Tag: Trump pettiness

‘Way past time for the straitjacket’: Trump ridiculed for RNC fundraiser speech meltdown

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According to reports from both Politico and the Daily Beast, former president Donald Trump went far off his prepared remarks at an RNC fundraiser on Saturday, spewing obscenities and attacking members of his own party while continuing to complain about the 2020 election having been stolen from him.

As the Daily Beast reported, “Predictably, Trump at times veered wildly off-scriptfrom his prewritten speech, the text of which was reviewed by The Daily Beast earlier in the day. While at the private event, he inveighed against Republican, Democratic, and celebrity enemies, and again denounced the 2020 presidential election outcome as ‘bullshit,’ according to those in the audience.”

Additionally, Trump lashed out at Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) — calling him a “son of a bitch” — and complained about former Vice President Mike Pence. Continue reading.

Trump moved Navy hospital away from Seattle to punish his critic as COVID-19 wreaked havoc: report

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Former president Donald Trump diverted a U.S. Navy hospital ship last year, in the early days of the pandemic, from Washington state to California as a show of favoritism, according to a new book.

ABC News chief White House correspondent Jon Karl published a new book, Front Row at the Trump Show, out Tuesday with new reporting on the former president’s decision in March 2020 to redirect the Navy hospital Mercy away from Seattle, where it had been deployed to help the region’s hospitals overwhelmed by COVID-19 patients, in excerpts published by Politico Playbook.

“Don’t you think we should send it to California?” Trump told advisers, according to Karl. “Gavin has been saying such nice things about me.” Continue reading.

Trump unloads on McConnell, promises MAGA primary challengers

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Former President Trump on Tuesday unloaded on Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and vowed to back challengers to lawmakers who have crossed him.

In a statement released through his Save America super PAC, Trump blamed McConnell for the GOP’s 2020 Senate losses and called for Republicans to elect new leaders to carry on his legacy.

“Mitch is a dour, sullen, and unsmiling political hack, and if Republican Senators are going to stay with him, they will not win again,” Trump said. Continue reading.

Biden releases Puerto Rico aid funds that Trump blocked for nearly 2 years

Trump blocked billions in relief aid to Puerto Rico for Hurricane Maria for over a year.

Puerto Rico will finally get to start using billions in relief aid Congress passed in 2017, after the island was hit hard by Hurricane Maria that year.

President Joe Biden’s administration approved the release of $1.3 billion in relief funding on Monday that the Trump administration had been blocking and restricting.

Biden approved the release of $1.3 billion in relief funding on Monday, and took restrictions off another $4.9 billion, the New York Times reported. Continue reading.

John Bolton fears that Trump has an ‘enemies list’ that he is working through

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White House National Security Advisor Ambassador John Bolton talks to reporters Wednesday, May 1, 2019, outside the West Wing entrance of the White House. (Official White House Photo by Tia Dufour) Alex Henderson November 18, 2020

Critics of President Donald Trump predicted that after the presidential race, he would be firing some prominent officials he considered non-loyalists — even if he lost the election. Trump did lose the election, and just as those critics predicted, he has been firing non-loyalists — and former National Security Adviser John Bolton, during a C-SPAN appearance on Wednesday, told the Washington Post’s Robert Costa that he fears Trump has an “enemies list” of more people he plans to fire.

Trump’s post-election firings have included former Defense Secretary Mark Esper and Christopher Krebs, who served as director of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency. Krebs’ unforgivable sin, in Trump’s mind, was arguing that the election was free and fair and that there is no evidence of widespread voter fraud or errors as the president has been claiming. Continue reading.

Trump seeks to settle scores in final days

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President Trump is settling scores and taking steps to cement his agenda in his final 60-plus days in the White House, even as he refuses to concede an electoral loss to Democrat Joe Biden and his legal team flails at the results in nearly a half-dozen states.

Trump fired the administration’s top cybersecurity official Christopher Krebs on Tuesday evening, the latest example of Trump settling a score. He expressed displeasure that Krebs issued a statement that the 2020 election had been the most secure in history, a message that undercut Trump’s unsubstantiated claims about voting machine vulnerabilities and a “rigged” election.

The removal of Krebs followed the firing of Defense Secretary Mark Esper and raises the prospect that Trump will remove more officials, such as CIA Director Gina Haspel and FBI Director Christopher Wray, while at the same time signaling that anything regarded as disloyalty to Trump will result in punishment. Continue reading.

Democratic anger rises over Trump obstacles to Biden transition

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Democrats and public health officials are furious at President Trump for obstructing President-elect Joe Biden’s transition to the White House, warning that the Trump administration is endangering lives and threatening national security by refusing to cooperate with the incoming administration. 

The president-elect has warned that “more people may die” because he’s been blocked from coordinating the coronavirus vaccine rollout and other public health measures with Trump’s team, which is moving ahead on its own.

Biden aides routinely point to the 9/11 Commission report to warn that national security is at risk as the president-elect continues to be shut out of government intelligence briefings. The 9/11 report determined that the drawn out legal battle between former President George W. Bush and Democrat Al Gore in the 2000 presidential election left a temporary power vacuum that al Qaeda was able to exploit in planning its terror attack against the U.S. Continue reading.

Is President Trump directing the GSA to decline to call Joe Biden the president-elect? They won’t say

Agency misses deadline for giving a response to Congress

The General Services Administration has missed a deadline to say whether the decision to not recognize President-elect Joe Biden is at the personal direction of outgoing President Donald Trump.

Three House Democrats wrote to GSA Administrator Emily Murphy on Monday questioning why the agency has not issued an ascertainment that Biden is in fact the president-elect.

Among the questions from Democratic Reps. Bill Pascrell Jr. of New Jersey, Gerald E. Connolly of Virginia and Dina Titus of Nevada were about specific interactions between GSA and White House personnel, up to and including the president himself. Continue reading.

Senate GOP calls grow to give Biden access to intelligence briefings

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Several Senate Republicans are joining calls for President-elect Joe Biden to get access to intelligence briefings, in a break with the Trump administration.

Most GOP senators aren’t yet ready to say Trump lost reelection but, in a potential hat tip to the inevitable outcome, they are publicly calling for Biden to get access to the sort of intelligence briefings that will help him hit the ground running in January. 

“I would think, especially on classified briefings, the answer is yes,” said Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa). Continue reading.

Biden behaves as the incoming president, even as Trump balks at giving up power

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WILMINGTON, Del. — President-elect Joe Biden sought to project the authority of an incoming president Monday as he dealt with matters domestic and international, even as the defeated incumbent continued to balk at turning over the reins.

Biden began taking calls from foreign leaders, speaking Monday with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. He also was weighing whom to appoint to top White House positions, with several of his longtime advisers expected to take senior roles. And he turned his attention to the coronavirus, dispatching a key aide to brief Senate Democrats this week and making a strong pitch to Americans of every ideology to follow public health recommendations.

Biden urged Americans to wear masks, at one point holding one up during a speech in Wilmington, and sought to depoliticize the act of putting one on. Continue reading.