Category Archives: Donald Trump

Fauci says he will resign if Trump retakes the presidency in 2024

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Fauci said ‘no’ when asked if he would stay on as National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases director under Trump again

The US’s top infectious disease expert has said he would resign if Donald Trump retakes the presidency in 2024.

Dr Anthony Fauci bluntly said “no” when CNN’s Jim Acosta asked him during an interview on Sunday if he would want to stay on as the director of the National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases in the event that voters gave Trump a second stint as president.

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US defence chief urges Ukraine ceasefire in call with Russian counterpart – as it happened

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Psaki’s final White House briefing continues.

“I promised myself I wouldn’t get emotional,” she says. She succeeds.

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Capitol attack panel subpoenas five Republicans in unprecedented step

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Chair Bennie Thompson says panel has been ‘forced to take this step’ as Kevin McCarthy complains investigation ‘not legitimate’

The House select committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol has issued unprecedented subpoenas to five Republican members of Congress, seeking to compel their cooperation with the inquiry into Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

The select committee empowered the chairman, Bennie Thompson, to move ahead with subpoenas to the House minority leader, Kevin McCarthy, Jim Jordan of Ohio, Scott Perry of Pennsylvania, Andy Biggs of Arizona and Mo Brooks of Alabama.

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Matt Kean warns of Trump-like shift in Liberal party if teal independents oust moderates

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In election pitch, NSW treasurer says party at risk of becoming like Republicans, with Putin sympathisers and anti-vaxxers

The New South Wales Liberal treasurer Matt Kean has warned of the dangers of a Trump-like shift to the right within the conservative party, as he pleaded with voters not to boot out moderate MPs in favour of teal independents on 21 May.

The plea was supported by the state’s premier, Dominic Perrottet, who said voters would regret stepping away from the party if independents won seats over moderate Liberals.

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Trump inquired if China could make hurricanes to harm US, ex-officials say

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Former president also wanted to know if it would constitute an act of war and if hurricanes could be nuked to stop them

As president, Donald Trump repeatedly asked aides if China could be manufacturing hurricanes and sending them to damage the United States, three unnamed former senior officials told Rolling Stone on Tuesday.

Trump also reportedly wanted to know if using such a “hurricane gun” would constitute an act of war, and if so, whether the US could retaliate militarily.

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San Francisco judge rejects Trump lawsuit challenging Twitter suspension

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The former president was banned from from the social media platform after the deadly US Capitol attack

A US judge on Friday dismissed Donald Trump’s lawsuit against Twitter that challenged his suspension from the platform.

In a written ruling, US district judge James Donato in San Francisco rejected Trump’s argument that Twitter violated his right to freedom of speech guaranteed by the first amendment of the US constitution.

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Trump sought strike on top Iran military figure for political reasons – Esper book

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Robert O’Brien told top general shortly before 2020 election that Trump wanted to kill unnamed official, according to Esper memoir

Shortly before the 2020 election, Donald Trump’s national security adviser, Robert O’Brien, “stunned” the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff by saying the president wanted to kill a senior Iranian military officer operating outside the Islamic Republic.

“This was a really bad idea with very big consequences,” Mark Esper, Trump’s second and last secretary of defense, writes in his new memoir, adding that Gen Mark Milley suspected O’Brien saw the strike purely in terms of Trump’s political interests.

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Esper book details Trump rage at Pence and proposal to hit Mexico with missiles

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Memoir from ex-defense chief Mark Esper details extraordinary outbursts he says he helped to defuse

In the heated summer of 2020, thwarted in his desire for a violent crackdown on protesters for racial justice, Donald Trump included his vice-president in a complaint that senior advisers were “losers”.

Trump’s second defense secretary, Mark Esper, details the Oval Office outburst in a new book. A Sacred Oath: Memoirs of a Defense Secretary in Extraordinary Times, will be published next week. The Guardian obtained a copy.

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Donald Trump Jr testifies before the committee on the events of January 6

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House panel also released text messages in which Donald Trump’s son begged the White House to get his father to condemn the riot

Donald Trump’s oldest son has met with the congressional committee investigating the January 6 insurrection, according to two people familiar with the matter.

The interview Tuesday with Donald Trump Jr comes as the bipartisan House committee moves closer to the former president’s inner circle of family members and political advisers.

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Militia group leader tried to ask Trump to authorize them to stop the transfer of power

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The justice department has alleged that Oath Keepers leadership called the president’s confidant to allow them to use force

Stewart Rhodes, the Oath Keepers militia group leader charged with seditious conspiracy over the January 6 attack on the Capitol, asked an intermediary to get Donald Trump to allow his group to forcibly stop the transfer of power, the justice department has alleged in court papers.

The previously unknown phone call with the unidentified individual appears to indicate the Oath Keepers had contacts with at least one person close enough to Trump that Rhodes believed the individual would be a good person to consult with his request.

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Biden condemns efforts of extremist ‘Maga crowd’ to overturn Roe v Wade abortion protections – as it happened

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The judge overseeing the federal civil rights cases of four former Minneapolis police officers in the killing of George Floyd said Wednesday that he has accepted the terms of Derek Chauvin’s plea agreement and will sentence him to 20 to 25 years in prison.

When the white former office is sentenced he will serve the term concurrently with the state criminal sentence he is currently serving (and appealing), of 22.5 years, following his conviction last spring for the May 2020 murder of Floyd, a Black father who had moved from Houston to Minneapolis to start a new chapter after being released from prison.

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Trump or no Trump: Asa Hutchinson mulls run for president in 2024

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Republican Arkansas governor says he would not be deterred by former president in party in wrong over January 6 insurrection

The Arkansas governor, Asa Hutchinson, is considering a run for the Republican presidential nomination in 2024 and would not be deterred if Donald Trump made an expected bid to return to the White House.

“No, it won’t [deter me],” Hutchinson told CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday.

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January 6 committee set to subpoena Trump allies, Republican Kinzinger says

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Members of Congress involved in attempt to overturn election have refused to testify voluntarily before June public hearings

The House committee investigating the January 6 attack on the US Capitol will decide “in the next week or two” whether to issue subpoenas trying to force Republican lawmakers to testify about Donald Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election, one of two Republicans on the panel said on Sunday.

“If that takes a subpoena, it takes a subpoena,” Adam Kinzinger said.

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Trump mocked for fearing protesters would throw ‘dangerous’ fruit at him

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Late-night talkshow hosts juice former president’s testimony to attorneys representing a group of protesters suing over 2015 rally

Donald Trump has been mocked for fearing protesters would throw “dangerous” fruit at him, with late-night talkshow host Trevor Noah calling it “one of the most crazy defenses I’ve ever heard”.

The revelation came during the former president’s testimony to attorneys representing a group of protesters suing over their violent removal from a Trump campaign rally in 2015.

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Judge denies Trump’s request to end contempt order and $10,000-a-day fine

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New York judge said there was no evidence Trump had conducted a thorough search for the records sought by attorney general

A New York judge on Friday denied a request from Donald Trump’s lawyer to end a contempt-of-court finding against the former US president and kept in place $10,000-a-day fine over his failure to comply with a subpoena issued by the state attorney general investigating the business practices of Trump’s family company, the Trump Organization.

Justice Arthur Engoron in New York state court in Manhattan said he was not satisfied with an affidavit provided by Trump and said there was no evidence Trump had conducted a thorough search for the records sought by New York’s attorney general, Letitia James.

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Capitol attack panel set to issue letters to Kevin McCarthy and other key Republicans

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Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert among those poised to receive letters requesting voluntary cooperation, sources say

The House select committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol is expected to issue letters requesting voluntary cooperation from House minority leader Kevin McCarthy and around a dozen other Republican members of Congress, according to two sources familiar with the matter.

The panel intends to issue a letter to McCarthy – the top House Republican – and is considering further letters to Scott Perry, Jim Jordan, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Mo Brooks, Lauren Boebert, Andy Biggs, as well as some Republican senators, the sources said.

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Trump testifies he hired bodyguard after seeing his ‘bravery’ in a fight

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Ex-president also testifies that thrown tomatoes can be lethal, after activist sues over his treatment by Trump security

Donald Trump has revealed in sworn testimony that he hired Matthew Calamari, later a senior executive in the Trump Organization at the time an activist alleges he was roughed up by Trump’s security team, as a bodyguard after seeing him demonstrate “bravery” in a fight at a tennis competition.

Trump discussed Calamari in a deposition for a civil lawsuit brought by Efrain Galicia, the activist who alleged the incident occurred while he was protesting outside Trump Tower in 2015.

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Trump appeals against judge’s contempt order and $10,000-a-day fine

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Ex-president found to be in contempt after failure to comply with subpoena in New York state attorney general’s fraud investigation

Donald Trump is appealing the contempt of court order he received from a Manhattan judge that fines him $10,000 a day for failing to comply with a subpoena, according to documents filed Wednesday.

The contempt order was issued in the civil investigation by New York state attorney Letitia James into the former president’s business practices. On 7 April, James asked Judge Arthur Engoron to hold Trump in contempt of court for not turning over documents and information she had subpoenaed as part of the investigation.

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Could Elon Musk’s Twitter plans prove a costly mistake?

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Analysis: Experts warn against reinstating banned accounts and neglecting moderation

Welcome back Donald Trump, Katie Hopkins, David Icke and Alex Jones? These are just some of the Twitter accounts that could be reinstated if the platform’s new owner-in-waiting, “free speech absolutist” Elon Musk, practices what he preaches.

All of those accounts have been permanently suspended from the platform for infractions that include, most notoriously, the former US president’s alleged support for the Capitol riot on 6 January last year. Their reinstatement now appears to be back in play given that the world’s richest man has agreed a $44bn (£35bn) takeover of the platform that banned them and has stated that “free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy”.

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Donald Trump held in contempt in New York attorney general’s investigation

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New York judge holds former president in contempt of court for failing to comply with a subpoena for documents

A New York judge has held Donald Trump in contempt and fined him $10,000 a day, following the former president’s failure to hand over documents to prosecutors investigating his business practices.

Letitia James, the New York state attorney general, had asked for the contempt finding this month stating that Trump had not complied with a subpoena requiring him to produce documents and information.

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