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Author: Mary Chastain

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Mary Chastain

Mary is the resident libertarian. She covers stories in every vertical, but her favorite thing to do is take on the media. She saw its bias against the right when she was a socialist.

Mary loves the Chicago Cubs, Chicago Blackhawks, tennis, cats, Oxford comma, Diet Coke, and needlework.

The United Nations International Organization for Migration (IOM) has found slave markets along migrant routes in Africa from the Sahara to Libya, which is where the majority of the migrants will take another dangerous journey to Europe. The staff found out that "hundreds of young African men are being traded in public in what they described as slave markets." From The Independent:
“The situation is dire,” Mohammed Abdiker, IOM’s Director of Operation and Emergencies, warned.

Kansas Treasurer Ron Estes won the special election in the 4th district against Democratic civil rights attorney James Thompson. Estes won with 52% of the vote. Democrats tried to spin the win into a positive because the margin of victory was small. Naturally, many members of the political media joined them.

President Donald Trump met with CEOs along with five Cabinet members again today to discuss tax reform, NAFTA, and Dodd-Frank. He believes reforming all of those will help domestic businesses. Fox Business reported:
“At the top of our agenda is creating great high paying jobs for American workers ... We've created over 600,000 jobs already … and it's catching on,” the president told the press Tuesday, before adding Americans can expect “some pleasant surprises” regarding NAFTA.

A federal judge has again rejected the 2011 Texas voter ID law, stating that the legislators meant to discriminate against minority voters. U.S. District Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos made this same ruling in 2014, which forced an appeal. The Fifth Circuit issued a stay against the order. The Supreme Court stepped in and allowed Texas to use the voter ID law. But last July the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans asked the judge "to re-examine the decision" since the judges found that "some of the evidence used by the judge wasn't relevant." The two sides reached a deal for the 2016 election, which allowed a voter to "sign a declaration swearing that he or she has had a reasonable difficulty that prevented obtaining one of the accepted forms of photo identification."

Midterms are 18 months away, but groups on both sides have planned ads to target vulnerable Republicans over the failure to repeal or reform healthcare. Congress has begun its recess, which has led groups like Save My Care to release ads. The group has spent $1 million on TV spots this month "that highlight the members’ support for the GOP health-care plan that now stands in limbo in the House." But conservative groups have also planned ads "against moderate Republicans" they placed blame on "for the holdup on an ObamaCare repeal bill."

Dylann Roof pleaded guilty to state charges, which included murder and attempted murder, for the 2015 massacre at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, SC. Circuit Judge J.C. Nicholson sentenced Roof to life in prison without the possibility of parole. This deal "means no state trial or sentencing phase will be necessary." A federal jury sentenced Roof to death in January.

Alabama lawmakers have started impeachment hearings on Governor Robert Bentley (R) after a year of allegations concerning a sex scandal with Rebekah Caldwell Mason, his senior political advisor. Bentley decided to resign on Monday. Fox News reported:
Bentley stepped down as part of a plea deal that saw him admit to two misdemeanor campaign and ethics charges. The 74-year-old grandfather of six was given a 30-day suspended jail sentence and a year of probation. The agreement includes provisions that Bentley not seek elected office again, that he repay campaign funds totaling $36,912 within a week and perform 100 hours of community service as a physician.

White House aides have told the Associated Press that President Donald Trump has decided to scrap the tax reform plan he campaigned on and start from scratch as a way to bring in more Republicans. Trump and House Republicans already endured one defeat when many Congressional Republicans would not vote for their healthcare plan. The White House wants to take a more active role with tax reform so failure does not happen again.

The Honorable Neil Gorsuch took his Constitutional oath in a private ceremony and the Judicial Oath in the Rose Garden today to become the 113th justice of the Supreme Court. From Fox News:
Gorsuch took the Constitutional Oath in a private ceremony, administered by Chief Justice John Roberts in the Supreme Court’s Justice’s Conference Room. He was accompanied by his wife Louise, who held the Bible, and his two daughters. That oath will be followed by a public ceremony at the White House where Justice Anthony Kennedy – Gorsuch’s former boss – will administer the Judicial Oath.

Last week, Pepsi received massive backlash from people on the left and right with an ad that starred Kendall Jenner. Those on the left claimed the ad made light of the Black Lives Matter movement while the right stated it put cops in a bad light. Pepsi pulled the ad in less than 24 hours. Now one of the extras in the ad spoke with People magazine and said the majority of the actors were foreign and that he, being from Thailand, did not understand the significance of the ad.

Former Blaze employee Tomi Lahren has filed a lawsuit against Glenn Beck and The Blaze for wrongful termination and access to her Facebook page after he fired her over pro-choice views she expressed on The View:
"I can't sit here and be a hypocrite and say I'm for limited government but I think the government should decide what women do with their bodies."
The Blaze suspended Lehran a few days later before terminating her employment. The document says that Lehran "did not want to file this lawsuit, but the conduct of Defendants and their refusal to resolve this matter without court intervention" forced her hand.

On Tuesday, almost 60 people died in Syria when warplanes dropped bombs filled with chemicals. Many suspected President Bashar al-Assad's regime for the attack. Many survivors went to Turkey and the Turkish Health Ministry announced that preliminary tests showed the poison in the bombs was sarin. Well, former President Barack Obama's national security advisor Susan Rice said in January that the administration forced Assad's regime to purge its chemical weapons.

On Thursday night, President Donald Trump ordered an airstrike against Syria near an airfield where President Bashar al-Assad's regime allegedly launched a chemical attack that killed over 60 people. The U.S. military attacked the Shayrat air base near Homs with 59 Tomahawk missiles from the Mediterranean Sea, which caused immense damage "to airfields, planes and fueling facilities allegedly used by the Assad regime."

A man plowed a truck into a shopping center in Stockholm, Sweden, killing at least five people and injuring many more. Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Lofven has called it a terror attack:
"Sweden has been attacked. Everything indicates an act of terror," PM Stefan Löfven said at a press conference on Friday afternoon. "The government is informed and doing everything to help authorities with it."

Unable to accept electoral defeat, Hillary Clinton found a new reason she lost the presidential election: misogyny:
"Certainly, misogyny played a role," Clinton said at the Women of the World Summit in New York. "I mean, that just has to be admitted. And why and what the underlying reasons were is what I'm trying to parse out myself."

On April 6, 1917, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to enter World War I, 373-50, almost three years after the war began. President Woodrow Wilson vowed American neutrality, but that all changed due to Germany's submarine warfare. Wilson admitted America's tactic did not work:
"With a profound sense of the solemn and even tragical character of the step I am taking and of the grave responsibilities which it involves, but in unhesitating obedience to what I deem my constitutional duty," he said.