Tag: Trump authoritarian tendencies

Washington taxpayers bear the burden as Trump’s ego infiltrates national Fourth of July celebration

The District of Columbia’s time-honored Independence Day traditions are being squeezed to the side for the sake of the president’s unquenchable thirst for self-aggrandizement.

Washington, D.C.’s Fourth of July celebrations have played out roughly the same way for decades.

This year, though, the longstanding security, logistics, and crowd management practices on the National Mall are being recrafted in the image of President Donald Trump. The nation’s birthday party won’t be a first-come first-serve egalitarian gawp in 2019. It’ll have tiered, ticketed entry, some form of militaristic performance art, and a speech by the divisive and twitchy current occupant of the country’s highest political office.

Trump’s less-than tickety-boo plans include cordoning off a special “VIP” area stretching from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to halfway down the length of the Reflecting Pool. The velvet-rope ethos is an essential part of the gaudy, ostentatious luxury image Trump long ago made into his own personal brand. But it’s alien to D.C.’s fireworks night, which has traditionally been a partisanship-free occasion.

View the complete June 30 article by Alan Pyke on the ThinkProgress website here.

Judge blocks Trump from using billions in military funds for border wall

The Hill logoA federal judge on Friday issued a ruling blocking the Trump administration from tapping billions of dollars in military funds to construct a wall on the United States’s southern border.

U.S. District Judge Haywood Gilliam issued the permanent injunction in a California federal court after initially ruling last month to temporarily halt the administration’s use of military funds for the border wall.

President Trump declared a national emergency earlier this year in order to divert roughly $6 billion in Defense Department funds toward border wall construction. Friday’s ruling blocks the administration from using $2.5 billion in military funds for a border wall.

View the complete June 28 article by Jacqueline Thomsen on The Hill website here.

Legal expert argues that the DOJ just asked the Supreme Court to essentially become a ‘branch of the Trump administration’

AlterNet logoWith the fate of the nation’s electoral maps — and thus the very basis of democracy — hanging in the balance, the Supreme Court is poised to rule on the controversial Census case. But at the last minute, Justice Department Solicitor General Noel Francisco wrote new a new plea to the justices asking them to take an even more extraordinary step than simply ruling on the issue before them.

Indeed, law professor Richard Hasen wrote in Slate on Tuesday that if the court goes along with Francisco’s request, it will essentially act as a part of the Trump administration.

The controversy arose when Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross decided to include a question about citizenship on the 2020 Census, which experts believe will reduce compliance with the survey in ways that benefit Republicans and white people electorally. The Justice Department claimed that it had asked Ross to include the question to protect the Voting Rights Act, but critics argued that this was a mere pretext and that the real purpose was to distort the Census results.

View the complete June 25 article by Cody Fenwick on the AlterNet website here.

ABC confronts a furious Trump over false claims of ‘no obstruction’ as he says Constitution lets him ‘do whatever I want’

In a combative interview with ABC’s George Stephanopolous, President Donald Trump brought up special counsel Robert Mueller’s report on links between his campaign and Russia in a bizarre effort to explain why he’s angered by internal polling that shows him trailing Joe Biden in 2020 battleground states.

During the interview, Trump accused former White House counsel Don McGahn of lying under oath about the president’s efforts to fire Mueller, “because he wanted to make himself look like a good lawyer.” Trump then brought up Article II of the Constitution, which he claimed gave him the authority to fire the special counsel.

“Article II allows me to do whatever I want,” Trump insisted.

Pressed on his argument that Article II of the Constitution grants him broad powers to obstruct justice, Trump told Stephanopolous to “read” Article II.

View the complete June 16 article by Elizabeth Preza on the AlterNet website here.

In ABC Interview, Trump Says Article II ‘Allows Me To Do Whatever I Want’

In a combative interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos, President Donald Trump brought up special counsel Robert Mueller’s report on links between his campaign and Russia in a bizarre effort to explain why he’s angered by internal polling that shows him trailing Joe Biden in 2020 battleground states.

During the interview, Trump accused former White House counsel Don McGahn of lying under oath about the president’s efforts to fire Mueller, “because he wanted to make himself look like a good lawyer.” Trump then brought up Article II of the Constitution, which he claimed gave him the authority to fire the special counsel.

“Article II allows me to do whatever I want,” Trump insisted.

View the complete June 16 article by Elizabeth Preza on The National Memo website here.

Trump gleefully compares himself to an authoritarian strongman

Hungary’s democratic institutions are under attack from its own Prime Minister Viktor Orban, but you wouldn’t know it from President Donald Trump treatment of the authoritarian leader on Monday in the Oval Office.

As the Washington Post explained, the previous two presidents had refused to meet with Orban as “he shut down Hungary’s opposition media, eliminated independent courts, drove a prestigious U.S. university out of Budapest and spewed hateful rhetoric toward Muslims and, in more subtle terms, Jews.” And while much of Europe is shunning him over his explicitly illiberal turn, promoting the country as a white Christian nation, Trump saw fit to praise Orban from the White House.

“You’re respected all over Europe,” he said. “Probably like me a little bit controversial, but that’s okay. That’s okay. You’ve done a good job and you’ve kept your country safe.”

View the complete May 13 article by Cody Fenwick on the AlterNet website here.

Trump seeks to limit judges’ powers on injunctions after legal blows

President Trump is looking to stop lower courts from being able to issue wide-ranging injunctions in a move that could dramatically limit the authority of judges.

The plan comes as groups opposed to Trump have been able to get several of his policies, including those seeking to limit immigration, put on hold by nationwide orders issued by lower courts in battles that were eventually decided by the Supreme Court.

Advocacy groups that have pushed judges to issue nationwide injunctions say they are necessary to protect people from policies they see as harmful, and some legal experts agree, arguing that the right to issue such actions is protected under the Constitution.

View the complete May 11 article by Jacqueline Thomse on The Hill website here.

Here are 6 of the wildest moments from Trump’s off-the-wall press conference

On Thursday,  President Donald Trump gave a White House press conference that was intended, primarily, to address medical billing. But the president was all over the place during the briefing, using it for everything from attacks on special counsel Robert Mueller and former Secretary of State John Kerry to a defense of his China trade policy. Here are some of the wildest and craziest moments from Trump’s May 9 White House press conference.

1. Trump described his administration as generous to Puerto Rico

Trump has been widely criticized for his response to the Hurricane Maria tragedy in Puerto Rico; San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz and Puerto Rico Gov. Ricardo Roselló have been especially critical. But during his press conference, Trump vigorously defended his Puerto Rico policy — saying he “gave Puerto Rico $91 billion” and insisting “I think the people of Puerto Rico should really like President Trump.”

2. Trump called for prosecution of John Kerry

Trump, after taking office, ended the Obama Administration’s nuclear arms deal with Iran, which was negotiated in part by former Secretary of State John Kerry. And Trump took aim at Kerry on Thursday, accusing him of telling Iran not to call his administration. Trump claimed that Kerry was in violation of the Logan Act and should be prosecuted for interfering.

View the complete May 9 article by Alex Henderson on the AlterNet website here.

Sarah Sanders carries out a ‘mass purge’ that disqualifies ‘almost the entire White House press corps’ from covering Trump

White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders has quietly implemented a new standard that has resulted in what one journalist calls “a mass purge” of “almost the entire White House press corps.”

Huckabee Sanders revoked the press credentials, known as a “hard pass,” for all Washington Post reporters assigned to cover the White House, and many others. That would be six correspondents, and Dana Milbank, a veteran journalist who writes an opinion column at the Washington Post, and is the first to report this story.

“After covering four presidents, I received an email informing me that Trump’s press office had revoked my White House credential,” Milbank writes in The Washington Post Wednesday evening.

View the complete May 8 article by David Badash from The New Civil Rights Movement on the AlterNet website here.

Trump Opposes ‘Censorship’ — But Yearns To Censor His Critics

An ordinary hypocrite would know better than to demand absolute freedom of speech for his friends, and deny it to his critics in the next breath. But then Donald J. Trump is no ordinary hypocrite. Because that’s exactly what the president did last week.
 Last Thursday, social media giant Facebook announced that it was banning a bunch of crackpot conspiracy theorists and professional race-baiters from its platform. The list included Infowars’ Alex Jones and Paul Joseph Watson, racial provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos and the notorious Jew-baiter and Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan.
All but the last, of course, are Trump’s allies in seeking the crucial antisocial sorehead vote. Taking to Twitter, the president erupted: “I am continuing to monitor the censorship of AMERICAN CITIZENS on social media platforms. This is the United States of America—and we have what’s known as FREEDOM OF SPEECH!” Trump wrote. “We are monitoring and watching, closely!!”

View the complete May 7 article by Gene tons on the National Memo website here.