Trump yells at CIA director over reports intel officials are keeping info from him

CBS News has learned that on Thursday, an angry President Trump called CIA Director Mike Pompeo and yelled at him for not pushing back hard enough against reports that the intelligence community was withholding information from the commander-in-chief.

The agency then drafted a strongly worded statement rebutting the claim. “We are not aware of any instance when that has occurred,” read Pompeo’s statement. “It is CIA’s mission to provide the President with the best intelligence possible and to explain the basis for that intelligence. The CIA does not, has not, and will never hide intelligence from the President, period.”

The White House also denied the report. The president “did not yell at the CIA director,” a White House spokesperson wrote Saturday in an email to CBS News.

This story has been updated with responses from the CIA and the White House.

CBS News has learned that on Thursday, an angry President Trump called CIA Director Mike Pompeo and yelled at him for not pushing back hard enough against reports that the intelligence community was withholding information from the commander-in-chief.

The agency then drafted a strongly worded statement rebutting the claim. “We are not aware of any instance when that has occurred,” read Pompeo’s statement. “It is CIA’s mission to provide the President with the best intelligence possible and to explain the basis for that intelligence. The CIA does not, has not, and will never hide intelligence from the President, period.”

The White House also denied the report. The president “did not yell at the CIA director,” a White House spokesperson wrote Saturday in an email to CBS News.

On Wednesday, the Wall Street Journal had reported that U.S. intelligence officials have kept information from Mr. Trump because they feared it could be leaked or compromised.

CIA spokesman Dean Boyd denied Friday that there was a conversation between Pompeo and Mr. Trump about the article.

“There was no conversation between the CIA Director and the President about the Wall Street Journal article either before or after CIA issued its statement about the article,” Boyd said. “The CIA issued its statement on its own accord because the story was inaccurate and we felt the need to defend the integrity of our officers and institution.”

The reality is, insiders say, that there has been a “chill” in the information flow. Intelligence sources say the agency is intent on protecting information, and if there are concerns it could be compromised, it will be withheld.

The ongoing investigation into whether Trump associates coordinated with the Russians remains a concern for some who handle sensitive data. It can be inferred that there is a lack of trust, and because the CIA has had a role in uncovering signs of Russian cyber intrusions, there are also concerns that sensitive information could be shared with adversaries.

(h/t CBS News)

China Grants Trump a Trademark He’s Been Seeking For a Decade

The Chinese government has granted President Trump and his business something they had been seeking for more than a decade: trademark protection for the use of the Trump name in the construction industry.

Trump fought unsuccessfully in Chinese courts for years to try to gain control of the trademark, but his fortunes changed suddenly last year during the latter stages of his campaign for the White House.

China’s trademark review board announced in September it had invalidated a rival claim for the Trump trademark, clearing the way for Trump to move in. In November, soon after the election, it awarded the trademark to the Trump Organization. The trademark was officially registered this week after a three-month notice period for objections expired.

The sequence of events makes some ethics experts uncomfortable: Chinese authorities reversed their position as Trump’s political star rose.

“China is going to want concessions from Mr. Trump, and this is now the first in what will be a series of efforts to influence him,” said Norman Eisen, a White House ethics counsel under President Obama. Eisen is part of a group that has sued Trump for violating the foreign emoluments clause of the Constitution by accepting foreign payments through his business ventures.

But Trump Organization attorneys told CNN that it was simply trying to protect the Trump trademark from someone who had been improperly squatting on it, and that any accusation that President Trump could be compromised by the trademark decision granted by the Chinese government is completely baseless and shows a disregard for the facts.

It is difficult to assess the value of the new trademark. It covers construction-related services, not for Trump’s core hospitality and real-estate businesses.

But even if construction-related services are not a core business for the Trump Organization, the company places a great value on anything with the Trump brand.

“The Trump brand is key to the value of the Trump Organization’s assets,” Sheri Dillon, a Trump lawyer, said last month.

Trump can also argue that he’s a lot more famous in China now than he was when he first started the trademark battle there in 2006, giving him a stronger claim to the Trump name. Trump already holds dozens of trademarks in China and is seeking dozens more.

“The Trump Organization has been actively enforcing its trademark rights in China for more than a decade and its latest trademark registration is a natural result of those efforts — all of which took place years before President Trump even announced his candidacy,” said Alan Garten, the Trump Organization’s chief legal officer.

The ethics concerns are fueled by Trump’s decision not to completely sever ties with his company.

Before taking office, he bucked the advice of ethics lawyers who urged him to avoid conflicts by selling off his vast business interests and putting the money in a blind trust. Instead, he pledged to place his assets in a trust run by his adult sons.

Trump talked tough on China in his campaign rhetoric, but so far hasn’t followed through on his threats to label it a currency manipulator on his first day in office, or to impose heavy trade tariffs.

China legal experts say they think Trump’s political ascendancy most likely played a role in the trademark decision.

“I’ve got clients who have fought these same cases time and time again without success. For this rapid turn of events, it does seem to be more than just a coincidence,” said Dan Plane, a China intellectual property expert in Hong Kong. “What’s striking about the Trump decision is the timing. I think it’s reasonable to assume that politics played a part — without Trump even necessarily asking for it.”

The Chinese Embassy in Washington told CNN that the case was handled in compliance with China’s trademark law.

“The Chinese trademark review board does not make its decisions publicly available, so we don’t know on what basis they made their decision,” said Matthew Dresden, an international trademark attorney. “I think these decisions were not made in a vacuum.”

The White House declined to comment, referring the question to the Trump Organization.

Another interpretation of the decision may simply be that China is becoming more responsive to Western companies that want to protect their trademark. In December, China’s top court found in favor of U.S. basketball start Michael Jordan, ruling that a Chinese company sportswear company, Qiaodan, had to stop using the Chinese characters that rendered the name Jordan.

“You could say there’s a nice ray of sunshine, that perhaps things are changing for foreign brands,” said Plane. “But [the Trump decision] really was a bit of a bolt out of the blue, particularly in relation to the case’s history and the decision’s timing.”

One remaining question is whether Trump will continue to find favor in future Chinese trademark decisions.

“If there’s a consistent pattern where you have ‘wins’ in every case to which Trump’s name is attached when normally, those cases would be non-starters for anyone else, then yes, I think there’s a real concern about his being given something that others wouldn’t receive,” Plane said.

(h/t CNN)

 

Trump Tweets: The Media is the ‘Enemy of the American People’

President Trump blasted the media as “the enemy of the American people” in a tweet Friday, calling out several outlets specifically.

“The FAKE NEWS media (failing @nytimes, @NBCNews, @ABC, @CBS, @CNN) is not my enemy, it is the enemy of the American People!” he wrote.

He had posted and then quickly deleted a slightly different version of the tweet just a few minutes earlier, which omitted ABC and CBS. He also included the word “SICK!” at the end of the original post.

The tweet came one day after Trump held an adversarial and lengthy news conference, in which he berated the media as “very fake news” and dismissed news reports about his and his associates’ ties to Russia as a “ruse.”

About an hour later, he posted a second tweet criticizing the media’s coverage of the press conference.

“‘One of the most effective press conferences I’ve ever seen!’ says Rush Limbaugh. Many agree.Yet FAKE MEDIA calls it differently! Dishonest,” Trump wrote.

Trump has long had an antagonistic relationship with the press, and often labels news stories he sees as unfavorable as “fake news.” Trump’s campaign issued a survey to supporters on Friday, asking them to gauge the trustworthiness of the media.

The news outlets singled out in Trump’s Friday afternoon tweet are not new targets for the president. He has often lambasted CNN and The New York Times, referring to them as “failing” and out of touch with voters.

In a rare interview with The New York Times last month, Chief White House Strategist Steve Bannon, the former chair of the far-right Breitbart News, called reporters the “opposition party” and said “the media should be embarrassed and humiliated and keep its mouth shut and just listen for a while.”

“They don’t understand this country,” Bannon said. “They still do not understand why Donald Trump is the president of the United States.”

Trump echoed Bannon’s comments shortly after, telling “The Brody File” that “the media is the opposition party in many ways.”

(h/t The Hill)

 

 

 

Administration Fires HUD Official Who Once Criticized Donald Trump

The Trump administration fired a top aide to Housing and Urban Development secretary nominee Ben Carson Thursday, after discovering that he once wrote columns critical of Donald Trump.

The New York Times reported that Shermichael Singleton, 26, was escorted out of HUD headquarters by security officials. The Huffington Post also confirmed the incident with an agency civil servant who said they were shocked and dismayed by the firing.

Singleton was one of the few black Republicans in the Trump administration. He has worked on other GOP campaigns, including Carson’s 2016 bid.

But he also wrote pieces that criticized Trump. In March 2016, for example, he wrote a column for The Hill that lamented Trump’s rhetoric toward people of color:

I would like to see nothing more than a Republican win the White House this November, but I have to seriously ask myself if Trump is capable of doing just that. I have attempted to remain hopeful and a part of me will continue do so, but Trump’s antics make it impossible for any Republican — particularly a minority — to defend him, which can only mean bad things for the future of the GOP.

Officials noticed the pieces during the vetting process, according to The New York Times, and asked him about them. Although Singleton said he regretted writing it, officials told him he would not get a permanent position at HUD because of them.

Trump has not taken well to people who once criticized him. Elliott Abrams, a veteran Republican national security official, was taken out of consideration for a top job at the State Department after the president found out that he had opposed him during the campaign. Trump did so over the objections of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who wanted Abrams on his team.

Singleton did not return a request for comment. HUD confirmed to the Times that as of Thursday, he is no longer working at the agency.

(h/t Huffington Post)

Cummings: ‘No Idea Why President Trump Would Make Up a Story About Me Like He Did Today’

Rep. Elijah E. Cummings swatted away President Trump’s claim that the Baltimore Democrat wouldn’t meet with him after repeated calls from the White House.

Trump made the comment during a wide-ranging news conference Thursday and speculated that Cummings may have been dissuaded from coming to the White House for political reasons, perhaps by Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), whom Trump dismissed as a “lightweight.”

“I have no idea why President Trump would make up a story about me like he did today. Of course, Senator Schumer never told me to skip a meeting with the President,” Cummings said in a statement.

Trump said Cummings “was all excited and then he said, ‘Well, I can’t move, it might be bad for me politically. I can’t have that meeting.’ ”

Trump continued: “But he probably was told by Schumer or somebody like that — some other lightweight. . . . He was probably told: ‘Don’t meet with Trump. It’s bad politics.’ And that’s part of the problem with this country.”

The musings came in response to a question about whether Trump would meet with the Congressional Black Caucus — of which Cummings is a high-profile member — to discuss crime in poor, urban areas.

The 11-term congressman and ranking Democrat on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee said he planned to talk to Trump about the skyrocketing cost of prescription drugs.

But first, he said, he wanted to finalize a proposal he has been working on with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) to allow the Department of Health and Human Services to negotiate drug prices — a concept that Cummings says Trump has supported.

“I also sincerely have no idea why the President made this claim in response to an unrelated question about the Congressional Black Caucus. I am sure members of the CBC can answer these questions for themselves,” the congressman’s statement said.

Cummings noted that prescription drugs affect “every American family — not just people of color.”

The congressman told reporters on Capitol Hill on Thursday afternoon that his office is working on setting up a meeting. “We’re looking forward to it,” he said. “I’m excited about meeting with the president. He’s my president, and I’m excited about meeting with him.”

Minutes after Trump’s news conference concluded, the Oversight Committee announced that Cummings had joined Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and other Democrats in calling for a review of how the president and his staff handled sensitive national security materials at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s Palm Beach, Fla., resort.

In a letter, the lawmakers asked the Government Accountability Office to determine whether protocols were followed and to provide an accounting of taxpayer costs related to Trump’s stay at his private club, which he has dubbed the “Winter White House.”

(h/t The Washington Post)

Trump Winery Seeks More Foreign Help

A Virginia winery owned by President Trump’s son Eric has requested permission to bring in nearly two dozen foreign workers, according to a new report.

The Trump Winery in Virginia is seeking 23 workers from overseas to plant and harvest grapes there this spring, BuzzFeed reported Thursday.

The Department of Labor published a request from the winery, which is also known as Trump Vineyard Estates LLC, earlier that day.

Thursday’s posting says potential workers will earn $11.27 hourly working at the 1,300-acre estate from April 3 to as late as Oct. 27.

The workers are being sought using the federal H-2A visa program, which permits U.S. employers to hire foreign agricultural laborers for temporary work as long as no qualified Americans want the jobs instead.

The H-2 visa program has brought more than 100,000 foreigners into the U.S. annually since 2003, BuzzFeed reported, and the initiative has benefited businesses relating to the Trumps.

BuzzFeed added that companies owned by President Trump or bearing his name have sought to hire at least 286 foreign workers since he launched his White House run in June 2015.

Many laborers now work as servers and housecleaners at Mar-a-Lago, the report said, Trump’s luxury resort in Palm Beach, Fla., that Trump has dubbed “the winter White House.”

Stores in the Washington, D.C., area have reportedly been selling out of bottles of wine that bear the president’s name since he entered office.

(h/t The Hill)

Trump Asked a Black Reporter If the Congressional Black Caucus Are “Friends of Yours”

President Trump’s press conference Thursday had many unbelievable moments. But one of the most shocking was an exchange in which Trump asked a black reporter to set up a meeting for him with the Congressional Black Caucus, and asked if the caucus members were “friends” of hers.

April Ryan, the White House correspondent and Washington bureau chief for American Urban Radio Networks in Baltimore, asked Trump whether he would include the Congressional Black Caucus in conversations about his “urban agenda” for the “inner city.”

But Ryan used the abbreviation “CBC” for the Congressional Black Caucus at first — and Trump didn’t appear to know what she was referring to.

“Am I going to include who?” he asked.

Ryan clarified: “Are you going to include the Congressional Black Caucus and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus — ”

“Well, I would,” Trump interrupted. “I tell you what, do you want to set up the meeting? Do you want to set up the meeting?”

“No, no, no, I’m just a reporter,” Ryan said.

“Are they friends of yours?” Trump asked.

Ryan replied, before Trump cut her off again, “I know some of them, but I’m sure they’re watching right now — ”

“I would love to meet with the Black Caucus,” Trump said. “I think it’s great, the Congressional Black Caucus, I think it’s great.”

As it turns out, the CBC asked Trump for a meeting weeks ago and never heard back:

Trump seems to have assumed that just because Ryan was black and asked a question about the CBC, she would know the caucus members personally and be able to set up a meeting with them. Trump’s question also reveals a basic ignorance of how reporters do their job.

As my colleague Jenée Desmond-Harris has explained, Trump has a big problem with racially stereotyping black people. He seems almost incapable of mentioning black Americans without also mentioning the “inner city,” which he strictly describes as a blighted, crime-ridden hellscape. But that association is not only racist stereotyping — it also doesn’t reflect how black Americans really live.

(h/t Vox)

 

Trump Slams 9th Circuit Court, Which Blocked His Immigration Ban, As ‘In Chaos’

During his first solo press conference as commander-in-chief, President Donald Trump on Thursday slammed the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals as being “in chaos” and “in turmoil.” The 9th Circuit Court ruled unanimously to block Trump’s ban on immigration from seven predominantly Muslim nations earlier this month.

Trump vowed to appeal the court’s ruling in Thursday’s press conference; he had previously vacillated on whether his administration would issue a brand new executive order on immigration or appeal the current order all the way to the Supreme Court.

Trump has been criticized in recent weeks for his apparent attempts to undermine the American judiciary system, with his own Supreme Court nominee Judge Neil Gorsuch calling Trump’s repeated attacks on judges’ integrity “demoralizing.” On Thursday, Trump said he’d “heard” that 80 percent of the 9th Circuit Court’s decisions are overturned — a claim that is patently false, and which Snopes debunked here.

(h/t The Week)

Media

Trump Reportedly Being Kept in the Dark About Sensitive Intelligence Due to Concerns About Leaks

U.S. intelligence officials’ mistrust of President Donald Trump is so acute that they have withheld information from him, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing current and former officials familiar with the matter.

The information withheld includes the sources and methods used to collect the intelligence, according to the newspaper.

The report comes amid Trump’s claims that intelligence agencies have leaked information to undermine him. In a tweet on Wednesday, Trump blasted the intelligence community for leaks.

And in tweets on Thursday, Trump lashed out at the media.

“Any suggestion that the U.S. intelligence community is withholding information and not providing the best possible intelligence to the president and his national security team is not true,” the Office of Director of National Intelligence said in a statement to the Journal.

The White House said it does not have evidence this is actually happening, the Journal said.

Withholding some information from presidents is not new for intelligence agencies, but the difference in Trump’s case is that the decision to refrain from sharing sensitive intelligence stemmed from concerns about leaks or compromises, the Journal reported.

To read more, check out the full Wall Street Journal report.

(h/t CNBC)

Trump Ally With Zero Experience to Review Intelligence Agencies

President Trump is planning to ask a member of his economic advisory council to lead a review of the U.S. intelligence community, The New York Times reported on Wednesday.

According to the newspaper, Stephen Feinberg, a co-founder of Cerberus Capital Management, has informed his company’s shareholders that he is currently considering a move to join the Trump administration.

Feinberg also maintains strong ties to top Trump officials, including chief strategist Stephen Bannon and senior adviser Jared Kushner, who is also President Trump’s son-in-law.

Both officials declined to comment on The New York Times report.

Top intelligence officials told the Times they fear that the businessman is being prepped for a position within the intelligence community.

According to the paper, Feinberg’s only national security experience stems from his company’s involvement with a private security company and two gun manufacturers.

The possible review of intelligence agencies comes in the wake of Trump’s renewed feud with the intelligence community over leaks that led to the ousting of national security adviser Michael Flynn.

“From intelligence, papers are being leaked, things are being leaked; it’s criminal action. It’s a criminal act, and it’s been going on for a long time before me, but now it’s really going on,” Trump said Wednesday.

“The real scandal here is that classified information is illegally given out by ‘intelligence’ like candy. Very un-American!” the president also tweeted.

House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) and the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.), on Wednesday formally asked the Justice Department’s inspector general to further investigate the leaks.

“We have serious concerns about the potential protection of classified information here. … The release of classified information can, by definition, have grave effects on national security. In light of this, we request that your office begin an immediate investigation into whether classified information was mishandled here,” the lawmakers wrote.

(h/t The Hill)

 

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