Tag: tweet

Trump Revisits Clinton Criticism in Tweets: She’s Guilty as Hell’

News that the Justice Department’s inspector general had announced a review of the FBI’s investigation into Hillary Clinton’s private email server was received warmly on Thursday by staff members from her presidential campaign.

On Friday, President-elect Donald Trump wondered aloud why Clinton’s team was so enthused.

“What are Hillary Clinton’s people complaining about with respect to the F.B.I. Based on the information they had she should never have been allowed to run – guilty as hell,” Trump wrote on Twitter Friday morning. “They were VERY nice to her. She lost because she campaigned in the wrong states – no enthusiasm!”

The FBI’s investigation into the homebrew email system Clinton maintained during her tenure as secretary of state was a thorn that her campaign was unable to remove from its side throughout the election. The issue was seemingly closed in early July when FBI Director James Comey announced at a press conference that Clinton’s system did not rise to the level of criminal activity and that he would recommend against filing any criminal charges.

But the email issue unexpectedly resurfaced 11 days before the election when Comey wrote a letter to Congress announcing that the bureau was examining potentially new evidence in the case. That new evidence ultimately amounted to nothing, but on a conference call with donors just days after her defeat, Clinton herself blamed Comey’s letter for her loss.

“My reaction is that it’s entirely appropriate and very necessary but also not surprising,” Clinton’s campaign press secretary Brian Fallon said Thursday on MSNBC when asked about the inspector general’s announced review. “Because the deviations from the protocols at the FBI and the Justice Department were so glaring and egregious in terms of their handling of not just the email investigation into Secretary Clinton but just in general, the amount of leaks that were coming from the FBI throughout the election and even post-election, is something that…I think most observers and former officials at the Justice Department realized cried out for an independent review.”

Joel Benenson, a pollster and strategist for Clinton’s campaign, said that Comey’s last minute letter to Congress manifested itself in polling data as a drag on enthusiasm towards the former secretary of state and a boost in momentum for Trump’s supporters. Benenson was clear that “nobody’s trying to relitigate the election here,” but that the FBI’s public actions so close to Election Day are worthy of further scrutiny.

“If you go back and look at what professionals said at the time, Mr. Comey made his announcement 11 days before an election, Republican and democratic prosecutors, former FBI people, said this was inappropriate, this was unprecedented, it violated every principle in the FBI,” Benenson said in his own appearance on MSNBC Thursday. “I think when prosecutors abuse their power, and people inside that agency advised him not to take that action, it is appropriate they look into this to make sure that if he did violate rules, procedures, he’s held accountability like anybody else would be.”

(h/t Politico)

Reality

The FBI cleared Hillary Clinton in July and AGAIN in November.

Trump Just Used His Presidential Power to Advertise a Donor

After the co-owner of retailer L.L. Bean expressed support for President-elect Donald Trump, the future leader of the United States urged his 19.6 million Twitter followers to buy the company’s goods.

The unprecedented endorsement came less than two hours after Linda Bean said on a talk show early Thursday that anti-Trump groups are browbeating American businesses, an effort she called “un-American.” “It’s a case of bullying,” Bean said on Fox and Friends. “I’m not going to back down. I never back down.”

Bean, a granddaughter of L.L. Bean founder Leon Leonwood Bean, contributed $30,000 to a pro-Trump super PAC called Making America Great Again LLC between August and October of last year, according to recently amended federal filings. Another $15,000 was contributed by Maine resident Diana Bean, the name of Linda’s sister.

The PAC, which also goes by Making Maine Great Again, ran a spate of TV and radio ads in the state toward the end of the campaign.

It was not until this month, however, that Linda Bean’s support for Trump burst into public view, when the Federal Election Commission alerted the group that it had erroneously formed as a traditional PAC, which can legally only accept donations up to $5,000.

That prompted Grab Your Wallet, a boycott effort against companies that carry Trump brand products or have other connections to the president-elect, to add L.L. Bean to its list. Organizers have said they will not take L.L. Bean off its website until Linda Bean is ejected from the board.

The company has asked for the boycott to be dropped, saying that the corporation has no connection to the PAC.

“We are deeply troubled by the portrayal of L.L.Bean as a supporter of any political agenda,” Executive Chairman Shawn Gorman posted on Facebook on Jan. 8. “L.L.Bean does not endorse political candidates, take positions on political matters, or make political contributions.”

Katherine DeCelles, a Harvard business professor who focuses on ethics, said no White House leader in modern history has used their platform to hawk products.

“It’s unprecedented,” she said, “for someone of his power voicing his support or being against particular companies.”

Federal employees are legally forbidden from endorsing private firms. Though the president is exempt from the rule and the president-elect is not a federal employee, such endorsements are largely frowned upon in America’s highest office.

In 2009, after a coat company used a photo of President Obama in an ad campaign, Ben LaBolt, a spokesman for the Obama administration, told the New York Times that, “the White House has a long-standing policy disapproving of the use of the president’s name and likeness for commercial purposes.”

Amanda Schreyer, an advertising and social media lawyer in Boston, said Trump’s tweet broke no laws Thursday. He’s entitled to free speech (but could face lawsuits if he distributes false information about a company and hurts its profit).

“It’s just poor form,” Schreyer said. The president-elect, she added, “shouldn’t be picking and choosing which companies to endorse or otherwise.”

Since the election, Trump has made a practice of praising and chastising private companies. Last month, he slammed air conditioning company Carrier for moving jobs from Indiana to Mexico. He also has criticized several automakers for offshoring jobs and Boeing for the cost of its new Air Force One.

Trump’s tweets tend to spark publicity storms around his targets. Kellan Terry, a data analyst at Brandwatch, said online mentions of L.L. Bean have surged 990 percent since Wednesday, jumping from 2,200 to 22,000.

David Mayer, a leadership and ethics in business professor at the University of Michigan, said it’s natural for people to want to reward those who demonstrate loyalty. But reciprocity from the president-elect, he said, is problematic for the free market, creating incentive for executives to craft their messaging around pleasing the country’s leader.

“You gain advantages from the government for supporting it,” Mayor said. “And when that happens, you could also become afraid to criticize the government.”

(h/t Washington Post)

 

 

 

Trump Fires Back at Meryl Streep Over Her Comments at Golden Globes

Donald Trump fired back at actress Meryl Streep on Twitter over her comments about him at the Golden Globes Sunday night, referring to her as “over-rated” and a “Hillary flunky” and complaining that, although she doesn’t know him, she attacked him.

Mr. Trump said much the same thing to the Times on Monday, adding, “And remember, Meryl Streep introduced Hillary Clinton at her convention (the Democratic National Convention), and a lot of these people supported Hillary.”

Streep, who was presented with the Cecil B. DeMille Award at Sunday night’s ceremony, took the president-elect to task during her acceptance speech over his remarks during the presidential campaign about a disabled New York Times reporter.

The actress called it “the one performance this year that stunned me sank its hooks into my heart.”

“It kind of broke my heart when I saw it, and I can’t get it out of my head, because it wasn’t in a movie. It was real life,” Streep said. “And this instinct — to humiliate — when it’s modeled by someone in the public platform, by someone powerful, it filters down into everybody’s life, because it kind of gives permission for other people to do the same thing.”

During the campaign, Mr. Trump had criticized Kovaleski for backing away from a 2001 story that suggested Arab-Americans in Jersey City may have celebrated the 9/11 the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center.  Mr. Trump hunched his shoulders and moved his arms in apparent imitation of the reporter, saying “the poor guy. You ought to see this guy. ‘Oh, I don’t know what I said! Ah, I don’t remember”’

Mr. Trump has denied repeatedly that he was mocking Kovaleski for his disability.

(h/t CBS News)

Trump Goes on Hours-Long Tweetstorm Over Russian Hacking

Twitter

President-elect Donald Trump said Saturday that the only reason the hacking of the Democratic National Committee is discussed is because Democrats are “totally embarrassed” about their election loss, and he urged friendlier relations with Russia.

“Only reason the hacking of the poorly defended DNC is discussed is that the loss by the Dems was so big that they are totally embarrassed!” Trump said as part of a Saturday morning tweetstorm.

His comments came a day after the declassification of a US intelligence report that concluded Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, ordered a campaign to influence the US election and hurt Hillary Clinton’s chances of winning.

Trump pointed to “gross negligence” by the DNC as the reason the hacking took place.

He also denied suggestions that the Russian hacking could have affected the election results, saying “there was absolutely no evidence that hacking affected the election results” because voting machines weren’t “touched.”

The US intelligence community’s report concluded that Russia — led by Putin — developed a “clear preference for President-elect Trump. But it did not assess the impact that Russian activities had on the election outcome, as Business Insider’s Pamela Engel reported.

The president-elect further touched on his relationship with Russia, saying that only “stupid people” and “fools” would think that having a good relationship with Russia is “bad.”

“When I am President, Russia will respect us far more than they do now, and both countries will, perhaps, work together to solve some fo the many great and pressing problems and issues of the WORLD!” he tweeted.

Here are the tweets:

(h/t Business Insider)

Trump Tweets New Years Greetings in Most Childish Way

President-elect Donald Trump tweeted New Year wishes on Saturday morning, and didn’t forget about what he called his “many enemies.”

“Happy New Year to all, including to my many enemies and those who have fought me and lost so badly they just don’t know what to do,” Trump wrote, adding his love at the end.

On Twitter, Trump Defends Foundation, Ignores Legal Controversy Surrounding It

President-elect Donald Trump took to Twitter on Monday night to defend the charitable foundation he has pledged to close, saying the media had not given him enough credit for his generosity and ignoring the legal issues that ensnared the organization in controversy.

The Donald J. Trump Foundation has come under intense scrutiny this year after reports in The Washington Post detailing its practices, including cases in which Trump apparently used the charity’s money to settle lawsuits involving his for-profit businesses.

New York’s attorney general is investigating the charity, and a spokeswoman for that office said on Saturday that the foundation could not officially shut down until that probe is over. Among the issues at hand is whether Trump violated a “self-dealing” provision that says nonprofit leaders cannot use their charity’s funds to help themselves, their relatives or their businesses.

“I gave millions of dollars to DJT Foundation, raised or recieved millions more, ALL of which is given to charity, and media won’t report!” Trump said in one Monday night tweet.

“The DJT Foundation, unlike most foundations, never paid fees, rent, salaries or any expenses. 100% of money goes to wonderful charities!” the president-elect said in another.

Trump and his companies gave about $6 million to his foundation since its launch in 1987, according to tax filings. The most recent tax filings go up to the end of 2015.

Other people have collectively given about $9.5 million. The biggest outside donors were Vince and Linda McMahon, two pro-wrestling moguls, who gave the Trump Foundation $5 million between 2007 and 2009. Trump recently nominated Linda McMahon to head the Small Business Administration.

Trump himself gave nothing to his foundation between 2009 and 2014, according to filings. His businesses contributed in 2015 for the first time in several years.

Experts on charities say it’s rare for the founder of a private, name-branded foundation to give nothing to his own foundation while relying entirely on donations from others. That anomaly allowed Trump to take advantage of the idea that the money in the foundation was his.

Trump’s donations to his foundation are also small, by the standards of billionaires’ philanthropy.

Filmmaker George Lucas, for instance, who is tied with Trump at 324th place in Forbes’s list of the world’s billionaires, donated $925 million to his family foundation in 2012. In 2014, Lucas’s foundation gave out $55 million in donations to museums, hospitals, artistic groups and environmental charities.

While much of the Trump foundation’s money has gone to charity, there are some high-profile exceptions.

In 2013, the Trump foundation gave a $25,000 gift to a campaign committee backing Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi (R) even though nonprofits like the charity are not allowed to give political gifts.

That gift was made as Bondi’s office was considering whether to investigate fraud allegations against Trump University. A consultant who worked on Bondi’s reelection effort has said that Bondi was not aware of the allegations when she solicited the donation from Trump. Ultimately, Bondi’s office did not pursue the fraud allegations.

Trump also reported using foundation money to buy items for himself, which runs afoul of federal tax law.

The Trump Foundation spent $30,000 to buy two large portraits of Trump himself, including one that was hung up in the sports bar at a Trump-owned resort. Trump also appears to have used $258,000 of his foundation’s money — legally earmarked for charitable purposes — to settle lawsuits involving two of his for-profit clubs.

The office of New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman (D) announced its investigation of the Trump Foundation after reports in The Post described such apparent cases of self-dealing that date back to 2007.

Trump’s foundation has admitted in IRS tax filings for 2015 that it violated a prohibition against “self-dealing” that says nonprofit leaders cannot use their charity’s funds to help themselves, their relatives or their businesses.

In these tax filings, the charity checked “yes” in response to a question asking whether it had transferred any income or assets to “a disqualified person” — a description that could have meant Trump, a relative or a Trump-owned business.

Trump has not said what exactly he did to violate the rule, or what he has paid the IRS in penalty taxes as a result. The IRS has not commented when asked whether it was investigating the Trump Foundation.

The New York attorney general’s investigation is unlikely to lead to any kind of criminal charge. Instead, Trump may be required to repay his foundation the money it spent to help him, and he may have to personally pay penalty taxes worth 10 percent or more of the value of the self-dealing transactions.

Trump’s tweet was correct in that his foundation has low overhead. It has no paid staff, and only a five-member board. It also has spent almost nothing on legal fees, raising the question of whether the organization was aware of the legal problems it created.

Trump Claims NBC ‘Purposely’ Misquoted Nuclear Comments

President-elect Donald Trump claimed Saturday that NBC News “purposely” misquoted his call for an expansion of the U.S. nuclear program last week, despite reports to the contrary.

Trump on Thursday said the United States “must greatly strengthen and expand its nuclear capability until such time as the world comes to its senses regarding nukes.” Saturday he accused NBC of intentionally leaving out the latter, more measure portion of his statements.

“.@NBCNews purposely left out this part of my nuclear qoute: ‘until such time as the world comes to its senses regarding nukes.’ Dishonest!” the president-elect tweeted Saturday afternoon.

Trump did not specify when NBC supposedly left out a portion of his comments.

NBC News’ initial report covering Trump’s comments on nuclear expansion, however, cited his comments in full. And the Thursday broadcast of NBC’s “Nightly News with Lester Holt” displayed his comments in their entirety.

Trump’s claim of dishonesty in media coverage has been a calling card of his ascendance to the White House. Since winning the presidency, Trump has repeatedly attacked the media, broadly accusing them of inciting violence against him, singling out individual reporters and blasting the news media as “crooked.”

(h/t Politico)

Reality

Just by watching the NBC report shows Trump was intentionally lying.

Media

http://www.nbcnews.com/widget/video-embed/840644675837

Newly Certified Trump Feuds with Bill Clinton

Now that the Electoral College has officially made him president-elect, Donald Trump spent Tuesday holding meetings and feuding with former president Bill Clinton.

Responding to criticism from the ex-president, Trump said he and 2016 Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton lost this year’s election because they failed to pay attention to essential states.

“They focused on wrong states,” Trump said in a brief tweet burst.

In an interview with a weekly newspaper in New York state, Clinton said that Trump “doesn’t know much,” but “one thing he does know is how to get angry, white men to vote for him.” Clinton also said that Trump called him after the election, another source of dispute between the two men.

Tweeted Trump: “Bill Clinton stated that I called him after the election. Wrong, he called me (with a very nice congratulations).”

The president-elect said Clinton is the one who “doesn’t know much,” including “how to get people, even with an unlimited budget, out to vote in the vital swing states ( and more).”

While losing the popular vote to Hillary Clinton by more than 2.8 million, Trump triumphed in the Electoral College by winning more states. They included industrial states that had gone Democratic in recent presidential elections: Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.

Electors in those and other states ratified Trump’s victory in Monday meetings of the Electoral College.

Despite the efforts of anti-Trump organizations, only two electors defected from the Republican candidate; five Democratic electors refused to vote for Clinton.

“With this historic step we can look forward to the bright future ahead,” the president-elect said after the Electoral College vote. “I will work hard to unite our country and be the President of all Americans. Together, we will make America great again.”

The president-elect is spending Christmas week at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Fla., where he is holding job interviews and planning meetings.

Trump will be sworn in as the nation’s 45th president a month from Tuesday.

Trump also issued statements condemning deadly attacks in Germany and Turkey.

After a truck attack on a holiday market in Berlin, Trump said “innocent civilians were murdered in the streets as they prepared to celebrate the Christmas holiday … These terrorists and their regional and worldwide networks must be eradicated from the face of the earth, a mission we will carry out with all freedom-loving partners.”

Trump also spoke out after Russia’s ambassador to Turkey, Andrei Karlov, was “assassinated by a radical Islamic terrorist.”

He added: “The murder of an ambassador is a violation of all rules of civilized order and must be universally condemned.”

(h/t USA Today)

Trump Draws His Conclusions Quickly, Says “Civilized World” Must Fight Terror

Twitter

In addition to seemingly implying the world’s 1.6 billion Muslims may not be “civilized,” in his first Tweet after being confirmed as President, Donald Trump demand for the West to “change thinking.”

But the authorities in Germany have yet to announce a motive for the deadly truck-ramming of a Christmas market in Berlin. Speculation on the motives of the assassin who gunned down Russia’s ambassador to Turkey has ranged from Muslim rage over Russia’s military actions in Syria to a C.I.A. plot to undermine the Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

And Islamist terrorism seems doubtful for an attack on a Zurich mosque frequented by Somali migrants.

But President-elect Trump tied together the three attacks on Monday, despite the 1,300 miles that separate Ankara and Zurich.

(h/t New York Times)

Donald Trump Angrily Tweeted About the SNL Sketch About Him Tweeting

President-elect Donald Trump unleashed another tweet of rage targeting “Saturday Night Live” — slamming the show as “unwatchable” and “totally biased.”

“Just tried watching Satruday Night Live – unwatchable!” he tweeted just after midnight on Sunday. “Totally biased, not funny and the Baldwin impersonation just can’t get any worse.”

“Sad,” he added.

He posted it after a sketch on Saturday night made fun of Trump’s persistent use of Twitter. The clip featured Alec Baldwin, playing Mr. Trump, obsessively retweeting other users.

“There is a reason actually that Donald tweets so much,” said Kate McKinnon, playing Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway in the sketch. “He does it to distract the media from his business conflicts and all the very scary people in his Cabinet.”

Baldwin and McKinnon have both been celebrated for their impressions on the comedy show, which has a history of poking fun at everyone, including politicians, through impersonations.

(h/t CBS News)

Media

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tI3g_laToxE

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