Donald Trump Announces 2016 White House Bid

[spaminator]

Trump launches new business venture during campaign: $100,000 watches
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Meg Kinnard
Published Sep 26, 2024 • 3 minute read

He’s sold Bibles, sneakers, photo books and cryptocurrency during his third campaign for president. Now, Donald Trump is launching a new business venture: diamond-encrusted watches.


The Republican presidential candidate unveiled the “Official Trump Watch Collection” on Thursday. The most expensive, listed as including 122 diamonds on its bezel and available in three 18-karat gold styles, costs $100,000. Another “Fight Fight Fight” model is listed at $499.

Trump has hawked a series of branded products since he launched his 2024 White House campaign, following his long tradition of melding his political and business interests. Thursday’s launch, coming 40 days before Election Day, could open him up to criticism about monetizing his campaign, particularly as he makes an argument that Vice President Kamala Harris is out of touch with Americans’ economic struggles.

While websites for the various products note that proceeds from their sales do not directly benefit Trump or his campaign, they also note that each is subject to a “paid license agreement.” That’s the same mechanism that allowed Trump, well before he entered politics, to profit for years from sales of everything from water, vodka and steaks.


Earlier this week, he announced the sale of $100 silver coins bearing his face. In March, ahead of Easter, Trump released a video on Truth Social urging his supporters to spend $59.99 for a “God Bless the USA Bible,” inspired by country singer Lee Greenwood’s patriotic ballad. Trump takes the stage to the song at each of his rallies and has appeared with Greenwood at events.


In February, he hawked new Trump-branded sneakers at “Sneaker Con,” a gathering that bills itself as the “The Greatest Sneaker Show on Earth.” The shoes, shiny gold high tops with an American flag detail on the back, are being sold as “Never Surrender High-Tops” for $399 on a new website that also sells other Trump-branded shoes and “Victory47” cologne and perfume for $99 a bottle.


Trump has also dabbled in NFTs, or nonfungible tokens, and last year reported earning between $100,000 and $1 million from a series of digital trading cards that portrayed him in cartoon-like images, including as an astronaut, a cowboy and a superhero.

Some of those items, including the coins, sneakers and Bibles, were listed as affiliated with CIC Ventures LLC, a company that Trump reported owning in his 2023 financial disclosure, has a similar arrangement with 45Footwear, which also says it uses Trump’s “name, likeness and image under paid license from CIC Ventures LLC, which license may be terminated or revoked according to its terms.”

The items have gone up for sale in the wake of a $489 million civil fraud judgment against the former president, which a New York appellate court on Thursday appeared to be open to reducing or reversing.


According to a disclaimer on a sales website, the watches are covered by a similar agreement to license Trump’s name, image and likeness, and proceeds from their sales do not go to Trump’s campaign or the Trump Organization and “are not designed, manufactured, distributed or sold by Donald J. Trump, The Trump Organization or any of their respective affiliates or principals.”

Instead, TheBestWatchesonEarth LLC — the company listed as the sales entity — says it uses the “‘Trump’ name, image and likeness under a paid license agreement which may be terminated or revoked according to its terms. Trump Watches are intended as collectible items for individual enjoyment only, not for investment purposes.”

A spokesperson for the Trump campaign referred questions about the licensing deal to the Trump Organization, which did not immediately return a message seeking comment. TheBestWatchesonEarth LLC also did not immediately respond to an inquiry on the deal via its website.

Trump launches new business venture during campaign: $100,000 watches

He's sold Bibles, sneakers, photo books and cryptocurrency during his third campaign for president.

torontosun.com

 

[spaminator]

Iranian operatives charged in U.S. with hacking Donald Trump’s presidential campaign
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Eric Tucker
Published Sep 27, 2024 • Last updated 17 hours ago • 5 minute read

WASHINGTON — Three Iranian operatives have been charged with hacking Donald Trump’s presidential campaign as part of what the Justice Department says was a sweeping effort to undermine the former president and erode confidence in the U.S. electoral system.


The action, coupled with sanctions and rewards for information leading to the accused hackers’ capture, is the latest U.S. government effort to call out what’s seen as Iran’s attempts to interfere in the election by damaging Trump and sowing general chaos. It comes as Iran has also been accused of threatening the lives of Trump and former officials and as US-Iran relations remain especially tense, with Israel fighting Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon.

The three accused hackers were employed by Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, which the U.S. government has designated as a foreign terrorist organization. Since 2020, their operation has sought to compromise email accounts of a broad swath of targets, which in addition to the Trump campaign also includes a former ambassador to Israel, a former CIA deputy director, officials at the State and Defense departments, a former U.S. homeland security adviser and journalists, according to the indictment.


In May, prosecutors say, the defendants began trying to penetrate the Trump campaign, successfully breaking into the email accounts of campaign officials and other Trump allies. They then sought to “weaponize” the stolen campaign material by spreading it to media organizations and people associated with President Joe Biden’s campaign in what’s familiarly known as a “hack-and-leak” operation.

“The defendants’ own words make clear that they were attempting to undermine former President Trump’s campaign in advance of the 2024 U.S. presidential election. We know that Iran is continuing with its brazen efforts to stoke discord, erode confidence in the U.S. electoral process and advance its malign activities,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said at a news conference Friday announcing the charges.


U.S. intelligence officials have said Iran opposes Trump’s reelection, seeing him as more likely to increase tension between Washington and Tehran. Trump’s administration ended a nuclear deal with Iran, reimposed sanctions and ordered the killing of Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani, an act that prompted Iran’s leaders to vow revenge.

Trump’s campaign said earlier this week that it had been briefed by U.S. officials on “real and specific” Iranian assassination threats, though one official told The Associated Press that the briefing had been requested by the campaign and did not include any suggestion of a new threat against Trump.


Iran’s mission to the United Nations last month denied the hacking allegations as “unsubstantiated and devoid of any standing,” saying that Iran had neither the motive nor intention to interfere with the election. It challenged the U.S. to provide evidence and said if the U.S. does so, “we will respond accordingly.”


The U.S. government has sought this year across multiple agencies to aggressively call out election interference and foreign influence operations — a stark turnabout from the government’s response in 2016, when Obama administration officials were criticized for not being forthcoming about the Russian interference they were seeing on Trump’s behalf as he ran against Democrat Hillary Clinton.

The Treasury Department issued sanctions Friday related to the hacking and the State Department offered rewards of up to $10 million for information leading to the arrests of the defendants, who remain in Iran.

FBI Director Christopher Wray said in a video statement that the FBI has been working to publicly condemn Iran’s “aggressive behavior,” including a plot to murder a journalist in New York City and a ransomware attack targeting a children’s hospital.


Even with the recent focus on Iran, U.S. officials have said Russia remains the primary threat to the elections.

The Justice Department earlier this month charged two employees of RT, the Russian-state media organization, with covertly funding a Tennessee-based content creation company with nearly $10 million to publish English-language videos on social media platforms favorable to Russia’s interests and agenda, and also seized dozens of internet domains that officials said were used to spread propaganda.

The Trump campaign disclosed on Aug. 10 that it had been breached and said Iranian actors had stolen and distributed sensitive internal documents.

Multiple major news organizations that said they were leaked confidential information from inside the Trump campaign, including Politico, The New York Times and The Washington Post, declined to publish it.


U.S. intelligence officials subsequently publicly blamed Iran for that hack and for an attempted breach of the Joe Biden-Kamala Harris campaign.

They have said the hack-and-dump operation was meant to sow discord, exploit divisions within American society and potentially influence the outcome of elections that Iran perceives to be “particularly consequential in terms of the impact they could have on its national security interests.”

Among the tactics the accused hackers used, the indictment said, is impersonating U.S. officials and creating fake email personas to try to dupe their victims.

Politico has reported that it began receiving emails on July 22 from an anonymous account. The source — an AOL email account identified only as “Robert” — passed along what appeared to be a research dossier that the campaign had apparently done on the Republican vice presidential nominee, Ohio Sen. JD Vance. The document was dated Feb. 23, almost five months before Trump selected Vance as his running mate.


Last week, officials also revealed that the Iranians in late June and early July sent unsolicited emails containing excerpts of the hacked information to people associated with the Biden campaign. None of the recipients replied. The Harris campaign said the emails resembled spam or a phishing attempt and condemned the outreach by the Iranians as “unwelcome and unacceptable malicious activity.”

One of the emails was sent June 27, the date of the Biden-Trump debate, when a halting performance by the president laid the groundwork for his announcement weeks later that he would not seek reelection. An email offering the stolen information, according to the indictment, stated that the debate was likely to be Biden’s “last chance” in the race.

The author stated negative feelings for Trump and wrote, “So I’m going to pass some materials along to you that would be useful to defeat him.”

Iranian operatives charged in U.S. with hacking Donald Trump’s presidential campaign

Three Iranian operatives have been charged with hacking Donald Trump's presidential campaign

torontosun.com

 

[justfred]

Should we check out where old Donnie is purchasing his $100,000 watches from. Place your bets that it is not from USA.

 

[justfred]

I see reports that John Deere are being reported to be bankrupt. They then say thank you to old Donnie as he has shown them the way to get away with being bankrupt, as he has been bankrupt how many times.

 

[pgs]

Should we check out where old Donnie is purchasing his $100,000 watches from. Place your bets that it is not from USA.

Look it up and let us know .

 

[pgs]

I see reports that John Deere are being reported to be bankrupt. They then say thank you to old Donnie as he has shown them the way to get away with being bankrupt, as he has been bankrupt how many times.

I don’t know why not tell us ? How many times have you made a Billion dollars ?

 

[Taxslave2]

I see reports that John Deere are being reported to be bankrupt. They then say thank you to old Donnie as he has shown them the way to get away with being bankrupt, as he has been bankrupt how many times.

Where did you hear that? Seems unlikely that one of the most popular equipment manufacturers would go bankrupt.

 

[spaminator]

Prosecutors lay out new evidence in Trump election case, accuse him of having ’resorted to crimes’
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Eric Tucker And Alanna Durkin Richer
Published Oct 02, 2024 • Last updated 1 day ago • 5 minute read

WASHINGTON — Donald Trump laid the groundwork to try to overturn the 2020 election even before he lost, knowingly pushed false claims of voter fraud and “resorted to crimes” in his failed bid to cling to power, according to a newly unsealed court filing from prosecutors that offers new evidence from the landmark criminal case against the former president.


The filing from special counsel Jack Smith’s team offers the most comprehensive view to date of what prosecutors intend to prove if the case charging Trump with conspiring to overturn the election reaches trial. Though a months-long congressional investigation and the indictment itself have chronicled in stark detail Trump’s efforts to undo the election, the filing cites previously unknown accounts offered by Trump’s closest aides to paint a portrait of an “increasingly desperate” president who while losing his grip on the White House “used deceit to target every stage of the electoral process.”

“So what?” the filing quotes Trump as telling an aide after being advised that his vice president, Mike Pence, had been rushed to a secure location after a crowd of violent Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 to try to prevent the counting of electoral votes.


“The details don’t matter,” Trump said, when told by an adviser that a lawyer who was mounting his legal challenges wouldn’t be able to prove the false allegations in court, the filing states.

The brief was made public over the Trump legal team’s objections in the final month of a closely contested presidential race in which Democrats have sought to make Trump’s refusal to accept the election results four years ago central to their claims that he is unfit for office.

The issue surfaced as recently as Tuesday night’s vice presidential debate when Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, a Democrat, lamented the violence at the Capitol while a Republican opponent, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, refused to directly answer when asked whether Trump had lost the 2020 race.


The filing was submitted, initially under seal, following a Supreme Court opinion that conferred broad immunity on former presidents for official acts they take in office, a decision that narrowed the scope of the prosecution and eliminated the possibility of a trial before next month’s election.

The purpose of the brief is to persuade U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan that the offenses charged in the indictment were undertaken in Trump’s private, rather than presidential capacity, and can therefore remain part of the case as it moves forward. Chutkan permitted a redacted version to be made public even though Trump’s lawyers argued that it was unfair to unseal it so close to the election.

Though the prospects of a trial are uncertain, particularly in the event that Trump wins the presidency and a new attorney general seeks the dismissal of the case, the brief nonetheless functions as a roadmap for the testimony and evidence prosecutors would elicit before a jury.


“Although the defendant was the incumbent President during the charged conspiracies, his scheme was fundamentally a private one,” Smith’s team wrote, adding, “When the defendant lost the 2020 presidential election, he resorted to crimes to try to stay in office.”

Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung called the brief “falsehood-ridden” and “unconstitutional” and repeated oft-stated allegations that Smith and Democrats were “hell-bent on weaponizing the Justice Department in an attempt to cling to power.” Trump, in a separate post on his Truth Social platform, said the case would end with his “complete victory.”

The filing alleges that Trump “laid the groundwork” for rejecting the election results before the contest was over, telling advisers that in the event he held an early lead he would “declare victory before the ballots were counted and any winner was projected.”


Immediately after the election, prosecutors say, his advisers sought to sow chaos in the counting of votes. In one instance, a campaign employee, who is also described as a Trump co-conspirator, was told that results favouring Democrat Joe Biden at a Michigan polling center appeared accurate. The person is alleged to have replied: “find a reason it isnt” and “give me options to file litigation.”

Prosecutors also alleged that Trump advanced claims of fraud despite knowing they were false, describing how he told others that allegations of election irregularities made by attorney Sidney Powell were “crazy” and referenced the science fiction series “Star Trek.” Even so, days later, he promoted on the platform then known as Twitter a lawsuit she was about to file.


In demonstrating his apparent indifference to the accuracy of the election fraud claims, prosecutors also cite an account of a White House staffer who after the election overheard Trump telling his wife, daughter and son-in-law on Marine One: “It doesn’t matter if you won or lost the election. You still have to fight like hell.”

The filing also includes details of conversations between Trump and Pence, including a private lunch the two had on Nov. 12, 2020, in which Pence “reiterated a face-saving option” for Trump, telling him, “Don’t concede but recognize the process is over.”

In another private lunch days later, Pence urged Trump to accept the results of the election and run again in 2024.

“I don’t know, 2024 is so far off,” Trump told him, the filing states.


Prosecutors say that by Dec. 5, the defendant was starting to think about Congress’ role in the process.

“For the first time, he mentioned to Pence the possibility of challenging the election results in the House of Representatives,” it says, citing a phone call.

But Trump “disregarded” Pence “in the same way he disregarded dozens of court decisions that unanimously rejected his and his allies’ legal claims, and that he disregarded officials in the targeted states — including those in his own party — who stated publicly that he had lost and that his specific fraud allegations were false,” prosecutors wrote.

Pence chronicled some of his interactions with Trump, and his eventual split with him, in a 2022 book he wrote called “So Help Me God.” He also was ordered to appear before the grand jury investigating Trump after courts rejected claims of executive privilege.


Prosecutors also argue Trump used his Twitter account to further his illegal scheme by spreading false claims of election fraud, attacking “those speaking the truth” about his election loss and exhorting his supporters to travel to Washington for the Jan. 6, 2021, certification.

They intend to use “forensic evidence” from Trump’s iPhone to provide insight into Trump’s actions after the attack at the Capitol.

Of the more than 1,200 Tweets Trump sent during the weeks detailed in the indictment, prosecutors say, the vast majority were about the 2020 election, including those falsely claiming Pence could reject electors even though the vice president had told Trump that he had no such power.

That “steady stream of disinformation” in the weeks after the election culminated in his speech at the Ellipse on the morning of Jan. 6, 2021, in which Trump “used these lies to inflame and motivate the large and angry crowd of his supporters to march to the Capitol and disrupt the certification proceeding,” prosecutors wrote.

His “personal desperation was at its zenith” that morning as he was “only hours from the certification proceeding that spelled the end,” prosecutors wrote.

— Associated Press writers Jill Colvin and Lisa Mascaro contributed to this report.

Prosecutors lay out new evidence in Trump election case, accuse him of having ’resorted to crimes’

The filing from special counsel Jack Smith's team offers the most comprehensive view to date of what prosecutors intend to prove.

torontosun.com

 

[pgs]

Prosecutors lay out new evidence in Trump election case, accuse him of having ’resorted to crimes’
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Eric Tucker And Alanna Durkin Richer
Published Oct 02, 2024 • Last updated 1 day ago • 5 minute read

WASHINGTON — Donald Trump laid the groundwork to try to overturn the 2020 election even before he lost, knowingly pushed false claims of voter fraud and “resorted to crimes” in his failed bid to cling to power, according to a newly unsealed court filing from prosecutors that offers new evidence from the landmark criminal case against the former president.


The filing from special counsel Jack Smith’s team offers the most comprehensive view to date of what prosecutors intend to prove if the case charging Trump with conspiring to overturn the election reaches trial. Though a months-long congressional investigation and the indictment itself have chronicled in stark detail Trump’s efforts to undo the election, the filing cites previously unknown accounts offered by Trump’s closest aides to paint a portrait of an “increasingly desperate” president who while losing his grip on the White House “used deceit to target every stage of the electoral process.”

“So what?” the filing quotes Trump as telling an aide after being advised that his vice president, Mike Pence, had been rushed to a secure location after a crowd of violent Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 to try to prevent the counting of electoral votes.


“The details don’t matter,” Trump said, when told by an adviser that a lawyer who was mounting his legal challenges wouldn’t be able to prove the false allegations in court, the filing states.

The brief was made public over the Trump legal team’s objections in the final month of a closely contested presidential race in which Democrats have sought to make Trump’s refusal to accept the election results four years ago central to their claims that he is unfit for office.

The issue surfaced as recently as Tuesday night’s vice presidential debate when Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, a Democrat, lamented the violence at the Capitol while a Republican opponent, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, refused to directly answer when asked whether Trump had lost the 2020 race.


The filing was submitted, initially under seal, following a Supreme Court opinion that conferred broad immunity on former presidents for official acts they take in office, a decision that narrowed the scope of the prosecution and eliminated the possibility of a trial before next month’s election.

The purpose of the brief is to persuade U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan that the offenses charged in the indictment were undertaken in Trump’s private, rather than presidential capacity, and can therefore remain part of the case as it moves forward. Chutkan permitted a redacted version to be made public even though Trump’s lawyers argued that it was unfair to unseal it so close to the election.

Though the prospects of a trial are uncertain, particularly in the event that Trump wins the presidency and a new attorney general seeks the dismissal of the case, the brief nonetheless functions as a roadmap for the testimony and evidence prosecutors would elicit before a jury.


“Although the defendant was the incumbent President during the charged conspiracies, his scheme was fundamentally a private one,” Smith’s team wrote, adding, “When the defendant lost the 2020 presidential election, he resorted to crimes to try to stay in office.”

Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung called the brief “falsehood-ridden” and “unconstitutional” and repeated oft-stated allegations that Smith and Democrats were “hell-bent on weaponizing the Justice Department in an attempt to cling to power.” Trump, in a separate post on his Truth Social platform, said the case would end with his “complete victory.”

The filing alleges that Trump “laid the groundwork” for rejecting the election results before the contest was over, telling advisers that in the event he held an early lead he would “declare victory before the ballots were counted and any winner was projected.”


Immediately after the election, prosecutors say, his advisers sought to sow chaos in the counting of votes. In one instance, a campaign employee, who is also described as a Trump co-conspirator, was told that results favouring Democrat Joe Biden at a Michigan polling center appeared accurate. The person is alleged to have replied: “find a reason it isnt” and “give me options to file litigation.”

Prosecutors also alleged that Trump advanced claims of fraud despite knowing they were false, describing how he told others that allegations of election irregularities made by attorney Sidney Powell were “crazy” and referenced the science fiction series “Star Trek.” Even so, days later, he promoted on the platform then known as Twitter a lawsuit she was about to file.


In demonstrating his apparent indifference to the accuracy of the election fraud claims, prosecutors also cite an account of a White House staffer who after the election overheard Trump telling his wife, daughter and son-in-law on Marine One: “It doesn’t matter if you won or lost the election. You still have to fight like hell.”

The filing also includes details of conversations between Trump and Pence, including a private lunch the two had on Nov. 12, 2020, in which Pence “reiterated a face-saving option” for Trump, telling him, “Don’t concede but recognize the process is over.”

In another private lunch days later, Pence urged Trump to accept the results of the election and run again in 2024.

“I don’t know, 2024 is so far off,” Trump told him, the filing states.


Prosecutors say that by Dec. 5, the defendant was starting to think about Congress’ role in the process.

“For the first time, he mentioned to Pence the possibility of challenging the election results in the House of Representatives,” it says, citing a phone call.

But Trump “disregarded” Pence “in the same way he disregarded dozens of court decisions that unanimously rejected his and his allies’ legal claims, and that he disregarded officials in the targeted states — including those in his own party — who stated publicly that he had lost and that his specific fraud allegations were false,” prosecutors wrote.

Pence chronicled some of his interactions with Trump, and his eventual split with him, in a 2022 book he wrote called “So Help Me God.” He also was ordered to appear before the grand jury investigating Trump after courts rejected claims of executive privilege.


Prosecutors also argue Trump used his Twitter account to further his illegal scheme by spreading false claims of election fraud, attacking “those speaking the truth” about his election loss and exhorting his supporters to travel to Washington for the Jan. 6, 2021, certification.

They intend to use “forensic evidence” from Trump’s iPhone to provide insight into Trump’s actions after the attack at the Capitol.

Of the more than 1,200 Tweets Trump sent during the weeks detailed in the indictment, prosecutors say, the vast majority were about the 2020 election, including those falsely claiming Pence could reject electors even though the vice president had told Trump that he had no such power.

That “steady stream of disinformation” in the weeks after the election culminated in his speech at the Ellipse on the morning of Jan. 6, 2021, in which Trump “used these lies to inflame and motivate the large and angry crowd of his supporters to march to the Capitol and disrupt the certification proceeding,” prosecutors wrote.

His “personal desperation was at its zenith” that morning as he was “only hours from the certification proceeding that spelled the end,” prosecutors wrote.

— Associated Press writers Jill Colvin and Lisa Mascaro contributed to this report.

Prosecutors lay out new evidence in Trump election case, accuse him of having ’resorted to crimes’

The filing from special counsel Jack Smith's team offers the most comprehensive view to date of what prosecutors intend to prove.

torontosun.com

Good luck with that .

 

[spaminator]

Melania Trump says she supports abortion rights, putting her at odds with the GOP
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Christine Fernando
Published Oct 03, 2024 • Last updated 1 day ago • 5 minute read

CHICAGO — Melania Trump revealed her support for abortion rights Thursday ahead of the release of her upcoming memoir, exposing a stark contrast with her husband, Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, on the crucial election issue.


In a video posted to her X account Thursday morning, the former first lady defended women’s “individual freedoms” to do what they want with their bodies — a position at odds with much of the Republican Party and her own husband, who has struggled to find a consistent message on abortion while wedged between anti-abortion supporters within his base and the majority of Americans who support abortion rights.

“Individual freedom is a fundamental principle that I safeguard,” Melania Trump said in the video. “Without a doubt, there is no room for compromise when it comes to this essential right that all women possess from birth: individual freedom. What does ‘my body, my choice’ really mean?”

The video appears to confirm excerpts of her self-titled memoir reported by The Guardian on Wednesday.



Melania Trump has rarely publicly expressed her personal political views and has been largely absent from the campaign trail. But in her memoir, set to be released publicly next Tuesday, she argues that the decision to end a pregnancy should be left to a woman and her doctor, “free from any intervention of pressure from the government,” according to the published excerpts.

“Why should anyone other than the woman herself have the power to determine what she does with her own body?” she wrote, according to The Guardian. “A woman’s fundamental right of individual liberty, to her own life, grants her the authority to terminate her pregnancy if she wishes.”

Melania Trump writes that she has “carried this belief with me throughout my entire adult life.”


These views contrast sharply with the GOP’s anti-abortion platform and with Donald Trump, who has repeatedly taken credit for appointing the three Supreme Court justices who helped overturn Roe v. Wade and boasted about returning the abortion question to the states. Democrats have blamed the former president for the severe deterioration of reproductive rights as abortion bans were implemented in large swaths of the country following the overturning of the landmark case, which had granted a constitutional right to abortion.

Donald Trump said Thursday that he had talked to his wife about the book and told her to “go with your heart.”

“We spoke about it. And I said, you have to write what you believe. I’m not going to tell you what to do. You have to write what you believe,” he told Fox News, adding, “There are some people that are very, very far right on the issue, meaning without exceptions, and then there are other people that view it a little bit differently than that.”


Vice-President Kamala Harris ’ campaign noted Trump’s role in ending Roe v. Wade in a statement reacting to Melania Trump’s defense of abortion rights.

“Sadly for the women across America, Mrs. Trump’s husband firmly disagrees with her and is the reason that more than one in three American women live under a Trump Abortion Ban that threatens their health, their freedom, and their lives,” Harris campaign spokesperson Sarafina Chitika said in a statement. “Donald Trump has made it abundantly clear: If he wins in November, he will ban abortion nationwide, punish women, and restrict women’s access to reproductive health care.”

Donald Trump on Tuesday said he would veto a federal abortion ban, the first time he has explicitly said so after previously refusing to answer questions on the subject. Abortion rights advocates are skeptical, however, saying Trump cannot be trusted not to restrict reproductive rights.


Alexis McGill Johnson, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Action Fund, said the memoir is another example of “the Trumps playing voters like a fiddle.”

“As president, (Trump) made it his mission to get Roe v. Wade overturned,” she said in a statement. “Melania stood by him, never once publicly disavowing his actions until weeks before an election where our bodies are again on the ballot and they are losing voters to this issue. Read between the lines.”

Democratic strategist Brittany Crampsie called the memoir’s release a “clear attempt to appeal to more moderate voters and to moderate JD Vance’s very clearly extreme views on the issue.” But she was skeptical that the move would work in favour of Trump, saying his shifting views “have already confused voters and sowed distrust.”


Melania Trump also defends abortions later in pregnancy, asserting that “most abortions conducted during the later stages of pregnancy were the result of severe fetal abnormalities that probably would have led to the death or stillbirth of the child. Perhaps even the death of the mother.”

“These cases were extremely rare and typically occurred after several consultations between the woman and her doctor,” she writes.

These views appear diametrically opposed to her husband, who has often parroted misinformation about abortions later in pregnancy, falsely claiming that Democrats support abortion “after birth,” though infanticide is outlawed in every state.

The national abortion group SBA Pro-Life America denounced the former first lady’s views on abortion, including her comments on abortion later in pregnancy, but said their “priority is to defeat Kamala Harris.”


“Women with unplanned pregnancies are crying out for more resources, not more abortions,” the organization’s president Marjorie Dannenfelser said in a statement. “We must have compassion for them and for babies in the womb who suffer from brutal abortions.”

Mary Ruth Ziegler, a law professor at the University of California, Davis School of Law who focuses on reproductive rights law and history, said it is unclear if the memoir’s release so close to the election was an attempt to help Donald Trump. But she did note that Melania Trump’s split from Trump on the issue is not uncommon historically.

There is “a pretty deep history of first ladies being more supportive of abortion rights than their husbands,” including Betty Ford, a vocal abortion rights supporter and the wife of former President Gerald Ford, Ziegler said.

Donald Trump promoted his wife’s book at a September rally in New York, calling on supporters to “go out and get her book.” It is unclear if the former president has read the book.

“Go out and buy it,” he told the crowd. “It’s great. And if she says bad things about me, I’ll call you all up, and I’ll say, ‘Don’t buy it.”’

— The Associated Press receives support from several private foundations to enhance its explanatory coverage of elections and democracy. See more about AP’s democracy initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1841806743216537870

Melania Trump says she supports abortion rights, putting her at odds with the GOP

The former first lady defended women's "individual freedoms" to do what they want with their body.

torontosun.com

 

[spaminator]

Melania Trump says she supports abortion rights, putting her at odds with the GOP
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Christine Fernando
Published Oct 03, 2024 • Last updated 1 day ago • 5 minute read

CHICAGO — Melania Trump revealed her support for abortion rights Thursday ahead of the release of her upcoming memoir, exposing a stark contrast with her husband, Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, on the crucial election issue.


In a video posted to her X account Thursday morning, the former first lady defended women’s “individual freedoms” to do what they want with their bodies — a position at odds with much of the Republican Party and her own husband, who has struggled to find a consistent message on abortion while wedged between anti-abortion supporters within his base and the majority of Americans who support abortion rights.

“Individual freedom is a fundamental principle that I safeguard,” Melania Trump said in the video. “Without a doubt, there is no room for compromise when it comes to this essential right that all women possess from birth: individual freedom. What does ‘my body, my choice’ really mean?”

The video appears to confirm excerpts of her self-titled memoir reported by The Guardian on Wednesday.



Melania Trump has rarely publicly expressed her personal political views and has been largely absent from the campaign trail. But in her memoir, set to be released publicly next Tuesday, she argues that the decision to end a pregnancy should be left to a woman and her doctor, “free from any intervention of pressure from the government,” according to the published excerpts.

“Why should anyone other than the woman herself have the power to determine what she does with her own body?” she wrote, according to The Guardian. “A woman’s fundamental right of individual liberty, to her own life, grants her the authority to terminate her pregnancy if she wishes.”

Melania Trump writes that she has “carried this belief with me throughout my entire adult life.”


These views contrast sharply with the GOP’s anti-abortion platform and with Donald Trump, who has repeatedly taken credit for appointing the three Supreme Court justices who helped overturn Roe v. Wade and boasted about returning the abortion question to the states. Democrats have blamed the former president for the severe deterioration of reproductive rights as abortion bans were implemented in large swaths of the country following the overturning of the landmark case, which had granted a constitutional right to abortion.

Donald Trump said Thursday that he had talked to his wife about the book and told her to “go with your heart.”

“We spoke about it. And I said, you have to write what you believe. I’m not going to tell you what to do. You have to write what you believe,” he told Fox News, adding, “There are some people that are very, very far right on the issue, meaning without exceptions, and then there are other people that view it a little bit differently than that.”


Vice-President Kamala Harris ’ campaign noted Trump’s role in ending Roe v. Wade in a statement reacting to Melania Trump’s defense of abortion rights.

“Sadly for the women across America, Mrs. Trump’s husband firmly disagrees with her and is the reason that more than one in three American women live under a Trump Abortion Ban that threatens their health, their freedom, and their lives,” Harris campaign spokesperson Sarafina Chitika said in a statement. “Donald Trump has made it abundantly clear: If he wins in November, he will ban abortion nationwide, punish women, and restrict women’s access to reproductive health care.”

Donald Trump on Tuesday said he would veto a federal abortion ban, the first time he has explicitly said so after previously refusing to answer questions on the subject. Abortion rights advocates are skeptical, however, saying Trump cannot be trusted not to restrict reproductive rights.


Alexis McGill Johnson, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Action Fund, said the memoir is another example of “the Trumps playing voters like a fiddle.”

“As president, (Trump) made it his mission to get Roe v. Wade overturned,” she said in a statement. “Melania stood by him, never once publicly disavowing his actions until weeks before an election where our bodies are again on the ballot and they are losing voters to this issue. Read between the lines.”

Democratic strategist Brittany Crampsie called the memoir’s release a “clear attempt to appeal to more moderate voters and to moderate JD Vance’s very clearly extreme views on the issue.” But she was skeptical that the move would work in favour of Trump, saying his shifting views “have already confused voters and sowed distrust.”


Melania Trump also defends abortions later in pregnancy, asserting that “most abortions conducted during the later stages of pregnancy were the result of severe fetal abnormalities that probably would have led to the death or stillbirth of the child. Perhaps even the death of the mother.”

“These cases were extremely rare and typically occurred after several consultations between the woman and her doctor,” she writes.

These views appear diametrically opposed to her husband, who has often parroted misinformation about abortions later in pregnancy, falsely claiming that Democrats support abortion “after birth,” though infanticide is outlawed in every state.

The national abortion group SBA Pro-Life America denounced the former first lady’s views on abortion, including her comments on abortion later in pregnancy, but said their “priority is to defeat Kamala Harris.”


“Women with unplanned pregnancies are crying out for more resources, not more abortions,” the organization’s president Marjorie Dannenfelser said in a statement. “We must have compassion for them and for babies in the womb who suffer from brutal abortions.”

Mary Ruth Ziegler, a law professor at the University of California, Davis School of Law who focuses on reproductive rights law and history, said it is unclear if the memoir’s release so close to the election was an attempt to help Donald Trump. But she did note that Melania Trump’s split from Trump on the issue is not uncommon historically.

There is “a pretty deep history of first ladies being more supportive of abortion rights than their husbands,” including Betty Ford, a vocal abortion rights supporter and the wife of former President Gerald Ford, Ziegler said.

Donald Trump promoted his wife’s book at a September rally in New York, calling on supporters to “go out and get her book.” It is unclear if the former president has read the book.

“Go out and buy it,” he told the crowd. “It’s great. And if she says bad things about me, I’ll call you all up, and I’ll say, ‘Don’t buy it.”’

— The Associated Press receives support from several private foundations to enhance its explanatory coverage of elections and democracy. See more about AP’s democracy initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1841806743216537870

Melania Trump says she supports abortion rights, putting her at odds with the GOP

The former first lady defended women's "individual freedoms" to do what they want with their body.

torontosun.com

she might want to invest in kevlar outfits.

 

[harrylee]

 

[petros]

Should we check out where old Donnie is purchasing his $100,000 watches from. Place your bets that it is not from USA.

Winners?

 

[petros]

Melania Trump says she supports abortion rights, putting her at odds with the GOP
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Christine Fernando
Published Oct 03, 2024 • Last updated 1 day ago • 5 minute read

CHICAGO — Melania Trump revealed her support for abortion rights Thursday ahead of the release of her upcoming memoir, exposing a stark contrast with her husband, Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, on the crucial election issue.


In a video posted to her X account Thursday morning, the former first lady defended women’s “individual freedoms” to do what they want with their bodies — a position at odds with much of the Republican Party and her own husband, who has struggled to find a consistent message on abortion while wedged between anti-abortion supporters within his base and the majority of Americans who support abortion rights.

“Individual freedom is a fundamental principle that I safeguard,” Melania Trump said in the video. “Without a doubt, there is no room for compromise when it comes to this essential right that all women possess from birth: individual freedom. What does ‘my body, my choice’ really mean?”

The video appears to confirm excerpts of her self-titled memoir reported by The Guardian on Wednesday.



Melania Trump has rarely publicly expressed her personal political views and has been largely absent from the campaign trail. But in her memoir, set to be released publicly next Tuesday, she argues that the decision to end a pregnancy should be left to a woman and her doctor, “free from any intervention of pressure from the government,” according to the published excerpts.

“Why should anyone other than the woman herself have the power to determine what she does with her own body?” she wrote, according to The Guardian. “A woman’s fundamental right of individual liberty, to her own life, grants her the authority to terminate her pregnancy if she wishes.”

Melania Trump writes that she has “carried this belief with me throughout my entire adult life.”


These views contrast sharply with the GOP’s anti-abortion platform and with Donald Trump, who has repeatedly taken credit for appointing the three Supreme Court justices who helped overturn Roe v. Wade and boasted about returning the abortion question to the states. Democrats have blamed the former president for the severe deterioration of reproductive rights as abortion bans were implemented in large swaths of the country following the overturning of the landmark case, which had granted a constitutional right to abortion.

Donald Trump said Thursday that he had talked to his wife about the book and told her to “go with your heart.”

“We spoke about it. And I said, you have to write what you believe. I’m not going to tell you what to do. You have to write what you believe,” he told Fox News, adding, “There are some people that are very, very far right on the issue, meaning without exceptions, and then there are other people that view it a little bit differently than that.”


Vice-President Kamala Harris ’ campaign noted Trump’s role in ending Roe v. Wade in a statement reacting to Melania Trump’s defense of abortion rights.

“Sadly for the women across America, Mrs. Trump’s husband firmly disagrees with her and is the reason that more than one in three American women live under a Trump Abortion Ban that threatens their health, their freedom, and their lives,” Harris campaign spokesperson Sarafina Chitika said in a statement. “Donald Trump has made it abundantly clear: If he wins in November, he will ban abortion nationwide, punish women, and restrict women’s access to reproductive health care.”

Donald Trump on Tuesday said he would veto a federal abortion ban, the first time he has explicitly said so after previously refusing to answer questions on the subject. Abortion rights advocates are skeptical, however, saying Trump cannot be trusted not to restrict reproductive rights.


Alexis McGill Johnson, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Action Fund, said the memoir is another example of “the Trumps playing voters like a fiddle.”

“As president, (Trump) made it his mission to get Roe v. Wade overturned,” she said in a statement. “Melania stood by him, never once publicly disavowing his actions until weeks before an election where our bodies are again on the ballot and they are losing voters to this issue. Read between the lines.”

Democratic strategist Brittany Crampsie called the memoir’s release a “clear attempt to appeal to more moderate voters and to moderate JD Vance’s very clearly extreme views on the issue.” But she was skeptical that the move would work in favour of Trump, saying his shifting views “have already confused voters and sowed distrust.”


Melania Trump also defends abortions later in pregnancy, asserting that “most abortions conducted during the later stages of pregnancy were the result of severe fetal abnormalities that probably would have led to the death or stillbirth of the child. Perhaps even the death of the mother.”

“These cases were extremely rare and typically occurred after several consultations between the woman and her doctor,” she writes.

These views appear diametrically opposed to her husband, who has often parroted misinformation about abortions later in pregnancy, falsely claiming that Democrats support abortion “after birth,” though infanticide is outlawed in every state.

The national abortion group SBA Pro-Life America denounced the former first lady’s views on abortion, including her comments on abortion later in pregnancy, but said their “priority is to defeat Kamala Harris.”


“Women with unplanned pregnancies are crying out for more resources, not more abortions,” the organization’s president Marjorie Dannenfelser said in a statement. “We must have compassion for them and for babies in the womb who suffer from brutal abortions.”

Mary Ruth Ziegler, a law professor at the University of California, Davis School of Law who focuses on reproductive rights law and history, said it is unclear if the memoir’s release so close to the election was an attempt to help Donald Trump. But she did note that Melania Trump’s split from Trump on the issue is not uncommon historically.

There is “a pretty deep history of first ladies being more supportive of abortion rights than their husbands,” including Betty Ford, a vocal abortion rights supporter and the wife of former President Gerald Ford, Ziegler said.

Donald Trump promoted his wife’s book at a September rally in New York, calling on supporters to “go out and get her book.” It is unclear if the former president has read the book.

“Go out and buy it,” he told the crowd. “It’s great. And if she says bad things about me, I’ll call you all up, and I’ll say, ‘Don’t buy it.”’

— The Associated Press receives support from several private foundations to enhance its explanatory coverage of elections and democracy. See more about AP’s democracy initiative here. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1841806743216537870

Melania Trump says she supports abortion rights, putting her at odds with the GOP

The former first lady defended women's "individual freedoms" to do what they want with their body.

torontosun.com

Its not rocket appliances. Its all marketing.

 

[spaminator]

Minnesota city says Trump campaign still owes more than $200,000 for July rally
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Published Oct 14, 2024 • 1 minute read

ST. CLOUD, Minn. — Former President Donald Trump’s campaign still owes St. Cloud nearly $209,000 for services related to a July rally, officials from the central Minnesota city say.


The bill is for services beyond what the city normally provides, The Minnesota Star Tribune reported Monday.

A request for comment emailed by The Associated Press to Trump’s campaign was not immediately returned Monday.

Trump and running mate JD Vance spoke to a hockey arena on St. Cloud State University’s campus July 27. An overflow crowd watched Trump speak for more than an hour and a half on a big screen outside the arena.

Expenses include $63,000 for extra police work during the rally, $62,000 to change a construction project near where the rally was held, and close to $2,000 for IT-related services.


St. Cloud City Administrator Matt Staehling on Monday told the newspaper that the city bills the White House for campaign stops and other events that require city services, such as half-marathon races. The White House is not billed for official events.

Trump’s campaign in August paid a $35,000 bill from St. Cloud State University related to the July rally, Athletic Director Holly Schreiner said.

Minnesota city says Trump campaign still owes more than $200,000 for July rally

Former President Donald Trump's campaign still owes St. Cloud nearly $209,000 for services related to a July rally

torontosun.com

 

[spaminator]

McConnell called Trump ’stupid' and ’despicable’ in private after 2020 election, new book says
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Mary Clare Jalonick
Published Oct 17, 2024 • 5 minute read

WASHINGTON — Mitch McConnell said after the 2020 election that then-President Donald Trump was “stupid as well as being ill-tempered,” a “despicable human being” and a “narcissist,” according to excerpts from a new biography of the Senate Republican leader that will be released this month.


McConnell made the remarks in private as part of a series of personal oral histories that he made available to Michael Tackett, deputy Washington bureau chief of The Associated Press. Tackett’s book, “The Price of Power,” draws from almost three decades of McConnell’s recorded diaries and from years of interviews with the normally reticent Kentucky Republican.

The animosity between Trump and McConnell is well known — Trump once called McConnell ” a dour, sullen, and unsmiling political hack.” But McConnell’s private comments are by far his most brutal assessment of the former president and could be seized on by Democrats before the Nov. 5 election. The biography will be released Oct. 29, one week before Election Day that will decide if Trump returns to the White House.


Despite those strong words, McConnell has endorsed Trump’s 2024 run, saying earlier this year “it should come as no surprise” that he would support the Republican party’s nominee. He shook Trump’s hand in June when Trump visited GOP senators on Capitol Hill.

McConnell, 82, announced this year that he will step aside as Republican leader after the election but stay in the Senate through the end of his term in 2026.

McConnell was ‘counting the days’ until Trump left office
The comments about Trump quoted in the book came in the weeks before the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. Trump was then actively trying to overturn his loss to Democrat Joe Biden. McConnell feared this would hurt Republicans in two Georgia runoffs and cost them the Senate majority. Democrats won both races.


Publicly, McConnell had congratulated Biden after the Electoral College certified the presidential vote and the senator warned his fellow Republicans not to challenge the results. But he did not say much else. Privately, he said in his oral history that “it’s not just the Democrats who are counting the days” until Trump left office, and that Trump’s behaviour “only underscores the good judgment of the American people. They’ve had just enough of the misrepresentations, the outright lies almost on a daily basis, and they fired him.”

“And for a narcissist like him,” McConnell continued, “that’s been really hard to take, and so his behaviour since the election has been even worse, by far, than it was before, because he has no filter now at all.”


Before those Georgia runoffs, McConnell said Trump is “stupid as well as being ill-tempered and can’t even figure out where his own best interests lie.”

Trump was also holding up a coronavirus aid package at the time, despite bipartisan support. “This despicable human being,” McConnell said in his oral history, “is sitting on this package of relief that the American people desperately need.”

On Jan. 6, soon after he made those comments, McConnell was holed up in a secure location with other congressional leaders, calling Vice President Mike Pence and military officials for reinforcements as Trump supporters stormed the Capitol. Once the Senate resumed debate over the certification of Biden’s victory, McConnell said in a speech on the floor that “this failed attempt to obstruct the Congress, this failed insurrection, only underscores how crucial the task before us is for our republic.”


McConnell then went to his office to address his staff, some of whom had barricaded themselves in the office as rioters banged on their doors. He started to sob softly as he thanked them, Tackett writes.

“You are my family, and I hate the fact that you had to go through this,” he told them.

The next month, McConnell gave his harshest public criticism of Trump on the Senate floor, saying he was ” practically and morally responsible ” for the Jan. 6 attack. Still, McConnell voted to acquit Trump after House Democrats impeached him for inciting the riot.

Years of doubts and criticism
In a statement to the AP on Thursday, McConnell referenced two fellow Republican senators — JD Vance of Ohio, the vice presidential nominee, and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, both of whom are strong Trump allies after harshly criticizing him during his first run in 2016.


“Whatever I may have said about President Trump pales in comparison to what JD Vance, Lindsey Graham, and others have said about him, but we are all on the same team now,” McConnell said.

McConnell also had doubts about Trump from the start. Just after Trump was elected in 2016, as Congress was certifying the election, McConnell told Biden, then the outgoing vice president, that he thought Trump could be trouble, Tackett writes.

The book channels McConnell’s inner thoughts during some of the biggest moments after Trump took office, as McConnell held his tongue and as the two men repeatedly fought and made up.

In 2017, as Trump publicly criticized McConnell for the Senate’s failure to repeal the Affordable Care Act, Trump and McConnell had a heated argument on the phone. Weeks went by with no contact. Then Trump invited McConnell to the White House and called a joint news conference without telling him first. McConnell said the event went fine, and “it’s not hard to look more knowledgeable than Donald Trump at a press conference.”


After the passage of a $1.5 trillion tax overhaul that same year, McConnell said, “All of a sudden, I’m Trump’s new best friend.”

He blamed Trump after House Republicans lost their majority in the 2018 midterm elections, Tackett writes. Trump “has every characteristic you would not want a president to have,” McConnell said in an oral history at the time, and was “not very smart, irascible, nasty.”

In 2022, as Trump continued to criticize McConnell and made racist comments about his wife, former Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao, McConnell told Tackett that “I can’t think of anybody I’d rather be criticized by than this sleazeball.”

“Every time he takes a shot at me, I think it’s good for my reputation,” McConnell said.

Also in 2022, McConnell said in his oral history that Trump’s behaviour since losing the election had been “beyond erratic” as he kept pushing false allegations of voter fraud. “Unfortunately, about half the Republicans in the country believe whatever he says,” McConnell said.

By 2024, McConnell had again endorsed Trump. He felt he had to if he were to continue to play a role in shaping the nation’s agenda.

“It was the price he paid for power,” Tackett writes.

McConnell called Trump ’stupid' and ’despicable’ in private after 2020 election, new book says

Mitch McConnell said after the 2020 election that then-President Donald Trump was "stupid as well as being ill-tempered."

torontosun.com

 

[spaminator]

Judge unseals heavily redacted trove of evidence in Trump’s 2020 election interference case
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Eric Tucker And Alanna Durkin Richer
Published Oct 18, 2024 • Last updated 1 day ago • 2 minute read

WASHINGTON (AP) — The judge overseeing Donald Trump’s 2020 election interference case made public Friday a heavily redacted trove of documents that provide a small glimpse into the evidence prosecutors will present if the case ever goes to trial.


The nearly 1,900 pages of documents collected by special counsel Jack Smith’s team were initially filed under seal to help U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan decide what allegations can proceed to trial following the Supreme Court opinion in July that conferred broad immunity on former presidents for official acts they take in office.

The information that could be seen in the redacted version released Friday appeared to be material that for the most part had already been made public, including screenshots of Trump’s social media posts about the 2020 election and a transcript of the video statement he made on Jan. 6, 2021, in which he told the rioters attacking the Capitol to go home, but added: “we love you” and “you’re very special.”


The overwhelming majority of the pages released Friday were whited out. The redacted files are believed to include things like transcripts of grand jury testimony, which remain under wraps because of grand jury secrecy rules.

Other information visible to the public includes passages from former Vice President Mike Pence’s book, excerpts of testimony provided by several witnesses to the House committee that investigated the Jan. 6 riot and a transcript of Trump’s phone call pressuring Georgia election officials to “find” enough votes to reverse his election loss in the state to Democrat Joe Biden.

Other documents include fundraising emails from Trump’s 2020 campaign and Pence’s letter telling Congress on Jan. 6 that he could not claim “unilateral authority to determine which electoral votes should be counted and which should not.”

The filing was submitted as a series of appendices to a 165-page brief unsealed this month in which prosecutors disclosed new evidence against Trump to support their argument that the former president is not entitled to immunity from prosecution.

Trump’s lawyers objected to the unsealing of the filing so close to next month’s presidential election, but Chutkan on Thursday rejected their bid to postpone the material from becoming public until after the election. She said it would be inappropriate to take the political calendar into account.

Judge unseals heavily redacted trove of evidence in Trump’s 2020 election interference case

The judge overseeing Donald Trump's 2020 election interference case made public Friday a heavily redacted trove of documents.

torontosun.com

 

[spaminator]

Judges punishing Jan. 6 rioters say they fear more political violence as Election Day nears
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Michael Kunzelman
Published Oct 19, 2024 • 4 minute read

WASHINGTON (AP) — Over the past four years, judges at Washington’s federal courthouse have punished hundreds of rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol in an unprecedented assault on the nation’s democracy. On the cusp of the next presidential election, some of those judges fear another burst of political violence could be coming.


Before recently sentencing a rioter to prison, U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton said he prays Americans accept the outcome of next month’s election. But the veteran judge expressed concern that Donald Trump and his allies are spreading the same sort of conspiracy theories that fueled the mob’s Jan. 6, 2021, riot.

“That sore loser is saying the same things he said before,” Walton said earlier this month without mentioning the Republican presidential nominee by name. “He’s riling up the troops again, so if he doesn’t get what he wants, it’s not inconceivable that we will experience that same situation again. And who knows? It could be worse.”

Walton, a nominee of President George W. Bush, is not alone. Other judges have said the political climate is ripe for another attack like the one injured more than 100 police officers at the Capitol. As Election Day nears, judges are frequently stressing the need to send a message beyond their courtrooms that political violence can’t be tolerated.


“It scares me to think about what will happen if anyone on either side is not happy with the results of the election,” Judge Jia Cobb, a nominee of President Joe Biden, said during a sentencing hearing last month for four Capitol rioters.

Judge Rudolph Contreras lamented the potential for more politically motivated violence as he sentenced a Colorado man, Jeffrey Sabol, who helped other rioters drag a police officer into the mob. Sabol later told FBI agents that a “call to battle was announced” and that he had “answered the call because he was a patriot warrior.”

“It doesn’t take much imagination to imagine a similar call coming out in the coming months, and the court would be concerned that Mr. Sabol would answer that call in the same way,” Contreras, a President Barack Obama nominee, said in March before sentencing Sabol to more than five years in prison.


Trump’s distortion of the Jan. 6 attack has been a cornerstone of his bid to reclaim the White House. The former president has denied any responsibility for the crimes of supporters who smashed windows, assaulted police officers and sent lawmakers running into hiding as they met to certify President Joe Biden’s 2020 victory.

Trump has vowed to pardon rioters, whom he calls “patriots” and “hostages,” if he wins in November. And he said he would accept the results of the upcoming election only if it’s “free and fair,” casting doubts reminiscent of his baseless claims in 2020.

Judges have repeatedly used their platform on the bench to denounce those efforts to downplay the violence on Jan. 6 and cast the rioters as political prisoners. And some have raised concerns about what such rhetoric means for the future of the country and its democracy.


“We’re in a real difficult time in our country, and I hope we can survive it,” Walton said this month while sentencing a Tennessee nurse who used a pair of medical scissors to smash a glass door at the Capitol.

“I’ve got a young daughter, I’ve got a young grandson, and I would like for America to be available to them and be as good to them as it has been to me,” he added. “But I don’t know if we survive with the mentality that took place that day.”

More than 1,500 people have been charged with federal crimes related to Jan. 6 siege, which disrupted the peaceful transfer of presidential power for the first time in the nation’s history. Over 1,000 rioters have been convicted and sentenced. Roughly 650 of them received prison time ranging from a few days to 22 years.


Justice Department prosecutors have argued in many cases that a prison sentence is necessary to deter convicted Capitol rioters from engaging in more politically motivated violence.

“With the 2024 presidential election approaching and many loud voices in the media and online continuing to sow discord and distrust, the potential for a repeat of January 6 looms ominously,” prosecutors have repeatedly warned in court filings.

Prosecutors argue that defendants who have shown little or no remorse for their actions on Jan. 6 could break the law again. Some rioters even seem to be proud of their crimes.

The first rioter to enter the Capitol texted his mother, “I’ll go again given the opportunity.” A man from Washington state who stormed the Capitol with fellow Proud Boys extremist group members told a judge, “You can give me 100 years and I’d do it all over again.” A Kentucky nurse who joined the riot told a television interviewer that she would “do it again tomorrow.”


A Colorado woman known to her social media followers as the “J6 praying grandma” avoided a prison sentence in August when a magistrate judge sentenced her for disorderly conduct and trespassing on Capitol grounds. Rebecca Lavrenz told the judge that God, not Trump, led her to Washington on Jan. 6.

“And she has all but promised to do it all over again,” said prosecutor Terence Parker.

Prosecutors had sought 10 months behind bars. After her April trial conviction, Lavrenz went on a “media blitz” to defend the mob, spread misinformation, undermine confidence in the courts and boost her celebrity in a community that believes Jan. 6 “was a good day for this country,” Parker said.

Magistrate Zia Faruqui sentenced Lavrenz to six months of home confinement and fined her $103,000, stressing the need to “lower the volume” before the next election.

“These outside influences, the people that are tearing our country apart, they’re not going to help you,” Faruqui told her.

Judges punishing Jan. 6 rioters say they fear more political violence as Election Day nears

.S. District Judge Reggie Walton said he prays Americans accept the outcome of next month's election.

torontosun.com

 

[justfred]

When you hear that old Donnie will bring down laws against “the Enemy“ from within. What old Donnie do is consider that Republicans that do not send him $100,000, they may be considered an enemy, and have them deported. What I am thinking is that old Donald will
do do anything to win and then get rich.

 

[pgs]

When you hear that old Donnie will bring down laws against “the Enemy“ from within. What old Donnie do is consider that Republicans that do not send him $100,000, they may be considered an enemy, and have them deported. What I am thinking is that old Donald will
do do anything to win and then get rich.

I am sure he is going to invade Canada and wack all negative posters pp . Be afraid be very afraid .