White House slams Tuberville for holding up Pentagon nominees over abortion policy

Haisten Willis

March 29, 05:01 PM March 29, 05:01 PM

The Alabama senator holding up military promotions over abortion policy could "absolutely" affect military readiness, the White House said Wednesday.

Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) has held up more than 160 promotions of military commanders over an abortion policy in the Department of Defense, which National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said could harm national security.

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"If it goes on too long, it can absolutely have an effect on U.S. military readiness around the world," Kirby said in response to a question from the Washington Examiner. "We noticed there were some Senate Republicans yesterday who urged Sen. Tuberville to drop these blocks themselves, and we certainly welcome that and agree with them."

The Department of Defense policy provides leave and reimbursement for service members or their spouses who need to travel to get an abortion.

Tuberville, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, has said he’ll continue to block nominations until the Pentagon rescinds the policy. The blockade now forces the Senate to consider and vote on each nomination rather than fast-tracking them and approving them in batches, severely prolonging the process.

“This is about not forcing the taxpayers of this country to fund abortion. That’s been a bipartisan consensus for more than 40 years,” Tuberville said Tuesday. “The American taxpayer [is] on the hook to pay for travel and time off for elective abortion.”

Kirby warned that the effects of Tuberville's block will get worse the longer it goes on, especially with the war in Ukraine and threats from North Korea and China lurking.

"When you hold these promotions up, there is a real ripple effect downstream," Kirby said. "Because now, people can't move on to the next job and they can't leave the one that they're in and they can't assume these new jobs of responsibility."

John Kirby 'not aware' of violent protests ahead of Trump's possible indictment

Rachel Schilke

March 19, 07:20 PM March 19, 07:30 PM

National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said the White House is "not aware" of any instances of violent protests sparked by former President Donald Trump's announcement that he expects to be arrested on Tuesday.

"We're always monitoring the situation here as best we can," Kirby said in an interview on "WHD News Sunday." "And we obviously don't want to see any activity grow violent, certainly nothing to the extent that we saw on January 6, but we're watching this. We'll watch it of course, closely."

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"We want to see if there are protests of any kind about any issue or quite frankly, let alone this, that they're peaceful," he added.

Kirby said that there are security measures in place in the event that protests do occur, stemming from a statement Trump posted to his Truth Social account on Saturday morning.

“Illegal leaks from a corrupt and highly political Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, which has allowed new records to be set in violent crime and whose leader is funded by George Soros, indicate that, with no crime being able to be proven, and based on an old and fully debunked (by numerous other prosecutors!) fairytale, the far and away leading Republican candidate and former president of the United States of America, will be arrested on Tuesday of next week,” Trump wrote on his social media platform this weekend. “Protest, take our nation back.”

Trump has repeatedly condemned the Manhattan district attorney's office's investigation into hush-money payments made to porn star Stormy Daniels in 2016. Several reports indicate that Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg is preparing to indict Trump on criminal charges. If true, it would be the first time an indictment is brought against a former United States president.

Bragg's case hinges largely on whether Trump falsified business records to list the reimbursement payments as legal expenses.

Kirby said there are no indications as of now that there will be potential violence related to the former president's calls for people to "protest."

"I'm not aware of any indications that we're preparing for that kind of activity, specifically, with respect to those comments," Kirby said. "But obviously, we work hand in glove with local and state authorities all around the country, and we'll continue to watch this as best we can."

Bragg sent an email to employees on Saturday evening stating they "do not tolerate attempts to intimidate our office or threaten the rule of law in New York."

Russia launches a new massive wave of strikes against Ukraine

Mike Brest

December 16, 10:50 AM December 16, 10:50 AM

Russian forces launched their latest barrage of missiles across Ukrainian territory, damaging Ukraine’s energy infrastructure in several regions on Friday.

Ukraine’s ministry of defense said it had destroyed 60 of the 76 air and sea-based cruise missiles fired at targets across the country from Ukraine’s capital city of Kyiv, as well as in the northeastern city of Kharkiv and the central city of Kryvyi Rih. Kyiv, Odesa, Poltava, Zhytomyr, Kharkiv, and Sumy all reported strikes.

Ukrainian Energy Minister Herman Halushchenko said “nine power generation facilities” were damaged in Friday’s attacks. The damage will lead to “restrictions of electricity production at nuclear generation facilities,” he added.

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At least two people were killed, and eight more were injured, when a residential building was hit by one of the strikes in Kryvyi Rih, officials said, according to the Washington Post. Most of the missiles had been targeted at Kyiv.

White House National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications John Kirby told reporters on Friday that the attacks hit “largely civilian infrastructure.” Kirby said Russia is “again trying to put fear into the hearts of the Ukrainian people and to make it that much harder on them as winter is now upon them.”

The United States announced late last month that it would provide more than $53 million to Ukraine to support efforts to repair the destroyed critical infrastructure that Russia has spent weeks deliberately targeting. Kirby said that the first tranche had “arrived in Ukraine.”

“It includes the kinds of equipment that they need to make emergency repairs, such as relays, and bus bars, and surge arresters, disconnectors, [and] circuit breakers, that kind of thing,” he said. “So this first tranche is really designed to assist them with emergency repairs, but it's just the first tranche. There will be more coming in, in coming weeks, to fulfill that pledge of more than $50 million.”

Kirby did not announce new military aid despite reports that the administration is finalizing plans to send Ukraine the Patriot missile defense system. While the highly sophisticated U.S. system that is designed to track and intercept incoming ballistic and cruise missiles would help Ukraine, it would also likely take weeks or months of training in a third country before Ukrainians would have the system on the battlefield.

US must have 'record' financial investment at the border to halt terrorists: John Kirby

Ryan King

September 24, 03:25 PM September 24, 03:25 PM

In purchase to safeguard the United States from any felony features slipping in by way of the southern border, the Biden administration sought a "document" volume of financial commitment in protection actions, according to White House Nationwide Security Council spokesman John Kirby.

When underscoring that the Biden administration is "operating really hard to secure the border" and has troops stationed there to help the Border Patrol, Kirby threw shade at Republicans for blocking the "record" degree of border funding the Biden administration pursued from Congress previously this yr.

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"We continue to have troops that are down there aiding Border Patrol officers to check out to focus on this. We requested for document concentrations of funding for DHS. Sad to say, there was no Republican assistance for that," Kirby explained to WHD News Electronic.

In April, Republicans opposed a funding ask for from the Biden administration to tackle the expiration of the pandemic-period Title 42 plan, which denied immigrants entry at the border to assistance sluggish the spread of the coronavirus. Republicans had been opposed to allowing that plan to expire in the 1st area.

Kirby was pressed on no matter if he believed it was a wise plan to permit an open border amid remnants of terrorist groups, this kind of as the Islamic State and al Qaeda, reportedly running in the region. So considerably, the U.S. had a report 2.3 million arrests at the U.S.-Mexico border for the fiscal 12 months of 2022, which ends Friday.

"We are doing the job really hard to secure the border by way of trying to spend in innovative abilities," Kirby pressured in reaction to Fox Digital. "So, we're going to continue to keep at this, and we naturally want to unquestionably really encourage more aid coming from the Republican side for some of the points that we're seeking to do."

A amount of Republican-led states have begun sending illegal immigrants to metropolitan areas run by Democrats in protest of the mass inflow, which includes asylum-seekers pouring as a result of the southern border. Previously this month, for example, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott sent two busloads of immigrants shut to the home of Vice President Kamala Harris.

In addition to border security problems, Kirby also lambasted Russian President Vladimir Putin for leaning on nuclear weapons as "blackmail" in opposition to the West.

"I can explain to you, we have observed no indication that tells us we have to have to improve our strategic deterrent posture. Rather than blustering and professing he's staying blackmailed by other nations about the planet, he wants to finish the war," the Countrywide Stability Council spokesman explained. "He wants to pull his troops out. It could conclude now if he would do the suitable thing."