Category: Latest News

Opinion: The man who will never go away

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Donald Trump is back, possibly at his party’s peril

There is a time-honored spy story plot: A retired CIA agent, tired of the clandestine life, has retreated to an island in Mediterranean. One day up the dirt road to his hideaway comes his former CIA station chief luring him back for one last mission. 

Saturday night, Donald Trump lured everyone back to his alternative universe of crazed conspiracies about a “rigged” election. His 91-minute speech in Wellington, Ohio, was the start of his vengeance tour against Republicans like nearby Rep. Anthony Gonzalez, who voted to impeach Trump for fomenting the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol. 

Equally predictable, but far more devastating, is the beginning of the onslaught of books featuring dramatic scenes from inside the Trump Oval Office. We have, of course, had articles and books like this before, but this time around the sources are finally talking on-the-record instead of lurking in the shadows.  Continue reading.

Walz takes executive action on police reform as state leaders urged to do more

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He acts on eve of House vote on public safety package that activists call insufficient. 

Gov. Tim Walz is taking executive action on an array of public safety and policing proposals amid intense criticism by Democrats and community activists over a law enforcement spending agreement they say is inadequate.

Walz said he would use $15 million in COVID-19 relief money to pay for community violence prevention grants, increase data sharing from the state’s police licensing board and order state-level law enforcement agencies to share footage of deadly police encounters with relatives of those killed within five days.

“Those are things people are asking for. Those build trust,” Walz said. “They build trust in police, they build trust in the systems, they build trust amongst communities, and they provide the community with some basic closure and understanding for families.” Continue reading.

Arizona’s Maricopa County will replace voting equipment, fearful that GOP-backed election review has compromised security

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Arizona’s Maricopa County announced Monday that it will replace voting equipment that was turned over to a private contractor for a Republican-commissioned review of the 2020 presidential election, concerned that the process compromised the security of the machines.

Officials from Maricopa, the state’s largest county and home to Phoenix, provided no estimates of the costs involved but have previously said that the machines cost millions to acquire.

“The voters of Maricopa County can rest assured, the County will never use equipment that could pose a risk to free and fair elections,” the county said in a statement. “As a result, the County will not use the subpoenaed equipment in any future elections.” Continue reading.

House to vote on bill launching probe of Jan. 6 insurrection

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WASHINGTON — A new committee to investigate the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol would have 13 members and the power to subpoena witnesses, according to legislation released by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. The House is expected to vote on the bill this week. 

The effort comes after Senate Republicans blocked the formation of an independent, bipartisan commission to probe the attack, in which hundreds of former President Donald Trump’s supporters violently broke into the Capitol and interrupted the certification of President Joe Biden’s victory. 

The new, partisan House panel would have eight members appointed by Pelosi and five appointed “after consultation with” Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy. A Pelosi aide said the speaker is considering including a Republican among her appointments, which would bring the likely partisan split to 7-6. The aide was granted anonymity to discuss her thinking.

Pelosi said in a statement Monday that Jan. 6 was “one of the darkest days in our nation’s history” and that the committee will seek the truth about it. Continue reading.

MSNBC host delivers a rapid-fire list of the evidence that has emerged to confirm Trump’s fascism

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Progressive firebrand Mehdi Hasan angered many Republicans during the 2020 summer when he described former President Donald Trump as a “fascist.” Hasan, now an MSNBC host, revisited that subject over the weekend on his Sunday-night program, saying that he now believes his anti-Trump statements of the past might have been an “understatement.” 

Hasan, during what he describes as one of his “one-minute rants,” recalled that when he was sitting in for MSNBC’s Chris Hayes last year, he “used the F word in relation to Donald Trump.”

“A lot of people, even some on the left, lost their minds,” Hasan told viewers. “I was accused of hyperbole and exaggeration, fear-mongering.”

The MSNBC host went on to explain why, if anything, he “understated” how dangerous Trump is. Continue reading.

Pence faces fierce resistance from GOP’s pro-Trump base

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Former Vice President Mike Pence is facing strong resistance from members of his party’s pro-Trump base over his role in certifying the Electoral College results in the 2020 election.

Pence has stepped up his public appearances recently and is set to appear at the Family Leadership Summit in Iowa next month alongside other high-profile Republicans. But his political future is complicated by his refusal in January to bow to pressure from then-President Trump to help deliver him a victory in the race against Joe Biden.

While garnering praise from Democrats and Republicans, that decision has led to howls from members of the party’s right flank — a swath of voters Pence will need should he launch a presidential campaign in three years. Continue reading.

Bill Barr’s ‘clean-up exercise’ to save his reputation actually reveals he was far more corrupt than anyone realized: columnist

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Former Attorney General William Barr is attempting to resuscitate his image after two years of using the Justice Department as a partisan defense agency for former President Donald Trump. In a new interview with reporter Jonathan Karl, Barr claimed he always knew Trump’s election conspiracy theories were “bullsh*t” and that then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) begged him to help push back on them.

But on Monday, writing for The Washington Post‘s “The Plum Line,” columnist Greg Sargent argued that far from exonerating him, Barr’s new revelations show the depths of his corruption.

“Having gone to extraordinary lengths to help Donald Trump corrupt the presidency, William P. Barr is working overtime to launder his post-Trump reputation,” wrote Sargent. “But the former attorney general’s latest clean-up exercise may end up showing that the stain of his corruption is even darker than we thought — in a way that soils other Republicans as well.” Continue reading.

Donald Trump’s January 6

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The view from inside the Oval Office.

Seems like quite a few crazies,” said the president.

A little more than three weeks before rioters and revelers stormed the Capitol on January 6, several thousand Trump fans and fanatics gathered in Washington, D.C. There were the Proud Boys in elaborate dress, ZZ Top beards, and tie-dyed kilts — Enrique Tarrio, a Proud Boy organizer, got in line and took a public tour of the White House — who seemed to have appointed themselves Trump’s protectors and vanguard, as the Hells Angels had once done for the Rolling Stones. There were Trump impersonators and a wide variety of other made-for-the-cameras MAGA costumes. There were veterans — or people in military gear trying to suggest patriotism and firepower. There were older men and women, too — more Las Vegas than Altamont. Virtually all without masks.

“It’s like Let’s Make a Deal,” said Trump the next day to a caller, referencing the long-running game show from the 1960s — many of his references have never left this psychic era — on which audience members dressed up in foolish costumes to get the attention of the host.

The speakers at the December 12 event were themselves a retinue of Trump attention seekers: Michael Flynn, the former general who had briefly served as Trump’s national security adviser before being rolled out of office for lying to the FBI, had, after pleading guilty, reversed himself and abjectly reaffirmed his Trump loyalty, finally getting his pardon just days before the rally. Sebastian Gorka, a figure of uncertain provenance and function in the Trump White House during its first months, was one of the early oddballs to be pushed out when John Kelly became chief of staff and had pursued a Trump-based media career ever since. Also speaking: MyPillow entrepreneur Mike Lindell, a former drug addict and a current fevered conspiracist. Continue reading.

DC investigators seek Weisselberg testimony as they compile case against Trump kids for ‘self-dealing’: report

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According to a report from the Daily Beast’s Jose Pagliery, the case being made against Donald Trump’s children — Don Jr., Ivanka and Eric — for cashing in on Donald Trump’s inauguration after his 2016 presidential win is being delayed while investigators seek testimony from Trump Org executive Allen Weisselberg.

The report states that Sunday, the District of Columbia’s attorney general was notified he will have to wait “…to find out if three more people in the Trump family circle can be forced to testify, as investigators continue to look into whether Donald Trump’s 2017 inauguration committee misspent more than $1 million and enriched his own company.”

In an interview with the Beast, lead witness Stephanie Winston Wolkoff — who helped oversee the inauguration events — said the investigation is looking at “self-dealing” by the Trump family. Continue reading.

Documents Show Ivanka Trump Didn’t Testify Accurately in Inauguration Scandal Case

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She said she played no role in planning inaugural events. These records suggest otherwise.

The Trump family has trouble with depositions. In 2007 testimony, Donald Trump was repeatedly shown to be a liar. In February, Donald Trump Jr. was deposed in the Trump inauguration scandal lawsuit, and on several key points, under oath, he provided false testimony. A review of documents filed in that case and other material obtained by Mother Jones shows that Ivanka Trump also testified inaccurately during her deposition in this lawsuit. 

The inauguration probe was launched last year by Karl Racine, the attorney general of Washington, DC. He has alleged that Trump’s inauguration committee misused charitable funds to enrich the Trump family. As Racine put it, the lawsuit maintains “that the Inaugural Committee, a nonprofit corporation, coordinated with the Trump family to grossly overpay for event space in the Trump International Hotel… The Committee also improperly used non-profit funds to throw a private party [at the Trump Hotel] for the Trump family costing several hundred thousand dollars.” In short, the attorney general accused the Trump gang of major grifting, and he is seeking to recover the money paid to the Trump Hotel so those funds can be used for real charitable purposes. 

During a December 1 deposition—in which she swore to tell the truth—Ivanka Trump, the eldest daughter of Donald Trump who was an executive at the Trump Organization before becoming a White House adviser to her father, was asked if she had any “involvement in the process of planning the inauguration.” She replied, “I really didn’t have an involvement.” Ivanka testified that if her “opinion was solicited” regarding an inauguration event, she “would give feedback to my father or to anyone who asked my perspective or opinion.” And that was as far as her participation went. Continue reading.