Secure Freedom Minute

This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute.

The Chinese military has decided to remove U.S.-produced operating systems from its computers over concerns that they could be used to penetrate and steal the People’s Liberation Army’s secrets.  Yet, the PRC insists that we can safely rely upon hardware and software sold by Huawei, a telecommunications conglomerate tied to its security services. How could that be?

Is it any more advisable for us to depend on Chinese sources for other critical stuff like the rare earth minerals that go into myriad high technology products – especially since China is threatening to cut off our access to such minerals?  How about medications or food that they can not only refuse to sell us but also adulterate, potentially with deadly effects?

It’s high time we wean ourselves from such reckless dependencies. Our country and our lives may depend on having all-American supply chains.

This is Frank Gaffney.

This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute.

Somali refugee-turned-U.S. Congresswoman Ilhan Omar of Minnesota delights in the outrageous statements that have made her overnight the poster child of American anti-Semitism and the hard left.  She recently declared, however, that she considers herself a “foreigner” who proudly criticizes the external policies of the country that generously took her in.

Ms. Omar’s criticisms align with those of her fellow Sharia-supremacists, including Muslim Brotherhood front groups like the Council on American Islamic Relations.  She has raised funds for that group, even though the federal government established in court that it was founded by the designated terrorist organization, Hamas.

It’s particularly worrying that this self-described foreigner’s views – notably, her deep hostility towards Israel, America’s most important ally in the Middle East – are increasingly being condoned, if not actually endorsed, by Democrats who still profess they are proud to be Americans.

This is Frank Gaffney.

This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute.

President Trump just expressed confidence that a great trade deal would be reached with Communist China. Importantly, he didn’t indicate when.

That’s good news since he’s under considerable pressure to make a less than great deal from the likes of former Goldman Sachs executive-turned-Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchen. They use as leverage Wall Street’s unhappiness with the so-called “trade war.”

But, one financial guru, Allianz’s Chief Economic Advisor Mohammed El-Erian, told CNBC last week that Mr. Trump was in a position to do “something Reaganesque.” By emphasizing national security imperatives to hold the line on trade, the President can “actually change the economic dynamics on a global scale.”

U.S. financial markets must do their part, however. For example, they must stop underwriting dangerous Chinese companies like surveillance giant Hikvision that helps its government crush freedom at home and increasingly elsewhere.

This is Frank Gaffney.

This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute.

It was shocking to hear on the eve of the Memorial Day weekend that John Walker Lindh had been released from federal prison. This news brought to the fore forgotten recollections of the capture of this “American Taliban” in Afghanistan at the start of the so-called “War on Terror” and his subsequent prosecution for murderously collaborating with the enemy.

Lindh remains an unrepentant Sharia-supremacist jihadist. While he is subject to certain probationary restrictions, the New York Times reports that his parents, lawyers and prosecutors aren’t revealing where he will live.

Within hours, the Louisiana House of Representatives voted to create a state Terrorist Registry like the ones enabling law enforcement to learn where freed sexual predators reside.

More once-jailed jihadists may be coming to a neighborhood near you. Make sure that those responsible for protecting us know where they’ll be living.  

This is Frank Gaffney.

This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute.

Yesterday, a U.S. District Judge in California decided to help the Chinese People’s Liberation Army, doing business as a telecommunications conglomerate known as Huawei, dominate the next generation wireless technology known as 5G.

It is hard to overstate the ominous implications of Judge Lucy Koh’s ruling against Qualcomm, America’s indispensable cell phone chip-manufacturer. Last year, the Trump administration called it “a national treasure” in blocking Qualcomm’s hostile takeover by a Chinese-linked Singaporean company.

Now, in part based on testimony from Huawei, Judge Koh has ordered Qualcomm to give access to its technology to that Chinese competitor – whose products President Trump just barred from use in U.S. telecom networks due to Huawei’s ties to a “foreign adversary.”   

Judge Koh’s reckless ruling must be immediately stayed and overturned before it does grave harm to our national security and vital economic interests.

This is Frank Gaffney.

This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute.

The 2020 presidential election is shaping up to offer the American people the most dramatic foreign policy choice since Ronald Reagan challenged Jimmy Carter’s appeasement of the Soviet Union with a platform of rolling back and defeating that “Evil Empire.”

That will be particularly the case if Donald Trump winds up running against the current Democratic frontrunner, former Vice President Joe Biden.  In contrast to President Trump, who recognizes China as a “foreign adversary” that is intent on “dominating the world,” Mr. Biden insists that the Chinese communists are not even competitors – let alone existential threats to freedom.

It would be bad enough if that were just a deeply misleading, indeed malfeasant, statement. Worse yet, it smacks of appalling corruption in light of the $1.5 billion Beijing invested in his son’s business while Biden was in office. 

That’s a problem, folks. 

This is Frank Gaffney.

This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute.

History is replete with what-if’s – what might have happened if different decisions were taken at critical junctures.  For example, what if U.S. forces were precipitously removed from Germany, Japan or South Korea after they helped end hostilities in each country?

We know what happened when President Obama removed them from Iraq in 2011. Candidate Donald Trump rightly castigated him for creating conditions that contributed to the rise of ISIS, its predations and territorial conquests in that country and neighboring Syria.

As President, Mr. Trump was tempted to do the same thing after ISIS’ so-called caliphate was destroyed. He ultimately and wisely decided to keep a small American military presence in Syria. Thankfully, as a result, we can indulge in speculation about what would have happened if he hadn’t done so, rather than deal with the likely, terrible consequences if he had.

This is Frank Gaffney.

This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute.

Rep. Justin Amash of Michigan has concluded something that neither Attorney General William Barr nor even Special Counsel Robert Mueller did.  He believes there is sufficient evidence that Donald Trump engaged in obstruction of justice to impeach him.

Congressman Amash is entitled to his opinion and to vote as he wishes. While his judgment certainly can be questioned – and found wanting, there’s not much point to speculating about his motives.   

That said, one can’t help but remark on the sudden celebrity – not to say adulation – that this Republican legislator has achieved for being the first in the GOP to side with partisan Democrats determined to remove President Trump from office.

Mr. Amash may now be the darling of Nancy Pelosi, MSNBC and the New York Times. It remains to be seen whether primary voters in Grand Rapids will feel the same.

This is Frank Gaffney.

MATTHEW CONTINETTI, Editor in Chief of the Washington Free Beacon, Contributing Editor to the Weekly Standard, Author of “The K Street Gang: The Rise and Fall of the Republican Machine” (2006), Author of “The Persecution of Sarah Palin: How the Elite Media Tried to Bring Down a Rising Star” (2009):

Is war with Iran imminent as mainstream media proposes?

Dissecting Ben Rhode’s ‘echo chamber’

The battle within the Trump administration over Iran policy

(PART TWO):

Implications of relentless attacks against John Bolton

Barr’s new investigation into the origins of Russia probe

Are the individuals in the Russia probe turning on each other?

MARK LANGFAN, Creator of a topographic raised-relief map system of Israel, Chairman of Americans for a Safe Israel (AFSI):

The threat Iran poses to the U.S. and Israel

The effort by Iran and its enablers to push Bolton out

(PART TWO):

How topography is key to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict

Why Jared Kushner’s ‘Middle East Peace Plan’ would be ineffective

This is Frank Gaffney with the Secure Freedom Minute.

Other governments routinely interfere in our internal affairs. For example, Russia tries to manipulate our elections and China operates Confucius Institutes to influence this country’s academia.

The Washington Free Beacon’s Matthew Continetti has just exposed today’s most aggressive foreign influence campaign. Iran’s regime is desperate to undermine the increasingly impactful “maximum pressure” Trump strategy designed to end the nuclear, missile and terrorist threats it poses to the rest of the world.

The mullahs’ subversive information operation is aimed at persuading the President to fire his putatively war-mongering National Security Advisor, John Bolton. And, predictably, the fellow travelers who populated the Obama administration and brought us its nuclear deal with Iran are ramping up their notorious “echo chamber” in support.

Fortunately, such “Never Trumpers” and their media allies have no influence with the one man who matters: President Trump.

This is Frank Gaffney.