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The White House is accusing Israel of "cherry-picking" information that distorts the U.S. position in nuclear talks with Iran. “There's no question that some of the things that the Israelis have said in characterizing our negotiating position have not been accurate. There's no question about that,” White House press secretary Josh Earnest said during a press briefing on Wednesday. "We've also been very clear about the fact that the United States is not going to be in a position of negotiating this agreement in public, particularly when we see that there is a continued practice of cherry-picking specific pieces of...

RUSH: I need to step back a couple of steps, maybe a step and a half, on John Boehner, 'cause he was good yesterday on Fox about the upcoming Department of Homeland Security shutdown. And I kind of raked -- I didn't rake Boehner. I raked the Senate Republicans over the coals last week about this, and it was somewhat justified. I have to walk it back a little bit, because it's actually, as I said last week, and I doubt anybody's gonna remember, but it really is the Senate Democrats who are willing to shut down DHS over this....

In a move more reminiscent of Texas Senator Ted Cruz than Ohio Representative John Boehner, the House Speaker has pursued a strategy to defund President Obama’s executive action on immigration, leveraging funding for Homeland Security in the process. Bloomberg News reports: House Speaker John Boehner said he’s prepared to let funding lapse for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and blame Democrats if the Senate fails to pass a House-backed bill for the agency. … The Homeland Security Department faces a shutdown of nonessential operations if Congress does not reach agreement before current funding ends on Feb. 27. When asked...

TEL AVIV — This latest breach in the U.S.-Israeli relationship began around Jan. 12 with a phone call from Netanyahu. Obama asked the Israeli leader to hold fire diplomatically for several more months while U.S. negotiators explored whether Iran might agree to a deal that, through its technical limits on centrifuges and stockpiles, extended the breakout period that Iran would need to build a bomb to more than a year. But Netanyahu is said to have responded that a year wasn’t enough and to have reverted to Israel’s hard-line insistence that Iran shouldn’t be allowed any centrifuges or enrichment. Relations...

The head of Israel's election commission acted on Monday to limit any pre-election boost Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may get from a March 3 speech to the U.S. Congress in which he will warn of the threat from Iran's nuclear program. The speech has caused controversy in Israel and the United States, where the Democrats and the White House are angry that the Republican speaker, John Boehner, invited Netanyahu to speak at a sensitive time in the nuclear negotiations between Iran and six big powers including Washington, and only two weeks before Israel's closely fought March 17 election.

Speaker of the House John Boehner called on President Barack Obama Monday to make a decision on the Syrian conflict, but not without the approval of congress first. "The Syrian regime has blatantly crossed President Obama's red line, the White House has acknowledged, by using chemical weapons on its people," the Ohio Republican wrote in a statement. "The options facing the president are complicated, have far-reaching ramifications, and may require significant resources." "That's why, if he chooses to act, the president must explain his decision publicly, clearly, and resolutely," he added. "The president is commander-in-chief. With that power comes obligations,"...

Fox News' Chris Wallace interviews Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-In) about a lot of topics. From 4:57-8:10, they talk about Boehner's invitation to Prime Minister Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congree next month. Boehner bluntly says that he did not tell the White House he was inviting Netanyahu (contrary to earlier reports), because he did not want President Obama interfering with Prime Minister Netanyahu coming to Washington. Let's go to the videotape.

House Speaker John Boehner on Sunday accused the White House of "animosity" towards Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, whose planned speech before the US Congress has stirred up a political furor in both countries. Boehner defended his decision to invite Netanyahu to give an address on Iran's nuclear program before Congress next month, flouting diplomatic convention which says that such an invitation should have come from US President Barack Obama. Boehner said he felt it was important to do an end-run around White House "interference," amid a raging debate over whether to soften sanctions on Tehran. "I wanted to make...

House Speaker John Boehner’s on-staff amnesty advocate Becky Tallent is in talks with former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush’s potential presidential campaign for a job, meaning if she takes it she’d leave Boehner’s office. Tallent is former chief of staff to Sen. John McCain (R-AZ)—having personally crafted the amnesty bill McCain and the late Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) introduced in the twilight years of the George W. Bush administration—and then also worked on immigration policy for the Bipartisan Policy Center. “Jeb’s team is looking to hire Rebecca for policy,” a former George W. Bush White House aide told Breitbart News. “The...

At this morning’s mass in St. Martha’s House Francis talked about "the martyrs of our times, men, women, children who are being persecuted, hated, driven out of their homes, tortured, massacred … who are meeting their end under the authority of corrupt people who hate Jesus Christ”

Leading members of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) are lining up to skip a coming speech by the prime minister of Israel. Reps. John Lewis (D-Ga.), the civil rights icon, and G.K. Butterfield (D-N.C.), the chairman of the CBC, said they won't attend Benjamin Netanyahu's March 3 speech before Congress to protest Speaker John Boehner's (R-Ohio) decision to invite the prime minister without first consulting President Obama and Democratic leaders on Capitol Hill. Butterfield said that move marked an "unprecedented overreach of the Speaker’s authority" that "goes beyond the traditions of his office." "It is baffling that Speaker Boehner, who...

Pope Francis will address a joint meeting of the House and Senate on Sept. 24, becoming the first pontiff to do so, House Speaker John Boehner said Thursday. "We're humbled that the Holy Father has accepted our invitation and certainly look forward to receiving his message on behalf of the American people," Boehner, R-Ohio, told reporters. Boehner is Catholic and extended the invitation for the pope to speak to lawmakers. During his planned trip next fall, Francis is also expected to visit the White House as well as speak at the United Nations in New York and participate in a...

In a sometimes heated meeting with Israel’s ambassador to the U.S., several House Democrats expressed anger Wednesday over Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s acceptance of a Republican invitation to address Congress next month. Some of the seven lawmakers—all of whom are Jewish and strong supporters of Israel—urged the prime minister to postpone the speech or hold it somewhere other than Congress, participants said. They told Ambassador Ron Dermer that Netanyahu was unwise to accept a GOP invitation that bypassed President Barack Obama, and to schedule the speech only two weeks before Netanyahu seeks another term in Israel’s elections. The meeting’s purpose...

Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) is blaming conservative groups in Washington for turning him into a human pinata to raise money. In an interview to air on Sunday’s “60 Minutes” on CBS, Boehner said he doesn’t disagree that much with conservatives on policy, but that the groups beat “the dickens out of me” in order to line their own pockets. “The issue with the Tea Party isn’t one of strategy. It’s not one of different vision,” Boehner said, according to excerpts released by CBS. “It’s a disagreement over tactics, from time to time. Frankly, a lot is being driven by national...

During an appearance on NBC News’ “Meet the Press” on Sunday, Rep. Paul Ryan defended House Speaker John Boehner’s decision to invite Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address Congress, calling the decision “wholly appropriate.” Host Chuck Todd asked the Wisconsin Republican if it was appropriate for the legislative branch to circumvent the executive branch in matters of foreign policy. Ryan said critics of Netanyahu’s visit should look to the U.S. Constitution. “These are three separate but equal branches of government,” said Ryan. “We don’t subserve one to the other.”

Hard to miss the recently kerfuffle over the fact that the Speaker of the House, John Boehner, invited the Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, to speak to a joint session of Congress. This happened immediately after President Obama’s State of the Union speech where many thought he skirted over the crisis with Iran. The problem is almost all of the analysis has missed the point. It begins with trying to understand why Speaker Boehner gave the White House only a half-day notice of the invitation. In what was disclosed by the Washington Post, the Speaker previously had been left...

correction appearing in the New York Times quietly unravels what has become a major story as phony agitprop, intended to discredit the leaders of Israel and the House of Representatives. Of course, the story is still believed by many, and has well served those in the White House and media who created and disseminated it. Omri Ceren spotted the correction and explained on Twitter: NYT tries to promote anti-Netanyahu talking point that #Israel blindsided Obama. They got just 1 tiny detail wrong.

WASHINGTON — When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses a joint session of Congress in March, it is unclear whether everybody invited will actually show up. Democrats have criticized House Speaker John Boehner for circumventing the administration when he invited Netanyahu to speak, and the White House has already said Obama will not meet with him when he’s here. BuzzFeed News asked several Senate Democrats whether they planned on skipping the speech or not. Most said they either hadn’t thought about it or they hadn’t decided. But there were no hard answers in the negative. Only one senator definitively said...

The State of the Union address this year falls one day after the federal Martin Luther King Jr. holiday. So it's quite fitting that Speaker John Boehner have as his honored guest a black human-rights activist. But alas, said human-rights activist is also a Cuban dissident, a former political prisoner of the Castro regime and a critic of resident Obama's push to normalize relations with Cuba without any concomitant political and economic reforms on the island to empower the impoverished, oppressed people there. We will watch to see what mention, if any, is given by network journalists tonight to Jorge...

At first blush, it might seem that the White House has become unhinged over an appearance by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu before a joint session of Congress. After days of whining that Netanyahu’s appearance was not cleared with the White House, U.S. officials have taken to the press to anonymously screech and moan... ....... Ironically, the scuffle comes just after Iranian-backed Hezbollah terrorists killed two Israeli soldiers, reminding us that Iran is on the march throughout the region and that the Iranian government with which Obama hopes to achieve a grand reconciliation is committed to Israel’s destruction. UPDATE: In...