A resource for journalists and for shutting down your crazy uncle.
On Monday, President Donald Trump retweeted a ‘hit list’ from Tom Fitton, the president of Judicial Watch, a conservative self-styled watchdog group.
Fitton tweeted a list out with Democrats name who believed have abused President Donald Trump.
People on the list included Barack Obama, Joe Biden, and Hillary Clinton.
President Donald Trump shared a “Game of Thrones”-style tweet featuring the words, “game over,” following Attorney General William Barr’s press conference where he repeatedly said that the Mueller report found “no collusion” between the Trump campaign and Russia.
[NBC News]
President Donald Trump on Wednesday blasted special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation as an “attempted coup” that failed and praised Attorney General William Barr for saying he is investigating how the probe began — a move congressional Republicans have long advocated.
“This was an attempted coup. This was an attempted takedown of a president and we beat them. We beat them,” Trump told reporters at the White House ahead of his departure for Texas. “So the Mueller report, when they talk about obstruction, we fight back. You know why we fight back? Because I knew how illegal this whole thing was: It was a scam.”
At about the same time, Barr, on Capitol Hill, said “I think spying did occur: on the Trump campaign and he wanted to look into how it began and whether it was legally justified.
Trump also blasted what he called the “haters of Trump” and “dirty cops” and bad people” who worked on the investigation but, according to him, still found no evidence of the campaign colluding with Russia to influence the presidential election.
“What has been found during this period of time are the illegal acts of getting this whole phony investigation started. And hopefully that’s where people are going now. That’s where people are going, and it’s very interesting. It was an illegal investigation,” Trump said.
Trump said he still has not read the Mueller report and said he’s not interested in the report, beyond the possibility that the Justice Department could look into the origins of the investigation.
“As far as I’m concerned, I don’t care about the Mueller report. I’ve been totally exonerated. No collusion, no obstruction,” Trump said. “I am not worrying about something that never, ever should have taken place.”
[ABC News]
President Donald Trump was asked about his rhetoric in the wake of a self-described “white nationalist” Coast Guard officer being arrested for planning on carrying out multiple terrorist attacks.
He also had a hit list of prominent congressional Democrats and media personalities, usually those who are heavy critics of Trump.
“It’s a shame. It’s a very sad thing when a thing like that happens. I’ve expressed that. But I’m actually getting a complete briefing in about two hours,” Trump said.
“Do you think you bear any responsibility for monitoring your language,” a reporter asked.
“No, I don’t. I think my language is very nice,” he replied.
White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders was asked earlier in the day if she thought Trump’s rhetoric helps fuel terror plots against journalists and politicians.
“I certainly don’t think that,” she said. “The president [hasn’t], at any point, has done anything but condemn violence, against journalists or anyone else. In fact, every single time something like this happens, the president is typically one of the first people to condemn the violence and the media is the first people to condemn the president.”
[Mediaite]
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe nominated U.S. President Donald Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize last autumn after receiving a request from the U.S. government to do so, the Asahi newspaper reported on Sunday.
The report follows Trump’s claim on Friday that Abe had nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize for opening talks and easing tensions with North Korea.
The Japanese leader had given him “the most beautiful copy” of a five-page nomination letter, Trump said at a White House news conference.
The U.S. government had sounded Abe out over the Noble Peace Prize nomination after Trump’s summit in June last year with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, the first meeting between a North Korean leader and a sitting U.S. president, the Asahi said, citing an unnamed Japanese government source.
A spokesman for Japan’s Foreign Ministry in Tokyo said the ministry was aware of Trump’s remarks, but “would refrain from commenting on the interaction between the two leaders.”
The White House had no immediate comment when contacted by Reuters.
The Nobel Foundation’s website says a nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize may be submitted by any person who meets the nomination criteria, which includes current heads of states. Under the foundation’s rules, names and other information about unsuccessful nominations cannot be disclosed for 50 years.
[Reuters]
President Donald Trump used part of his Monday night rally in El Paso, TX to rail against a particular branch of the media: fact checkers.
As Trump slammed former president Barack Obama‘s “you can keep your doctor” promise from the Affordable Care Act, he accused fact-checkers of never calling out the falsity of that claim.
“Where are the fact-checkers? Some of the most dishonest people in media are the so-called ‘fact-checkers’…That didn’t turn out to be what he said.”
Trump’s remarks come after he got on Twitter earlier today and parroted Fox News opinion host Jesse Watters who said “the fact-checkers have become fake news.”
To put some perspective on Trump’s complaints, Politifact has figured that approximately 70 percent of Trump’s political statements are factually-challenged to varying degrees, plus Washington Post‘s fact-check finds that Trump has made 8,158 false or misleading claims throughout his presidency so far.
[Mediaite]
President Donald Trump wrote online on Monday that former Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz “doesn’t have the ‘guts’ to be president,” lashing out at the coffee mogul who said over the weekend that he is weighing an independent 2020 bid for the White House.
“Howard Schultz doesn’t have the ‘guts’ to run for President! Watched him on @60Minutes last night and I agree with him that he is not the ‘smartest person.’ Besides, America already has that! I only hope that Starbucks is still paying me their rent in Trump Tower!” the president wrote on Twitter Monday morning.
During a pre-taped interview on CBS’ “60 Minutes” that aired Sunday, Schultz told journalist Scott Pelley he was “seriously thinking of running for president.” Though he characterized himself as “a lifelong Democrat,” Schultz said he would run as a “centrist independent outside of the two-party system,” criticizing both Democrats and Republicans for failure to meet the needs of the American people.
Many, including former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro, a Democrat who announced his own 2020 campaign on Jan. 12, warned that an independent candidate like Schultz could boost Trump’s reelection chances by siphoning voters away from a Democratic candidate.
In recent decades, candidates running independent campaigns for president have caused a stir, but never come close to winning. Billionaire Ross Perot placed third in 1992 with 19 percent of the vote, enough that many have credited him with drawing support from then-incumbent President George H.W. Bush, allowing President Bill Clinton to unseat him.
In 2000, Consumer advocate Ralph Nader ran as the Green Party’s presidential candidate, pulling enough votes from Democrat Al Gore to help President George W. Bush secure the presidency in that year’s razor-thin election.
[Politico]
Trump’s approval numbers are nearly at all-time lows.
The Mueller investigation continues to pick off members of the president’s inner circle.
The government shutdown still doesn’t have a firm resolution.
Yet here’s how you know Trump’s reign might be truly going someplace unprecedented: The president criticized Fox News on Sunday night.
Trump has long criticized the press as “fake news,” though normally spares Fox News. The cable news outlet also frequently lands exclusive interviews with the president.
In the tweet, Trump is referring to a poll by NPR/PBS/Marist poll that shows his approval rating among Latino voters at 50 percent, up from 31 percent a month ago. But according to a more recent Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll, Trump is down to 34 percent approval among Americans overall, nearly the lowest of his two-year presidency, and falling from 42 percent a month earlier.
Last week a deal was struck to “temporarily” end the longest government shutdown in American history. But Trump has warned that if he doesn’t get funding for his U.S.-Mexico border wall by Feb. 15 that the government would close again or that he would invoke emergency powers to build it without Congressional approval.
President Donald Trump this morning went on another tweetstorm about the government shutdown, going off on Democrats and the media.
Great support coming from all sides for Border Security (including Wall) on our very dangerous Southern Border. Teams negotiating this weekend! Washington Post and NBC reporting of events, including Fake sources, has been very inaccurate (to put it mildly)!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 5, 2019
The Democrats could solve the Shutdown problem in a very short period of time. All they have to do is approve REAL Border Security (including a Wall), something which everyone, other than drug dealers, human traffickers and criminals, want very badly! This would be so easy to do!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 5, 2019
But he also tweeted again this morning that most federal workers not getting paid are Democrats––yesterday he claimed many federal workers not being paid would consider his fight for border security more important––and added this time that he doesn’t care:
I don’t care that most of the workers not getting paid are Democrats, I want to stop the Shutdown as soon as we are in agreement on Strong Border Security! I am in the White House ready to go, where are the Dems?
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 5, 2019
[Mediaite]
President Donald Trump ended former Defense Secretary James Mattis’ tenure as defense secretary right before the New Year, seemingly in retaliation for a letter Mattis published criticizing President Trump’s global policy.
At a cabinet meeting Wednesday, the President lashed out at Mattis.
“What’s he done for me? How had he done in Afghanistan? Not too good,” Trump said.
“As you know, president Obama fired him, and essentially so did I,” he added. In fact, general Mattis tendered his resignation after Trump announced the hasty withdrawal of troops from Syria. The President has since said he would slow the troop withdrawal.
“I think I would have been a good general, but who knows?” the President added