Category: 2020 Election

Bolton: Trump moves in office guided by reelection concerns

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump “pleaded” with China’s Xi Jinping during a 2019 summit to help his reelection prospects, according to a scathing new book by former Trump adviser John Bolton that accuses the president of being driven by political calculations when making national security decisions.

The White House worked furiously to block the book, asking a federal court for an emergency temporary restraining order Wednesday against its release.

Bolton’s allegations that Trump solicited Chinese help for his reelection effort carried echoes of Trump’s attempt to get political help from Ukraine, which led to his impeachment. Continue reading.

Trump ‘unfit for office,’ lacks ‘competence,’ Bolton says in TV interview

Washington Post logoFormer national security adviser John Bolton says in a television interview that President Trump is “unfit for office” and lacks the “competence to carry out the job.”

Bolton made the comments to ABC News as the former administration insider sought to promote a new book that Trump claimed in a tweet Thursday is “a compilation of lies and made up stories, all intended to make me look bad.” Excerpts of the Bolton interview aired Thursday.

“I don’t think he’s fit for office. I don’t think he has the competence to carry out the job,” Bolton said during the ABC interview, which is scheduled to air in full Sunday. “There really isn’t any guiding principle that I was able to discern other than what’s good for Donald Trump’s reelection. I think he was so focused on the reelection that longer-term considerations fell by the wayside.” Continue reading.

A Trump Tax Break Is Not Spurring Job Creation, Study Finds

New York Times logoA report on opportunity zones finds that a tax incentive President Trump credits with revitalizing black communities has mostly helped real estate developers.

WASHINGTON — A new tax break that President Trump frequently touts as a boon to black Americans and hard-hit communities is spurring relatively little job creation while disproportionately helping high-profit real estate projects and not small businesses, an extensive new study by the Urban Institute has found.

The report, released on Wednesday, draws on interviews from more than 70 key players in the deployment of money — mostly from wealthy investors — into so-called opportunity zones. It is the most comprehensive look to date at the effects of the zones, which were created as part of the 2017 tax law and for which the government has scant data.

Opportunity zones are spread across the country, in rural, urban and suburban areas that state and local officials selected, under criteria set out in the law, as in need of additional investment and economic growth. Continue reading.

NO SHOW TikTok users are trolling Trump by reserving tickets for Tulsa rally that they won’t use

TIKTOK users are trolling Donald Trump and his supporters by reserving tickets for his comeback rally – with no plans to actually attend.

The president took to Twitter on Monday to announce that almost one million people had requested tickets for his upcoming campaign rally in Tulsa.

But at the time he was probably unaware that some who have registered for the free event are not intending to show up.

TikTokers say they want the president to be left standing in front of an empty or fairly empty 20,000 seat auditorium in Oklahoma on June 20. Continue reading.

Does Trump Want to Fight for a Second Term? His Self-Sabotage Worries Aides

New York Times logoAdvisers and allies say the president’s repeated acts of self-destruction have significantly damaged his re-election prospects, and yet he appears mostly unable, or unwilling, to curtail them.

In a recent meeting with his top political advisers, President Trump was impatient as they warned him that he was on a path to defeat in November if he continued his incendiary behavior in public and on Twitter.

Days earlier, Mr. Trump had sparked alarm by responding to protests over police brutality with a threat that “when the looting starts, the shooting starts.”

Mr. Trump pushed back against his aides. “I have to be myself,” he replied, according to three people familiar with the meeting. A few hours later, he posted on Twitter a letter from his former personal lawyer describing some of the protesters as “terrorists.” Continue reading.

Trump asked China’s Xi to help him win reelection, according to Bolton book

Washington Post logoPresident Trump asked Chinese President Xi Jinping to help him win the 2020 U.S. election, telling Xi during a summit dinner last year that increased agricultural purchases by Beijing from American farmers would aid his electoral prospects, according to a damning new account of life inside the Trump administration by former national security adviser John Bolton.

During a one-on-one meeting at the June 2019 Group of 20 summit in Japan, Xi complained to Trump about China critics in the United States. But Bolton writes in a book scheduled to be released next week that “Trump immediately assumed Xi meant the Democrats. Trump said approvingly that there was great hostility among the Democrats.

“He then, stunningly, turned the conversation to the coming U.S. presidential election, alluding to China’s economic capability to affect the ongoing campaigns, pleading with Xi to ensure he’d win,” Bolton writes. “He stressed the importance of farmers, and increased Chinese purchases of soybeans and wheat in the electoral outcome. I would print Trump’s exact words but the government’s prepublication review process has decided otherwise.” Continue reading.

Dr. Fauci, Tulsa Officials Warn Against Trump Rally

Public health experts are warning about the risks of Trump holding a campaign rally in Tulsa as the state experiences record increases in new coronavirus cases. Once again, Trump has put his ego over the advice of health experts.

Dr. Fauci warned of the risk of Trump holding his Tulsa rally and said “of course” he wouldn’t attend because of coronavirus.
Washington Post: “‘Of course not’: Fauci says he personally wouldn’t attend Trump’s Tulsa rally, citing coronavirus”

Tulsa public officials and health experts say “there is nothing good” about Trump’s rally and “it’s like seeing a train wreck coming.”
Tulsa Health Department Executive Director: “I recommended it be postponed until it’s safer.” Continue reading “Dr. Fauci, Tulsa Officials Warn Against Trump Rally”

Trump pushing officials to speed up already-ambitious coronavirus vaccine timeline

Washington Post logoScientists fear regulators could come under pressure to approve a vaccine before it is fully vetted for safety and effectiveness

President Trump, faced with multiple crises and falling poll numbers less than five months before the presidential election, is prodding top health officials to move faster on a historically ambitious timeline to approve a coronavirus vaccine by year’s end.

The goal is to instill confidence among voters that the virus can be tamed and the economy fully reopened under Trump’s stewardship.

In a meeting last month with Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar — who is overseeing the effort called Operation Warp Speed, along with Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper — Trump pushed Azar repeatedly to speed up the already unprecedented timeline, according to two senior White House officials familiar with the meeting who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations. Trump wants some people to be able to get the vaccine sooner than the end of the year to demonstrate an end to the pandemic is within reach, according to those officials and two others. Continue reading.

Here is why Bill Barr’s lawsuit against John Bolton may only have an ‘audience of one’: Law professor

On Tuesday, the Department of Justice filed a civil suit against President Donald Trump’s former National Security Adviser John Bolton over the publication of his tell-all book alleging misconduct in the administration.

In a lengthy Twitter thread, law professor Rick Hasen explained why the lawsuit is likely just for show, to put Trump’s mind at ease, rather than to actually block the book or win any sort of legal relief.

Rick Hasen

✔@rickhasen

I’ve looked at the Bolton complaint, and a bit about the remedies portion t (https://electionlawblog.org/wp-content/uploads/Bolton.pdf …).
The suit seeks declaratory relief (saying Bolton breached agreements), a constructive trust (disgorging any profits), and what looks like an injunction /1

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The Memo: Trump’s risky Tulsa rally

The Hill logoPresident Trump is about to make a high-risk return to the campaign trail.

Trump will hold a massive rally in Tulsa, Okla., on Saturday, at a time when coronavirus infections there are rising steeply.

Any upsurge in cases that could be linked to the event, set to take place at a 19,200-capacity indoor arena, would be a political nightmare for a president facing a tough reelection battle. Continue reading.