House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., is worried President Trump might not step down if defeated in 2020, according to a report published Saturday. “We have to inoculate against that, we have to be prepared for that,” she told The New York Times. She
urged the Democrats to win the debate that matters most to many voters
inside the party: electability. “Own the center-left, own the
mainstream,” she said. Pelosi
also said that in order to beat Trump, liberals have to play at his
level, and the best way to do that is to win big, so he can’t challenge
the results. “If we win by four seats, by a thousand votes each,
he’s not going to respect the election,” she said. “He would poison the
public mind. He would challenge each of the races. He would say you
can’t seat these people.” Last Wednesday, Pelosi pushed out a statement taking aim at the Trump administration in
the aftermath of Special Counsel Robert Mueller's report, blasting the
president as “immoral, unethical, corrupt and unpatriotic.” The
statement kicked off by taking aim at Trump over his comments last week
that he would “fight all the subpoenas,” accusing the president of
“blanket, Unprecedented Stonewalling." “The
President has made clear that he will broadly defy requests for
information from Capitol Hill. Trump’s obstruction extends to Democrats’
inquiries on issues that address the challenges facing American
families from the Administration’s efforts to sabotage Americans’ health
care to its cruel family separation policy,” the statement read. Trump
told Fox News last Thursday that he would not allow former White House
counsel Don McGahn or other administration officials to
testify. “They've testified for many hours, all of them. I would say,
it's done,” the president said. “Nobody has ever done what I've done.
I've given total transparency. It's never happened before like this.
They shouldn't be looking anymore. It's done.” Fox News' Catherine Herridge contributed to this report.
President Trump’s latest choice to lead U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is a former Border Patrol chief under the Obama administration who has backed the president’s border wall. Trump tweeted on Sunday that Mark Morgan “will be joining the Trump Administration as the head of our hard working men and women of ICE.” He added: “Mark is a true believer and American Patriot. He will do a great job!” Acting
Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan said in a statement that
Morgan’s “record of service is needed to address the crisis at the
border and support the men and women of Immigration and Customs
Enforcement.” ICE is the agency tasked with enforcing immigration law in the interior of the U.S. Part
of ICE’s mission is to arrest immigrants in the U.S. illegally, which
has made it a symbol of Trump’s hardline immigration policies. Midwestern Education Morgan
graduated magna cum laude from the University of Central Missouri with a
degree in Construction Engineering; he got a JD from the University of
Missouri-Kansas City. His LinkedIn page
says he is an “accomplished senior executive with 30 years of
progressive experience leading people, driving strategic change, and
creating an innovative culture with value-driven proven results.” His
bio also states his service: “U.S. Border Patrol/Customs and (Border)
Protection, Federal Bureau of Investigations, Los Angeles Police
Department, and United States Marine Corps.” Morgan Supports Trump’s Border Wall Morgan,
who was named the head of U.S. Border Patrol in 2016, was ousted early
in Trump’s presidency. Morgan was the first and so far the only outsider
to lead the Border Patrol. He clashed with its union, which has had a
strong relationship with Trump. Since Morgan left, he has defended
Trump’s immigration policies and publicly declared earlier this year his
support for Trump’s efforts to build a wall along the southern border. Morgan wrote in an opinion piece for Fox News this past March:
“It’s time to stop listening to those driven by a personal political
ideology and arm yourself with facts, thorough analysis, and the
perspective of credible experts. It’s an emergency.” In April,
Trump made his appreciation known, tweeting: “Mark Morgan, President
Obama’s Border Patrol Chief, gave the following message to me:
‘President Trump, stay the course.’ I agree, and believe it or not, we
are making great progress with a system that has been broken for many
years!” Morgan Saw Signs of the Growing Humanitarian Crisis Years Ago Morgan told Fox News last January that starting in 2014, the demographics of the people coming across the U.S. border started to change. “Meaning, we saw an influx in family units and unaccompanied minors,” Morgan said. “It was then, also, across the aisle on both sides that referred to that as a humanitarian crisis.” Morgan Thinks Immigration Laws “Are So Broke” Just last week, Morgan told Fox News that the crisis at the U.S. border with Mexico has been getting exponentially worse. “Right now if you grab a kid and come to our country illegally, you’re allowed in,” he said. “They’re
not even asserting credible fear claims, they’re not even asserting
asylum now,” he said. “They don’t need to because our laws are so
broke.” The Associated Press contributed to this report.
US Congressman Steve Cohen, D-Tenn., ate chicken during a
hearing before the House Judiciary Committee on Capitol Hill in
Washington, DC.
(Getty Images)
The Tennessee congressman who dug into a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken
last week during a House Judiciary Committee hearing in an effort to
take a swipe at Attorney General William Barr, who was absent, responded
to critics in an interview Sunday and said the move was simply an
attempt at "levity." Rep. Steve Cohen, D-Tenn., told MSNBC that the chicken bucket was purchased the night before and was cold. He described the meal as not “wonderful.” Cohen
showed up on Capitol Hill with the bucket of fried chicken and a
ceramic chicken statue to mock Barr for being “too chicken” after the
attorney general did not appear for his scheduled hearing before the
House Judiciary Committee. Barr was expected to testify on his handling
of Special Counsel Robert Mueller's Russia report. The joke
largely fell flat. Most notably, Jimmy Kimmel mocked the stunt and
warned Democrats that using this kind of “sick burns” will cost them the
presidential election in 2020. "Wow, what a sick burn that is," Kimmel sarcastically said to his audience. "Trump's gonna win again with stuff like that, isn't he?" "Late Night" host Seth Meyers mocked Cohen for his overly obvious message that Barr was a "chicken." "Dude,
if you want KFC, just order KFC. It's fine," Meyers told the Democratic
congressman. "You don't need to tie it into the hearing."
California Rep. Eric Swalwell was slammed on Twitter Wednesday for
posting about his decision to bypass a coffee shop inside Trump Tower
and walk a couple of extra blocks. (Rep. Eric Swalwell / Twitter)
The move wasn’t the first time that a Democrat’s
attempt at humor appeared to fall flat. California Rep. Eric Swalwell
earlier this year posted a selfie on Twitter announcing that he refused
to purchase a cup of coffee inside the Trump Tower in New York.
The U.S. is sending the USS Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group and a bomber task force to the Middle East in order "to send a clear and unmistakable message to the Iranian regime," National Security Adviser John Bolton announced Sunday night. Bolton
said the deployment was in response to "a number of troubling and
escalatory indications and warnings" on the part of Tehran, but did not
elaborate. Such deployments are rarely announced in advance. "[A]ny
attack on United States interests or on those of our allies will be met
with unrelenting force," Bolton said. "The United States is not seeking
war with the Iranian regime, but we are fully prepared to respond to
any attack, whether by proxy, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, or
regular Iranian forces."
Aircraft parked on the flight deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln in this 2012 photo.
(AP, File)
The strike group, which
includes the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, the guided missile
cruiser USS Leyte Gulf and destroyers from Destroyer Squadron 2,
departed Naval Station Norfolk on April 1 for what the Navy described as
a "regularly scheduled deployment." The strike force is under the
command of Rear Adm. John Wade. The USS John Stennis aircraft
carrier strike group was in the Persian Gulf as recently as late March.
The Stennis and USS Abraham Lincoln joined forces in the Mediterranean
Sea in recent days. The deployment comes less than a month after
the Trump administration designated Iran's elite Islamic Revolutionary
Guard Corps (IRGC) a terrorist organization. In late March, the Air
Force pulled its bombers from Qatar, one of the rare times since 2001 no
bombers were deployed to the Middle East. Last
month, the Air Force deployed a task force of F-35 stealth fighter jets
for the first time to the Middle East. Last week, some of the advanced
jets carried out their first air strikes against ISIS, the Air Force
said. Earlier Sunday, Axios reported
that the Trump administration was preparing to announce a new set of
sanctions against Iran on Wednesday, one year after the U.S. pulled
out from the 2015 Iran nuclear deal. The Wall Street Journal reported
last week that the White House was considering sanctions targeting
petrochemical and consumer goods sales by Iran, but Axios reported
Sunday that the sanctions to be announced this week would target a
different sector of the rogue nation's economy. The
U.S. Navy says there have been zero cases of “unsafe” interactions
between its warships and aircraft and Iranian forces this year as well
as last year. The deployment also comes amid the bloodiest fighting in five years between Israel and Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip. Last
Friday, two Israeli soldiers were wounded by snipers from the
Iran-backed militant group Islamic Jihad. Late Saturday, the Israeli
military announced that an airstrike had killed Hamas commander Hamed
al-Khoudary, a money changer whom Israel said was a key player in
transferring Iranian funds to the militant group. Fox News' Lucas Tomlinson, Kelly Phares and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks at the North Side Gymnasium in
Elkhart, Ind., Thursday, May 10, 2018, during a campaign rally. (AP
Photo/Carolyn Kaster)
President Trump said he’s looking for a bipartisan plan to address infrastructure in the U.S. In a tweet Saturday, the president said there’s “nothing easy about making an infrastructure plan.” He added, its especially hard to get the funds when the country is spending trillions of dollars in the Middle East. Republicans are currently looking for a way to fund the plan, which is expected to cost between $1 and $2 trillion. Senator Rand Paul has suggested withdrawing troops from Afghanistan and other combat zones to pay for the move.
White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders expressed disbelief on Saturday at the fact that Democrats pushed "socialism" while living under President Trump's growing economy. "It's
truly mind-boggling. I don't know why anyone would vote for a system
that they are literally watching crumble before their very eyes,"
Sanders said while appearing Saturday on "Watters' World." Her comment was an apparent reference to the developing political crisis and looming regime change in Venezuela, which has met with sky-high inflation, deteriorating humanitarian conditions and a political uprising. She
told host Jesse Watters that favoring socialism was particularly odd
given that this nation's capitalist system has worked "so well." "Under
this president, [the] American economy is booming, we're thriving, and
we're doing better than we've done in a long time," she added. She made those remarks just after the administration celebrated a positive jobs report which included 263,000 added jobs and the lowest unemployment rate since 1969.
President Trump’s post-Mueller-report victory lap includes new merchandise such as $30 “Collusion Delusion” T-shirts and “Witch Hunt!” mugs. Buyers are also snatching up white tees that reproduce Trump’s March
24, 1:42 p.m. tweet following Attorney General William Barr’s
announcement of his summary of Mueller’s findings: “Complete and
Total EXONERATION.” The “Witch Hunt!” and “No collusion” taglines also
come in decals ($9) and beverage coolers ($8). The shop.donaldjtrump.com site is authorized by Trump For President Inc. and the Republican National Committee. Sales surged on April 18, the day the redacted Mueller report was released, said campaign officials. “Our
Mueller-related merchandise has been doing exceptionally well. Our
supporters are even more energized,” said First Daughter-in-law Lara
Trump. Campaign
spokeswoman Erin Perrine said, “President Trump is a branding master
and all of the best ideas come from his messaging and tweets.” The
store’s best seller, by far, remains the $25 “Make America Great Again”
caps, which are closing in on their 1 millionth sale.
Tickets to the latest stop on Bill and Hillary Clinton’s speaking tour were going for as little as $20 on the secondary market as their 13-city adventure continued to struggle to find an audience. The
best seats in the house at Seattle’s WaMu Theater on Friday could be
had for $829, a steep 54% drop from the $1,785 that the former first
couple fetched when the tour was announced in early November. But organizers soon had to slash listed prices and even offer discount ducats through Groupon to boost sales. The official prices for Friday’s appearance ranged from $66.50 to $519, the Seattle Times reported. “I
really believe that we are in a crisis, a constitutional crisis,”
Hillary Clinton opined during the 90-minute performance, presented as an
interview of her and her husband by actor Bradley Whitford. “This is a
test for our country.”
Aircraft parked on the flight deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln in this 2012 photo.
(AP, File)
CNN’s Scott Jennings once again took liberals to the cleaners on the Abrego Garcia case, the ‘Maryland man...
