In last week’s edition of our NR podcast, The McCarthy Report, Rich and I spent the first half of our discussion digging in to the knotty issues of birthright citizenship and the 14th Amendment, including whether — assuming for argument’s sake that birthright citizenship is not mandated by the Amendment — the president has the power to change current policy (or is it law?) by executive order. I won’t belabor the discussion further, having had plenty to say about it in the weekend column and in an earlier column last week. Basta!
The second half of the podcast homes in on some issues that deserve more attention in the wake of the horrific massacre two Saturdays ago at the synagogue in the Squirrel Hill section of Pittsburgh. Rich pressed me on why I don’t think we need new domestic-terrorism laws to deal with white-supremacist groups — an issue I’ve dealt with a few times over the years, most recently in connection with Antifa (see here). We also talk about why I don’t think the synagogue murders should be a federal prosecution (which I explained in this column — the Justice Department has filed its complaint, and has indicated an indictment alleging death-penalty charges is imminent). I relate my personal horror story about a very tough state attempted-murder that I tried to prosecute as a federal racketeering case.
We also talk a bit about the arrest of the pipe bomber; touch on the intriguing Politico reporting that suggests Special Counsel Mueller is in a secret grand-jury litigation to try to force a witness to testify (is it the president?); and take a look back at the truly abominable Whitey Bulger, the Boston mobster who was killed in federal prison last week.
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