS THE PROF!

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Welcome back, fellow Conspirators… Let’s begin with an update of what has been happening in MN and DC after Border Patrol goons assaulted a woman, then pepper-sprayed a man trying to help her, then stole that man’s gun, then killed that man by shooting him multiple times in the back.

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Here is the theme

And, while that hovers, umbrella-like, over the real debate, some continue to engage in the Statist Psychosis. Here are examples, featured on X and on Patrick Henningsen’s 21st Century Sunday Wire, as well as one I found via Facebonk. I will link to all of Patrick’s excellent coverage, and hope that, if you didn’t already watch his work or visit his site, you will find it to be a valuable discovery. Notice how Mr. Trump tries to blame the victim, tries to blame the local cops (remember, his ICE goons kidnapped a local Maine cop three days ago), tries to distract with the “focus on this” welfare fraud issue (all govt welfare is fraud, and it’s the GOVT that STEALS it FIRST) and calls ICE agents “patriots”.

Here is Bilal Ali "Bill" Essayli the First Assistant United States Attorney for the Central District of California, noting his belief that a man has no right to carry a firearm, especially when armed, tax-fed, federal invaders are in his hometown.

Here is the offensive and fraudulent NRA echoing the same narrative, besmirching the character of Mr. Pretti and NOT defending the right to keep and bear arms.

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Here are Libs of TikTok and Kristi Noem, lying, and, again, not defending the principle of self-defense or the very wording of their vaunted US Constitution.

Here is all of Patrick’s program, broadcast live at noon, eastern, today

This speaks volumes

Here is something I thought was worth noting

and more, in response to DC politicians “speaking up”

This is valuable

And Dana Bash did a decent job pressing Bovino on his lies, though she could have gone further to ask him to provide constitutional or moral justification for the very existence of ICE or their invasion of states.

And more, as yes, Bovino claims it was the BORDER PATROL GOONS who were the victims. Seriously.

Here is another observation of Noem’s hypocrisy. Of course, what might one expect from a woman working for Trump, who, in his first term, sat beside Pam Bondi in FLA while she as AG there, and applauded the idea of eliminating DUE PROCESS by engaging in Red Flag gun-grabs.

And more on the DHS disinformation they keep spreading, this, about their supposed “target”… The corrections-judicial system of MN has no such records for the purported DHS target.

Of course, we all know that when Trump can invade states he is making the streets “safe” as the Trumpers claim — so, disregard those murders on the streets, committed by the DHS invaders.
-And, yes, the feds are obstructing local and state police investigating the crime scene.

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And more insanity and anti-rights positioning, this from Bessent, a week after he praised the idea of starving innocent people in Iran — for their own good, of course.

the unconstitutional FBI head spouting more anti-rights rhetoric, reading from the playbook.

Kash might want to keep this in mind

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A mixed bag of comments here, but his overall approach lacks the references to the anti-constitutional, immoral nature of the ICE-DHS-BPS invasion.

And this is stunning

And this is important, on the legal side, as one watches what the govt of MN is doing in response…

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Massie offers key thoughts.

The Trump Deputy Atty Gen is evil

And…

Now… Let’s get into the second installment of our logical, constitutional, and deeper-moral investigation of federal immigration policing, to see how those who do not question federal presences in Minnesota or other states are undercutting both the US Constitution and fundamental ethics.

In many of the respectful back-and-forths I’ve had with pro-federal-immigration-policing figures — people such as Pat Buchanan, Tom Tancredo, and JD Hayworth — a pattern quickly became visible to me. Though they would admit the validity and argumentative strength of my citations of Jefferson and Madison, my noting of the lack of any word “immigration” and my citation of the improper “Chy Lung v Freeman” SCOTUS decision, and though they would accept the logic I laid out that the Missouri Compromise never would have happened and Texas could not have entered the Union with its state constitution in 1869 if immigration were to be controlled by the feds, and though they would admit that naturalization is NOT immigration, they would, as if following a script, all fall on the argument of saying, “But, America is being invaded!”

SO, one asks, what is the Constitutional response to an invasion? If it is an invading nation state, the Congress must declare war against the aggressive state in order to allow the President to lead the Militia in response. If the “invaders” are not agents of a foreign state, in the uniforms thereof, the Congress must pass “Letters of Marque and Reprisal” to allow the President to hire mercenaries in order to go after the baddies.

The only other way a President can enter a state is spelled out in Article Four, Section Four, which states:

“The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.”

This means, as I have noted for MRCTV, that, during times of non-war and when there are no Letters of Marque and Reprisal issued, the feds only can enter a state (Militia or the mercenaries hired under Letters of Marque…) if the legislature has requested help, or, if the legislature of the state is out of session, if the state Governor requests the aid. The only two states I know of that have requested this form of help have been Texas and Florida. The governments of Minnesota and California both have explicitly told the feds to STAY OUT.

Now, some might argue that, under the “necessary and proper” clause, the Executive branch can do anything that is “necessary and proper” in the Chief Exec’s eyes. That is, of course, ridiculous, a shattering of the concept of enumerated powers and an amendment process to add or subtract powers, and a misreading of the original meaning of the clause. Others might argue that it means CONGRESS can pass any statutes its members like. Again, that is foolish and aberrant nonsense. The “necessary and proper” clause allows Congress to pass any statutes that allow the feds to fulfill any ENUMERATED POWER. Thus, logically, if there is no original power to do something, the clause doesn’t grant a magical power to let Congress invent justification to expand its power. That would undercut the entire reason they wrote the document and enumerated the “powers”.

But, what if, as Washington and Hamilton claimed, there were some ambiguity? For example, though Congress was granted a power to levy excise taxes on whiskey, the Constitution did not explicitly spell out a way to collect its whiskey tax in places like Ohio or PA if the makers and sellers were unwilling to pay. (I will refrain from discussing the deeper anarchist points about the fact that none of this political gamesmanship is moral, none of the taxes are moral, and that no state is founded on anything but immoral taxation and coercion)…

In his book, “The Whiskey Rebellion: Frontier Epilogue to The American Revolution”, Thomas Slaughter notes that the claim of “rebellion” did not arise from PA officials. Not at all. It appears to have been a plot cooked up by Alexander Hamilton, getting his friend, a SCOTUS judge, to simply declare the whiskey makers to be “in rebellion”. Notice the similarities to the MAGA members who argue that the President can use the so-called “insurrection act” to simply declare that there’s an “insurrection” somewhere, and invade a state, contrary to Article Four, Section Four. The wondrous “insurrection act” of 1807 is, of course, an ACT, not an Article in the US Constitution and not an Amendment. As a result, it is inferior to the enumerated powers in the Constitution, and if it breaches the Constitution, it is null. This was the case in Washington’s time, as well. In 1792, the Congress passed the “Militia Act”, a clearly unconstitutional statute that undercut the Declaration of War Provision and expanded a President’s arbitrary power to use military force inside the US. According to this legislative sleight of hand, before a President (in this case George Washington) could federalize and deploy state militia to suppress the unrest, a federal judge (specifically a Supreme Court justice) had to certify that local authorities could not enforce the laws due to an insurrection or similar obstruction. On August 4, 1794, Supreme Court Justice James Wilson provided this certification/opinion, stating that the western counties of Pennsylvania were “in a state of rebellion.” This formal judicial determination directly enabled Washington’s proclamation on August 7, 1794, warning of militia action to restore order and suppress the rebellion.

None of that was, of course, constitutional. All of it was an utter insult to Article Four, Section Four, to the concept of a Declaration of War, and to the superstructure of federalism in the Constitution. This is obvious.

Likewise, Trump’s argument that he can “claim an insurrection” runs counter to Article Four, Section Four.

But, some might argue, what if the Feds claim they have to enter a state in order to “protect” a federal courthouse (or their obviously unconstitutional ICE detention facilities)?

To address that question, one must note the problem of federal property, and “federal courts” on land inside states.

Since the US Constitution only allows the feds to own/run three forms of land: 1. a ten-square-mile area for the national capitol 2. military garrisons and, 3. territories, and since territories were to enter the union, as the US Constitution says, “with all the rights and privileges” of any other state, that meant that the states did not have to cede land to the feds, and, even if they could, the feds had no way to run such land (making all federal parks and “national monuments” in states unconstitutional, obviously).

As a result, the only truly constitutional way for federal courthouses to exist would be for them to be on “federal land”, which would mean in DC, in a territory, or on military garrisons. This is not what we find for US District and Circuit courts. Thus, the argument that the Pres has to enter a state with troops (how can he call them up without a Declaration of War?) to insure the safety of “federal property” that is, clearly, unconstitutionally inside states? That’s rather a questionable arrogation of power atop a problematic federal claim of land inside states.

There is nothing in the US Constitution that allows the feds to handle immigration. They can’t claim “invasion” without a Declaration of War. They cannot use inferior acts such as the “Militia Act” or the “Insurrection Act.” These are fundamental points, irrefutable points, and should be remembered by any honest people looking at the utter criminality of ICE and the Border Patrol goons whose jobs should not exist.

Next, we will dive deeper, into the more fundamental moral arguments against the government blocking freedom of movement, forcing you to pay for the police state, and more, including the clear impossibility of any statist entity claiming its agents can define a “border” and say that it has any tie to what anyone actually wants.

Join us for Liberty Conspiracy LIVE tomorrow night at 6 pm eastern, and watch for tomorrow’s release in the News Notes!

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