Donald Trump (image via public domain/White House) Via Twitter this morning we get the news that Donald Trump will NOT attend the inauguration of President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris. Trump is the first president to ghost his successor in 152 years. The announcement represents just one more Trumpian break with the traditions of U.S. democracy which has always embraced a peaceful transfer of power. The news doesn’t come as much of a surprise in that he took 61 days to barely concede he lost the election. Vice President Mike Pence has indicated he will attend the swearing-in ceremony but an administration official told theNew York Times he hasn’t received an official invitation yet. The Times also notes that only 3 presidents have declined to attend their successor’s inauguration: “John Adams in 1801, his son John Quincy Adams in 1829 and Andrew Johnson, a Democrat who sat out the 1869 inauguration after he was replaced in favor of fellow Republican Ulysses S. Grant.”
Donald Trump (screen capture) Amid calls for a second impeachment proceeding and his Cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment, Donald Trump has issued his fifth response to the invasion of the U.S. Capitol yesterday and asked his cultists to stand down. Trump released a two-minute video today calling for his cultists to stand down and accept the results of the 2020 election. In a speech that could not ever have been written by the Donald, this represents two things in my mind: 1. This is the closest thing Trump will ever come to conceding the election. 2. He is clearly scared by the wide-ranging calls for his removal from office either via the 25th Amendment or a second impeachment. All of the language used here is carefully scripted with the idea of a future legal proceeding in mind. Yesterday, Trump told his followers he “loved them” and that they “are special.” p.s. Trump lies in the video saying he “immediately” ordered the National Guard to go into the fray. He did not.
This is Trump’s “please don’t impeach me (again)” speech! Obviously he didn’t write it and doesn’t believe anything that he just said, but at least he said this election is OVER and that he will be leaving office. Thanks to whoever wrote the speech!
Trump in new WH produced video calls for “healing” and offers to help with transition to next admin, adding “tempers must be cooled.” (Trump had weeks to send this message but instead incited a riot Wednesday. He doesn’t take responsibility or apologize for his action in video)
Donald Trump (image: public domain) Donald Trump has been blocked from his Facebook and Instagram accounts for at least two weeks according to a statement by CEO Mark Zuckerberg. This comes in response to yesterday’s invasion of the Capitol building by pro-Trump cultists. “We believe the risks of allowing the President to continue to use our service during this period are simply too great,” read a statement on the Facebook Newsroom Twitter account. “Therefore, we are extending the block we have placed on his Facebook and Instagram accounts indefinitely and for at least the next two weeks until the peaceful transition of power is complete.” Twitter, on the other hand, restored access to Trump’s account Thursday morning after a 12 hour time-out for blasting out a series of falsehoods as rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol. As of this writing, the Donald has not posted any new tweets. But it’s early in the day…
We believe the risks of allowing President Trump to continue to use our service during this period are simply too great, so we are extending the block we have placed on his Facebook and Instagram accounts indefinitely and for at least the next two weeks. pic.twitter.com/JkyGOTYB1Z
After hours of violent insurrection by mobs of MAGA cultists, Donald Trump asked his cultists who violently breached the U.S. Capitol to go home while still pushing his baseless claims of election fraud.
I know your pain. I know you’re hurt. We had an election that was stolen from us. It was a landslide election. And everyone knows it. Especially the other side.
But you have to go home now. We have to have peace. We have to have law and order. We have to respect our great people in law and order. We don’t want anybody hurt.
It’s a very tough period of time. There’s never been a time like this, where such a thing happened, where they could take it away from all of us. From me, from you, from our country. This was a fraudulent election. But we can’t play into the hands of these people. We have to have peace.
So go home. We love you. You’re very special. You’ve seen what happens. You see the way others are treated that are so bad and so evil. I know how you feel. But go home and go home in peace.
As you can see, Twitter tagged the video for its “disputed claim of voter fraud.”
Prior to Trump’s video, President-elect Joe Biden issued his own message calling on Trump to call off the domestic terrorists. “I call on President Trump to go on national television now to fulfill his oath and defend the Constitution and demand an end to this siege,” Mr. Biden said from Wilmington, Delaware. Biden urged the insurrectionists to end what was effectively an armed occupation of the Capitol. Biden also called out Trump for not speaking out against the violence. “At their best, the words of a president can inspire. At their worst, they can incite,” said Biden. “This is not dissent. It’s disorder. It’s chaos. It borders on sedition, and it must end now. I call on this mob to pull back and allow the work of democracy to go forward.”
BREAKING: President-elect Joe Biden: “At this hour, our democracy is under unprecedented assault.”
L-R Donald Trump, VP Mike Pence (image: public domain/Flickr) Donald Trump is really setting Mike Pence up as the fall guy for his failure to secure a second term as president. Trump falsely announced on Tuesday that his number two “has the power to reject fraudulently chosen electors.” Last night in Georgia at a campaign rally for the two Republican senatorial candidates, he told the crowd of supporters “I hope Mike Pence comes through for us, I have to tell you. Of course, if he doesn’t come through, I won’t like him as much.” Think how Trump’s supporters will feel about Pence (who probably was considering a 2024 run for the White House) if he doesn’t “come through” for Trump and somehow flip the election results. The Vice President has no such power to pick and choose which slate of electors from a state to count on January 6 at the joint session of Congress.
The Vice President has the power to reject fraudulently chosen electors.
"And I hope Mike Pence comes through for us, I have to tell you. I hope that our great Vice President comes through for us, he's a great guy. Of course, if he doesn’t come through, I won’t like him quite as much…"
Terri Nunn of Berlin (photo via Facebook) Terri Nunn, lead singer for 80s band Berlin, has penned an apology for performing at Donald Trump’s New Year’s Eve super-spreader event at Mar-a-Lago. On the band’s Facebook page she writes:
I am truly sorry I performed at Mar-a-Lago and would not have done so if I’d known what I learned while I was there. My goal in performing was not to support a political party. I see now that that’s not the way it appeared and I am apologetic for that as well.
The contract stated it was a small Covid-safe event for the members of Mar-a-Lago. Unfortunately it was not Covid-safe anywhere in Florida. I had no idea masks and social distancing were not required. I thought I was current on all Covid news everywhere, but clearly I was not.
I was shocked by Florida and Mar-a-Lago’s lack of regard for the pandemic and if I’d known I would never have gone. Once I fulfilled my contractual obligation, I left the event as quickly as I could. It is a mistake I regret. I took a Covid 19 test yesterday and tested negative.My apologies to those in the LGBTQ community who thought my performance was a statement against them. I have been and always will be fully supportive.
I’m not sure how you could perform at Trump’s own party and not see how it could be considered some kind of stamp of approval for him and his woeful policies. But the apology was direct and without qualifications, so I give her that.
Donald Trump (screen capture) In an extraordinary phone call between Donald Trump and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, Trump urged Raffensperger to “find 11,780” so the results of the 2020 presidential election in Georgia could be reversed. The hour-long phone call was obtained by the Washington Post. From the Washington Post:
“The people of Georgia are angry, the people in the country are angry,” he [Trump] said. “And there’s nothing wrong with saying, you know, um, that you’ve recalculated.”
Raffensperger responded: “Well, Mr. President, the challenge that you have is, the data you have is wrong.”
At another point, Trump said: “So look. All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have. Because we won the state.”
The rambling, at times incoherent conversation, offered a remarkable glimpse of how consumed and desperate the president remains about his loss, unwilling or unable to let the matter go and still believing he can reverse the results in enough battleground states to remain in office.
“There’s no way I lost Georgia,” Trump said, a phrase he repeated again and again on the call. “There’s no way. We won by hundreds of thousands of votes.”
You can listen to the excerpts below.
In addition to being harmful to our democratic process, Trump’s desperation is really very sad and pathetic. He continued his empty, baseless claims on Twitter, of course.
Respectfully, President Trump: What you're saying is not true. The truth will come out https://t.co/ViYjTSeRcC
— GA Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (@GaSecofState) January 3, 2021
Now that we've heard a recording of the actual call, Donald is revealed to be the corrupt liar is always is. Sad.https://t.co/EoevoqKvKI
Donald Trump (image via Flickr/White House)And stay out! In a virtual backhand, the Senate voted today to override Donald Trump’s veto of the $740 billion National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). From the Washington Post:
The Senate on Friday voted to turn a $741 billion defense authorization bill into law over President Trump’s objections, delivering the first successful veto override of his presidency in the waning days of his administration.
The 81-to-13 vote in the Senate, just days after the House also voted in overwhelming numbers to back the legislation, was one of two rare rebukes of Trump on Friday from Republican lawmakers.
Ahead of the vote on rejecting the president’s veto, Senate Republicans blocked a Trump-endorsed effort to increase the size of stimulus checks from $600 to $2,000.
The House of Representatives voted 322-87 on Monday to overturn Trump’s veto. This is the only veto override of Trump’s presidency. The defense bill, which funds the armed forces, also includes a pay increase for the men and women in our military. Normally, this is a bill that gets widespread bipartisan support. But Trump wanted legislation to allow lawsuits against tech companies like Twitter, which the Donald longs to sue because they’ve taken to tagging his disinformation tweets with warning signs. He also opposed language in the defense bill that would rename 10 military bases currently named after Confederate leaders.
In three weeks, our country will inaugurate a President who respects our military, protects our security and honors the will of the Congress. Until then, the Congress urges Trump to end his desperate and dangerous sabotage. https://t.co/FRJfI0O7uW
If the Commander in Chief cared about our troops and their families half as much as his own political fortunes, we never would have needed today’s vote to override his NDAA veto. ⁰⁰I’m relieved to finally put an end to Trump’s temper tantrum and support our national security.
Donald Trump (photo: Gage Skidmore/Flickr – CC License)The New York Times spoke to several White House insiders regarding the whys and wherefores of Donald Trump’s failed response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The upshot seems to be practically every decision was predicated on: what would it mean for Trump? Between Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and not-an-infectious-expert Dr. Scott Atlas bending to Trump’s ego, scientists and doctors had a tough time getting solid health policy implemented. Trump thought wearing face masks wouldn’t appeal to his base, so he didn’t really encourage their use. And he really hated how the positivity rate of testing ‘made him look bad.’ Trump reportedly didn’t want folks tested for COVID until they were so sick they landed in an emergency room and were vomiting. From the New York Times:
It was a warm summer Wednesday, Election Day was looming and President Trump was even angrier than usual at the relentless focus on the coronavirus pandemic.
“You’re killing me! This whole thing is! We’ve got all the damn cases,” Mr. Trump yelled at Jared Kushner, his son-in-law and senior adviser, during a gathering of top aides in the Oval Office on Aug. 19. “I want to do what Mexico does. They don’t give you a test till you get to the emergency room and you’re vomiting.”
Mexico’s record in fighting the virus was hardly one for the United States to emulate. But the president had long seen testing not as a vital way to track and contain the pandemic but as a mechanism for making him look bad by driving up the number of known cases.
“I’m going to lose,” Trump told Kushner during one exchange. “And it’s going to be your fault, because of the testing.” In another episode, Jared Kushner and Hope Hicks tried to get Trump to embrace face mask use but with Meadows and adviser Stephen Miller pushing back, the Donald refused. Read the full report at the New York Times.
Donald Trump called for the Republican governor of Georgia, Brian Kemp, to resign from office today because Kemp wouldn’t attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election results. After counting the ballots three times in the Peach State, the results show President-elect Joe Biden won the state by 12,000 votes. Trump also tried to allege that some kind of conspiracy theory that Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger’s brother works for China and somehow figures into the mix. By the way, did I mention Brad Raffensperger doesn’t have a brother? In related news, the Atlanta-Journal Constitution reports an audit of over 15,000 voter signatures from the election didn’t find a single fraudulent absentee ballot as Donald Trump has repeatedly claimed. The report by the Georgia secretary of state’s office released Tuesday. From the AJC: “There were 10 absentee ballots that had been accepted but voter signatures didn’t match or signatures were missing, according to the report. But agents from the GBI and investigators with the secretary of state’s office contacted those voters and confirmed they had submitted those ballots.”
Hearings from Atlanta on the Georgia Election overturn now being broadcast. Check it out. @OANN@newsmax and many more. @BrianKempGA should resign from office. He is an obstructionist who refuses to admit that we won Georgia, BIG! Also won the other Swing States.
…The consent decree signed by the “Secretary”, with the consent of Kemp, is perhaps even more poorly negotiated than the deal that John Kerry made with Iran. Now it turns out that Brad R’s brother works for China, and they definitely don’t want “Trump”. So disgusting! #MAGA
Read the Georgia Secretary of State’s report on the Cobb County signature audit that found one missing signature and one mistaken signature out of 15k. #gapol
Highlight: “no fraudulent absentee ballots were identified.” Story in the morning.
The news doesn’t come as much of a surprise in that he took 61 days to barely concede he lost the election. Vice President Mike Pence has indicated he will attend the swearing-in ceremony but an administration official told the New York Times he hasn’t received an official invitation yet. The Times also notes that only 3 presidents have declined to attend their successor’s inauguration: “John Adams in 1801, his son John Quincy Adams in 1829 and Andrew Johnson, a Democrat who sat out the 1869 inauguration after he was replaced in favor of fellow Republican Ulysses S. Grant.”
