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Author: Kemberlee Kaye

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Kemberlee Kaye

Kemberlee Kaye is the Senior Contributing Editor of Legal Insurrection, where she has worked since 2014 and is the Director of Operations and Editorial Development for the Legal Insurrection Foundation. She also serves as the Managing Editor for CriticalRace.org, a research project of the Legal Insurrection Foundation.

She has a background working in immigration law, and as a grassroots organizer, digital media strategist, campaign lackey, and muckraker. Over the years Kemberlee has worked with FreedomWorks, Americans for Prosperity, James O'Keefe's Project Veritas, and US Senate re-election campaigns, among others. 

Kemberlee, her daughter, and her son live a lovely taco-filled life in their native Texas.

You can reach her anytime via email at kk @ legalinsurrection.com.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 21, 2015 16 Comments

First, she came prepared with her hometown paper. You know, just in case she got bored:

Then, she got to enjoy the company of her coworkers.

But since this year's State of the Union address was just like every.other.state.of.the.union.address President Obama has given, Ginsberg decided to take a beat mid-speech. Being a Supreme Court Justice is hard work, you know.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 19, 2015 31 Comments
American Sniper opened this weekend, raking in $90.2 million and earning the attention of moviegoers and pundits on both sides of the aisle. Clint Eastwood masterminded the Oscar nominated film that chronicles the life of Iraq War veteran, Chris Kyle, and earned himself the best opening weekend of his career. Bradley Cooper who stars as Kyle, began working on the project in 2012. In an interview with the Navy Times, Cooper explained:
"There hasn't been a character study of a soldier that's gone through this war that I've seen on film," he said. "I liked that idea, and I thought framing it as a Western would be very interesting."
Cooper worked with the men who trained Kyle on sniper weapons. He told The Navy Times:
"The one thing that I could control is, I wanted it to look like this guy that you're watching is very familiar and dexterous with his weapons, and I felt successful with that."
Cooper's portrayal of Kyle was so successful that Kyle's widow told the Military Times she felt as though she was watching her late husband on the silver screen, not Cooper.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 19, 2015 31 Comments
First and foremost, Happy Martin Luther King, Jr. Day! In 1983, President Reagan signed Martin Luther King, Jr. day into law. Even so, it wasn't until 2000 that all states observed the day as intended. 2000. That's... incredible. So called 'controversial figures' are always difficult to discuss. Regardless of what I write, someone, many even, will inevitably comment about King's shortcomings, his failures, maybe even his alleged infidelities. Yet none of those things detract from what Dr. King accomplished on the civil rights front nor the legacy of hope he left behind. God how I wish he were here today. I've often wondered if we would've been spared the pestilence of the Sharpton's and Jackson's of this world had Dr. King survived. So abundant are King's words of wisdom; the truths he left with us, that it's always hard to pick one. So this Martin Luther, King, Jr. Day, I pick love.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 18, 2015 19 Comments
Why fix what you can abolish? The scandal-laden IRS has found itself a new adversary in Senator Cruz. Last week, Senator Cruz called for abolishing the IRS while joking that sending the agencies 110,000 employees to the Southern border was a better use of their time. Fox News reports:
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) emphatically denounced the IRS this week in a Heritage Foundation speech, saying that that the agency doesn't need to be reformed, it needs to be "abolished." Now that Republicans control Congress, Cruz said the party must seize on the opportunity to simplify the tax code and make it fairer. “The last two years have fundamentally changed the dynamics of this debate [on the tax code],” he said. “As we have seen the weaponization of the IRS, as we have seen the Obama administration using the IRS in a partisan manner to punish its political enemies.”

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 18, 2015 18 Comments
Have you been struggling to talk to your kids about immigration? Worried they might not understand our immigration policy? Have you been pacing back and forth at night wondering how to explain that America is a nation of immigrants; and oh god, what about this whole "melting pot" thing or is it a "salad bowl" these days? Worry no more. TIME has you covered.
News stories about the debate over the DREAM act, the tens of thousands of children who arrive unaccompanied in the U.S. each year and even the backlash against immigrants in Europe after the Charlie Hedbo killings can raise all kinds of questions and stir up all kinds of emotions for kids. This is especially true when they involve children being separated from their parents.
I distinctly remember laying in bed after an arduous day at German kindergarten, wondering how the President's immigration policy, and Euro-Arab relations would affect me. Not really, but if I had, this article would've undoubtedly improved my entire childhood. To bring clarification to the matter of immigration, children, and communication, TIME chatted with what appears to be a completely and totally unbiased, objective, and nonpartisan source, Professor of Education at Claremont Graduate University and author of Americans By Heart: Undocumented Latino Students and the Promise of Higher Education, William Perez who made the following suggestions:

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 16, 2015 18 Comments
This, ladies and gentleman, is our Department of State. Just call out their name and you know where ever they are, they'll come running with a hashtag or cheesy publicity stunt. After the terrorist attack workplace violence incident that took place at Charlie Hebdo, our response to one of our longest standing allies and friends is... James Taylor. Nous sommes tres insultant. Taylor performed "You've Got a Friend" at a press conference held by Secretary Kerry in Paris:

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 16, 2015 8 Comments
This day in 1919 was irrefutably one of the darkest days in American history -- the day the 18th amendment to the Constitution was ratified, making Prohibition the law of the land. Forever the hallmark of nanny-statism run amok, Prohibition was a progressive dream come true -- an amendment to the Constitution that limited freedoms rather than securing them. Interestingly enough, the 16th amendment paved the way for the 18th amendment. With the income tax in place, the federal government was no longer reliant upon taxes from alcohol producers. In his documentary Prohibition (which I highly recommend), Ken Burns explains:

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 15, 2015 32 Comments
Two days ago, Duke made headlines when it was revealed that the Muslim call to prayer would be played from the campus chapel bell tower on a weekly basis. Fox News reported: Amidst mounting pressure Duke has decided not proceed with playing the call to prayer on campus.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 15, 2015 6 Comments
As Congress struggles to fight Obama's executive immigration overreach, Speaker Boehner compiled a list of 22 times Obama said he couldn't create his own immigration law. March 31, 2008: “I take the Constitution very seriously. The biggest problems that we’re facing right now have to do with [the president] trying to … not go through Congress at all. And that’s what I intend to reverse when I’m President...” May 19, 2008: “I believe in the Constitution and I will obey the Constitution of the United States.”

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 14, 2015 11 Comments
2015: the year feminism won all the things... or at least an entire award show. Nestled in between articles like, "The Thong is Dead!" and "17 Butts From 'Dating Naked,'" the astute publication Cosmopolitan recounted the Golden Globe award show in an intellectually stimulating article entitled, "Who Won the Golden Globes? Women. Feminism got top billing at last night's awards." The article explains:
At the Golden Globes last night, it was hard to miss the feminist overtones. Two funny female hosts. Shout-outs and thank-yous to the trans community. Some of Hollywood's most seasoned feminist activists taking the mic. Famous men declaring themselves proud husbands. Recognition of rape survivors.
But what about Amy Adams who had the gall to thank strong women in the room for being fabulous role models?
Some of the feminism on display was the kind of cookie-cutter you-go-girl-ism present at just about any award show in the past 30 years — see Amy Adams breathlessly thanking all the strong women in the room for being good role models for her 4-year-old daughter.
Pssh. So, 2014. Get with the times, Amy!
That desire to be heard and recognized set the tone for the night, and women led the way.
Sometimes I think "feminists" live in an alternative universe. How have women in this country been ignored?

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 13, 2015 16 Comments
In December, 4 governors and 14 states filed suit, requesting a preliminary injunction from President Obama's executive overreach. Lead by then Texas AG (now Governor) Abbott, the complaint stated, "This lawsuit is not about immigration. It is about the rule of law, presidential power, and the structural limits of the U.S. Constitution." The Abbott lead complaint cited numerous damning examples of the President's insistence on circumventing Congress, beginning with the his most recent venture in bypassing Congress to unilaterally implement immigration reform:
"On November 20, 2014, the President of the United States announced that he would unilaterally suspend the immigration laws as applied to 4 million of the 11 million undocumented immigrants in the United States. The President candidly admitted that, in so doing, he unilaterally rewrote the law: “What you’re not paying attention to is, I just took an action to change the law.”
Equipped with reinforcements, House Republicans will debate a Department of Homeland Security (the agency responsible for immigration) appropriation bill Wednesday that if passed with the current amendments, would obliterate Obama's immigration executive overreach. Disarming the President's immigration action through funding was the brain child of Rep. Price.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 12, 2015 23 Comments
Dr. Ben Carson has become a fan favorite among Tea Partiers. A well-spoken, educated, political-outsider with an inspiring story, Carson has created enough excitement to inspire a national effort to draft him into a 2016 Presidential bid. Being an untried outsider might prove advantageous in some respects... until it comes time to deal with the airing of the past grievances. Those experienced in political combat have well-trained, battle-ready teams to deal with any unflattering press that might surface. Last week, would-be 2016 presidential contender Dr. Ben Carson apologized for plagiarism. Buzzfeed unearthed attribution issues in Carson's book 2012 book, America the Beautiful. National Review reported:
America the Beautiful, which mixes history, politics, and autobiography, is the first book on which Carson collaborated with his wife, who is credited on the front cover. Candy Carson, the source says, “relied heavily on the editor” to ensure all of the sources were attributed correctly. Carson’s book agent, Sealy Yates, told the Daily Caller that the Carsons “delivered a completed manuscript to the publisher and they then relied on the editorial staff, which every author does.” The book was published by Zondervan, HarperCollins’s Christian division, which is currently featuring Carson’s latest book on its web page. BuzzFeed highlights sentences in the book lifted from a number of sources, including SocialismSucks.net. Zondervan did not immediately return a request for comment.
Following the Buzzfeed report, Carson apologized. According to CNN:
"I attempted to appropriately cite and acknowledge all sources in America the Beautiful, but inadvertently missed some. I apologize, and I am working with my editors to rectify the situation," Carson said in a statement his representative, Armstrong Williams, provided to CNN.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 10, 2015 13 Comments
Yesterday, the House Appropriation's Committee released their plan to fund the Department of Homeland Security, making it the last federal agency to receive funding for this fiscal year. The appropriation bill provides additional funding and reallocates resources to strengthen border security and significantly enhance immigration enforcement. The House will debate the appropriation bill next week. Several amendments to the House appropriation bill have already been submitted. In order to prevent implementation of President Obama's immigration overreach, amendments to the appropriation bill further restrict where and how DHS funds will be spent. This was by design. As we've reported, at the center of this debate lies United States Immigration and Citizenship Services (USCIS); the department responsible for processing immigration petitions. USCIS does not receive federal funding from appropriations as it sustains itself on fees collected from petitions. The vast majority of petitions filed with USCIS are filed by immigrants in the United States legally. Whether they are applying for an extension of their green card, changing their visa type, extending lawful status, or applying for naturalization, these petitions (and many, many others) are all processed by USCIS.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 09, 2015 6 Comments
In last year's budget battle, Rep. Tom Price, incoming House Budget Committee Chairman, proposed funding the Department of Homeland Security through the end of February. (DHS oversees immigration by way of United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).) The idea was that if funding for DHS and subsequent entities were held until the Republicans had a majority in both houses, Republicans would be in a strategically advantageous position to enact substantive reforms and direct more resources to our national borders. Today, the House Appropriations Committee released the DHS appropriations bill. Next week, the bill will be considered on the House floor, making it the last of the annual appropriations bills for this fiscal year. Overall, DHS is slated to receive an increase of $400 million from last fiscal year, giving the agency a budget of $39.7 billion. As the bill currently reads, the surge in funding and substantial reallocations will be poured into enforcement agencies like Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) who are responsible for border protection and confiscating contraband, and Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) who are the "round 'em up and detain 'em while they await trial" folks. CBP will receive an extra $118 million with the aim of providing more support than the agency has ever received since it's creation in 2003. Almost $400 million is allocated to border security fencing, infrastructure, and technology. Funding has been allocated to add more than 2,000 additional CBP officers to it's current force of 21,370. CBP's total budget in this bill clocks in at $10.7 billion.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 08, 2015 50 Comments
Gendered restroom spaces have endured intense public scrutiny lately, but usually from the "stop with your fascist gender labels and let me pick my preferred pronoun!" crowd. So this piece in TIME is slightly outside of the "ban public restroom gender divisions" norm. Soraya Chemaly, the author, describes herself as a, "media critic and activist whose work focuses on the role of gender in politics, religion and popular culture." Context is important. The story begins with her visit to the the loo at The British Museum:
Despite years of “potty parity” laws, women are still forced to stand in lines at malls, schools, stadiums, concerts, fair grounds, theme parks, and other crowded public spaces. This is frustrating, uncomfortable, and, in some circumstances, humiliating. It’s also a form of discrimination, as it disproportionately affects women.
Some say "discrimination", others say "biology", but let's continue:
After counting the women, I tweeted, “Dear @britishmuseum there are FIFTY women and girls standing in line for the loo while the men’s room has zero line #everydaysexism.” Immediately, people responded with the suggestion that women use the men’s room. But even more responses were defensive, along the lines of “How on god’s green earth did you arrive at the conclusion that this was sexist?” Let me count the ways.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 08, 2015 11 Comments
Working in the political sphere has provided a sort of quasi-emotional inoculation. For the most part, I'm able to read and write about all kind of stories, tragedies, atrocities, and hypocrisies without having much more reaction than, "Seriously? You've got to be kidding me!" before moving on the next le sigh-worthy moment. I imagine doctors have a similar arrangement. It's not that they don't care, but as a matter of practicality they cannot become emotionally entangled with every single patient without risking professional burnout. But then there are stories, tragedies, atrocities, and hypocrisies too powerful for the inoculation. The destruction of Charlie Hebdo is one of those. I'm not yet able to comprehend that a group of Muslim terrorists exterminated an entire newspaper. In the most literal sense, the terrorists won. The goal was to destroy Charlie Hebdo for printing "offensive" images of Muhammad; and that's exactly what they did. Mission accomplished.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 07, 2015 42 Comments
The wake of the attacks on Charlie Hebdo is littered with a confusing mix of blame, counter blame, politically correct waffling, and outrage from every possible race and creed. Financial Times columnist Tony Barber went down the familiar road of blaming freedom of expression by way of a call for "common sense":
Charlie Hebdo is a bastion of the French tradition of hard-hitting satire. It has a long record of mocking, baiting and needling Muslims. Two years ago the magazine published a 65-page strip cartoon book portraying the Prophet’s life. And this week it gave special coverage to Soumission (“Submission”), a new novel by Michel Houellebecq, the idiosyncratic author, which depicts France in the grip of an Islamic regime led by a Muslim president. This is not in the slightest to condone the murderers, who must be caught and punished, or to suggest that freedom of expression should not extend to satirical portrayals of religion. It is merely to say that some common sense would be useful at publications such as Charlie Hebdo, and Denmark’s Jyllands-Posten, which purport to strike a blow for freedom when they provoke Muslims.
But that's just one columnist's opinion, right? (To be fair, the Financial Times editorial board went in a completely different direction.) In an op-ed from today's New York Times one Nick Kristof is ready to string up the attackers, but doesn't want to put a label on what motivated them:
One of things I’ve learned in journalism is to beware of perceiving the world through simple narratives, because then new information is mindlessly plugged into those story lines. In my travels from Mauritania to Saudi Arabia, Pakistan to Indonesia, extremist Muslims have shared with me their own deeply held false narratives of America as an oppressive state controlled by Zionists and determined to crush Islam. That’s an absurd caricature, and we should be wary ourselves of caricaturing a religion as diverse as Islam. So let’s avoid religious profiling. The average Christian had nothing to apologize for when Christian fanatics in the former Yugoslavia engaged in genocide against Muslims. Critics of Islam are not to blame because an anti-Muslim fanatic murdered 77 people in Norway in 2011. ... The great divide is not between faiths. Rather it is between terrorists and moderates, between those who are tolerant and those who “otherize.”
Who's really responsible? Maybe the Jews. Or the West. Or people who assume "freedom of expression" means freedom to insult Muhammad without getting blown away. At least that's what's swirling around on Twitter right now:
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