During a bond hearing today prosecutors say the FBI is still investigating whether a 32-year-old Yujing Zhang, the Chinese woman accused of lying to illegally enter President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, is a spy.

After a search warrant, additional spy tech was found in her hotel room including: $7,500 in one hundred dollar bills; a signal detector device to find hidden cameras; nine USB drives, five SIM cards and an additional cell phone.  Sketchy… all of it.

(Via CBS) A federal prosecutor says a Chinese woman who was arrested for illegally entering President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club had a device to detect hidden cameras in her hotel room when Secret Service agents searched it.

Speaking at Yujing Zhang’s bail hearing Monday in West Palm Beach, Florida, prosecutor Rolando Garcia said agents also found U.S. and Chinese currency in her room, along with nine USB drives and five USB cards. She’s charged with lying to a federal agent and illegal entering.

Secret Service agents arrested the 32-year-old woman on March 30 after they say she gained admission by falsely telling a checkpoint she was a member.

Inside, they say she told a front-desk clerk she was there for a nonexistent Chinese American event. She was arrested after agents say they found her carrying four cellphones, an external hard drive and a thumb drive with computer malware installed.

The purpose of the hearing Monday is to determine if Zhang should be released on bond. Federal prosecutors believe she’s a flight risk.  (read more)

A little backstory…  Long-time CTH readers will note we have been recommending since candidate Trump first announced, when Donald Trump won the presidency one of the priorities should be to put the Secret Service back into the U.S. Treasury Department.

The reasoning for our recommendations beginning in 2015 was simple: the scale of opposition to an outsider as President would be off-the-charts.  DHS is a multi-layered matrix of conflicting political interests and career bureaucrats with internal agendas.

The recently visible political bias within the FBI is an example of the same issues likely to exist within another massive bureaucracy of the DHS.  Removing the U.S. Secret Service, and putting them back into Treasury, would give them operational independence and renewed clarity of purpose.  Current structures are just too sketchy.  That said, here’s the latest…

(CNN) United States Secret Service director Randolph “Tex” Alles is being removed from his position, multiple administration officials tell CNN.

President Donald Trump instructed his acting chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney, to fire Alles. Alles remains in his position as of now but has been asked to leave.

The USSS director was told two weeks ago there would be a transition in leadership and he was asked to stay on until there was a replacement, according to a source close to the director.

Secret Service officials have been caught by surprise with the news and are only finding out through CNN, according to the source.

White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said later Monday that Trump has picked James M. Murray, a career USSS official, to replace Alles. (read more)

 

Statement from White House:

(link)

There has been something more opaque happening in the background recently…. This story is likely connected to several other elements yet to fully surface.  President Trump has excellent instincts.

According to multiple media reports, with a growing crisis at the U.S-Mexico border, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen has resigned and President Trump has just confirmed via tweet:

UPDATE: Resignation letter below

(Source Link)

National Economic Council Chairman Larry Kudlow appears on Face The Nation to discuss issues with the U.S-Mexico border and possible economic ramifications if the security issues are not addressed. Additionally, Kudlow discusses the USMCA trade deal and the status of current negotiations with China.

So, Democrats and The Big Club want to play Lawfare with the border crisis?  Well, this is not an ordinary President.  In a move that is straight out of the Alinsky ‘make them play by their own rules‘ playbook, President Trump enforces the rules.

Amid a crisis of growing consequence, President Trump announces deployment of additional 750 Border Agents to U.S-Mexico specific ports of entry:

What President Trump is doing here is a process colloquially called extreme compliance. It is a strategy usually deployed by left-wing activists.  There was an example a few years ago of a group of drivers driving the speed limit, not an single MPH faster, on a six lane highway.  Every car went the speed limit and only the speed limit; not a single car broke the law, but traffic backed up for miles.

Enforcing rules/laws, and not breaking them, creates consequences.  In the example of opening up all points of entry to CBP checkpoints, well, that leads to consequences.  In a rather prescient CTH comment, the possibility of this approach was predicted:

Extreme Compliance – If the President wants to … he might have another card up his sleeve. There are interior checkpoints operated by the border patrol on the I5 and I15 (northbound) freeways. These are the only routes out of the San Diego area to Orange and Riverside counties and all points past them.

Moreover, when they are operating traffic backs up for miles. Imagine if they were operating continuously and more deliberately then normal (due to the increased border crossings). Traffic would come to a complete halt from San Diego to Orange and Riverside counties.

Republicans refuse to accept that normal political back and forth no longer applies. The political environment is a knife fight and we all know what the rules are for that.

Funny how that happens….