Donald Trump on Tuesday vowed to immediately repeal and replace President Barack Obama’s signature health care law if he’s elected president next week.
“When we win on Nov. 8 and elect a Republican Congress, we will be able to immediately repeal and replace Obamacare. We have to do it,” Trump said Tuesday afternoon in an address on the Affordable Care Act in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania.
“I will ask Congress to convene a special session so we can repeal and replace,” he continued. “And it will be such an honor for me, for you and for everybody in this country because Obamacare has to be replaced. And we will do it, and we will do it very, very quickly. It is a catastrophe.”
But should Trump win, Congress would already be in session by the time he took the oath of office; lawmakers return to work on Jan. 3, while the presidential inauguration is Jan. 20. Those dates were enshrined into the Constitution with the 20th Amendment.
Speaking to supporters in Florida Monday, Donald Trump denounced that the alleged NYC bomber would be given hospitalization and legal counsel in accordance with his constitutional rights.
“Now we will give him amazing hospitalization. He will be taken care of by some of the best doctors in the world. He will be given a fully modern and updated hospital room,” Trump said.
Trump continued: “And he’ll probably even have room service, knowing the way our country is. And on top of all of that, he will be represented by an outstanding lawyer. His case will go through the various court systems for years and in the end, people will forget and his punishment will not be what it once would have been. What a sad situation.”
He argued for the need for “speedy, but fair trials,” as well as a “very harsh punishment.”
He also said that authorities must use “whatever lawful methods are available to obtain information from the apprehended suspect to get information before it’s no longer timely.” (Previously on the campaign trail, Trump has spokenof his enthusiasm for waterboardingand other methods of torture.)
Speaking to CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on Monday evening, New York’s Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomoresponded to Trump by saying, “Welcome to America. We have a system of jurisprudence. You’re innocent until proven guilty. You have a right to counsel. And you have the right to hospitalization if you’re ill.”
Cuomo added, “Let’s not lose ourselves in an effort to protect ourselves. We want to protect America. What is America? It’s the rights that we’ve established.”
He said, “I fear sometimes with this rhetoric that people are suggesting we lose what’s special about us in a way to protect ourselves. And that doesn’t work. It’s not who we are. Let’s preserve the system. Let’s be fair about it. Let’s keep our heads.”
Republican Rep. Mark Sanford said Friday that Donald Trump has a “callous disregard for details” that was on full display when the GOP presidential candidate told a private meeting of House Republicans he would fiercely defend articles of U.S. Constitution that don’t exist.
“I think what a number of us have been concerned about is a pattern of laxity with regard to details,” Sanford told CNN in an interview, explaining that details are critical to good governance, one day after he was part of a group meeting with the presumptive Republican presidential candidate. “It is the details that really matter in impacting people’s lives. It is the details that matter frankly in any legislative negotiation.”
The South Carolinian lawmaker, who has been critic of Trump, said that lack of respect for details could make it difficult for the businessman to be a successful president.
“I wasn’t particularly impressed,” Sanford told reporters after Thursday’s meeting at an event. “I think it was the normal stream of consciousness that’s long on hyperbole and short on facts. At one point there was mentioned — somebody asked about, you know, Article I powers and what would you do to protect them and you know, I think his response was ‘I want to protect Article I, Article II, Article XII — go down the list.’ As we both know there is no Article XII.”
Trump’s answer came in response to a question from a House Republican about whether Trump as president would defend the prerogatives of Congress that are laid out in Article I of the Constitution. The issue is highly important to lawmakers who are frustrated by the powers of the presidency, which are defined in Article II of the Constitution but that have expanded in recent years by the increased use of executive authority.
There are a total of just seven articles to the Constitution although there are many more amendments to the founding document, which could be what Trump was referring to accidentally.
The Trump campaign did not immediately respond to CNN for a comment about the apparent gaffe in the meeting or Sanford’s concerns.
When Trump made his comments “a number of people looked around at each other at that point with a little bit of a quizzical or curious eye,” Sanford told CNN Friday.
Sanford, who still hasn’t decided if he will back his party’s presumptive nominee, acknowledged Trump has successfully connected with voters even as he glosses over the minutia of governing.
“I would say we all love broad sweeping statements. They’re pleasant. At times they’re amusing, at times they’re interesting, but in terms of making a difference in people’s lives, it’s the details that matter,” Sanford said.
Sanford also defended Trump.
While “there seems to be a deliberate lack of detail” from the candidate, there is not “malfeasance” — as Sanford said was on display Thursday in a House committee that was examining Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s email usage while running the State Department.
“What we’re left with is a Faustian choice between malfeasance and very callous disregard for details,” Sanford said.
In the meeting with House Republicans, Trump repeatedly stressed the importance of a Republican winning the White House because of the balance of power on the Supreme Court. In the end, Sanford suggested that issue might be enough to tilt him to vote for Trump, something initially he didn’t think he would do.
Sadly this is not the first time Donald Trump displayed a lack of understanding of the United States Constitution, government functions, or how laws work.
Once Trump vowed to do away with the “Department of Environmental,” an agency that does not exist.
As President he promised to open up libel lawsuits against those who would criticize him, a clear violation of freedom of speech guaranteed by the 1st Amendment to the Constitution.
One of Trump’s keystone policies is to ban all Muslims from entering the United States, a clear violation of due process and equal protection guaranteed by the 5th and 14th Amendments to the Constitution.
Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump lashed out at what he called the party’s “rigged” delegate selection rules on Monday after rival Ted Cruz swept all of Colorado’s 34 delegates over the weekend.
The New York billionaire, who has been outmaneuvered by Cruz in a series of recent state meetings to select national convention delegates, said the process was set up to protect party insiders and shut out insurgent candidates.
“The system is rigged, it’s crooked.”
Trump said on Fox News on Monday, alleging the Colorado convention results showed voters were being denied a voice in the process.
“There was no voting. I didn’t go out there to make a speech or anything, there’s no voting. The people out there are going crazy, in the Denver area and Colorado itself, and they’re going absolutely crazy because they weren’t given a vote. This was given by politicians – it’s a crooked deal.”
Again at a rally in Rome, NY, he accused party leaders of maneuvering to cut his supporters out of the process:
“Our Republican system is absolutely rigged. It’s a phony deal,” “They wanted to keep people out. This is a dirty trick.”
Trump has 743 bound delegates to 545 for Cruz, according to an Associated Press count, in the battle for the 1,237 delegates needed to win the nomination on the first ballot and avoid a messy floor fight at the Republican National Convention from July 18-21.
But both are at risk of not acquiring enough delegates for a first-ballot victory, leaving many free to switch their votes on later ballots.
That has set off a fierce scramble by Republican candidates to get their supporters chosen as convention delegates and brought new scrutiny to the selection rules, which vary by state.
Trump, who has brought in veteran strategist Paul Manafort to lead his delegate-gathering efforts, complained about Cruz’s recent success at local and state party meetings where activists pick the actual delegates who will attend the national convention.
Trump accused Cruz, a U.S. senator from Texas, of trying to steal delegates in South Carolina. Trump won the state primary in February, but Cruz supporters got four of the first six delegate slots filled at congressional district meetings on Saturday, according to local media.
Cruz also succeeded at getting more of his supporters chosen as delegates in Iowa, where he won the caucuses in January, and at last week’s state convention in North Dakota.
We are unable to locate the chapter in “Art of the Deal” where it instructs you how to whine after you lose.
Trump being surprised about the nomination process, that has currently given him the lead, is an example of how unfamiliar with the process he knows and how unprepared he is.
To put it in more general terms; How Trump is complaining about the nomination process is analogous to listening to someone completely unfamiliar with baseball who is watching a game for the first time:
“Why did that guy run to a base when the batter didn’t hit that ball! It’s called stealing? That’s not fair!”
“I thought there was only four fouls! That guy got more! This game is rigged!”
“Well if that fielder made an error he should get another try. It’s only fair.”
Perhaps a video like this could help him.
Trump has a pattern of claiming fraud when an election does not go his way, like when he claimed voter fraud after losing Iowa. And his critics say this kind of misdirection is his specialty. By blaming the process rather than his own inadequacies as a manager, Mr. Trump is trying to shift focus after Senator Ted Cruz of Texas outmaneuvered him in delegate contests in states like Colorado, North Dakota and Iowa, losses that could end up denying Mr. Trump the nomination.
Chairman of the Republican National Committee Reince Priebus has spent the past few days pushing back over Twitter.
Nomination process known for a year + beyond. It's the responsibility of the campaigns to understand it. Complaints now? Give us all a break
However there might be a tactical reason for Trump’s attacks on the Republican primary process. Every time Donald Trump attacks the establishment he strengthens his position as an “outsider” candidate, which plays to his supporters. So there is no downside in the primary for attacking the nomination process to a group largely unaware of how it works.
Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump made a bizarre assertion about judges “signing bills” during the February 25th Republican CNN debate.
Trump made the comments while defending his sister Maryanne Trump Barry, who is a senior judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. She is also pro-choice.
Trump said:
“Excuse me, she’s a brilliant judge. He’s been criticizing — he’s been criticizing my sister for signing a certain bill. You know who else signed that bill? Justice Samuel Alito, a very conservative member of the Supreme Court, with my sister, signed that bill. So I think that maybe we should get a little bit of an apology from Ted. What do you think?”
Donald Trump’s tetchy relationship with protesters took another controversial turn on Sunday when he appeared to mock a turban-clad man ejected from a campaign rally in Iowa.
The incident began as Trump was inveighing against “radical Islamic terror,” a common theme in his stump speeches.
“Somebody has to say what’s going on,” he said roughly 15 minutes into an hour-long speech at Muscatine High School, before referencing the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and the San Bernardino, Calif., shooting in December.
“When planes fly into the World Trade Center, and into the Pentagon, and wherever the third plane was going, when people are shooting their friends in California–” Trump said before abruptly pausing as his attention was drawn to the gym’s upper level, where a security guard and a police officer were confronting two protesters.
The protesters were trying to unveil a white sheet with the words “stop hate.” One of the protesters wore a beard and bright-red turban similar to those worn by Sikhs.
“Bye, bye,” Trump said sarcastically as the guard pushed the protester toward the exit and as the crowd began whistling. “Goodbye, goodbye.”
The capacity crowd then broke into chants of “U.S.A., U.S.A.,” before Trump appeared to make a quip about the protester’s turban, which was roughly the same color as Trump’s popular red “Make America Great Again” hats.
“He wasn’t wearing one of those hats was he?” Trump said, gesturing to a supporter’s hat and eliciting a laugh from the crowd.
“And he never will,” Trump continued, segueing back into his speech, “and that’s okay, because we got to do something folks because it’s not working.”
Reality
Sikh is not Muslim. Muslim is not Sikh. Read a little. You become less ignorant.
In criticizing the Iran deal as one of the “worst contracts” he would have to inherit as president, Trump has also incorrectly said that the agreement includes a stipulation that the United States would have to fight Israel in defense of the Iranians.
But there is a clause in there that people are not even talking about that we’re supposed to essentially come to their defense, the Iranian’s defense, and if Israel attacks, you know, where are we? Well, believe me, that will never happen. But how do they agree to things like this? We have a horrible contract. But we do have a contract.
Reality
The State Department disputed Trump’s characterization of the deal’s Section 10 of Annex III.
“This provision of the [agreement] is designed to help bring Iran’s nuclear security and safety practices in line with those used by other nuclear programs around the world,” said Marie Harf, Secretary of State John Kerry’s senior communications adviser, during a CNN fact check.
“The IAEA provides this kind of training routinely, as it is in the interest of all countries that nuclear material be safeguarded from theft and terrorist attacks — the types of ‘sabotage’ in question. This would be the focus of any such assistance by the P5+1 or other states,” she noted. “Nevertheless, this provision does not commit any country to engage in this kind of routine nuclear security cooperation, and it is absurd to suggest it [commits] anyone to ‘defend’ Iran’s nuclear facilities.”
