Trump

Politic

Pelosi hits back at Trump over coronavirus response: “Not a time for name-calling or playing politics”

By Letitia Denham 2 months ago

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi fired back at President Trump on Thursday after he called her “incompetent,” urging bipartisanship before calling his administration’s response to the coronavirus outbreak “opaque and often chaotic.”

“Lives are at stake,” Pelosi said during her weekly press conference. “This is not a time for name-calling or playing politics.”

The California Democrat said she and her fellow Democrats are working with Republicans to reach agreement on emergency funding to combat the spread of the deadly virus, which countries are racing to contain.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer called for $8.5 billion in emergency funding Wednesday, while the White House outlined a $2.5 billion plan Monday that includes $1.25 billion in new funds. Mr. Trump, however, told reporters at the White House on Wednesday his administration would spend “whatever’s appropriate” to adequately fight the coronavirus outbreak.

Any emergency funding package approved by Congress must include entirely new money,

Politic

Trump Administration Rejected WHO Coronavirus Test

By Letitia Denham 2 months ago

CHANDAN KHANNAGetty Images

The most consequential—and logically inexplicable—decision taken by this administration* in response to the current pandemic occurred in January, when German scientists developed the first test for COVID-19 and the World Health Organization offered the test to countries around the world and 60 countries accepted. We were not one of them. From Politico:

Why the United States declined to use the WHO test, even temporarily as a bridge until the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention could produce its own test, remains a perplexing question and the key to the Trump administration’s failure to provide enough tests to identify the coronavirus infections before they could be passed on, according to POLITICO interviews with dozens of viral-disease experts, former officials and some officials within the administration’s health agencies.

The slowness of the testing regimen — which, administration officials acknowledged this week, is still not producing enough tests

Trump announces the US will use a 1950s-era law to ramp up production of masks and protective gear as coronavirus spreads

By Letitia Denham 2 months ago

Associated Press

President Donald Trump announced Wednesday the US would invoke a 1950s-era law called the Defense Production Act.
It would allow the nation to ramp up the production of gear to combat the spread of the novel coronavirus.
“It can do a lot of good things if we need it,” the president said at a news briefing on the respiratory illness COVID-19.
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President Donald Trump announced Wednesday the US would invoke a 1950s-era law that would allow the government to ramp up the production of gear to combat the spread of the novel coronavirus.

“It can do a lot of good things if we need it,” the president said at a news briefing on the respiratory illness COVID-19.

The move marked the latest escalation in efforts by the Trump administration to contain the illness, which has killed more than 100 in the

Goverment

Trump: Government will start withholding funds from sanctuary cities after court ruling

By Letitia Denham 2 months ago

President TrumpDonald John TrumpMeat and poultry industry groups applaud Trump for keeping processing plants open FBI releases documents showing Roger Stone, Julian Assange communications Approval for Trump’s handling of coronavirus drops 10 points: poll MORE on Thursday said his administration will begin withholding funding from self-described sanctuary cities after a federal court ruled last week that it could do so.

“As per recent Federal Court ruling, the Federal Government will be withholding funds from Sanctuary Cities,” Trump tweeted. “They should change their status and go non-Sanctuary. Do not protect criminals!”

As per recent Federal Court ruling, the Federal Government will be withholding funds from Sanctuary Cities. They should change their status and go non-Sanctuary. Do not protect criminals!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 5, 2020

The 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan ruled on Feb. 26 that the Department of Justice (DOJ) could withhold funding from cities

Goverment

Trump, Putin issue joint commemorative statement, triggering concerns from government officials

By Letitia Denham 2 months ago

President TrumpDonald John TrumpWH officials discuss HHS secretary replacement following criticism of pandemic response: WSJ Pentagon leaders at impasse about next steps for Capt. Brett Crozier: report Trump forgoes WH press briefing for the first time since Easter weekend MORE and Russian President Vladimir PutinVladimir Vladimirovich PutinTrump, Putin issue joint commemorative statement triggering concerns from government officials How autocrats are using coronavirus to grab more power Can COVID-19 open the door to peace-building in Syria? MORE issued a joint statement on Saturday commemorating the 75th anniversary of a World War II meeting of U.S. and Soviet troops at the Elbe river in 1945.

“As we work today to confront the most important challenges of the 21st century, we pay tribute to the valor and courage of all those who fought together to defeat fascism,” the statement read.

Those familiar with the statement’s drafting said that its issuance is

Politic

Coronavirus Timeline: How President Trump Failed to Protect America

By Letitia Denham 3 months ago

In the middle of a crisis, it can be difficult to comprehend the full scope of the failures that brought the nation to its knees. To reframe the coronavirus pandemic, and the Trump administration’s catastrophic response, Rolling Stone presents here a timeline.

It shows that the pandemic was not a “black swan” event — some unforeseeable tragedy. Rather, a global pandemic of this sort has been predicted for decades, and indeed previous administrations, both Republican and Democrat, had sought to prepare the country for just such an outbreak. Yet upon taking office, the Trump administration consistently sought to defund and disarm America’s preparedness against a mass outbreak of a viral respiratory illness.

When the outbreak hit, the administration dithered. Our once storied public health agencies fumbled the rollout of COVID-19 testing — causing bottlenecks and weeks of delay, as powerful resources sat idle. “We didn’t unleash our biomedical establishment to

Politic

Trump Meets Every Criteria for an Authoritarian Leader, Harvard Political Scientists Warn

By Letitia Denham 3 months ago

Two political scientists from Harvard University have identified four warning signs that indicate if someone poses a dangerous authoritarian risk to a nation. No U.S. politician, at least dating back to the Civil War, has come close to ticking off all four boxes, one of the authors told Newsweek—until Donald Trump came along.

Professors Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt have authored the new book How Democracies Die, which details the warning signs Trump showed as a candidate. In a healthy democracy, they argue, those traits should have derailed his bid for the presidency.

GettyImages-632276036 — President Donald Trump met all the warning signs for an authoritarian leader during the 2016 presidential campaign, two Harvard political scientists write in their new book, “How Democracy Dies.”
JUSSI NUKARI/AFP/Getty Images

“Trump was easily identifiable as someone who is not committed to the democratic rules of the game,” Levitsky told Newsweek on Thursday. “There

Politic

Video of Trump Killing Media in Shooting Played at One of His Resorts

By Letitia Denham 3 months ago

At a time when our nation is facing an epidemic of mass shootings, supporters of President Donald Trump, at a conference held at one of the president’s resorts, showed a violent depiction of a fake Trump massacring members of the news media using a gun and other weapons, The New York Times reported Sunday night.

American Priority, a group that supports the president, hosted the conference at Trump National Doral Miami. Former White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the president’s son Donald Trump Jr., and Florida Gov. Rick DeSantis were all scheduled to speak at the event. But Huckabee Sanders and a source close to Trump Jr. denied either saw the video.

Bloomberg technology reporter William Turton surfaced a video matching the description from the Times on YouTube. The video appears to have been uploaded by YouTube account TheGeekzTeam in July 2018, and the account has posted other videos

Politic

‘The Case For Trump’ Book Review

By Letitia Denham 3 months ago

President Donald Trump during a news conference in the Rose Garden in Washington, D.C., April 30, 2018 (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)

The Case for Trump, by Victor Davis Hanson (Basic Books, 400 pp., $30)

Victor Davis Hanson’s newest book is also one of his most personal. Hanson is a celebrated historian of war, a retired professor of classics, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, and a National Review columnist. But he is also a farmer in California’s Central Valley. He routinely peppers his articles and even his academic work with telling details about farming life and social realities in Selma, a town outside Fresno where he lives in the same house in which he was born and raised. In this book, as in his others, the glimpses of Selma come only in support of Hanson’s wider thesis, never as part of an effort to tell his personal story. Nevertheless,

Trump Signs ‘Families First’ Relief Bill Into Law: Here’s What That Could Mean For You

By Letitia Denham 4 months ago

While his administration and congressional leaders continued to hammer out a trillion-dollar COVID-19 stimulus package, President Trump signed into law Wednesday evening the Families First Coronavirus Response Act, the second bipartisan coronavirus relief bill Congress has passed so far — the first providing around $8 billion in emergency funding for emergency prevention and response efforts. So what’s in the “Families First” bill? Below is a breakdown of its key provisions.

The Families First law addresses the following key priorities, among others:

provides additional funding for nutrition and food assistance programs, particularly in light of schools being shutdown and additional needs for elderly assistance programs
expands paid leave benefits
expands unemployment benefits
provides coronavirus testing at no cost to consumers
temporarily increases the Medicaid federal medical assistance percentage

Food and Nutrition Assistance Funding: Families First infuses significant federal money — nearly a billion dollars’ worth — into various nutrition assistance programs,