Transparency Data Availability And Record Keeping
The Washington Post reported in May 2017, “a wide variety of information that until recently was provided to the public, limiting access, for instance, to disclosures about workplace violations, energy efficiency, and animal welfare abuses” had been removed or tucked away. The Obama administration had used the publication of enforcement actions taken by federal agencies against companies as a way to name and shame companies that engaged in unethical and illegal behaviors.
The Trump administration stopped the longstanding practice of logging visitors to the White House, making it difficult to tell who has visited the White House. In July 2018, CNN reported that the White House had suspended the practice of publishing public summaries of Trump’s phone calls with world leaders, bringing an end to a common exercise from previous administrations.
Use Of The Office Of President
Trump often sought to use the office of the presidency for his own interest. Under his leadership, the Justice Department, which is traditionally independent from the President, became highly partisan and acted in Trump’s interest.Bloomberg News reported in October 2019 that during a 2017 Oval Office meeting, Trump had asked Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to pressure the Justice Department to drop a criminal investigation of Reza Zarrab, an Iranian-Turkish gold trader who was a client of Trump associate Rudy Giuliani. Tillerson reportedly refused.
Trump attempted to host the 2020 G7 Summit at his Doral Golf Resort, from which he could have made significant profits. Trump visited his properties 274 times during his presidency. Government officials were charged as much as $650 per night to stay at Trump’s properties.
In the lead up to the 2020 election, Trump and Postmaster GeneralLouis DeJoy, a close ally of Trump, sought to hamper the US postal service by cutting funding and services, a move which would prevent postal votes from being counted during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Trump has fired, demoted or withdrawn numerous government officials in retaliation for actions that projected negatively on his public image, or harmed his personal or political interests, including Federal Bureau of Investigation Director James Comey, Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe, U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions, and Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire.
Hanie Grisham: Trump Will Be About Revenge If He Wins In 2024
Ex-presidents third press secretary says he will run again and presents a greater threat to democracy
The former White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham thinks Donald Trump will run for president again in 2024, and will present a significantly greater danger to US democracy should he win than at any time in his four years in office.
Hes clearly the frontrunner in the Republican party, Grisham told ABCs Good Morning America on Monday. Everybodys showing their fealty to him. Hes on his revenge tour, for people who dared to vote for impeachment.
And I want to just warn people that once he takes office if he were to win, he doesnt have to worry about re-election any more. He will be about revenge, he will probably have some pretty draconian policies.
As Grisham spoke, the Washington Post reported that Trump came close to announcing a 2024 run in August, only to be advised to hold off.
On Tuesday, Grisham, also formerly a close aide to Melania Trump, will publish a tell-all book, Ill Take Your Questions Now. It has been widely trailed.
In a statement on Monday, Melania Trump said Grisham was desperately trying to rehabilitate her tarnished reputation by manipulating and distorting the truth and called Grisham a deceitful and troubled individual who doesnt deserve anyones trust.
Grisham was Donald Trumps third press secretary of four, working for the first lady either side of that appointment.
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More: Trump Pac Paid Nearly Half A Million To Law Firms Representing Allies Subpoenaed By Jan 6 Committee
The Republican Party committee has described the legal payments for Trump as support for the former president against political attacks against him. But at least two of the three firms that have been paid on behalf of Trump are involved in legal work on behalf of the former president regarding investigations against his personal businesses by the New York attorney general and Manhattan district attorney.
Although both officials are Democrats, they have both said their probes are not politically motivated.
In all, the $1.7 million paid in total to the three firms includes more than $862,000 paid to NechelesLaw LLP, $516,000 paid to Fischetti & Malgieri LLP, and $350,000 paid to van der Veen, Hartshorn and Levin, the RNC’s disclosure filings show. The most recent payments are $50,440 to Fischetti & Malgieri LLP in mid-June and $186,182 to NechelesLaw LLP in May.
Neither NechelesLaw LLP, Fischetti & Malgieri LLP, or van der Veen, Hartshorn and Levin responded to ABC News’ requests for comment.
Holman, the watchdog group lobbyist, said regulations that would govern legal expense funds for executive branch officials and candidates have been proposed to the Office of Government Ethics. Among the proposals are regulations that would enforce contribution limits, prohibit certain funding sources, and require the full disclosure of where money comes from and how it is spent.
What The 2024 Gop Field Could Look Like With Or Without Trump
Another uncertainty tied up with Trump’s 2024 decision is who will comprise the rest of the GOP primary field.
Some potential candidates, such as Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, former UN Secretary Nikki Haley and South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem have all stated to varying degrees to say they would support a Trump 2024 bid and put their own presidential ambitions on hold if he were to run.
Florida’s pair of GOP senators, Marco Rubio and Rick Scott, have also said they would support Trump in 2024 despite early rumors about each of them entering the primary.
A smaller cadre of potential candidates have made it clear through a mix of statements and hiring maneuvers that they’re prepared to launch 2024 campaigns regardless of what Trump does. Among them are former Vice President Mike Pence, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.
Pence already assembled a campaign leadership team in waiting and has visited the key first-in-the-nation states of Iowa and New Hampshire at various fundraisers for local candidates and county GOPs. He also hasn’t ruled out a run in 2024 if Trump enters the race.
Christie, who lost to Trump in the 2016 primary, has expressed open disdain for anyone who would decide whether to enter the primary depending upon Trump’s decision.
But as long as Trump positions himself for a run other potential contenders will have little room to grow their support.
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Some Republicans Fear An Announcement Will Undercut Them At A Time When They Have A Strong Chance Of Retaking The House And Senate
For nearly a year, a kitchen cabinet of Donald Trump confidants has told the former president not to announce his 2024 comeback candidacy before the midterms, arguing that he could be a drag on 2022 candidates and would be blamed if Republicans underperformed.
But Trump has continued to regularly push for an early announcement in private meetings, as potential 2024 rivals become more aggressive amid signs of weakening support among his base. Now an increasing number of allies are urging him to follow his instincts as a way to shore up his standing in the party and drive turnout to help the GOP take over the House and Senate next year.
The former president is now eyeing a September announcement, according to two Trump advisers, who like some others interviewed for this article spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe private conversations. One confidant put the odds at 70-30 he announces before the midterms. And others said he may still decide to announce sooner than September.
Trump has begun talking with advisers about who should run a campaign, and his team has instructed others to have an online apparatus ready for a campaign should he announce soon, two people familiar with the matter said. He also has begun meeting with top donors to talk about the 2024 race, one of these people said, while on trips to various places across the country.
The Complicated Truth About Trump 2024
The former president may already be running for president againor it may be a lot of bluster.
If Donald Trump tries to run for president again, one of his former campaign advisers has a plan to dissuade him. Anticipating that Trump may not know who Adlai Stevenson was or that he lost two straight presidential elections in the 1950s, this ex-adviser figures he or someone else might need to explain the mans unhappy fate. Theyll remind Trump that if he were beaten in 2024, he would join Stevenson as one of historys serial losers. I think that would resonate, said this person, who, like others, spoke on condition of anonymity to talk more freely. Trump hates losers.
Unlike past presidents who willingly ceded the stage after defeat, Trump has made himself impossible to ignore since leaving office earlier this year. Hes behaving like a candidate-in-waiting. Id be shocked if he doesnt run, Senator Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican and Trump ally, told me. I think Trump is our best pick, to be honest with you, because everybody knows his flaws, but his successes are in stark contrast to what were experiencing now.
Imagine what would happen if he said, After careful consideration, I wont be a candidate in 2024, John Bolton, the former Trump White House national security adviser, told me. You can hear the spotlight switches turning off. Hell talk about it right up until the point when he doesnt.
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Historical Evaluations And Public Opinion
In the sixth Siena College Research Institute’s presidential rankings, conducted after Trump had been in office for one year, Trump was ranked as the third-worst president.C-SPAN‘s 2021 President Historians Survey ranked Trump as the fourth-worst president overall and the worst in the leadership characteristics of Moral Authority and Administrative Skills. Trump’s best rated leadership characteristic was Public Persuasion, where he ranked 32nd out of the 44 individuals who were previously president.
At the time of the 2016 election, polls by Gallup found Trump had a favorable rating around 35% and an unfavorable rating around 60%, while Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton held a favorable rating of 40% and an unfavorable rating of 57%. 2016 was the first election cycle in modern presidential polling in which both major-party candidates were viewed so unfavorably. By January 20, 2017, Inauguration Day, Trump’s approval rating average was 42%, the lowest rating average for an incoming president in the history of modern polling during his term it was an “incredibly stable ” 36% to 40%. Trump was the only president to never reach a 50% approval rating in the Gallup poll dating to 1938.
Election Audits Will Not Change The Outcome
Trump supporters are holding on to the results of ongoing election audits to support the reinstatement theory. However, those recounts have found no evidence of widespread fraud in the 2020 election.
Three separate audits of election results in Georgia, where Biden beat Trump by more than 10,000 votes, found no evidence of wrongdoing affecting the state’s results. An ongoing audit in Maricopa County, Arizona, also hasn’t surfaced any evidence of widespread voter fraud. A number of manual hand recounts across the country have affirmed Biden’s victory.
At least 61 lawsuits from the Trump campaign alleging election fraud have failed. Courts in battleground states have denied hearing Trump’s appeals to overturn election results.
Business Insider reported that even if Lindell uncovered widespread election fraud, Congress could only remove Biden through impeachment. If Biden were removed from office, Vice President Kamala Harris would become president, not Trump.
The only path for Trump to return to the presidency would be to win the 2024 presidential election race.
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Trump 2024 Run Could Upend Midterms And Deflect Risk Of Prosecution
Rumors are swirling that the ex-president could make an announcement soon, as January 6 revelations continue
Speculation is swirling in the US media that Donald Trump is considering announcing a 2024 presidential run as early as this summer and in the face of ever more damaging revelations from a congressional investigation of his role in the January 6 attack on the Capitol.
Irrespective of Trumps chances of winning a second term, another presidential campaign under consideration as reported by the New York Times, CBS and other US outlets could give the former president a multi-year shield to deflect the attention of prosecutors.
The reports have come after committee hearings into the 6 January 2021 Capitol riot that could see the congressional panel itself recommend Trump face criminal charges for his role in an attempt to thwart the certification of Joe Bidens electoral win. Or the justice department could charge Trump via its own investigation of the scheme.
In testimony to the panel last week, Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide to Trumps chief of staff Mark Meadows, strengthened a potential criminal case when she alleged that Trump knew his supporters were armed when he encouraged them to march on the Capitol.
A former House Republican aide told MSNBC on Saturday that Trump would probably announce his intentions soon.
White Nationalists And Charlottesville Rally
On August 13, 2017, Trump condemned violence “on many sides” after a gathering of hundreds of white nationalists in Charlottesville, Virginia, the previous day turned deadly. A white supremacist drove a car into a crowd of counter-protesters, killing one woman and injuring 19 others. According to Sessions, that action met the definition of domestic terrorism. During the rally there had been other violence, as some counter-protesters charged at the white nationalists with swinging clubs and mace, throwing bottles, rocks, and paint. Trump did not expressly mention Neo-Nazis, white supremacists, or the alt-right movement in his remarks on August 13, but the following day condemned “the KKK, neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and other hate groups“. On August 15, he again blamed “both sides”.
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Will Trump Run Again And Win
All bets are off in the United States of Fear, Rage, and Peril.
- Senior political analyst at Al Jazeera.
The fear and rage that gripped the US capital under the presidency of Donald Trump have left the country in peril, its democracy ill, and its immunity weak.
Trump may have been excised from office in November but Trumpism has not been eradicated. After months of post-elections recovery, it is back with a vengeance, slowly metastasising throughout the countrys body and soul.
Less than a year after winning the battle for the soul of America, President Joe Biden is slipping in the polls while his predecessors numbers are, well, rising. In fact, according to a recent poll, Trump is already ahead of Biden, albeit by a small margin of 48 to 46 points.
These numbers may flip again in favour of the Democrats if they are able to pass the New Deal-like infrastructure and reconciliation bills in Congress before the end of the year, which will inject trillions of dollars into the US economy.
But even the effect of such legislation may prove transitory, depending on a number of economic and political factors, and on the Republican opposition to the socialist nanny-state policies on the federal and state level.
Meanwhile, 14 Republican-controlled states under Trumpian influence passed 24 new laws that assert their control over the running of elections and make it easier to overturn elections results.
But what will he run on? What will be his message, his mantra?
- About
The Claim: Donald Trump Will Be Reinstated As President In August
Supporters of Donald Trump are promoting a conspiracy theory on social media suggesting the former president will return to the White House in August, even though he lost the 2020 election eight months ago.
The theory gained traction after MyPillow CEO and founder Mike Lindell and Trumps former attorney Sidney Powell baselessly claimed in conservative media appearances that the Supreme Court would find evidence of voter fraud and a new inauguration date would be set.
Now, the claim has made its way to social media.
TRUMP REINSTATED! reads text over a fake newspaper cover that was on July 18. The image includes other debunked claims about arrests, election fraud and more.
The user captioned the image: SOON VERY SOON 08-05 2021.
The post has more than 500 reactions and more than 300 shares. Similarly, some users on YouTube have asserted Trump will be back in office by Aug. 13.
Trump himself has reportedly told allies that he thinks he will be reinstated in August, according to New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman. A Politico/Morning Consult poll found 29% of Republican voters believe Trump will return to the White House this year.
Lindell claimed evidence of election fraud would be revealed at a “cyber symposium” event in August and the Supreme Court will overthrow the results of the 2020 election by a 9-0 vote, which would lead to Trump returning to office.
USA TODAY reached out to Powell and the Facebook user who shared the post for comment.
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More: A Year After Jan 6 How Trump Keeps Pushing The ‘big Lie’: Analysis
On Jan. 6, ABC News Live will provide all-day coverage of events marking one year since the attack on the U.S. Capitol and the continuing fallout for American democracy.
Many of those who defied Trump were Republicans and had been loyal Trump supporters. Its not hard to imagine scenarios where some of them would have gone along with Trumps demands, with disastrous consequences.
Georgias secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, was a Republican who endorsed Trump and voted for him. Trump demanded he “find” enough votes to overturn the results in his state. He threatened him. Raffensperger refused. What if he hadnt? There was no guarantee Raffensperger would do the right thing.
Trump demanded Republican leaders of the state legislatures in Georgia, Pennsylvania and Michigan overturn the elections in their states by sending to Washington Trump electoral votes instead of electoral votes for Biden, who actually won their states. They didnt do it. What if they had tried?
Trump told his secretary of Homeland Security he wanted him to seize voting machines in states he lost — a demand made first by Trump and later through his young enforcer, Johnny McEntee, director of the Presidential Personnel Office. Chad Wolf, the acting secretary, had no authority to do that and he refused. But what if he had tried?
The system held. Democracy prevailed. But there were many steps along the way where we were perilously close to a complete breakdown, a true constitutional crisis.
