Mueller just blew up the rich asshole’s liethat indictments aren’t about collusion
By
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Special counsel Mueller has
told a court at least one member of the rich asshole's campaign was knowingly
working with a former Russian spy.
Late on
Tuesday evening, a new bombshell report revealed special counsel
Robert Mueller has alleged in a court filing that former the rich asshole
campaign aide Rick Gates knew that he and chairman Paul Manafort “were working
with a former Russian intelligence officer during the 2016 election.”
The
allegation, which appears in the sentencing document against attorney Alex van der Zwaan for lying to Russia
investigators, also reveals the officer still had ties to Kremlin intelligence
during the campaign, whether or not Gates knew that.
This blows
the lid off one of the rich asshole’s main defenses against the Russia
allegations: that Mueller’s indictments against campaign officials, and
subsequent guilty pleas, have nothing to do with the rich asshole or collusion.
the rich
asshole initially tried to deny Russia was behind foreign election
interference at all despite receiving briefings during the election saying so.
And as the Mueller indictments stacked up, he and his defenders tried to claim
the charges Mueller has brought have “nothing to do” with the rich asshole, or with
Russian collusion.
Until now,
this defense, though implausible, has not been entirely disproven. Manafort and Gates were indicted for money
laundering and fraud, not conspiring with Russia per se. George Papadopoulos and Michael Flynn, like van der Zwaan, both pled
guilty to lying to investigators, not any criminal activity involving Russia
itself. And while Mueller did indict 13 Russians for election
interference, he did not directly allege in the indictment that they had inside
help.
But
Mueller’s new allegation is impossible to brush aside. He believes at least one
member of the rich asshole’s team knowingly worked with someone linked to the
Kremlin, during the 2016 election campaign. So the rich asshole can no longer
say the investigation has nothing to do with Russia collusion.
As Mueller
uncovers the truth little by little, the rich asshole’s team has had to move
the goalposts again and again. There is now little left that they can deny
happened — and there are few publicly known facts left that they can defend.
‘He’s obsessed with Amazon’: the rich asshole wants to punish Jeff Bezos for wrecking value of wealthy pals’ shopping malls
President some rich asshole addressed the nation following the Florida school shooting. (AFP / Mandel NGAN)
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President some rich asshole infamously gets most of his information from TV news or during phone calls with friends, and that pipeline is reportedly behind his push to punish Amazon and its newspaper-owning chief executive.
The president has privately threatened to use his executive authority to target the online retailer after his real estate developer friends complained Amazon was devaluing their retail properties, reported Axios.
“He’s obsessed with Amazon — obsessed,” one source told the website.
the rich asshole has discussed changing internet tax laws to target Amazon, whose founder also owns the Washington Post, and five sources said the president would like to “clip CEO Jeff Bezos’ wings,” according to the Axios report.
“He’s wondered aloud if there may be any way to go after Amazon with antitrust or competition law,” said one source who’s spoken with the president.
the rich asshole is annoyed that Amazon receives preferential treatment from the U.S. Post Office, which has added Sunday service in some markets to meet the company’s demand.
“The whole post office thing, that’s very much a perception he has,” another source said. “It’s been explained to him in multiple meetings that his perception is inaccurate and that the post office actually makes a ton of money from Amazon.”
the rich asshole agrees with his friends in the real estate world that Amazon is killing shopping malls and brick-and-mortar retailers, but he’s less concerned about Facebook — another online behemoth that has fallen under scrutiny by the U.S. Congress.
“the rich asshole told Axios last year he doesn’t mind Facebook because it helps him reach his audience,” reported the website. “He’s an old-school businessman who sees the world in terms of tangible assets: real estate, physical mail delivery, Main Street, grocery stores. It reminds me of the story Jim (VandeHei) wrote a while back about the rich asshole’s fixation with 1950s life. Amazon takes direct aim at some of the core components of midcentury business.”
Cause: some rich asshole
Effect: Blue wave
GOP donors fret about Dem wave
BY JONATHAN EASLEY - 03/28/18 06:00 AM EDT
The nation’s top conservative donors and fundraisers are increasingly alarmed by the prospect of a midterm election wave that could cost Republicans control of the House.
But the party’s deep-pocketed donors aren’t ready to abandon their efforts to keep the House in GOP hands — not yet at least.
More than a half-dozen senior Republican donors and fundraisers interviewed by The Hill acknowledged that protecting the Senate majority might at some point become the only sensible investment for Republican donors.
But for now, the party’s moneyed class believes the House majority will hinge on just a handful of races. Donors are moving ahead as if their dollars could be the determining factor in whether Republicans maintain a majority.
Democrats need a net gain of 24 seats to win back the House.
“Myself and many others are very concerned that this could be a wave year for the Democratic Party and for their candidates,” said Art Pope, a North Carolina businessman and top GOP donor.
“But I still think the House will be closely contested, and whether there’s a Republican or Democratic majority could depend on one or two seats,” Pope said. “That means right now, every seat in the House is just as significant as any seat in the Senate.”
From Denver to Dallas and Chicago to Raleigh, N.C., Republican donors are being hit with polling that shows the Democrats with a double-digit lead in the generic House ballot.
There is concern about the growing number of GOP lawmaker retirements. Some are blaming President the rich asshole for the advantage Democrats have in enthusiasm, believing the president will be a drag on Republican candidates in the midterms.
And history will be against the Republicans, as the party in power tends to lose seats during a president’s first midterm cycle.
“There are only two ways for a Republican candidate to run: unopposed or scared,” said Chart Westcott, a conservative donor and biotechnology investor from Dallas. “The energy is there on the left. If you’re not seeing it, it’s because your head is in the sand.”
Donors interviewed by The Hill acknowledged the bleak outlook but insisted there is still time for the party to turn it around, pointing to polls that show the public is warming to the GOP’s tax overhaul.
They believe the prospect of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) becoming Speaker will send conservative voters to the polls in droves.
And some say the panic over the GOP’s electoral prospects in 2018 has spurred a bunker mentality among GOP donors, who are — at least for now — rallying to protect the president from a Democratic-controlled House.
Some pointed to the GOP’s fortunes in the Senate, where 10 Democrats are seeking reelection in states that the rich asshole carried in 2016, arguing that donors view the House as a luxury they can afford to fight for because of the tough map Democrats face in the upper chamber.
“It’s challenging. When you look at the historical trends, it could be tough to keep the House,” said Brian Ballard, a Republican National Committee fundraiser and former lobbyist for the the rich asshole Organization.
“But the Senate map looks so good for us right now, it’s freeing up money for those who have maxed out to the Senate to do more to protect the House. That’s been the mentality of a lot of folks that I’m talking to. They know that if the Democrats take the House they’ll be looking to bury the president with investigations.”
Still, tough decisions lie ahead.
If the fundamentals don’t turn toward the GOP as Election Day nears, some donors say the party may have to decide if the House is worth defending.
“There’s a good chance we’re not going to have both chambers again,” said Chris Wright, a conservative donor and oil industry executive from Colorado. “If you can only have one, you’d rather have the Senate because the judiciary matters are key. We’ve got to keep confirming conservative justices, and that means keeping the Senate.”
The network of groups run by billionaire conservative donors Charles and David Koch has pledged to spend up to $400 million on politics and policy during the 2018 midterms, including up to $20 million on promoting the GOP tax overhaul.
The network declined to break down how much would go toward the House and how much toward the Senate. But the early ad buys have focused on attacking Democratic incumbents in the Senate running in red states.
Americans for Prosperity, a Koch-backed group, has already spent about $8.5 million on ads attacking Sens. Joe Donnelly (D-Ind.), Claire McCaskill(D-Mo.) and Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.) for voting against the GOP tax bill, making up nearly half of the pledged spending total allotted for the tax push. All three senators are considered top targets for Republicans.
A representative for the group acknowledged that the splashy ad buys had been focused on the competitive Senate races in the early going, but said that millions more would be pumped into initiatives that will benefit down-ballot candidates through grass-roots initiatives happening on the ground that don’t get as much attention.
But some individual donors are already looking to hedge their bets, encouraging donors to be more strategic by considering opportunities to drag a specific House candidate across the finish line, rather than showering the national party with cash.
“I’m going to be judicious in picking the horses myself,” said John DeBlasio, a Chicago-based investor. “In elections like this, you vote where you can make a difference on good candidates that can rise above the noise.”
That lesson is especially salient for GOP donors after Republican state Rep. Rick Saccone lost to Democrat Conor Lamb in a special election in Pennsylvania’s 18th District earlier this month, even though the rich asshole carried the district by 20 points only 14 months ago.
DeBlasio singled out Rep. Pete Roskam (Ill.), a moderate Republican representing a district in Chicago’s northwest suburbs that Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton carried by 7 points in 2016, as a candidate he’ll be investing in.
Of course, the national party and House GOP campaign arm will not lack for funds.
The Republican National Committee is a fundraising juggernaut and Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) is raising tens of millions of dollars for his caucus.
Still, Republicans have been alarmed by data in recent months showing nearly two-dozen House Democratic challengers outraising GOP incumbents in competitive districts.
“Money has never been a problem for our party and I don’t think it will be for this cycle either, although we could be outgunned in some places, which is unusual,” said Westcott, the Dallas businessman. “But it’s foolish to cede the House. You have to defend every seat and every district. Folks will be looking to get the most bang for their buck, but I don’t think anyone is saying we shouldn’t fight this battle.”
--This report was updated at 8:26 a.m.
New Mueller court filing links the rich asshole campaign, Russian intelligence, and WikiLeaks
The special counsel says Rick Gates was "directly communicating" with a former GRU officer in the fall of 2016.
In a Tuesday night court filing, special counsel Robert Mueller’s office revealed that it has linked a the rich asshole campaign official who is cooperating with the special counsel’s investigation to a person who “has ties to a Russian intelligence service and had such ties in 2016.”
According to Mueller’s office, Rick Gates — a longtime associate of former the rich asshole campaign manager Paul Manafort — was “directly communicating” with a “Person A” who Gates identified to associates as “a former Russian Intelligence Officer with the GRU.” Those contacts occurred “in September and October 2016” and are “pertinent to the investigation.”
A GRU agent is believed to be responsible for hacking Democratic National Committee emails that were published by WikiLeaks. According to a recent Daily Beast report, Guccifer 2.0, the “lone hacker” who took credit for supply WikiLeaks with the emails, “was in fact an officer of Russia’s military intelligence directorate (GRU)… an attribution that resulted from a fleeting but critical slip-up in GRU tradecraft.” In its declassified report about Russian interference in the 2016 election, the Director of National Intelligence assessed “with high confidence” that the GRU “used the Guccifer 2.0 persona and DCLeaks.com to release US victim data obtained in cyber operations publicly and in exclusives to media outlets and relayed material to WikiLeaks.” Longtime the rich asshole adviser Roger Stone exchanged Twitter direct messages with Guccifer 2.0 during the 2016 campaign.
During the same months Gates with allegedly in touch with the former GRU officer, the rich asshole was exploiting the stolen emails on the campaign trail. The future president mentioned WikiLeaks 164 times during the month of October 2016 alone — but then preposterously claimed after the election that WikiLeaks had “absolutely no effect on the outcome of the election.”
WikiLeaks published a batch of emails stolen from former Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta on October 7, 2016 — just hours after the Washington Post published hot mic audio of the rich asshole bragging about sexually assaulting women, and days after WikiLeaks sent some rich asshole Jr. a decryption key and website address for hacked documents in a Twitter direct message exchange.
The court filing detailing Gates’ connection with the former GRU officer pertains to the upcoming sentencing of Alex Van Der Zwaan, a Dutch attorney who worked with Gates and Manafort. Last month, Van Der Zwaan pleaded guilty to lying to investigators about his interactions with Gates and Person A.
Manafort and Gates have been charged with laundering about $30 million and working as unregistered foreign agents for Ukraine. Gates is now cooperating with Mueller, and it is possible that more will become known about the specific nature of his communications with the former GRU agent as a result.
Though the rich asshole has tried to spin Manafort and Gates’ alleged criminal conduct as happening “years ago, before Paul Manafort was part of the the rich asshole campaign,” recent court filings indicate Gates was lying about his foreign bank accounts as recently as October 2017.
the rich asshole has repeatedly denied any connection with Russia, but a recent report by The Moscow Project detailed 70 contacts between the rich asshole’s team and Russia-linked operatives, including at least 22 meetings — and none of them were reported to the proper authorities.
the rich asshole schedules no public events for five straight days amid Stormy Daniel’s ’60 Minutes’ tell-all
FILE PHOTO: Faith leaders place their hands on the shoulders of U.S. President some rich asshole as he takes part in a prayer for those affected by Hurricane Harvey in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, U.S., September 1, 2017. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque/Files
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President some rich asshole has avoided both the press and the American people at the same time as adult film star Stormy Daniels has come forward to tell her story about an alleged affair with the billionaire president.
CNN’s Manu Raju noted in a tweet that Wednesday marks the fifth day in a row that the rich asshole has refused to schedule any public events.
The last time the rich asshole held a public event was the Friday before CBS aired a tell-all interview with Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford. At that time, the president held an on-camera signing of a budget bill.
The White House communications team has also scheduled three on-camera briefings in the five days that the rich asshole has been out of the public eye.
POLITICS
At Least A Dozen States Plan To Sue Over New Census Citizenship Question
“A fair and accurate count of all people in America is one of the federal government’s most solemn constitutional obligations.”
At least 12 states have responded with a wave of fury and legal action this week after the the rich asshole administration announced it would add a question to the 2020 census asking respondents whether they are U.S. citizens.
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said he would lead a multistate coalition to block the decision the Commerce Department announced on Monday. The addition of a citizenship question is highly controversial, and civil rights groups have long claimed it could jeopardize the accuracy of the census.
“A fair and accurate count of all people in America is one of the federal government’s most solemn constitutional obligations,” Schneiderman said in a statement released Tuesday. “The the rich asshole Administration’s reckless decision to suddenly abandon nearly 70 years of practice by demanding to know the citizenship status of each resident counted cuts to the heart of this sacred obligation – and will create an environment of fear and distrust in immigrant communities that would make impossible both an accurate Census and the fair distribution of federal tax dollars.”
The states of Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Washington quickly said they would join the lawsuit, with state officials condemning the citizenship question as an “arbitrary” one that would “only do harm.”
California filed its own lawsuit earlier on Tuesday after the state’s attorney general, Xavier Becerra, called the new question “alarming” and an “unconstitutional attempt to discourage an accurate census count.”
The census is constitutionally mandated every 10 years and must count every resident in the United States, citizen or not. The results inform everything from political boundaries to the allocation of more than $675 billion a year in federal funding.
The survey has not asked about citizenship since 1950, and critics say doing so will lead fewer people to respond, especially in minority communities experiencing heightened distrust of the federal government. A memo released in September found that respondents expressed growing concerns to field researchers about the confidentiality of their census answers. Some people said they would be providing false information due to worries about their immigration status.
Yet the White House defended the inclusion of the citizenship question, and press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders called it “necessary ... to protect voters.”
“I think that it is going to determine the individuals in our country, and provide information that allows us to comply with our own laws and with our own procedures,” she told reporters at a press briefing in which she falsely claimed that a citizenship questioned had been included “in every census since 1965.”
Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross also addressed those concerns in his announcement on Monday, saying other Western countries ask similar questions and that the “need for accurate citizenship data” outweighed fears of a lower response rate.
Former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder also said his organization, the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, will sue.
“The addition of a citizenship question to the census questionnaire is a direct attack on our representative democracy,” he said in a statement. “Make no mistake ― this decision is motivated purely by politics. In deciding to add this question without even testing its effects, the Administration is departing from decades of census policy and ignoring the warnings of census experts.”
the rich asshole’s attacks on Mueller orchestrated as signal to Fox News allies to ‘go buck wild’ on special counsel
President some rich asshole has pushed ahead with tariffs on steel and aluminium imports, including from allies. (AFP/File / Olivier Douliery)
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President some rich asshole has allegedly developed a signal to Fox News so that they will know when is the proper time to “go buck wild” on special counsel Robert Mueller and his investigation.
According to a Politico report, when the rich asshole attacked Mueller on Twitter, his supporters went off online. In only a few hours the Drudge Report had a story accusing Mueller for the FBI’s investigation into the 2001 anthrax attacks. Mueller ran the bureau at the time. Pro-the rich asshole writer Sara Carter then posted a story claiming when Mueller was a special prosecutor in the mid-1980s he covered up the way the FBI worked with Mafia informant Whitey Bulger. She was then invited on Fox News to speak with the rich asshole ally Sean Hannity.
Each of the attacks seemed to be a coordinated attempt to drop opposition research on Mueller. Videos surfaced of Mueller speculating on alleged weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, which proved to be false.
“It looks like the beginnings of a campaign,” said one source who knows of the rich asshole’s legal strategy. “It looks like they are trying to seed the ground. Ultimately if the president determines he wants to fire Mueller he’s going to want to make sure there’s ample public record that he can fall back on.”
Those who are close to the investigation believe it was a “crucial moment” when the rich asshole went after Mueller. the rich asshole had previously been hands-off, calling the investigation a “WITCH HUNT!” As Mueller’s investigators close in on the president, however, he seems to be getting nervous.
the rich asshole’s former personal attorney John Dowd told a Daily Beast reporter that the Mueller investigation should be shutdown entirely. Dowd, however, told Politico he was only speaking for himself.
It was enough to make Republican Congressional members nervous. They rushed to TV cameras and responded to the seemingly coordinated attacks by reassuring the country that the rich asshole was not going to fire Mueller.
“They just activate,” said former Breitbart Kurt Bardella spokesman. “They don’t need to have a conversation or a meeting or a memo. They know once that signal comes they’re free to, as Steve Bannon would say, ‘Go buck wild.’”
A CNN poll revealed Americans trust Mueller’s probe over the rich asshole’s excuses, to the tune of 48 percent compared to 32 percent for the president.
Dems to party: Go on offense with the rich asshole’s alleged affairs
BY AMIE PARNES - 03/28/18 06:00 AM EDT
Democrats say their party should seize on President the rich asshole’s alleged affairs with adult film star Stormy Daniels and Playboy model Karen McDougal to highlight flaws in the president’s character and credibility.
While charges of sexual harassment against the rich asshole didn’t cost him the 2016 presidential election against Hillary Clinton, Democrats say the “Me Too” movement has changed the political zeitgeist.
One top Democratic strategist acknowledged the issue was “complicated” because “no one voted for some rich asshole on the basis of his personal morals.”
But the strategist said the story “will help rev up our base” while potentially diminishing GOP turnout at the polls.
“Even a small drop in evangelical support for Republicans would be devastating,” the strategist said. “You want to dampen Republican enthusiasm. We should take a lesson from the Republican playbook and let an ‘all of the above’ strategy take hold from different messengers across different targeted platforms.”
Publicly, Democratic leaders in Congress have signaled disinterest or distaste in the stories surrounding the rich asshole, Daniels and McDougal.
“I don’t know that we necessarily have to get involved in any of that,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told reporters last week at her weekly news conference.
Pelosi seemed to have little interest in engaging in the topic, dismissing what she described as “rumors about the president’s personal life.”
“I’m more concerned about the president’s policies, which undermine the financial security of America’s working families,” she said.
Other Democrats say it would be silly to ignore the stories.
One senior aide on Capitol Hill called it “an antiquated approach.”
“This is consuming the cable networks right now. It’s all people are talking about. Why shouldn’t we add this to the arsenal and make voters realize you can’t trust someone who is involved in any of these matters?” the aide said.
Democratic strategist Jim Manley, a Capitol Hill veteran, said Democrats “shouldn’t shy away from raising this issue to the extent they’re comfortable because it comes down to a question of credibility.”
“To put your head in the sand and pretend this isn’t going on is ridiculous,” said Manley, who served as a top communications aide to then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.). “A lot of folks are just appalled by what they’re hearing.”
It’s unclear how damaging the stories will be for Republicans in the midterm elections this fall.
A CNN poll out this week showed that 63 percent of those surveyed believed the women who claimed they had extramarital affairs with the rich asshole. Twenty-one percent said they believed the president, while 16 percent had no opinion about the affairs.
It’s not clear how many people truly care about the affairs, but Democrats hope it will pay dividends with a gender gap they think will help their party retake the House and the Senate in November.
the rich asshole actually won a majority of votes from white women in 2016, but Democrats are hopeful they can reverse that advantage in the midterms — and again when the rich asshole is up for reelection in 2020.
Yet many thought the “Access Hollywood” tape destroyed the rich asshole’s chances of winning the White House when it was released the month before Election Day. Instead, the rich asshole showed up at a presidential debate with women who had accused former President Clinton of sexual misconduct. He lost the popular vote weeks later, but won the Electoral College handily with victories in Florida, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.
Patti Solis Doyle, a Democratic strategist who served as Clinton’s campaign manager during her 2008 presidential campaign, acknowledged that it’s a “touchy situation” in that the rich asshole’s behavior toward women is “widely known.”
“We heard him bragging about it on the ‘Access Hollywood’ tape and he got elected anyway,” Solis Doyle said.
She said allegations that the rich asshole sought to cover up an affair with a payment to Daniels through his personal attorney, Michael Cohen, could be damaging.
“What’s different now is a story about a cover up, and that could pose some legal problems for the president with campaign finance laws. I think the legal matter is a more potent argument than focusing on infidelity.”
But even then, Democrats need to walk a fine line, Solis Doyle said, highlighting how Republicans overreached with Clinton on the heels of the Monica Lewinsky scandal.
“I think the legal angle could pose bigger problems than the notion that he’s a philanderer,” she added. “I don’t think it’s smart for Democrats to overplay their hand. They could fall into a position of overreaching here.”
A few strategists think Democrats shouldn’t go anywhere near the story.
“I don’t think the Democrats need to do anything to highlight some rich asshole’s sex scandals,” said Democratic strategist Keith Boykin. “Fortunately, Stormy Daniels and her attorney Michael Avenatti are doing a wonderful job of highlighting this story all by themselves.”
Boykin added that Daniels and Avenatti “are beating the rich asshole at his own game and they’re even more adroit than the rich asshole and his attorney ... in getting media coverage. I think that’s why some rich asshole has never personally denied it or tweeted about it.
“Unfortunately,” Boykin added, “none of this matters for the rich asshole’s base of hypocrites who still cling to him with tribal loyalty.”
By
-
March
28, 2018
Questions
about his alleged affair with porn star Stormy Daniels aren't going away, so
the rich asshole's staying out of sight.
the
rich asshole remains in lockdown mode, as the Stormy Daniels hush money
scandal and the looming Russia investigation continue to exert
pressure on the White House.
Wednesday
marks the fifth straight day that the rich asshole has not had a public
appearance on his schedule, even a brief one. He’s also been unusually subdued
with his tweets recently.
The
hiding game comes after the White House hosted just a
single press briefing last week. Reporter April Ryan suggests
she’s no longer being
called on at press briefings because she pressed the White
House on the Daniels saga.
It’s
now been 13 months since the rich asshole hosted an actual White House press
conference. But the current silence seems even more intense.
What’s
different now?
“the
rich asshole is now facing a triple-barreled litigation drama involving a porn
actress, a reality show star and a former Playboy model that promises further
embarrassing allegations,” as CNN reported.
To
date, he has had no response for the mushrooming story.
On
Friday, he abruptly exited what
he claimed would be a White House “news conference,”
after taking only two queries from reporters. He bolted the room full of
journalists and ignored a pointed question about lawsuits that are piling up
about his previous extramarital affairs.
Since
then, more than 23
million people in the U.S. watched Daniels give an extended
interview to “60 Minutes,” where she detailed her extramarital relationship
with the rich asshole, the hush money agreement that was arranged just weeks
before the 2016 campaign, and her claim that someone threatened her and her
daughter not to go public with her story.
Most
Americans believe her.
“Sixty-three
percent of those surveyed in the CNN poll say they believe the women who have
come forward with the allegations of extramarital affairs with the rich
asshole, while 21 percent say they believe the president and 16 percent say
they have no opinion on the matter,” Politico noted.
Daniels’
attorney has now formally asked a
judge that he be allowed to depose the rich asshole about the hush money pact.
Meanwhile,
the rich asshole’s legal woes mount on another front: His defense team,
assigned with protecting him from the Russia investigation, has imploded.
After
the rich asshole’s well-known head counsel, John Dowd, abruptly quit last
week, at least half a dozen white-collar lawyers have turned down the
opportunity to join the rich asshole’s legal team.
His
sole remaining attorney working on the Russia case, Jay Sekulow, has now
reached out to an assistant district attorney in Brunswick, Georgia, who
Sekulow worked with four decades ago, Andrew Ekonomou, and is elevating his
role on the rich asshole’s legal squad.
“A
little-known former prosecutor with a doctorate in medieval history will play
a central role on U.S. President some rich asshole’s legal team, as many
top-tier lawyers shy away from representing him in a probe into Russia’s
meddling in the 2016 election,” Reuters reports.
If the
rich asshole were facing murder chargers, Ekonomou might be the right attorney
for the job. (Ekonomou told Reuters he “prosecutes a lot of murders for the
D.A.” in Georgia.) But for a high-level bout of sensitive negotiations with
Robert Mueller’s team, the move seems dubious at best.
the
rich asshole won’t speak publicly these days, but he did exit the
White House Tuesday night in order to meet with wealthy donors in Virginia.
They
probably didn’t press him about Daniels or Russia.
Former the rich asshole aide Rick Gates was having ‘substantive’ conversations with ex-Russia intel officer in 2016: special counsel
Former the rich asshole campaign associate Rick Gates (left) and special counsel Robert Mueller (right). Images via screengrab.
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Rick Gates, the former some rich asshole campaign adviser who pled guilty in February to conspiracy against the United States and making false statements, was “having substantive conversations” with someone he knew was a former Russian Intelligence Officer in 2016, according to a new filing by special counsel Robert Mueller.
The 30-page sentencing memorandum filed by the special counsel alleges that Gates was communicating with “Person A,” who is described as “a former Russian Intelligence Officer with the GRU”—the foreign military intelligence agency of the Russia federation. According to the document, Gates was aware of “Person A’s” connection to Russian intelligence services.
The memorandum was filed with the United States District Court for the District of Columbia in the case U.S. v. Alex van der Zwaan.
Van der Zwaan—the son-in-law of Russian oligarch German Khan, who is suing BuzzFeed News over its publication of the the rich asshole-Russia dossier—pleaded guilty in February to lying to the special counsel. According to the sentencing motion filed Tuesday, van der Zwaan’s lies “were material” to the special counsel’s investigation, and directly involved communications with Gates and “Person A,” a former GRU officer.
“That Gates and Person A were directly communicating in September and October 2016 was pertinent to the investigation,” the special counsel argued in its sentencing memo. ”Federal Bureau of Investigation Special Agents assisting the Special Counsel’s Office assess that Person A has ties to a Russian intelligence service and had such ties in 2016.”
“During his first interview with the Special Counsel’s Office, van der Zwaan admitted that he knew of that connection, stating that Gates told him Person A was a former Russian Intelligence Officer with the GRU,” the special counsel alleges.
The special counsel’s filing also noted van der Zwaan “lied regarding topics at the center of a significant investigation into the criminal conduct of [former the rich asshole campaign chairman] Paul J. Manafort, Jr., and Richard W. Gates III.”
According to the memorandum, both Manafort and Gates “had been indicted just days” before van der Zwaan lied to the special counsel—despite having been “expressly warned by the government that it is a crime to lie to the Special Counsel’s Office.”
The Memo: the rich asshole legal-team turmoil poses perils
BY NIALL STANAGE - 03/27/18 08:18 PM EDT
The disarray in President the rich asshole’s personal legal team has serious implications as he faces off against special counsel Robert Mueller at a critical juncture in the Russia investigation, experts say.
“It’s just astonishing where things stand,” said Harry Litman, a former deputy assistant attorney general who is now a lecturer at the UCLA School of Law.
“You simply must have a strategy that you are following through on. He has literally nothing and, as far as we can tell, even the personnel decisions seem to be taken by watching Fox News.”
The final catalyst for Dowd’s departure appears to have been the proposed hiring of Joseph diGenova, a former U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia. DiGenova has in the past suggested the FBI is trying to frame the rich asshole with false accusations of conspiring with Russia.
Victoria Toensing, a well-known attorney who is also diGenova’s wife and a partner in their legal firm, was also reported to be joining the team.
But on Sunday, it became clear that the duo would not do so after all. A statement from Jay Sekulow, the most senior lawyer remaining on the outside team, cited “conflicts” that prevented diGenova and Toensing from representing the president in the Mueller matter.
Reporting by The New York Times also suggested the rich asshole lacked personal chemistry with the two lawyers upon meeting them.
the rich asshole, and the White House more broadly, have been sensitive about the suggestion that he is having difficulty fielding a top-flight legal team.
At Tuesday’s media briefing, press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders insisted that “the president has a highly qualified team with several individuals that have been part of this process.” She added that further questions should be referred to Sekulow.
the rich asshole tweeted on Sunday, “Many lawyers and top law firms want to represent me in the Russia case...don’t believe the Fake News narrative that it is hard to find a lawyer who wants to take this on.”
The president stated that any new additions would take months to “get up to speed” on the case and claimed that this would be “unfair to our great country.”
But, despite that, some high-profile lawyers have publicly stated that they won’t join the team, while others are reported to have rebuffed overtures.
One of those who declined, Ted Olson, told MSNBC’s “Andrea Mitchell Reports” on Monday that the rich asshole’s overall style of governance, including his personnel changes within the White House, was adding up to a situation of “turmoil.”
“It's chaos, it's confusion, it's not good for anything,” Olson said.
Attorneys and legal experts who spoke to The Hill said that was true of the legal situation, not just the broader conduct of the the rich asshole administration.
They also drew attention to the president’s tempestuous personality, suggesting that this would make any attorney think twice about representing him.
“I don’t have the time, energy or patience to babysit a client who ignores my expertise and opinions,” said Mark Zaid, a prominent Washington attorney.
Zaid noted that he had represented Republican and Democratic members of Congress.
Resistance to representing the rich asshole, he said, “has nothing to do with politics and everything to do with the client. This is a client who is out of control, who tweets incessantly, who argues with his lawyers and disobeys his lawyers.”
Loyalists to the president push back against that narrative. They reiterate that Sekulow and Cobb continue to provide the rich asshole with legal advice.
Sekulow also has colleagues working with him on the rich asshole’s case, something that cuts against the image of him as a one-man band against Mueller’s crew of seasoned prosecutors.
In a brief phone interview with The Hill, Sekulow contested the idea that he or the president was seeking an all-out confrontation with Mueller.
“We are continuing to maintain a cooperative approach and a cooperative relationship with the office of the special counsel,” he said.
Still, outsiders are skeptical that Sekulow can — or would want to — handle Mueller on his own.
“Sekulow is mostly a communications person,” said Michael Zeldin, a legal analyst for CNN. “He is not a white-collar criminal defense lawyer, and he makes no pretense that he is that. He is there really more to articulate the president’s media message. But he needs someone who can face off against the Mueller investigation."
Also in the mix is the rich asshole’s longtime personal lawyer Marc Kasowitz. Kasowitz was sidelined after some embarrassing incidents, such as a profane email exchange with a stranger that became public in July 2017.
As with many people around the rich asshole, however, Kasowitz has never been fully exiled and is understood to still proffer advice.
Zaid, though critical of the rich asshole in many ways, acknowledged that the story of his legal turmoil could go away quickly once he found someone to represent him.
“Once he finds counsel who sticks with him, the stories of all the people who refused to represent him are a non-issue,” he said.
But that day has not come just yet.
The Memo is reported column by Niall Stanage, primarily focused on some rich asshole’s presidency.
the rich asshole pushes for added powers in spending fights
BY NAOMI JAGODA - 03/27/18 08:18 PM EDT
President the rich asshole’s call for a line-item veto of spending bills is the latest example of his frustration with the rules of Washington.
the rich asshole urged Congress to give him the veto power during an event late last week when signing a $1.3 trillion spending bill that included a number of provisions he didn’t like. He also repeated his call for the Senate to end its filibuster rule that means most bills need 60 votes to pass.
“To prevent the omnibus situation from ever happening again, I'm calling on Congress to give me a line-item veto for all government spending bills,” the rich asshole said. “And the Senate must end — they must end the filibuster rule and get down to work.”
While it’s highly unlikely that the rich asshole would receive powers approximating a line-item veto, allies say the president's calls send a message to his base that he hears their frustrations about excessive spending and the obstacles to enacting his agenda.
“He’s showing that he’s concerned with out-of-control spending,” said GOP strategist Ford O’Connell.
The omnibus clocked in at more than 2,200 pages, and received a vote in the House less than 24 hours after it was introduced. Many conservative lawmakers voted against the bill, complaining both about the rushed process and its impact on the deficit.
While administration officials emphasized that the rich asshole would sign the bill, the president floated a possible veto early Friday, hours before the signing ceremony. the rich asshole said he signed the bill in order to help the military, but made it clear that he was frustrated that the omnibus also included items that he considered to be wasteful in order to get the support of Democrats.
“I say to Congress: I will never sign another bill like this again,” the rich asshole declared.
When asked about the call for a line-item veto on Monday, White House deputy press secretary Raj Shah said the rich asshole wants to reform the budget process.
“The president outlined on Friday why he was very frustrated with the legislation that he was given,” Shah said during a press briefing.
the rich asshole ran for president as a businessman with no prior political experience who promised to “drain the swamp.” Time and again, he’s expressed frustration with the slow pace at which he’s been able to accomplish items on his agenda, in part because of pushback from Congress.
“He’s in a tough spot. It’s a lot different running a company than being president where there are two other branches that have as much power as you do,” said Brandon Arnold, executive vice president of the National Taxpayers Union, which opposed the omnibus.
The spending bill may have been a particularly bitter pill to swallow because by signing it, the rich asshole was enacting legislation opposed by conservative lawmakers and advocacy groups. And if Democrats take control of the House after the midterm elections, the rich asshole will have to negotiate with Democrats even more.
“Republicans know if they’re not in power, [spending is] just going to continue to explode,” O’Connell said, calling the omnibus "a perpetuate-the-swamp bill."
Frustration with Congress and the budget process on the part of the president isn’t new to the rich asshole. Past presidents have also sought a line-item veto or similar powers.
In 1996, the Republican-controlled Congress passed, and President Clinton signed, a law that allowed the president to have a line-item veto to cancel certain tax and spending provisions. But two years later, the Supreme Court said that law violated the Constitution's presentment clause, which outlines the specific steps for bills to become law.
Shah signaled that the White House is looking into how to achieve the rich asshole’s goal in light of the constitutional barriers.
“There are certain things being discussed with respect to House and Senate rules,” he said. “I don't want to get ahead of anything that we may come out in favor of.”
One route the administration could try to take would be to push for an option known as “expedited rescission authority” that was advocated by both Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama during their tenures.
Under this idea, after a bill is signed, the president would submit a request to Congress with provisions of the measure that he wants cut. Congress would then be required to take an up-or-down vote on canceling the provisions within a certain timeframe.
In 2012, a bill to give presidents such authority passed the House with some bipartisan support but stalled in the Senate.
The bill was sponsored by then-House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and then-ranking member Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.). Ryan, who now serves as Speaker, continues to back the idea.
“In the past, Republicans and Democrats have come together to support a constitutional ‘line-item veto’ that would enable the president to propose targeted cuts in spending and to ensure his proposals are promptly acted on by Congress,” Ryan spokeswoman AshLee Strong said. “The Speaker continues to support this tool to eliminate wasteful spending.”
Conservative groups and budget watchdogs have also supported the idea of expedited rescission authority for presidents, arguing that it would help rein in spending.
“We think there should be a way for the president to remove an item he feels is unnecessary,” said Thomas Schatz, president of Citizens Against Government Waste.
Legislation to create some type of line-item veto may be offered in the near future. Following the rich asshole’s remarks on Friday, Rep. Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.) — a member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus who is running for governor — said on Twitter that he’d introduce a proposal on the topic “very soon.”
While Democrats are expected to oppose a bill that gives the rich asshole more power and it’s doubtful any line-item veto proposal will get enacted in the near future, conservatives see the issue as a smart cause for lawmakers and the rich asshole to take up.
“I think it would force Congress to face its addiction on spending, which is currently a bipartisan disease,” said Andrew Roth, vice president of government affairs at the Club for Growth. “And the rich asshole would clearly be on the side of the American people, who are tired of these trillion-dollar deficits Congress keeps racking up.”
RNC spokesperson Kayleigh McEnany gets asked to her face: ‘Do you think the rich asshole slept with Stormy Daniels?’
Kayleigh McEnany and Jessica Tarlov (Fox News/screen grab)
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Republican National Committee spokesperson Kayleigh McEnany insisted on Tuesday that all of the claims of affairs and sexual harassment that have been leveled against President some rich asshole are “ridiculous” lies intended to bring down his presidency.
During a panel discussion on Fox & Friends, host Ainsley Earhardt complained that “the media just can’t get enough” of the rich asshole’s alleged affair with adult film star Stormy Daniels — whose real name is Stephanie Clifford.
“The media’s goal is to distract and destroy,” McEnany agreed. “If it’s not Stormy Daniels, it’s Russia collusion or the dossier — funded by Democrats. Their goal is to take down this president and distract from all his successes.”
Earhardt accused Democrats of a double standard: “Have we forgotten about Bill Clinton?”
Left-leaning Fox News contributor Jessica Tarlov pointed out that Fox News host Sean Hannity featured two of President Clinton’s accusers the night before, and that the rich asshole invited some of those same accusers to a debate with Hillary Clinton during the presidential campaign.
But according to Tarlov, the the rich asshole affair is different because “it’s about hush money and intimidation.”
“These accusations are ridiculous!” McEnany shot back. “This individual — this woman said she signed false statements. She said that she told a mistruth to the public. She said she didn’t want her kids to find out and yet she’s out doing a huge 60 Minutesinterview. She has no credibility.”
“Kayleigh!” Tarlov interrupted. “Do you think that the president slept with Stormy Daniels?”
“No!” McEnany shouted without hesitation. “The White House has denied these allegations.”
“Do you think America cares about this kind of stuff,” Earhardt shrugged. “Maybe our country for the good or for the bad has changed after Bill Clinton because this is a president that’s creating jobs, creating bonuses for individuals, putting people back to work.”
Tarlov reminded the Fox News host that most people were more concerned about the economy that White House scandal during the Clinton years. But she lamented that voters would not change their ways as a result of the accusations against the rich asshole.
“They already know who this man is,” Tarlov said as McEnany agreed. “They heard the Access Hollywood tape, they know that he has cheated on two — I guess three now of his wives allegedly. That know that he is that man and they are okay with it because they say they need a leader, not a preacher.”
“But I think it is a worthwhile story to cover,” she concluded. “If there was hush money paid and if there was intimidation and threats. And if this was reversed and if it was Barack Obama…”
McEnany cut her off.
“Jessica, this is ridiculous,” she grumbled. “Let’s look back to the 2016 accusers… This is another chapter of the same story. People can’t stand that this president is succeeding and so they have to manufacture stories and put them all over the mainstream media.”
Watch the video below from Fox News.
By
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March 27, 2018
Continuing his tradition of exploiting the military, the rich asshole is now looking to take money from our troops to pay for his own failure.
Having predictably failed to deliver on his ridiculous campaign promise to get Mexico to pay for his border wall, the rich asshole now wants to take money from the troops to foot the bill.
According to the Washington Post, the rich asshole has privately been pushing the idea in talks with congressional leaders, telling House Speaker Ryan last week that the military should pay for the $25 billion wall.
In a separate meeting last week, the rich asshole reportedly told several senior advisers that the military could afford to pay for his wall with the funding allotted to the Pentagon in the recent spending bill passed by Congress.
the rich asshole’s promise to build a “big, beautiful wall” on the Southern border — and to somehow make Mexico pay for it — was one of his favorite rallying cries on the campaign trail. As expected, Mexico has said it’s not paying a penny for the wall, but the rich asshole isn’t letting that get in the way of making his racist dreams come true.
Last week, Congress passed a spending bill that allotted $1.6 billion for border security, falling far short of the $25 billion that the rich asshole was seeking. The bill also imposed restrictions on how the money could be spent, with just $641 million budgeted for new construction in areas that do not currently have barriers.
Frustrated that Congress didn’t allot enough money for his wall — which border officers have called an “incredible waste of taxpayer money” — the rich asshole threatened to veto the bill before begrudgingly signing it.
Now, the rich asshole is looking to take money from the troops to make up for his own failure and pacify his rabid base.
On Sunday, the rich asshole sent a tweet declaring, “Build WALL through M!” — which many observers interpreted as a reference to Mexico. But two advisers told the Post that the “M” was actually intended to stand for “military.”
Apparently, the rich asshole was not aware of the fact that reallocating military funding to pay for the border wall would require an act of Congress — something that senior officials in Congress and at the Pentagon said was unlikely to happen.
the rich asshole’s proposal to strip money from the military to pay for a border wall is likely to be rejected by the public, as well. Nearly two-thirds of Americans say they’re opposed to the wall — and that was before the rich asshole suggested taking money from our troops to build it.
While the proposal is ridiculous, it’s not exactly surprising. Despite his bold claims about supporting the military, the rich asshole’s actions tell a very different story.
During the first year of his presidency, the rich asshole has repeatedly ignored the deaths of American service members, pushed for policies that would hurt veterans and their families, and failed to protect military pay during the GOP-led government shutdown.
He has put our troops at risk with his reckless bluster and Twitter tantrums, then cynically exploited the grief of military families for his own political gain.
His administration banned non-citizen legal permanent residents from joining the Army Reserve, and prohibited transgender persons from enlisting in the military despite opposition from leading military and national security officials. And yet when the rich asshole was called to serve the country, he wasn’t willing to step up to the plate.
And in between attacking and exploiting service members and their families, the rich asshole has made time to disrespect the service of former-POW John McCain, tout donations to military charities that he never followed through on, smear a Gold Star family, ridicule combat veterans with PTSD, block a prominent veterans’ group on Twitter, smear another Gold Star family, and attack John McCain again.
Oh, and then he demanded that the military throw a parade for him.
Just like he views government resources as part of his business empire, the rich asshole sees the military as an entity that belongs to him.
When he failed as an entrepreneur, the rich asshole would simply look for a loan to patch up the mess he left behind. And now that he’s failing as a politician, he’s looking to the military to pay for his mistakes.
‘Something’s up’: Senators spark concern after releasing bipartisan statement directing the rich asshole to leave Mueller alone
Special Prosecutor Robert Mueller and President some rich asshole (Photos: Screen capture and AFP)
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Abipartisan Senate duo is calling on President some rich asshole to back off of attacks on the special counsel — and are prompting speculation that they may know more about the Russia investigation than they’re letting on.
Politico reported Tuesday that Sens. Thom Tillis (R-NC) and Chris Coons (D-DE) issued a statement urging the president to allow special counsel Robert Mueller to continue his probe into Russia’s electoral interference “without impediment,” marking a renewal in legislative interest in protection for the investigator.
“We have heard from constituents — Republicans, Democrats, and Independents alike — who agree that Special Counsel Robert Mueller should be able to conduct his investigation without interference,” the senators wrote in their statement. “This should not be a partisan issue.”
“We urge President the rich asshole to allow the Special Counsel to complete his work without impediment,” the statement continued, “which is in the best interest of the American people, the President, and our nation.”
Following the release of the statement, journalists on Twitter began speculating about what prompted the need for the statement.
HuffPost politics reporter Igor Bobic posted a screenshot of the statement, noting that it had “odd timing.”
“You don’t suppose Coons and Tillis have heard something’s up, do you?” never-the rich asshole conservative and Weekly Standard editor-at-large Bill Kristol noted. “During a congressional recess right before Easter/Passover weekend, with everyone dispersed and disorganized, wouldn’t be a ridiculous time to fire Sessions or Rosenstein or Mueller or pardon a bunch of people.”
You don’t suppose Coons and Tillis have heard something’s up, do you? During a congressional recess right before Easter/Passover weekend, with everyone dispersed and disorganized, wouldn’t be a ridiculous time to fire Sessions or Rosenstein or Mueller or pardon a bunch of people. twitter.com/kylegriffin1/s…
In a comment to BuzzFeed News, a Tillis spokesperson told Capitol Hill correspondent Emma Loop that “no one thing or event prompted the release of today’s statement, Senators Tillis and Coons are simply reiterating their position on Special Counsel Mueller.”
On the timing of this statement, Tillis’ office says: "No one thing or event prompted the release of today’s statement, Senators Tillis and Coons are simply reiterating their position on Special Counsel Mueller." twitter.com/LoopEmma/statu…
the rich asshole’s transgender military ban prompts mental health experts to clarify the science
"This discrimination has a negative impact on the mental health of those targeted."
On Friday night, President the rich asshole announced that he would once again attempt to ban transgender people from serving in the military, based on recommendations that their health concerns undermine military readiness. Since then, the nation’s two biggest mental health organizations have come forward to condemn that decision.
The American Psychiatric Association responded Saturday with a statement from APA CEO and Medical Director Saul Levin, M.D., M.P.A. “The APA stands firmly against discrimination against anyone, and this ban is a discriminatory action,” he said. “This ban not only harms those who have chosen to serve our country, but it also casts a pall over all transgender Americans. This discrimination has a negative impact on the mental health of those targeted.”
Levin insisted, “All Americans who meet the strenuous requirements and volunteer to serve in U.S. military should be given the opportunity to do so.”
The APA publishes the Diagnostic and Statistics Manual (DSM-5), which sets the diagnostic criteria used across the entire field. The latest edition of the manual, published in 2012, no longer classifies being transgender as a mental illness. The report informing the ban essentially discounts this understanding, casting doubt on the mental health of transgender people who have have transitioned.
In a statement published Monday, the American Psychological Association also took direct aim at this distorted research. “The American Psychological Association is alarmed by the administration’s misuse of psychological science to stigmatize transgender Americans and justify limiting their ability to serve in uniform and access medically necessary health care,” said Arthur C. Evans, Jr., PhD, CEO of the organization.
He added, “Substantial psychological research shows that gender dysphoria is a treatable condition, and does not, by itself, limit the ability of individuals to function well and excel in their work, including in military service. The science is clear that individuals who are adequately treated for gender dysphoria should not be considered mentally unstable.”
Evans specifically noted that there is no research supporting the ban’s conclusions. “No scientific evidence has shown that allowing transgender people to serve in the armed forces has an adverse impact on readiness or unit cohesion,” he said. “What research does show is that discrimination and stigma undermine morale and readiness by creating a significant source of stress for sexual minorities that can harm their health and well-being.”
Both organizations have previously passed resolutions calling for full equality for transgender and gender nonconforming people in society.
According to reporting from both ThinkProgress and Slate, Vice President Pence was largely responsible for the latest iteration of the transgender military ban. Relying on anti-LGBTQ activists like Tony Perkins (Family Research Council) and Ryan T. Anderson (Heritage Foundation), Pence reportedly injected his own language and agenda into the memo, overruling Defense Secretary James Mattis, who reportedly supported allowing transgender people to enlist.
On Monday, Mattis was asked about the ban at a press conference, but declined to comment. “I think the statements stand on their own right now,” he said.
Sarah Sanders lies about Census citizenship question
This was blatant.
White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders falsely claimed on Tuesday that the citizenship question the rich asshole administration decided to add to the 2020 Census has been part of the national survey for decades.
“This is a question that’s been included in every census since 1965, with the exception of 2010 when it was removed,” Sanders said, later repeating the same claim.
The citizenship question has not been part of the census since 1950. As Michael Li, a voting and redistricting lawyer with the Brennan Center for Justice, explained, a citizenship question has been included on the ongoing American Community Survey, but not on the full form, decennial census since the middle of the twentieth century.
White House press secretary Sarah Sanders says adding the question about citizenship in the 2020 Census is “necessary for the Department of Justice to protect voters” cnn.it/2GhOGt2
The rich asshole administration announced late Monday that it was adding the question to the survey which is used by the government to redraw congressional districts, allocate funds, and provide a survey of the U.S. population. Within hours, California filed suit, calling the addition unconstitutional and saying it will lead to inaccurate results because immigrants and communities of color are likely to avoid the survey.
“We’re prepared to do what we must to protect California from a deficient Census,” said state Attorney General Xavier Becerra. “Including a citizenship question on the 2020 census is not just a bad idea – it is illegal.”
Sanders also claimed that the Commerce Department felt strongly that the question be included in order to provide the U.S. Department of Justice with data to “protect voters” and “specifically to help us better comply with the Voting Rights Act.”
That statement is also misleading. According to a recent ProPublica report, the original DOJ letter requesting the change was drafted by John Gore, “ a rich asshole political appointee who is best known for his work defending Republican redistricting efforts around the country.”
Emails obtained by ProPublica show Gore sent a draft of the letter to the Census Bureau in November. Gore did not sign the letter.
Craiglist ad mocking the rich asshole over legal team struggles goes viral
BY AVERY ANAPOL - 03/27/18 03:48 PM EDT
A Craiglist ad mocking President the rich asshole over reports he's having difficulty finding lawyers to represent him has gained traction on Twitter.
The ad, “Seeking lead attorney for difficult client,” was posted Tuesday by an anonymous user, who lists their contact information under the name “General John,” referring to chief of staff John Kelly.
“Seeking a lead attorney to represent client involved in an ongoing Federal investigation,” the ad reads. “Working knowledge of social media, especially Twitter is a plus, as is a better than average knowledge of the adult film industry and a collection of Playboy magazines from 1985-2010.”
In recent days, multiple prominent lawyers have turned down offers to join the rich asshole’s legal team countering the special counsel investigation.
In addition, lead personal attorney John Dowd announced his resignation
next week, and Joseph diGenova, who had been considered the most likely option to replace Dowd, backed out of a previously announced hire.
the rich asshole claimed in a Sunday tweet that “many lawyers and top law firms” want to represent him.
The Craigslist ad includes specific wishes for applicants’ physical appearance.
“Must look the part — Gregory Peck or Tommy Lee Jones type,” the ad reads. “Prior appearances on Fox News a huge plus. No fatties.”
The ad does not specify exact compensation, instead saying: “Client is a hugely wealthy man. Hugely successful. Everyone says it.”
The posting also mocks the rich asshole for the high number of staff turnover in his administration.
“Ask about our other openings on our staff and submit your resume to be considered for potential openings in the near future. Perhaps the very near future. Like, hit refresh on your browser now. Now again,” it reads.
The posting quickly went viral among Twitter users, with one calling it an “A+ troll.”
"Must look the part - Gregory Peck or Tommy Lee Jones type. Prior appearances on Fox News a huge plus." Aka straight out of "central casting" twitter.com/igorbobic/stat…
I love DC twitter.com/igorbobic/stat…
A+++++ troll twitter.com/igorbobic/stat…
If war hero must not have been captured. Russian accent is a plus. Will be required to give loyalty pledge. Don’t ask about salary; non-negotiable. Stomach ulcer is a bonus. twitter.com/igorbobic/stat…
omg, someone put up a Craigslist ad in DC titled 'SEEKING LEAD ATTORNEY FOR DIFFICULT CLIENT' washingtondc.craigslist.org/doc/lgl/d/seek…
White House 'not probing whether Jared Kushner violated the law'
BY JORDAN FABIAN - 03/27/18 03:43 PM EDT
The White House on Tuesday downplayed reports it is investigating more than $500 million in loans made last year to presidential son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner’s family real estate firm.
Press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said White House attorneys are “not probing whether Jared Kushner violated the law” by taking meetings with executives whose companies later loaned large sums to his family’s business.
“While the White House counsel's office does follow up with staff to assist with compliance with various ethics standards, it is not probing whether Jared Kushner violated the law,” Sanders said.
The White House informed the U.S. Office of Government Ethics (OGE) that it is aware of news reports regarding the loans and “would proceed as appropriate,” according to Sanders.
The Wall Street Journal reported Monday that the head of the OGE informed a Democratic lawmaker that the White House was examining whether ethics rules or criminal laws were broken in Kushner’s dealings.
Kushner’s firm, which is run by members of his family, accepted a $184 million loan from Apollo Global Management’s real estate division and a $325 million loan from Citigroup. Both loans were made after Kushner met with top executives from each firm at the White House, according to The New York Times.
“I have discussed this matter with the White House counsel’s office in order to ensure that they have begun the process of ascertaining the facts necessary to determine whether any law or regulation has been violated,” acting OGE Director David Apol wrote last week to Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.)
Kushner’s private attorney, Abbe Lowell, told the Journal that after looking into reports about the loans, “the White House counsel concluded there were no issues involving Jared.”
That explanation did not satisfy the top Democrat on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, Rep. Elijah Cummings (Md.), who along with Krishnamoorthi requested documents related to the White House’s internal investigation.
Asked if the White House would comply with the request, Sanders said “we don’t have anything further" beyond the statement she delivered.
The investigation is the latest headache for Kushner, whose standing has been damaged by a swirl of negative headlines over the past month.
The White House recently downgraded Kushner’s top secret security clearance after it was revealed he did not pass a background check.
His personal finances are a subject of interest for special counsel Robert Mueller, who is leading the Russia investigation, and New York state officials.
The Washington Post reported last month that foreign governments have tried to use the 37-year-old’s lack of government experience and business ties to gain leverage over him.
White House fumes at reporters' focus on Stormy Daniels
BY JONATHAN EASLEY - 03/27/18 03:24 PM EDT
White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders ripped reporters on Tuesday for their focus on Stormy Daniels as she fielded multiple questions about why President the rich asshole has not addressed allegations that he had an affair with the adult-film actress.
Sanders referred questions about the payment to Cohen, who has said he paid out of his own pocket and was not reimbursed and that the president and campaign did not know about the payment.
“I don't think it's silent when the president has addressed this, we’ve addressed it extensively, there's nothing else to add,” Sanders said. “Just because you guys continue to ask the same question over and over and over again doesn't mean we have to come up with new things to say. We addressed it. We addressed it extensively and there’s nothing new to add to this conversation.”
Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, accepted the $130,000 payment and signed a nondisclosure agreement with Cohen shortly before the 2016 election, agreeing not to talk about the alleged affair.
But after The Wall Street Journal reported on the payment earlier this year, Daniels and her attorney sought to get out of the agreement to allow her to talk.
That effort culminated in a “60 Minutes” interview on Sunday night in which Daniels laid out for the first time the details of an alleged sexual encounter with the rich asshole in 2006.
The White House has said the rich asshole denies the affair took place.
On Monday, White House deputy press secretary Raj Shah pointed to statements Daniels had released this year in which she said an affair did not take place. She has since said she was “forced” to sign those denials under threat of legal action.
The president, who is known to attack his political enemies over Twitter, has not publicly responded to the interview.
Sanders said Tuesday that the president is too busy to respond to all of his critics.
“I didn't say he punches back on every single topic,” Sanders said. “If he did, he would probably be addressing a lot of the stories that you guys write every single minute of the day. He has a job to do and a country to run, and he’s doing a great job with that. That's why the economy is booming, [the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq] is on the run, we’re remaking the judiciary and pushing his agenda through. Sometimes he chooses to punch back and sometimes he doesn't.”
A reporter from the Christian Broadcasting Network asked Sanders to respond to a statement from former President Carter, who said Americans want a president with “basic moral values.”
“I think the people of this country came out by the millions to support some rich asshole, to support his agenda and the policies that he's pushing forward,” Sanders said. “He has been delivering day in and day out on that front. He's kept a number of his campaign promises. That's only been within the first one and a half years.
"I think the people that voted for and came out and supported him still do so and do so because they believed in the agenda that he was driving and he's been delivering on that since he came into office.”
New report highlights the rich asshole’s indifference toward Puerto Rico following Hurricane Maria
Unlike earlier tragedies, the president's response to Puerto Rico's suffering was largely apathetic.
A new investigation by Politico this week proves what many in Puerto Rico have known for months: that President the rich asshole and his administration paid far less attention to the island following Hurricane Maria last September than they had other places in the United States following similar tragedies — namely Texas after Hurricane Harvey.
According to the report, which culled information from an array of public reports, FEMA records, and those involved in disaster response, the rich asshole and his officials dug deep into their pockets and pooled all available resources after Hurricane Harvey made landfall in Texas last August. The hurricane inundated several major cities and destroyed hundreds of thousands of homes and buildings. At least 103 people were killed, 68 of whom died as a result of the hurricane’s direct effects.
However, a month later, when Maria made landfall in Puerto Rico, the rich asshole’s response was markedly different: whereas Texas was granted $141.8 million in individual assistance funding, for instance, Puerto Rico, which suffered a far more drastic fate, received a small fraction of that, with only $6.2 million for individual assistance.
Though the damage incurred in Texas after Harvey was devastating, the fallout in Puerto Rico following Maria was utterly catastrophic. The hurricane not only flattened 80 percent of the island’s agriculture and laid waste to its roads, bridges, and homes, it also wiped out Puerto Rico’s power grid, leaving all 3.5 million residents without electricity. Nearly all of the island was left without phone service and half the population was left without potable water. Hospitals were plunged into darkness as the death toll climbed.
To date, authorities believe the total cost to repair the island’s decimated electrical grid could reach up to $94 billion. Although the official number of fatalities was estimated at a little over 100, Puerto Rican officials say the real death toll may actually be closer to 1,000.
In the face of such devastation, the rich asshole’s interest seemed to wane.
“We have the U.S. Army and Marine Corps. We go anywhere, anytime we want in the world, and [in Puerto Rico] we didn’t use those assets the way they should have been used,” retired Army Lt. Gen. Russel Honoré, who led the disaster response efforts after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, told Politico.
EXCLUSIVE: A POLITICO investigation shows the Trump administration — and the president himself – was more aggressive in responding to Texas than to Puerto Rico after last fall’s devastating hurricanes politi.co/2pM4ptd
While the fact that the rich asshole apparently cared less about Puerto Rico than other disaster areas is hardly a surprise to anyone keeping up with the island’s recovery efforts, seeing that stark discrepancy on paper is jarring.
According to Politico, within six days of Harvey making landfall in Texas, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) approved the aforementioned $141.8 million in “individual assistance” to hurricane victims; within nine days, it had supplied 5.1 million meals, 4.5 million liters of water and over 20,000 tarps to the Houston region, which saw some of the worst flood damage. In the first week and a half following the hurricane, the government was able to provide 30,000 emergency personnel and had deployed 73 helicopters capable of bringing residents supplies and transporting victims.
By contrast, rescue and recovery efforts in Puerto Rico were severely lacking: within the first week and a half after Maria made landfall, FEMA had approved the relatively meager $6.2 million in individual assistance for hurricane victims and supplied 1.6 million meals, 2.8 million liters of water, and around 5,000 tarps to the entire island. It took nine days for 10,000 emergency personnel to respond to the crisis and three weeks for the U.S. Northern Command to deploy more than 70 rescue and supply helicopters. Approvals on contracts and federal relief applications continue to move at a snail’s pace.
“We are being treated as second-class citizens,” Puerto Rico Gov. Ricardo Rossello said in a recent interview with Fox News. “Why is it the same process in Florida or in Texas takes a week, and in Puerto Rico it takes four months?”
the rich asshole’s personal response to the two scenarios also varied wildly. According to Politico’s Danny Vinik, the rich asshole visited Houston twice in the week after the hurricane, but didn’t visit Puerto Rico for 13 days after the storm hit. He also posted three times as many tweets about Harvey as he did Maria. Behind the scenes, Vinik wrote, the rich asshole appeared more concerned about how his administration would look in the media than he was about the actual crisis itself.
The ignorance with which the rich asshole went about responding to the situation in Puerto Rico — and his continued apathy — has angered residents still suffering from the hurricane’s after-effects.
“I don’t understand how the government thinks that Puerto Rico needs no more help. My mother’s home, she just got electricity two days ago,” Maria Beri, member of New York Communities for Change (NYCC), told ThinkProgress at a rally outside of FEMA’s Washington, D.C. headquarters this month.
She continued, “It’s alarming the way the government has responded so slowly. Even in my family, people from FEMA have visited, and nobody qualified [for assistance]. There’s always some excuse — they don’t have titles, they don’t have certain paperwork. … It’s a humanitarian crisis. All those technicalities should be put aside. They have a need for help right then and there. And they haven’t gotten it so far.”
Puerto Ricans have long insisted that the response to their struggles has been disproportionately lax, despite officials in the U.S. mainland arguing otherwise — around 16 percent of the island is still without power and clean drinking water is still hard to come by in some areas.
In January, for instance, FEMA officials wrote a letter to Puerto Rico stating that, despite its ongoing struggles, the island had too much cash on hand to qualify for an emergency assistance loan. Gerardo Portela, executive director of Puerto Rico’s Fiscal Agency and Financial Advisory Authority (AAFAF), responded, saying that the refusal meant Puerto Rico would be forced to lend money to its own public utility companies to stay afloat — money that was intended for recovery work.
“These public corporations are facing severe liquidity problems that threaten essential services to the people of Puerto Rico if their operations are interrupted for lack of immediate action,” he said in a statement.
Similar disparities have strained recovery efforts even further, a fact that hasn’t escaped the people living there. “Wheels are spinning, but things don’t seem to get off the ground,” San Juan Mayor Carmen YulÃn Cruz told Democracy Now back in February: “[There’s been a] 55 percent increase in suicide rates, which tells you the mental state where people are at because of the dire situation and living conditions that we’re still in.”
The trickle-down effect from that indifference has affected Puerto Rican residents on a more personal level — one less covered by the media, but inescapable for the people who call the island home.
“Recovery here has been so slow that it’s affected people,” Toa Alta resident Michelle Rebollo told USA Today earlier in March. “Everyone’s tense. No one’s talking to one another. You see it in their faces: They’ve changed.”
White House defends citizenship question on census
BY BEN KAMISAR - 03/27/18 02:58 PM EDT
The White House on Tuesday defended its decision to include a citizenship question on the 2020 census, a shift that has drawn sharp criticism and lawsuits from Democrats.
"This is a question that's been included in every census since 1965, with the exception of 2010, when it was removed," White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Tuesday.
"We’ve contained this question that provides data that is necessary for the Department of Justice to protect voters and specifically help us better comply with the Voting Rights Act."
Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross announced the citizenship decision in a memo released Monday night. The seemingly arcane tweak drew an outcry from Democrats who warned it could have a major impact on immigrant communities.
Census data helps the government allocate federal aid and draw state legislative districts. Critics warn the question will deter immigrants in the country illegally from filling out the census, which could lead to less federal aid to areas with high populations of such immigrants.
Democrats have met the change with efforts to sue and block the change with legislation, although it's unclear whether those avenues have legs.
the rich asshole ducks questions and stays quiet about Russia
A president not known for dissembling in conflicts has not been speaking clearly on Russia.
On Monday, the United States announced it would join over a dozen European nations in expelling Russian intelligence officers in response to Russia’s recent use of a chemical weapon in Britain.
The announcement came in the form of a White House statement from Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders. Vice President Pence followed up shortly afterward with a statement of his own aggressively pushing back on Russian actions.
But there was no direct statement regarding the move from one person who is not normally prone to being shy: President some rich asshole.
This is hardly the first time that the rich asshole has failed to directly and personally address a conflict with Russia when a president might normally be expected to speak out strongly on the matter.
the rich asshole didn’t make a direct statement about chemical attacks
A little over a week after a former Russian spy and his daughter, living in the United Kingdom, were found comatose near a bench after they were exposed to a deadly nerve agent traced back to Russia, the United States formally backed the U.K.’s claim of Russian involvement. Monday’s announcement revealed the United States would expel Russian diplomats and close a Russian diplomatic site in Seattle.
Sanders’ statement was not attributed to the president, and detailed the reasons for the expulsions.
Pence released a statement that said “the United States will not tolerate acts of foreign aggression on the soil of this country or that of our allies.”
Asked about the rich asshole’s silence on the issue and failure to confront Putin about it during the previous week’s phone call, White House spokesperson Raj Shah said Monday that the whole thing was up to Putin and the Russian government to decide:
Well, I think, you know, that’s a statement coming from the press secretary on this. The last sentence outlined our approach to this which is our relationship with Russia is frankly up to the Russian government and up to Vladimir Putin and others in senior leadership in Russia. We want to have a cooperative relationship. The president wants to work with Russia. Their actions sometimes don’t allow it to happen. The poisoning in the U.K. that has led to today’s announcement was a very brazen action. It was a reckless action that endangered not just two individuals who were poisoned but many innocent civilians. This is not the type of conduct that the United States or our allies can accept. But the president still remains open to working with the Russians on areas of mutual concern — counter terrorism, for example and others. That’s up to the Russians to decide.
Shah also said, when asked again about the rich asshole’s call with Putin, that the rich asshole “raised a number of issues.” He did not raise, according to the White House, the chemical attack in the United Kingdom.
Last week, the rich asshole was asked about the earlier reports of Britain’s claim about the poisoning, and he dismissed it, saying, “as soon as we get the facts straight, if we agree with them, we will condemn Russia or whoever it may be,” he said.
According to British Prime Minister Theresa May, up to 130 people could have been exposed to the same nerve agent, with 50 getting treatment in the hospital. Britain said last week it had proof the nerve agent used in the attack was stockpiled by Russia.
the rich asshole complained about being forced to approve sanctions against Russia
Last July, the rich asshole signed a Russian sanctions bill to punish and respond to Russia for its interference with America’s 2016 presidential election. the rich asshole’s response to this bill, which was passed with veto-proof majorities, was to criticize the provisions limiting his power to curtail the extent of the sanctions as “unconstitutional.” He said he signed it only “for the sake of national unity.”
Unlike his other bill signings, he signed the legislation without inviting press; afterward, he ducked questions about it from reporters.
Russia’s response to these sanctions was to seize two American diplomatic properties and kick out 755 U.S. Embassy staff — an action that also earned nothing but silence from the rich asshole.
the rich asshole congratulated Putin on winning the Russian election
After Vladimir Putin won yet another term as president of Russia, the rich asshole — ignoring the advice of his staff who wrote in a briefing, “DO NOT CONGRATULATE” — congratulated Putin on winning an election marred by attackson opposition leaders and many reports of ballot stuffing and other irregularities.
Apart from the nauseating incongruity of the president of the United States congratulating the president of an increasingly-autocratic state about a deeply flawed election, there are also many other flashpoints — chemical attacks on foreign soil of political opponents, sophisticated attempts to influence the result of the U.S. presidential election being two examples — that would have prevented most other leaders from praising Putin.
the rich asshole secretly met Putin at the G-20 summit
After a public discussion at the G-20 summit in Germany last summer, the rich asshole and Putin met again, in secret, for an hour. Undisclosed discussions with foreign leaders are not unheard of for American presidents. This meeting, however, pushed the boundaries of expected presidential behavior even further.
the rich asshole claimed that press was aware of the meeting, but in fact the only reason its existence became public was because a political scientist tweeted about it. the rich asshole also held the meeting without Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who had been present for the public meeting. And he also relied entirely on Putin’s translator, which is not normal for an American leader.
the rich asshole talked about teaming up with Russia on a joint cybersecurity unit
After meeting with Putin in Germany, the rich asshole tweeted that he had talked with the Russian leader about “forming an impenetrable Cyber Security unit so that election hacking, & many other negative things, will be guarded.”
This displayed a shocking lack of self-awareness about the role Russia played in influencing American and European elections, and the casual disregard with which Russia treated norms for a legitimate election in its own country. Around the same time, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson reportedly considered shutting down the State Department’s cybersecurity office.
Apart from election interference, U.S. officials have stated that Russian hackers “were behind recent cyber-intrusions into the business systems of US nuclear power and other energy companies in what appears to be an effort to assess their networks.”
the rich asshole also, after the G-20 meeting, reportedly neared a deal with Russia to return two Russian espionage-linked compounds in Maryland and New York. The Obama administration seized them in late 2016 in response to Russian interference in the presidential election. And a half-year later, the the rich asshole administration considered returning them, following several Twitter threats from the Russian government which demanded them back without conditions, or the United States would face retaliation. Later in the year, the rich asshole was convinced to keep the compounds, and even proposed the U.S. sell them and “keep the money.”
the rich asshole repeatedly denied and downplayed Russian involvement in the 2016 presidential election
After Special Counsel Robert Mueller indicted 13 Russian nationals for meddling in the 2016 presidential election last month, the rich asshole said “I never said Russia did not meddle in the election.” In fact, the rich asshole has repeatedly claimed that the whole Russia story is a hoax made up by Democrats.
the rich asshole said after the 2016 election, “I don’t believe they interfered. That became a laughing point, not a talking point, a laughing point. Any time I do something, they say ‘oh, Russia interfered.'” And in at least two other instances, the rich asshole relayed that he had asked Putin if Putin had interfered in the 2016 election and because Putin denied it, he believed him.
Putin and the rich asshole have also used the same set of talking points to dismiss the idea that Russian nationals interfered in the election. In 2016 the rich asshole suggested it was other countries, or someone in the United States, who could be responsible for the hacks of the Democratic National Committee. In an interview with Megyn Kelly, Putin suggested that the Russian nationals indicted for election interference could actually have been working for an American company.
This month, the rich asshole said Russian interference “had no impact on our votes whatsoever.”
the rich asshole disclosed classified intelligence to Russian diplomats in Oval Office meeting
On May 10 — the day after the rich asshole fired FBI Director James Comey — he met two Russian envoys in the Oval Office. In that meeting, he disclosed details about a classified and highly-sensitive Israeli military operation to Russia’s foreign minister and ambassador to the United States.
the rich asshole would later admit that he fired Comey because of Comey’s decision to investigate the rich asshole’s connection to Russia. Special counsel Robert Mueller, assigned to take on the investigation after Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself due to his own conflicts of interest on the rich asshole campaign and Russia, is also looking into the rich asshole’s disclosure of classified information.
The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. some rich asshole Jr. cited attorney-client privilege when asked questions about Russia in his congressional testimony in Congress’ own investigation into Russian influence on the rich asshole campaign.
Howard Stern to the rich asshole: 'Get the f--- out of there, man'
BY JUDY KURTZ - 03/27/18 12:19 PM EDT
Howard Stern has some advice for President the rich asshole: “get the f--k out” of the White House.
“I was watching the news. They said that the president calls his friends and asks advice,” Stern said on his eponymous SiriusXM radio show on Tuesday, following a discussion about adult film star Stormy Daniels’s allegations that she had an affair with the rich asshole. “He’s never once called me and asked for advice,” Stern lamented. “Which kind of got me a little upset.”
“Well, maybe he’s just not thinking that you have good advice,” Stern’s co-host, Robin Quivers, said.
“Yeah, probably not,” Stern replied. “My advice would be, like, get the f--- out of there, man.”
“Why do you need that for?” Stern exclaimed. “Go back to Mar-a-Lago and hang.”
Stern says the rich asshole should simply pack it in and hand things over to his vice president.
“Just give it over to Pence — let him do his thing.”
Stern predicted last year that the rich asshole would regret becoming president.
“Seventy-year-old guy who has made so much money — he’s made billions of dollars — that he has his own helicopter, he has his own airplane. He has a hot wife. He’s got fame from a No. 1 television show,” Stern said last May. “He can walk around Mar-a-Lago, which is like any palace — better than the f--king White House.”
“And then when he went out on the campaign trail, and he started to win, it was like, 'Oh my God, I’m going to be president, and all these crowds love me, and it’s going to be fun,'” Stern told his listeners. “No f--king idea the shitty life he was gonna have."
House Republican says he’s too focused on Putin to worry about threats against Stormy Daniels
"What we need to do is pay attention to Putin."
During a CNN interview on Tuesday, Rep. Francis Rooney (R-FL) said he doesn’t think President the rich asshole has anything to answer for regarding his alleged affair with Stormy Daniels and a legally sketchy $130,000 hush payment his lawyer made to Daniels just before the 2016 election — because “really what we need to do is pay attention to Putin.”
Asked specifically if the rich asshole “needs to address” a death threat Daniels says she received from someone who wanted her to stop talking about the rich asshole, Rooney said, “Oh, I don’t know.”
“I think he probably should say we might’ve been better off not trying to cover anything up, and we really weren’t trying to cover anything up, we just signed an agreement to protect ourselves financially or something,” Rooney said. “But really what we need to do is pay attention to Putin.”
At another point during the interview, Rooney repeatedly suggested the rich asshole’s affair with Daniels and the scandal surrounding his attempts to cover it up is no big deal because of the precedent set by Bill Clinton two decades ago.
“We had a lot of presidents that were certainly not Boy Scouts… you just mentioned about Bill Clinton here a while ago,” Rooney said, before asserting that the media wasn’t as interested in Clinton’s alleged misconduct as they are about the rich asshole.
“It would have been helpful if the public had the right to know about some of the previous indiscretions of other people, had the right to know about Bill Clinton,” he said.
Rooney, who identifies as Catholic, served as President George W. Bush’s ambassador to the Vatican from 2005 to 2008. During a CNN interview on March 8, he generically described the conduct surrounding the Stormy Daniels scandal “abhorrent,” but wouldn’t directly condemn the rich asshole.
GOP @RepRooney sounds off on Stormy Daniels, but doesn't directly condemn Trump: "The whole fact this is being talked about, this conduct may have occurred, is just abhorrent to me... I don't think it is a good thing. I really don't."
Rooney’s comments on Tuesday indicate that as far as the President of the United States is concerned, he believes two wrongs make a right. He’s not the first self-professed Christian to go extreme lengths to dismiss the rich asshole’s conduct.
Earlier this month, Robert Jeffress — a Southern Baptist who leads First Baptist Church in Dallas and serves as an evangelical adviser to the president — made a case on Fox News that evangelicals “knew they weren’t voting for an altar boy when they voted for some rich asshole. We supported him for his policies and his strong leadership.” Jeffress added that evangelicals “understand the concept of sin and forgiveness.”
But the rich asshole has never asked for forgiveness. In fact, on Monday, deputy press secretary Raj Shah said that the rich asshole “doesn’t believe that any of the claims that Ms. Daniels made” during a 60 Minutes interview that aired Sunday — including one about being threatened in a parking garage — “are accurate.”
Later, a reporter asked Shah why a $130,000 payment to Daniels was made in the first place if she never in fact had an affair with the rich asshole, as the White House claims.
“I would have Michael Cohen address any specifics regarding this agreement that you’re referring to,” Shah said, dodging the question.
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