George Soros lost nearly $1B in weeks after Trump election

George Soros reportedly lost nearly $1 billion after becoming bearish after Donald Trump’s election.

George Soros, the billionaire hedge-fund manager and liberal financier, lost nearly $1 billion after becoming bearish after Donald Trump’s election victory, The Wall Street Journal reported.
The 86-year-old was cautious about the market prior to November’s election became more bearish after Trump’s win. So far, the bet was a mistake, and the stock market has risen about 9 percent over the past two months, the report said.
Soros Fund Management LLC has about 250 traders and manages about $30 billion. The billionaire took a more active role in the company in anticipation of turmoil in China and the European Union, the report said, citing people familiar with the matter.
Over the past few years, Soros has become an advocate and donor for liberal causes.  His name reportedly appeared in the Wikileaks emails of Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman John Podesta 60 times.
Soros, who last year, called on a “global system of political decision-making,” came out strongly against Trump during the campaign. He reportedly contributed  $7 million to Priorities USA Action and gave Clinton’s campaign the maximum $2,700 donation. He also contributed $5 million to a super PAC aimed at mobilizing Latinos and other immigrants in hopes to stop the Trump campaign.
Soros has a long history of contributing millions to liberal political causes, and pockets don't get much deeper than his. He ranked No. 23 in the latest Forbes richest men list.
The Wall Street Journal reported that overall, Soros’ fund is up about 5 percent on the year.

Obama, Biden made aware of dubious dossier of Trump allegations before leak

Turning point in Trump's relationship with intel community?

Vice President Joe Biden said Thursday that he and President Barack Obama were informed about the unverified allegations about President-elect Donald Trump by intelligence officials.
Biden said in an interview with the Associated Press that neither he nor Obama asked U.S. intelligence agencies to try to corroborate the unverified claims that Russia had obtained compromising sexual and financial allegations about Trump.
"I think it's something that obviously the agency thinks they have to track down," Biden said. He added later, "It surprised me in that it made it to the point where the agency, the FBI thought they had to pursue it."
Biden added that the briefing he and Obama received from Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and others, there were “no conclusions drawn” from the leaked dossier, which was produced in August and then released publicly this week by the media. Biden said it was "totally ancillary" to the purpose of the meeting, which was to brief Obama on a report he ordered documenting Russian interference in the U.S. campaign.
"As a matter of fact, the president was like, 'What does this have anything to do with anything?'" Biden said. He said intelligence leaders responded by saying "Well, we feel obliged to tell you, Mr. President, because you may hear about it. We're going to tell him," referring to Trump.
Biden said intelligence leaders told him and Obama that they couldn't say whether or not the allegations were true or untrue. He said there was "hardly any discussion" about the allegations in the briefing.
"Neither the president nor I asked for any detail," Biden said. But he added of the dossier: "I've read everything."
Trump confirmed earlier Thursday that Clapper spoke to him by phone, apparently sometime after a press conference in which Trump lashed out at media outlets, including Buzzfeed and CNN, that ran the story and speculated it was leaked by federal officials.
"James Clapper called me yesterday to denounce the false and fictitious report that was illegally circulated," Trump tweeted. "Made up, phony facts. Too bad!"
On Wednesday, Clapper released a rare statement addressing rising tensions between spy agency chiefs and Trump, who believes the intel community has become politicized and is working to undermine him. He also acknowledged contacting Trump directly to express "profound dismay" about the leaks to CNN and Buzzfeed — the latter of which published the unverified allegations in full.
"I emphasized that this document is not a U.S. Intelligence Community product and that I do not believe the leaks came from within the IC," Clapper said. "The IC has not made any judgment that the information in this document is reliable, and we did not rely upon it in any way for our conclusions."
Several media outlets reported that the salacious material, originally compiled by a former British intelligence officer turned political consultant, was relayed to Trump when he was briefed on the intelligence community's evidence of Russian hacking in the 2016 election.

More on this...

• Rudy Giuliani to advise Trump on cyber security

• Why the BuzzFeed debacle damaged journalism and handed Trump a gift

• Intel chief calls Trump to disavow leaks

But Trump never received any summary of unsubstantiated allegations that Russian spies had collected compromising financial and personal information about him, a highly placed transition source told Fox News Wednesday.
The source said that intelligence officials who briefed Trump on Friday brought up the allegations verbally, but added that they were "barely mentioned in passing."
A government source told Fox News that the intelligence community wanted to give Trump a heads-up that the allegations had been widely circulating and that a lot of media outlets were sitting on the story. The source said the claims did not constitute a "central element" of Trump's briefing.
CNN initially reported that Trump and President Obama were presented with a two-page summary that detailed the allegations. The report said the summary was attached to a broader report about Russian operatives' activities during the 2016 election.
At the Wednesday press conference, Trump said that he had learned details of the allegations "outside of the meeting" with intelligence officials.
"It's all fake news. It's phony stuff. It didn't happen," Trump said, later adding. "But I read what was released and I think it's a disgrace. I think it's an absolute disgrace."

Ex-spy allegedly behind Trump dossier reportedly helped FBI in FIFA probe

Krauthammer on Buzzfeed-Russia-Trump debacle

Christopher David Steele

The former British spy who allegedly created an incriminating but now-discredited dossier on President-elect Donald Trump reportedly helped the FBI build its case against FIFA officials back in 2010, The Washington Post reported.
Christopher David Steele, 52, who was last seen leaving his home in southwest of London on Wednesday, apparently to avoid detection and escape possible retribution once his identity as the source of the salacious document became known, the New York Times reported.
A person close to Steele said he left his home because he now fears a prompt and potentially dangerous backlash from Moscow against him and his family, the Telegraph reported.
Trump lashed out at the media for publishing the unsubstantiated material and at the U.S. intelligence officials, accusing them of leaking the allegations and likening the leaks to Nazi conduct.
Reuters reported on Thursday that in 2009, Steele’s London-based consulting firm, Orbis Business Intelligence, was hired by England’s Football Association to investigate FIFA over corruption allegations.
It was his work on corruption in international soccer “that lent credence to his reporting on Trump’s entanglements in Russia,” the report said.
Before developing the material on Trump, Steele was hired to investigate former European Commission Vice President Kristalina Georgieva, EurActiv.com said. Steele’s work occurred while Georgieva was a candidate for U.N. secretary-general.
Steele, who previously worked years undercover in Russia, London and France for MI-6, was specifically tasked with investigating her alleged links to a Bulgarian organized crime group known as Multigroup, a shady business empire run by Iliya Pavlov who was assassinated in Sofia in 2003.
Last October Georgieva resigned from the European Commission to take a job with the World Bank.

CNN Cartoons

Spicer: 'Rude, inappropriate' CNN reporter owes Trump an apology

CNN reporter Jim Acosta

Incoming White House press secretary Sean Spicer said Wednesday that CNN reporter Jim Acosta should apologize to President-elect Trump after Spicer said Acosta was "rude, inappropriate and disrespectful" during Trump's press conference earlier Wednesday.
"I think Mr. Acosta owes the president-elect and frankly the entire press corps an apology for his childish and inappropriate behavior," Spicer told Fox News' "Tucker Carlson Tonight."
TRUMP SPARS WITH REPORTER FOLLOWING RUSSIA CLAIMS
Acosta repeatedly called on Trump to let him ask a question after the president-elect disparaged reports by CNN and BuzzFeed that Russian spies have collected compromising information about him. Trump refused to call on Acosta, at one point telling him "Don't be rude" before finally blasting CNN's report as "fake news."
After the press conference, Spicer said he approached Acosta and "I informed him that I thought that no one should be treated that ... disrespectfully, and that if he did it again in the future, I would have him removed."
"No one needs to be treated with that level of disrespect and rudeness," Spicer later added.
The former Republican National Committee spokesman added that the contentious nature of Wednesday's presser could be a preview of future briefings under a Trump administration.
"If you want to have a conversation and engage in a polite and respectful manner with the president-elect, he’s gonna treat you in kind," Spicer said. "But if you come in hot and want to be disrespectful and rude, as Jim Acosta was today, he’s not gonna sit back and take it. This is a man who fights and wins."

Republican-led Senate takes first step to repeal Obamacare

Trump: You're going to be proud of plan to replace ObamaCare

The Senate early Thursday passed a measure to take the first step forward on dismantling President Barack Obama's health care law, responding to pressure to move quickly even as Republicans and President-elect Trump grapple with what the replace it with.
The nearly party-line 51-48 vote came on a nonbinding Republican-backed procedural budget vote. Committee action to write repeal legislation could come to a vote next month. A full replacement would follow sometime after that, presuming Republicans can come up with one, the Associated Press reported.
"We must act quickly to bring relief to the American people," said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.
The House is slated to vote on the measure on Friday, though some Republicans there have misgivings about setting the repeal effort in motion without a better idea of the replacement plan.
Trump said at a news conference on Tuesday that his incoming administration would soon reveal a plan to both repeal so-called Obamacare and replace it with legislation to "get health care taken care of in this country."

Tillerson, during confirmation hearing, says Russia poses 'danger' but refuses to call Putin 'war criminal'

Rubio grills Tillerson on if Putin is a war criminal

Secretary of State nominee Rex Tillerson and Sen. Marco Rubio clashed during a pair of contentious exchanges Wednesday, with an incredulous Rubio pressing the prospective diplomat to brand Russian President Vladimir Putin a "war criminal" and Tillerson coolly blunting Rubio's broadsides by explaining his more deliberative vision.

During the tense back-and-forths at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee confirmation hearing, Rubio, R-Fla., cross-examined Tillerson on policy regarding Russia, Cuba, Saudi Arabia and the Philippines. At the end of Rubio's second questioning period, Tillerson sought to allay any concerns the aggressive Rubio may have had.

"There seems to be some misunderstanding that I see the world through a different lens, and I do not," Tillerson said. "...But I'm also clear-eyed and realistic about dealing with cultures."
Tillerson's statement followed a heated initial session during which the ExxonMobil CEO refused to specifically call Putin a "war criminal."
"I find it discouraging your ability to cite that, which I think is globally accepted," Rubio said.
That exchange mirrored later questions by Rubio, who tried getting Tillerson to categorize Saudi Arabia as a "human rights violator" and denounce the practices of controversial Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte.
Tillerson also wouldn't bite when Rubio, a former opponent of President-elect Donald Trump during the Republican presidential primary, tried to get Tillerson to say Putin murdered political foes.
Still, Tillerson took a noticeably harder line toward Putin and Russia than Trump has done during the transition period and prior to it.

Booker breaks with precedent to testify against Sessions – and earns Republican rebuke

Another Snowflake.

Democratic Sen. Cory Booker cast aside long-standing precedent Wednesday and testified against a sitting Senate colleague, as he urged the chamber not to confirm Jeff Sessions for attorney general – a move that earned him a rebuke from Republicans.
Critics charged the New Jersey senator was merely burnishing his credentials for a presidential run, with Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., writing on Facebook he was “disappointed” Booker “has chosen to start his 2020 presidential campaign by testifying against Senator Sessions.”
According to the Senate historian, no sitting senator has ever testified against a colleague at a Cabinet nomination hearing. Cotton said Booker “knows better” than to use the hearing as a “platform for his presidential aspirations.”
The first-term senator countered in his testimony that Senate traditions were not the priority here.
"I believe, like perhaps all of my colleagues, that in the choice between standing with Senate norms or standing up for what my conscience tells me is best for our country, I will always choose conscience and country," Booker told the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Testifying during the second day of Sessions’ confirmation hearing, Booker charged that his colleague is incapable of fulfilling the responsibilities of the office of attorney general.
“Senator Sessions has not demonstrated a commitment to a central requisite of the job [of attorney general] -- to aggressively pursue the congressional mandate of civil rights, equal rights and justice for all of our citizens,” Booker said.
The senator asserted that at times during his career Sessions has “demonstrated a hostility toward these convictions.”
Ever since President-elect Donald Trump nominated him to the AG post, Sessions has been battling efforts to revive allegations of past racist comments which helped derail his failed 1986 nomination for a federal judgeship.
Wednesday’s testimony coincided with other civil-rights figures testifying against Sessions including NAACP head Cornell Brooks and Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., a civil rights icon who marched with Martin Luther King Jr.
Sessions, however, adamantly denied claims of harboring racial animus during the opening day of the hearing Tuesday. He decried the “false charges” and said critics were painting a “caricature” of him.
Jeff Giertz, Booker’s communications director, confirmed to FoxNews.com that the senator “attended parts of yesterday’s Judiciary hearing in-person and watched the hearing throughout the day when he wasn’t able to be in the room.”
Though Booker, a former Newark mayor, came out against a Senate colleague just three-plus years into his term, Democrats came to Booker’s defense -- suggesting his break with tradition pales in comparison to Republican tactics.
“He is taking a stand and is doing so fully recognizing that a lot of his Republican colleagues will be upset. Republicans did not think much of discretion and deference when they refused to give [Obama Supreme Court nominee] Merrick Garland a hearing,” Jim Manley, a former spokesman for ex-Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid, told FoxNews.com.
Cotton answered Booker’s testimony on Twitter Wednesday afternoon, by joking that his “attacks on Jeff Sessions are so far-fetched I half-expected his make-believe friend T-Bone to be next witness.”
T-Bone is a reference to an individual Booker frequently claimed over the years had threatened his life when he was mayor of Newark. It came to light during his campaign for the Senate that T-Bone was not an actual person.
South Carolina Republican Sen. Tim Scott, the only other black member of the Senate, gently chided Booker for his appearance Wednesday.
“I have always respected Senator Booker as a colleague. This is not a decision I would have made,” he said in a statement to FoxNews.com.
Booker’s comments Wednesday stand in contrast to remarks he made less than a year ago.
“I feel blessed and honored to have partnered with Senator Sessions in being the Senate sponsors of this important award,” Booker said of his collaboration with Sessions on a bill honoring participants of the Selma civil rights marches with the Congressional Gold Medal.