Category: 2020 Election

Trump Campaign Secretly Paying $180,000 A Year To His Sons’ Significant Others

Lara Trump and Kimberly Guilfoyle are each receiving $15,000 per month through the campaign manager’s private company, GOP sources said, to dodge FEC rules.

WASHINGTON ― President Donald Trump’s campaign is secretly paying one Trump son’s wife and another one’s girlfriend $180,000 a year each through the campaign manager’s private company, according to top Republicans with knowledge of the payments.

Kimberly Guilfoyle, the girlfriend of eldest son Donald Trump Jr., and Lara Trump, wife of middle son Eric Trump, are each receiving $15,000 a month, according to two GOP sources who are informal White House advisers and who spoke on condition of anonymity.

They were unsure when the payments began but say they are being made by campaign manager Bradley Parscale through his company rather than directly by either the campaign or the party in order to avoid public reporting requirements. Continue reading.

Trump announces $19B program to help agriculture sector

The Hill logoPresident Trump on Friday announced a $19 billion program to help the struggling agriculture sector and distribute food to families in need amid the economic toll of the coronavirus pandemic.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) will purchase crops and livestock from farmers and ranchers facing a steep decline in orders and massive supply chain disruption. Funding will come from the $2.2 trillion coronavirus economic relief bill and separate USDA funds to support commodity prices.

USDA will offer $16 billion in direct grants to farmers and ranchers to compensate for short-term drops in demand and oversupply driven by the coronavirus pandemic. The department will also purchase $3 billion in fresh produce, dairy, and meat to distribute to food banks, community organizations and charities. Continue reading.

Trump’s lifelong delinquency is suddenly a matter of life and death — and he has no one to blame but himself

AlterNet logoWhen he isn’t watching Fox News or tweeting insults at his perceived enemies, President Donald Trump spends a lot of time hunting scapegoats. Always preoccupied with escaping responsibility, Trump’s lifelong delinquency is suddenly a matter of life and death, as coronavirus claims thousands of American lives on his presidential watch. And as it becomes clearer that the United States might have easily avoided the worst consequences of the pandemic — and failed because of federal inaction — it is Trump whose historic reputation will plummet.

So will his chances of reelection. The latest Gallup poll shows his approval rating, now mired in the low 40s, has slid six points during the past month.

Trump’s peripatetic search for someone else to blame has taken him from Beijing to Capitol Hill to Manhattan to Geneva as well as various state capitals. He complains about the Chinese government, the Democrats in Congress, the New York Times and CNN; the governors of Washington state, Illinois and Michigan; and, most recently, the World Health Organization, whose vital funding he has threatened in one of the most misguided acts ever perpetrated by an American president. Continue reading.

Trump builds campaign-style press shop at the White House

The White House wants to expand its rapid response team tasked with monitoring and attacking critics of the president’s efforts to quell the coronavirus outbreak.

Kayleigh McEnany was brought on as White House press secretary to add a counterpunch, campaign-style energy to President Donald Trump’s communications team.

She’s starting to show how that will be done.

On Wednesday, McEnany began blasting tweets from the official White House press secretary account, hitting Speaker Nancy Pelosi in at least five tweets. On Thursday, she made her first “Fox & Friends” appearance in her new role, reiterating her Pelosi attacks and chiding the media. And she’s working in parallel with the Trump campaign as both the White House and campaign expand their communications and rapid response teams tasked with monitoring and attacking any critics of the president’s efforts to quell the coronavirus outbreak. Continue reading.

Michelle Obama to lend star power to Biden

The Hill logoFormer Vice President Joe Biden’s campaign is planning a rollout for Michelle Obama’s endorsement, although there are questions around just how public a role the enormously popular former first lady will play in his campaign.

Sources tell The Hill that the Biden campaign’s early plans include a focus on remote fundraising and voter registration efforts.

The trick for Michelle Obama and the Biden campaign is finding the right balance for the pop culture icon, who could be a massive asset for the campaign but has never shown much enthusiasm for campaign politics. Continue reading.

Vote-by-mail states don’t see the rampant fraud that alarms Trump

Security measures track ballots and voters, but took years to implement

States are expecting an increase in voters wanting to mail in their ballots as the coronavirus pandemic has made in-person voting potentially dangerous. And some — most notably the president — have questioned whether mail-in ballots are secure.

President Donald Trump has repeatedly said voting by mail has a high potential for voter fraud, despite recently casting an absentee ballot in Florida himself. But officials in states that conduct elections entirely by mail say fraud is extremely rare, and they also have measures in place to protect against ballot tampering.

The question for other states is whether, and how quickly, they can ramp up similar protections ahead of November. Continue reading.

We’ve never backed a Democrat for president. But Trump must be defeated.

Washington Post logoThis November, Americans will cast their most consequential votes since Abraham Lincoln’s reelection in 1864. We confront a constellation of crises: a public health emergency not seen in a century, an economic collapse set to rival the Great Depression, and a world where American leadership is absent and dangers rise in the vacuum.

Today, the United States is beset with a president who was unprepared for the burden of the presidency and who has made plain his deficits in leadership, management, intelligence and morality.

When we founded the Lincoln Project, we did so with a clear mission: to defeat President Trump in November. Publicly supporting a Democratic nominee for president is a first for all of us. We are in extraordinary times, and we have chosen to put country over party — and former vice president Joe Biden is the candidate who we believe will do the same. Continue reading.

Trump Has a Gut Feeling About What Covid-19 Means for 2020

New York Times logoIt’s not too soon to wonder whether he’s on to something.

Evidence of President Trump’s mishandling of the current Covid-19 emergency has been building steadily. Most recently, The Washington Post on April 4 (“The U.S. was beset by denial and dysfunction as the coronavirus raged”) and The Times on April 11 (“He Could Have Seen What Was Coming: Behind Trump’s Failure on the Virus”) have put together a carefully constructed case against the administration.

On April 13, Trump added fuel to the fire, declaring at his daily briefing, “When somebody’s president of the United States, the authority is total. And that’s the way it’s got to be. It’s total. It’s total.” Governors who have challenged his authority to order an end to social distancing and other preventive measures, “know that,” he added, and “they will agree to it.” Trump wasn’t done: “The authority of the president of the United States, having to do with the subject we’re talking about, is total.”

The notion that Trump’s provocative attitude will bring him down on Nov. 3 does not, however, take into account the resilience of his base and the animosity to elite liberalism that Trump has feasted on. Continue reading.

Here’s where things stand 200 days before Election Day

The Hill logoDemocrats are growing more confident about their chances of retaking power in Washington with 200 days to go before Election Day.

It’s an election that both sides now see as turning on the coronavirus pandemic and the American public’s views on how President Trump steers the country through the worst public health crisis in modern memory.

Recent polls suggest a tight race, but also give Democrats hope that former Vice President Joe Biden can top Trump in states such as Florida and Arizona that are crucial to his reelection chances. Continue reading.

Biden blasts Trump comments: ‘I am not running for office to be King of America’

The Hill logoFormer Vice President Joe Biden on Tuesday ripped President Trump for his assertion that he has the power to make states reopen their economies amid the continuing COVID-19 outbreak.

“I am not running for office to be King of America. I respect the Constitution. I’ve read the Constitution. I’ve sworn an oath to it many times,” the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee tweeted.
“I respect the great job so many of this country’s governors — Democratic and Republican — are doing under these horrific circumstances,” he said. Continue reading.