DOJ: Making fun of boys wearing makeup is illegal

The Civil Rights Division has struck again. This time the target was Mohawk Central School District in upstate New York. The CRD's involvement was needed because students had been mean to another of their fellow students who had made some interesting life choices.

On Jan. 14, 2010, in the Northern District of New York, the United States sought to join a lawsuit filed by the New York Civil Liberties Union on behalf of a student, J.L., who was the alleged victim of severe and pervasive student-on-student harassment based on sex. According to the United States’ motion, J.L. failed to conform to gender stereotypes in both behavior and appearance. He exhibited feminine mannerisms, dyed his hair, wore makeup and nail polish, and maintained predominantly female friendships. The United States alleged that the harassment against J.L. escalated from derogatory name-calling to physical threats and violence.

Of course bullying is always wrong, but it's also a natural consequence of grade school. Students are insulted and beat up on the playground for being fat, thin, geeky, snide, poor at sports, and everything in between. If J.L. chooses to be transgendered, it's illegal to discriminate against him as far as things like hiring go. But bullying at school is a much different story. J.L. was awarded $50,000 for the incident.

The Civil Rights Division's lawsuit technically has merit under Title IX of the Civil Rights Act. But to use it to criminalize schoolyard bullying stretches the law in a very dangerous direction.

Justice Department looking forward to causing another mortgage meltdown

Our favorite racist activist lawyers at the Justice Department Civil Rights Division are back. Last week, the CRD reached a settlement with two subsidiaries of American International Group (AIG) for at least $6.1 million. (Talk about kicking a dead horse.) The lawsuit, as with almost every lawsuit brought by the Civil Rights Division, was based on race.

The settlement was filed today in conjunction with a complaint made by the Justice Department in U.S. District Court in Delaware. Brought under the federal Fair Housing and Equal Credit Opportunity Acts, the complaint alleges African American borrowers nationwide were charged higher fees on wholesale loans made by AIG Federal Savings Bank (FSB) and Wilmington Finance Inc. (WFI), an affiliated mortgage lending company.

AIG didn't intentionally charge African-Americans with higher fees. The CRD's complaint was on the basis of disparate impact, which bans lending practices where the intent isn't discriminatory but the outcome is. What probably happens is that black homeowners are charged more by insurance companies in general, not because of their race, but because the actuaries assess this demographic as being poorer and a higher risk.

Maybe the CRD thinks we should just crash the entire housing industry all over again? The single largest factor in the housing bubble collapse was the Community Reinvestment Act, which mandated that a certain percentage of loans be made to minorities. The hope was that more blacks and Latinos would end up able to purchase homes. The result was that mortgage companies were forced to make countless subprime loans that couldn't be paid back. This pumped more and more air into the bubble until it finally popped.

The CRD proudly announced that this is the first time a mortgage company has been sued based on racial factors and that it won't be the last. Under disparate impact, they can sue pretty much any company that charges an average of one cent more for minorities than whites. The Obama Administration and its executioners have, it seems, learned nothing.

Justice Department covers up the identity of its own lawyers

The Obama administration is more than willing to release classified records showing enhanced interrogation techniques used against terrorists. But the identities of taxpayer-funded lawyers at the Justice Department are strictly confidential.

Earlier this week, a conservative group headed by Liz Cheney unveiled a video asking the Justice Department to release the names of seven lawyers who had previously defended terrorist detainees. The Justice Department has only named two and refuses to go any further. This is a slap in the face to taxpayers and also a little scary. Conflicts of interest aren't kosher at the Justice Department, and that's when they just involve lobbyists. Any of these five anonymous attorneys could have defended and conferred with detainees who were members of al Qaeda or the Taliban. We're at war with al Qaeda and the Taliban.

The two names that have been released are Jennifer Daskal and and Neal Katyal. Katyal was a lawyer in the famous Hamdan v. Rumsfeld case. Daskal represented detainees collectively for the liberal group Human Rights Watch. If Eric Holder was willing to release those names, why not the other five? How much worse could they possibly be? What is the DOJ hiding?

Here's the video from Liz Cheney's group Keep America Safe:

Civil Rights Division thinks American citizenship is racist

The good people of Georgia are still subjected to an old provision in the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that requires them to get permission from the Justice Department to change state voting laws. The antiquated law was meant to prevent southern states from trying to limit blacks' right to vote. It's never caused any problems, until Obama's DOJ came to town.

A new law passed in Georgia would require new voters to present a driver's license and Social Security Number when they register to vote. It's to an effort to keep illegal immigrants off the voting rolls. The DOJ's notorious Civil Rights Division jumped in and refused to approve the law because it "unfairly burdened a disproportionate number of minorities."

Yes, Obama's government is actually arguing that presenting proof of American citizenship is racist.

It's unclear whether the CRD is doing this because illegal immigrants are a key Democrat constituency or because the CRD is populated by race-baiting radicals. (Probably a combination of both.) But Georgia is fed up. In a courageous move, Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp announced the state will be suing the Justice Department to get the law passed. "The State of Georgia will no longer watch the Obama Justice Department play politics with our election processes and protections," Kemp said. This is the first time that anyone has stood up to the Civil Rights Division's racial bullying and we at ObamaWatchNews wish Kemp all the best.

Sotomayor law is the norm at the Justice Department

Remember the Ricci v. DiStefano case in New Haven? The test scores of white and Hispanic firefighters seeking to become sergeants were thrown out by the city after not enough blacks passed. The firefighters sued and Sonia Sotomayor, then a District Court judge and wise Latina, ruled in favor of New Haven. The Supreme Court disagreed and overturned her defense of discrimination.

The controversy that followed almost ruined Sotomayor's chances of sitting on the Supreme Court. You'd think the Justice Department would get the message that these so-called "disparate impact" cases, usually brought against police and fire departments, are a bad idea. Instead the nutty Thomas Perez, who heads up the DOJ's Civil Rights Division, gave a speech last week downplaying the Ricci case. He also bragged about lawsuits filed against a Department of Corrections in Massachusetts and a sheriff's office in Oklahoma, among others. The offense of all these defendants is that they were judging others based on their merit rather than their sex or skin color.

The Oklahoma case is particularly hilarious. The Sheriff of Bryan County was reassigning pregnant female confinement officers to desk duty while they were pregnant. The Justice Department hit them with a discrimination rap. Now, the Bryan County sheriff's office has to provide mandatory training against "pregnancy discrimination."

Welcome to BHO's America, where "diversity" is more important than law enforcement keeping us safe, and the lunatics have taken over the asylum.

Thank goodness: Obama appoints another Islamic envoy

BHO's State Department already has its own special envoy to the Islamic world, Farah Pandith. But that didn't stop the president from reaching into his radical Justice Department and pulling out another one.

His name is Rashad Hussain. He's a former trial attorney at DOJ (naturally) and, of course, he's a die-hard left-winger. Hussain said in 2004 that terrorism sympathizer, Sami al-Arian, was the victim of "politically motivated persecutions" and was being used to "squash dissent." Actually, Al-Arian had been sentenced to four years in prison for acting as one of the leaders of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a terrorist group responsible for the murder of more than 100 Israelis. Former attorney general John Ashcroft called the PIJ one of the most dangerous terrorist groups in the world. Al-Arian was also a university professor (yep, we were surprised too) as well as a PIJ terrorist.

So Barack Obama just appointed a terrorist sympathizer to represent America to the Muslim world. Then again, Hussain might fit in well. The group he's assigned to, the Organization of the Islamic Conference, is an alliance of Islamic nations that has declared "Islamophobia" to be the worst form of terrorism. Maybe Hussain can explain that to Khalid Sheik Mohammed. Or the panty bomber.

Surprise! More wicked hypocrisy from the Justice Department

Today's instance comes from the Civil Rights Division (another shocker). The DOJ has refused to investigate ACORN. It has swept the Black Panthers' revolting voter intimidation in Philadelphia under the rug. But when some loser at his computer threatens La Raza, the big guns come out.

Vincent Johnson of Brick, New Jersey stands charged with sending threatening e-mails to several pro-amnesty illegal immigrant groups, including La Raza, the Puerto Rican Legal Defense Fund, and the League of United Latin American Citizens. The e-mails contain violent threats, but they could have easily been handled by state police. "Nutjob Sends Threatening E-mails" isn't exactly a shocking development. Most political organizations get them every day.

But when Obama's cronies at La Raza are under attack, you can be sure the entire Civil Rights Division will swing into action. (Republican voters in Philadelphia are a different story.) Of course, this entire case has nothing to do with civil rights. The e-mails threaten illegal aliens, not Hispanics. File this under "Hypocrisy" while we stare at our watches and wait for the DOJ to lift a finger against ACORN.

Obama's getting even with James O'Keefe for that ACORN expose

There's something very sinister going on with the arrest of James O'Keefe. Barack Obama's government seems to have served up a galling miscarriage of justice.

O'Keefe is the journalist who sneaked a hidden camera into ACORN offices while posing as a pimp. Along with partner Hannah Giles, who was dressed as a prostitute, he tried to obtain tax benefits for his supposed prostitution agency. In almost all of the videos, the fine folks at ACORN were more than willing to help the pair break the law. O'Keefe was later arrested in what seemed to be another sting gone horribly wrong in which he and three others, disguised as telephone repairmen, tried to gain access to Sen. Mary Landreiu's office.

O'Keefe's latest actions were dumb and possibly criminal...but nothing compared to the way Obama's government has treated the case. Here's what we know so far.

-- After his arrest, O'Keefe sat in prison for 28 hours without access to an attorney, which is against the law.

-- During that time, the FBI "accidentally leaked" an affadavit about the case to the press. This is despite the fact that FBI documents are rarely leaked like this. Investigators could never put a case together if the public was being constantly alerted to their actions.

-- Almost immediately, the press began reporting that O'Keefe was accused of trying to wiretap Landrieu's phones, even though the affadavit made no mention of wiretap charges. A few newsmen called it "Watergate Jr." Countless newspapers later had to issue corrections.

-- Shortly after the scandal broke, the head prosecutor for the case, U.S. Attorney Jim Letten, suddenly recused himself for reasons unknown. Andrew Breitbart, who has sponsored much of O'Keefe's journalism in the past, accused Letten of leaking the affadavit.

-- Five days earlier, Sen. David Vitter, a Republican but an ally of Letten's, had met with Attorney General Eric Holder. Vitter had been concerned that the Justice Department would try to replace Letten. Vitter came out of the meeting saying he was satisfied that Letten would be allowed to keep his job.

Now today comes news that ACORN may be tied up in this twisted web. The criminal group has been circling a petition asking supporters to "chip-in $52 to help us keep the pressure on O’Keefe and his corporate paymasters." So ACORN is applying "pressure" in the O'Keefe case? We already know the group has a direct line to the White House through Political Director Patrick Gaspard, whose number is in Bertha Lewis' rolodex.

Meanwhile, Obama's Justice Department looms in the background, which has tripped over itself to hurt O'Keefe, but can't be bothered to look into ACORN or voter intimidation by the Black Panthers.

So what the hell is going on here? Was Letten allowed to keep his job after he leaked the affadavit? Did ACORN lean on the White House to persecute O'Keefe? And why was O'Keefe denied an attorney for more than a day? It all looks like an outrageous miscarriage of justice so Obama and company can get revenge on O'Keefe.

Illegal alien extremists dancing in the streets thanks to Obama

Yes, La Raza is clicking its heels today. Barack Obama has always been an extremist on the issue of illegal immigration, whether he tries to hide it or not. Now comes word that, at a time when our southern border is still plagued by illegal aliens and drug violence, Obama's budget cuts funding to the Border Patrol.

It's our largest federal budget in history at over $3 trillion, but one thing Obama doesn't have money for is border security. His budget will reduce the number of Border Patrol agents, even though the entire 2,000 mile expanse is guarded by only 20,000 agents. The president is also pulling $226 million from the virtual fence being built along the border, even though the fence has had great success at keeping illegal aliens out.

So what are Obama's real priorities? His stimulus gave millions of dollars to La Raza and the League of United Latin American Citizens, two extremist groups sympathetic to illegal aliens. A bill introduced by Rep. Luis Gutierrez is winding through Congress that would give amnesty to illegals already in the United States. And the Justice Department is currently at war with Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County, Arizona, whose aggressive tactics have gone a long way towards battling illegal immigration.

Hat tip to Jim Gilchrist of the Minuteman Project.

More hypocrisy at the Justice Department

So the Black Panthers are free as a bird but small towns in Texas are on notice?

Barack Obama's Justice Department announced today that it will send observers to monitor a special municipal election in Hondo, Texas. Municipal elections are done entirely at the town level, but Eric Holder wants to send G-Men to stand guard. Why? He's worried that voters who want to vote in Spanish won't be able to do so.

Hondo does have a substantial Mexican population. But after Holder sat on his hands for a year and refused to prosecute the Black Panthers who violently bullied voters in Philadelphia, he now thinks it's necessary to mobilize the Justice Department to protect Hispanic voters in a small town of 8,000 people in Texas? It's further evidence of the radicalism and hypocrisy that have completely permeated Barack Obama's Justice Department.

Eric Holder's illegal immigration hypocrisy

Barack Obama's attorney general, Eric Holder, gave a speech at the National Sheriffs' Association 2010 Winter Conference today. In the midst of his speech, Holder made an outrageously hypocritical statement.

"Some of you work along our southwest border. You know, as surely as I do, that we simply cannot afford to ignore the problem of illegal immigration. Several of you have reached out to us and to our colleagues across the Administration. You’ve warned that tension is building."

There's one sheriff in the southwest who has been extremely effective: Joe Arpaio. Fed up with illegal immigration in Maricopa County, Arpaio began jailing illegal immigrants in tent cities surrounding by barbed wire. He also forced them to wear chains and bright pink jumpsuits. His techniques worked well. But Arpaio has been under attack since the Obama administration since literally day one: last year, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano actually stripped him of his authority. Holder cannot be serious about battling illegal immigration in the southwest as long as he keeps going after Joe Arpaio.

Barack Obama's Sotomayor Justice

Remember the New Haven firefighters? They studied hard and passed an exam qualifying them to be firefighters in the city of New Haven, Connecticut. But their results were thrown out after New Haven determined that the test was invalid because not enough African-Americans had scored highly. The firemen sued the city and Barack Obama's Supreme Court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor, ruled against them.

This toxic racism has spread from Sotomayor's office to Barack Obama's Justice Department. Today, Justice announced that it is suing the state of New Jersey. Why? New Jersey requires candidates seeking to become police sergeants to take an exam, and not enough African-Americans and Hispanics are passing.

According to the press release, Justice wasn't going to allow any employment practices that resulted in something called "disparate impact." Disparate impact, also known as adverse impact, is a legal theory loved by liberals that forbids any employment practice "that does not appear to be discriminatory on its face; rather it is one that is discriminatory in its application or effect." It's affirmative action gone wild -- if enough minorities can't pass the test, then the test itself is illegal, even if the intent was never to discriminate.

This travesty of a lawsuit is the result of Thomas Perez, the head of the Justice Department Civil Rights Division. Perez has pledged to increase hate crime prosecutions, among other racially discriminatory practices. He has promised to use his position to make sure any alleged victims of discrimination "are made whole." Thanks to disparate impact, Obama's Justice Department will practice Sotomayor Justice -- judging by skin color rather than the law.