Tag: fight
Lauren Boebert

Police Probe Boebert's Latest 'Physical' Confrontation With Ex-Husband

A Colorado police department is actively investigating "an alleged physical altercation" between US Representative Lauren Boebert and her ex-husband, Jayson Boebert, that occurred Saturday night, The Daily Beast's Roger Sollenberger exclusively reports.

A Boebert aide told Sollenberger, "Jayson Boebert had called the police to the Miner's Claim restaurant in Silt, claiming that he was a 'victim of domestic violence.' The aide emphasized that Lauren Boebert denies any allegation of domestic violence on her part, and that the events as depicted in social media posts on Saturday were not accurate."

The aide also confirmed "police did come" but no one was arrested, and "a friend drove Boebert home."

When Jayson Boebert spoke to the Beast about the incident, he said, "I don’t know what to say."

According to the report, the incident occurred when Jayson Boebert apologized to the GOP congresswoman following a prior incident, and asked to meet. Rep. Boebert agreed, but only if the meeting could take place in public — which led the former couple to "Miner's Claim, a restaurant in Boebert's small hometown of Silt."

The senior political reporter notes:

Inside, at the table, Jayson Boebert apparently started 'being disrespectful,' 'being an a**hole,' and getting 'lewd,' the aide relayed. The alleged behavior revolted Lauren Boebert, but that seemed to make her ex more aggressive, the aide said. There was then apparently a physical altercation of indeterminate severity.

Jayson Boebert 'made a motion' towards his ex-wife, 'to grab her.' It was 'an aggressive move, not romantic,' the aide relayed.

As Lauren Boebert described it, the aide said, she tried again to keep him back and in the process 'put her hand in his face, put her hand on his nose.' (The Muckrackers’ post describes a violent confrontation, with the congresswoman landing two punches on her ex’s nose. The aide said that Boebert maintains she didn’t punch him.)

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

Iraq’s Largest Refinery Ablaze As Militants, Government Fight For Control

Iraq’s Largest Refinery Ablaze As Militants, Government Fight For Control

By Mitchell Prothero, McClatchy Foreign Staff

IRBIL, Iraq — Skirmishes over Iraq’s largest oil refinery left part of the facility ablaze Wednesday as Islamic militants battled Iraqi security forces for control.

Iraqi state television reported that security forces remained in control of the refinery and electric-generation plants in Baiji, just north of the rebel-held city of Tikrit. But witnesses contacted by independent Iraqi media outlets reported that fighters from the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria and their Sunni Muslim tribal allies had taken over at least portions of the facility and sent home the workers trapped inside.

Black plumes of smoke could be seen from at least a dozen burning storage tanks on local television stations as much of Iraq went into a panic over the possibility of a sustained gasoline shortage in a country already forced to import more than 100,000 barrels of gasoline a day because of high demand and crumbling infrastructure.

In addition to Tuesday’s announcement that the government had shut off the oil supply to the facility — either to stop the output from falling into ISIS’ hands or to prevent the facility from exploding amid the fighting — the German firm Siemens and the security company Olive said they’d cleared dozens of foreign workers and security guards from the complex, which has been surrounded by militants since much of northern Iraq fell in last week’s surprise takeover. The government, however, denied that foreign workers had left.

Government helicopters reportedly struck either the facility itself or rebel positions close by and, according to some witnesses talking to local media, caused the fires.

One executive with a Western oil-services company that’s working in Irbil — who spoke only on the condition of anonymity so as not to annoy the Iraqi government, which he does business with — said control of the facility appeared to be split between militants and an army unit that had been sneaked into the area recently to reinforce the beleaguered security guards usually assigned to protect it.

“We don’t exactly know, because Baghdad has lost all credibility with the oil industry this week,” the executive said. “They keep announcing things they wish were true instead of giving us the information we need to make proper decisions.”

He added: ‘This does not inspire confidence in their competence or their handle on events on the ground.”

Little in the performance of the Iraqi government has inspired much confidence of late, as tens of thousands of soldiers and police officers deserted their posts and fled the battlefield when ISIS — which previously had controlled large chunks of eastern Syria and the western Iraq province of Anbar — suddenly materialized in force on June 9. Within 24 hours, ISIS had overrun the northern city of Mosul, the country’s second largest, capturing huge amounts of military hardware and perhaps hundreds of millions of dollars from banks.

Within days, the group’s militants had reached the northernmost edges of Baghdad’s suburbs, backed by what appears to be a broad Sunni rebellion against the Shiite-dominated government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who’s been widely accused at home and abroad of fostering unrest with sectarian political policies.

In Irbil — which remains quiet and under the control of the semiautonomous Kurdistan Regional Government despite a local gasoline refinery remaining online — the loss of the highway from Turkey through Mosul, on top of the loss of the Baiji facility, caused a mild panic. Motorists faced long lines and severe limits on gasoline purchases.

But the oil industry executive said an impending shortage was, at least so far, unlikely to be truly disruptive.

“It’s a lot longer trip now (avoiding Mosul), but the Turks want to make money and can send it by land,” he said. “This seems a combination of both prudent rationing and psychological panic as people realize the conflict isn’t going away.”

Ahmad Al-Rubaye via Flickr

Kerry Says Five Released Taliban Risk Death If They Fight Again

Kerry Says Five Released Taliban Risk Death If They Fight Again

By Katherine Skiba, Chicago Tribune

WASHINGTON — Secretary of State John F. Kerry, in his first remarks on the prisoner swap involving American soldier Bowe Bergdahl, warned Sunday that the five released Taliban leaders risk being killed by the United States if they re-enter the fight.

He spoke as reports emerged that Bergdahl, held for five years and released May 31, had been locked in a metal cage for long periods as punishment for trying to escape his captors.

Bergdahl’s release in exchange for five Guantanamo Bay detainees dominated the Sunday talk shows amid reports that the FBI was investigating death threats against Bergdahl’s family.

Kerry, talking about the prospect of the former Guantanamo prisoners returning to the battlefield, said: “I’m not telling you that they don’t have some ability at some point to go back and get involved, but they also have an ability to get killed doing that.”

Speaking on CNN’s “State of the Union,” he said Qatar, where the Taliban leaders will live for one year, would be monitoring the men and that the U.S. would also keep an eye on them. Asked whether he meant the U.S. would kill them, he replied, “Nobody, no one should doubt the capacity of America to protect Americans.”

Sen. John McCain, who was held captive in Vietnam for more than five years, took issue with Kerry in a separate interview on the same program, saying that 30 percent of the detainees released from Guantanamo Bay had resumed fighting and “we certainly haven’t been able to kill all of them.”

“So what we’re doing here is … reconstituting the Taliban government, the same guys that are mass murderers,” said McCain, an Arizona Republican who was the 2008 GOP presidential nominee.

McCain said he had previously signed off on the outlines of a prisoner swap to retrieve Bergdahl, but not specifically the “top five picked by the Taliban.”

Asked whether reports that Bergdahl deserted his Army unit made him less worthy of rescue, McCain said no. But he added that the obligation to bring back captured military personnel had to be weighed against whether the effort “would put the lives of other American men and women who are serving in danger.”

“And in my view, this clearly would,” he said.

Top Senate Intelligence Committee officials, including Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., said they had not been briefed by the Obama administration on Bergdahl being tortured or kept in a cage, allegations first reported Saturday on the New York Times website. Feinstein chairs the committee; its top Republican lawmaker, Sen. Saxby Chambliss of Georgia, echoed her.

Both said they had heard “rumors” that Bergdahl had tried to flee and both had concerns about the prisoner swap and what they saw as the administration’s lack of openness with congressional leaders. They spoke on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”

“What’s unfortunate is that I see no sign of the Taliban relenting,” Feinstein said. “And so some of us worry very much when we pull out (of Afghanistan), the Taliban finds its way back into power. And that would be tragic.”

David Rohde, who was abducted by the same Taliban faction as Bergdahl more than five years ago while on leave from The New York Times to write a book, said news reports about Bergdahl enduring harsh treatment sounded “very credible.”

Rohde, who also spoke on “Face the Nation,” escaped after being held hostage for eight months.

Now working for Reuters, he said Bergdahl needed to explain why he left his Army outpost, but cautioned that many rumors surrounded his own kidnapping in 2008. The journalist said he still regretted going to an interview with a Taliban official that led to his abduction near the Afghan capital, Kabul.

Of Bergdahl, Rohde said: “He will regret this for the rest of his life, I guarantee you.”

Rohde said he had spoken to Bergdahl’s parents, and alluded to the reports of death threats against them. “They are heartbroken by what’s been happening,” he said.

If any U.S. troops had died in the search for Bergdahl, “that would break their hearts as well,” he said.

©afp.com / Jacquelyn Martin

Detroit Teacher Who Broke Up Fight With Broom Gets Her Job Back

Detroit Teacher Who Broke Up Fight With Broom Gets Her Job Back

By Robert Allen, Detroit Free Press

DETROIT — A Detroit high school teacher fired after using a broom to break up a vicious fight in a classroom is getting back her job with retroactive pay, school district officials announced Tuesday.

Tiffani Eaton was fired May 1, one day after the incident at Pershing High School, where the fight erupted between two boys.

She will have the option of returning to the school or another school in the district of her choosing, according to the Education Achievement Authority of Michigan.

Eaton recently was represented by Abood Law Firm as it worked to get her termination reversed. Attorney Jeffrey Lance Abood issued a statement Tuesday morning saying that they appreciate the EAA acknowledging “that their previous action was wrong,” and they’re working with the school district to resolve the matter before Eaton will make a comment.

Principal Gregory King had said in an emailed statement that the firing seemed illegal and “basic investigation procedures usually followed were not undertaken.”

He also said he has asked repeatedly for safety-committee meetings and for administrators to address insufficient security at the school, which is guarded at the entrance with metal detectors.

Present and former students of the school had a mixed reaction to Eaton’s firing, with some saying she didn’t have any better options but others saying she went too far by striking a student.

In a video obtained by Fox 2, one boy appears to be pummeling another in the head when Eaton steps in to break up the fight.

The Education Achievement Authority is a statewide body that takes over failing schools. It was responsible for the firing and reinstatement.