Tag: Donald Trump

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Trump: ‘I’m The Best Thing That Ever Happened To Puerto Rico’

(photo: public domain – Flickr/WhiteHouse)
Forty-six days before the presidential election, and with a very tight race in battleground state Florida (I’ll get to that), the Trump administration has suddenly announced a new $13 billion aid package to help rebuild Puerto Rico which was decimated by Hurricane Maria in 2017. The Hill reports the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) will award $9.6 billion in grants to help rebuild the Puerto Rico Electrical Power Authority addressing repairs to electrical substations, power generation systems and transmission lines. Additionally, $2 billion will be targeted to rebuilding the U.S. territory’s school buildings and educational facilities. During a press briefing today, Donald Trump told reporters, “I have to say in a very nice way, very respectful way, I’m the best thing that ever happened to Puerto Rico. Nobody even close.” Hold the phone… You may recall this is the same man who, in November 2018, told congressional leaders he didn’t want anymore relief funds going to Puerto Rico. He also claimed officials in Puerto Rico inflated Hurrican Maria’s death toll in an effort to make him look bad. In June 2019, when Congress was finally able to pass additional relief funds for Puerto Rico, Trump attempted to take credit for the move even though he’d worked to block such funding. At the press event today, Trump tried to say “Democrats don’t want to see” aid to Puerto Rico passed, but the Democratic-led House passed billions in aid to Puerto Rico in February amid Republican objections. Now, I’d sooner bite my tongue than be cynical, but it’s a fact that thousands of Puerto Ricans migrated to Florida after the devastation of Hurricane Maria. And in a race where every vote counts, the timing of this new funding certainly is convenient. Real Clear Politics average of polls in Florida shows Democrat Joe Biden just 1.6 points ahead of the Donald. If Trump loses the Sunshine State’s 29 electoral votes, his path to winning becomes VERY tight.

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Former Pence Aide Endorses Biden, Says Trump Only Concerned With Reelection

Donald Trump smirks during a press event

Donald Trump smirks during a press event
Donald Trump (photo: public domain/Flickr)
Olivia Troye, a former homeland security official who served in Vice President Mike Pence’s office for the coronavirus task force, endorsed Joe Biden for president today. She described her time in the White House (she resigned two months ago) as “terrifying” and said the president “could have saved lives” in his response to the coronavirus pandemic in a video released Thursday. In the video, she says Trump was only concerned with his reelection. From CNN:

A former top aide to Vice President Mike Pence assailed President Donald Trump’s response to the pandemic in a new video Thursday, adding to the growing list of former Trump administration officials who have criticized the President and, in several cases, endorsed his Democratic opponent Joe Biden.

Olivia Troye, who was a homeland security adviser to Pence and his lead staffer on the White House’s coronavirus task force, charged in the two-minute video that Trump failed to protect the American public because he only cared about himself and getting reelected. Troye’s criticism is particularly striking because of her role working on the coronavirus task force, which Pence leads.

“Towards the middle of February, we knew it wasn’t a matter of if Covid would become a big pandemic here, it was a matter of when,” said Troye, who left the White House in late July. “But the President didn’t want to hear that, because his biggest concern was that we were in an election year, and how was this going to affect what he considered to be his record of success?”

At one coronavirus task force meeting, Troye claimed that Trump suggested “maybe this Covid thing is a good thing.”

“I don’t like shaking hands with people. I don’t have to shake hands with these disgusting people,” Troye claimed Trump said at the meeting.

The White House denied Troye’s statements and predictably accused her of being a disgruntled former employee.

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Fact-Checking Trump’s ABC News Townhall

(screen capture via ABC News)
NowThis News fact-checks Donald Trump’s ABC News town hall earlier this week where he took questions from undecided voters. During the session, Trump blamed Joe Biden for not implementing a national face-mask mandate (even though Biden isn’t president) and said he thinks he’s done a “great job” handling the COVID-19 pandemic as the U.S. approaches 200,000 coronavirus-related deaths. This is a terrific quick wrap-up of the event. Hit the play button below.

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Town Hall: Trump Cites ‘Herd Mentality’ And Churchill Atop Buildings During Bombing Of London

Donald Trump (screen capture)

Donald Trump during ABC News Town Hall (screen capture)
In case you missed it, Donald Trump didn’t have a great time during last night’s town hall event hosted by ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos. At one point, he was asked by an undecided voter about a national mandate on wearing face masks during the coronavirus pandemic. In an odd twist, Trump pointed to his Democratic opponent, Joe Biden, for failing to implement such a mandate. Note – Joe Biden is a private citizen holding no public office meaning he has no authority to enact such policies. Did Trump forget HE is currently president? “A good question is, you ask, like Joe Biden. They said, ‘We’re going to do a national mandate on masks,'” Trump said Tuesday evening. “But he didn’t do it, I mean, he never did it.” Biden has said he would encourage governors to support the use of face masks and promised to lead by example by wearing face coverings in public. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci recommend universal mask-wearing when in public and around people who don’t live in your household to help prevent coronavirus transmission. Trump also said “a lot of people” don’t like face masks. When asked who those folks were, Trump said “waiters.”

Additionally, Trump declared, again, that the coronavirus will just disappear citing “herd mentality.” “Over a period of time, sure, with time, it goes away and you’ll develop, you’ll develop like a herd mentality — it’s going to be herd-developed, and that’s going to happen. That will all happen.” Most people believe he meant to say “herd immunity,” but, you know, four-syllable words can be hard… Along the way, the Donald also told some wild story about Winston Churchill standing on the roof of buildings while the Nazis were bombing London during WWII telling folks, “Everything’s going to be ok.” Actually, as soon as Churchill became prime minister, he warned the UK of ‘struggle and suffering’ and told Londoners the Nazi campaign was ‘killing large numbers of women and children.’

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Trump Got How Much Support In New Poll Of Gay Voters?

L-R President Donald Trump, former Vice President Joe Biden
As the U.S. heads into the final weeks of the 2020 presidential campaign, gay dating app Hornet surveyed 10,000 gay men on who they support in the race for the White House. Twelve percent of those polled (1,200) identified as American citizens and 51 percent indicated they plan to vote for former Vice President Joe Biden. Forty-five percent said they plan to vote for Donald Trump. Those numbers align fairly closely with recent national polling. Real Clear Politics average of polls shows the former Vice President currently averaging 49.9 percent while Trump’s support is 42.9 percent. Data-crunching website FiveThirtyEight also reports Biden leads in national polling by 7 or 8 percentage points. Here’s the breakdown of responses to the question “Describe your support of Donald Trump:” • 49% said “I do not support him at all” • 11% said “I disagree with him on most issues” • 9% responded “I disagree with him on some issues and agree with him on others” • 11% said “I agree with him on most issues” • 16% responded “I fully support him”
(graphic via Hornet)
Overall, among the 10,000 respondents worldwide, 66 percent said they support Biden while 34 percent indicated support for Trump. What’s surprising is the American LGBTQ community historically skews to the left politically. For Trump to garner slightly higher support in this poll than current national averages raised some eyebrows. Plus, as has been widely reported, the Trump administration’s track record regarding the LGBTQ community has been hostile on numerous fronts including the transgender military ban, arguing before the U.S. Supreme Court LGBTQ people shouldn’t be protected under federal civil rights law, supporting taxpayer-funded religious adoption agencies that refuse to place children in LGBTQ homes, and opposing passage of The Equality Act. Related: White House Spokeswoman ‘Trump Has Great Record On LGBTQ Issues’ (Oh My Sides…) The Washington Blade reported that national exit polls for the 2016 presidential campaign showed Hillary Clinton garnered a lopsided 78 percent of the queer vote versus Trump’s 14 percent – which is the lowest percentage for a Republican presidential candidate in modern history. In 2012, President Obama won 76 percent of the vote compared to Mitt Romney’s 22 percent support. Of course, many point out Trump’s surprise win in 2016 seemed to defy most polls, so this poll by Hornet could be an outlier. You can check out more from the Hornet survey here.

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Irony: Trumpers Race To Campaign Rally To Tune Of ‘Macho Man’

I reported earlier today about Donald Trump’s visit to Nevada over the weekend where he held an indoor campaign rally with a few thousand supporters in violation of the current Nevada guidelines regarding gatherings of more than 50 people. I just came across this, however, which has to go in the ‘You can’t make this stuff up’ file. Watch these hundreds of Trump fans race past the barricades (barely a mask in sight) all to the tune of the Village People’s gay anthem, “Macho Man.” It’s also worth noting that Victor Willis, the only original member of the Village People still with the group, sent a cease and desist letter to the Trump campaign in June asking that the group’s music (Trump also loves using “YMCA” and “In the Navy”).

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Trump: COVID-19 Restrictions Don’t Apply To Me

Donald Trump smirks during a press event

Donald Trump smirks during a press event
Donald Trump (photo: public domain/Flickr)
Donald Trump told the Las Vegas Review-Journal in an interview Sunday that he doesn’t believe Nevada’s COVID-19 restrictions regarding large gatherings of over 50 people apply to him giving himself permission to hold his indoor rally in Henderson attended by a few thousand followers.

The president blamed the Democratic governor for forcing his campaign to abandon plans to hold an outdoor rally Sunday at Cirrus Aviation near McCarran International Airport and a Saturday rally in Reno, which was moved to an outdoor venue in Minden.

After failing to arrange alternative venues in the Las Vegas area, the campaign decided to hold the rally indoors at the Xtreme Manufacturing facility, owned by his friend Don Ahern, Trump said. “They canceled six different sites because the governor wouldn’t let it happen, all external sites,” the president said.

Henderson officials issued written and verbal warnings of compliance to the event organizers. Kathleen Richards, a spokeswoman for the city of Henderson, said in a statement “gatherings of more than 50 people in a private or public setting is prohibited.”

“If the governor’s directives are not followed,” she said, “the city may assess a fine of up to $500 per violation as well as suspend or revoke the business license.”

Sisolak was not targeting Trump in any way. Currently, no one is supposed to hold large gatherings of more than 50 people in Nevada. That’s the rule for everyone.

Sisolak clapped back in a lengthy thread on Twitter writing, “Tonight, President Donald Trump is taking reckless and selfish actions that are putting countless lives in danger here in Nevada.”

“The president appears to have forgotten that this country is still in the middle of a global pandemic,” added Sisolak.

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Jake Tapper Ends Scrappy Interview With Peter Navarro Over Trump’s COVID Lies

L-R CNN anchor Jake Tapper, White House trade adviser Peter Navarro
There’s a strategy in public relations. During a scandal or debacle, send out a representative to do an interview with a news outlet. When asked a question about the scandal, begin spewing the talking points you’ve been told to repeat. When asked to get back to the question at hand, repeat the talking points to continue killing time out of the 7 or so minutes of the segment. When the host tries to get back to the question at hand AGAIN, become irate and say, “You’re not letting me answer the question” when you KNOW you’re just running out the clock AND you’re just repeating the scripted talking points without addressing the actual issue. This is what happens in the clip below between CNN anchor Jake Tapper and White House trade adviser Peter Navarro. Now, you might wonder why a trade adviser is speaking to the news about the coronavirus pandemic. It has nothing to do with his background, he’s just the kind of pugnacious scrapper that Donald Trump likes to see defend him. That’s why he’s doing the interview. In this appearance, Navarro has an audience of one. His boss. When Tapper asked Navarro to explain why Trump privately acknowledged the coronavirus was deadlier than the flu but said otherwise publicly, Navarro repeatedly goes down a rabbit hole with his talking points. At one point, as Navarro throws out the false statement that Trump was “called a xenophobe and a racist by Joe Biden” (he wasn’t) and later apologized for it (he didn’t), Tapper corrects him. Navarro says, “We’ll do the fact-checker on that.” “I just did,” responds Tapper. In the end, Tapper ends the segment and reminded viewers of the facts: “I would just like to remind the American people that the United States has less than 5 percent of the world’s population, and the United States has more than 20 percent of the world’s coronavirus deaths. That is a fact. It does not matter how many times he insults CNN.”

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Twitter Flags Another Trump Tweet Urging Double Voting

Donald Trump reportedly took classified top secret documents from the White House when his administration came to an end.

Donald Trump (screen capture)
After Donald Trump again urged his Twitter followers in battleground state North Carolina to vote twice, the state’s Attorney General Josh Stein reminded his constituents it’s a felony to vote twice. Twitter also blocked likes, replies, and retweets on the Donald’s tweet. By the way, if you’re going to go to the polls to ‘check on your vote,’ why not just GO VOTE? Stein’s tweet also included a link where NC voters can track their mail-in votes to make sure they are counted. Twitter tagged Trump’s tweet with a disclaimer: “This Tweet violated the Twitter Rules about civic and election integrity. However, Twitter has determined that it may be in the public’s interest for the Tweet to remain accessible.”