A 1st For Outrageous Trump Acts & Call

Object 1
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Outrageous Trump Acts
A First for an American President,

and a First for Donald Trump
Matt Flegenheimer and Maggie Haberman
Sat, January 16, 2021, 11:38 AM
When President Donald Trump faced (and overcame) the gravest
crisis of his first campaign, he defended his boasts of sexual assault on the
“Access Hollywood” tape as ultimately harmless gabbing.
“Locker room talk,” he said — nothing to dwell on.
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When the president faced (and overcame) impeachment in 2019 after
pressing the Ukrainian president to investigate President-elect Joe Biden,
he insisted it was merely an innocuous case of two guys talking.
“A perfect call,” he said, not a high crime.
And when Trump leaves the White House no later than Wednesday —
amid the impeachment sequel and uncommon comeuppance he has
encountered since inciting a riotous mob in Washington on Jan. 6 — he will
surrender a valued perk: an executive phone system, he once enthused,
34 /conversion/tmp/activity_task_scratch/571411455.odt
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hat made it feel as if his words would self-destruct before they became
self-destructive.
“The world’s most secure system,” Trump marveled in a 2017 interview
during his first week in office, observing that no one was listening in and
recording. “The words just explode in the air.” Poof. Gone. Just as he likes
it.For most of Trump’s 74 years, the relationship between his words and
their consequences has been fairly straightforward: He says what he
wants, and nothing particularly durable tends to happen to him. But in the
final frames of his presidency, Trump is confronting an unfamiliar fate. He
is being held to account as never before for things he has said, finding his
typical defenses — denial, obfuscation, powerful friends, claiming it was all
a big joke — insufficient in explaining away a violent mob acting in his
name.
Aides could not do it for him, anonymously offering more palatable
accounts. Allies could not argue that he had been misunderstood.
His own words were all anyone needed to hear on this one.
In almost certainly the most expansive series of penalties he has incurred
in his life, Trump’s Twitter account has been banned, his business brand
badly dented, his presidency doomed to the historical infamy of a second
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impeachment. His largest lender, Deutsche Bank, is moving to create
distance from him. His New Jersey golf club was stripped of a major
tournament. Some once-reliable Republican congressional loyalists are
revisiting their commitment, threatening his grip on the party, even as the
president’s popularity with much of his support base remains undimmed.
Those who have known and watched Trump across the years cannot
shake the irony of a president felled by the very formula that powered his
rise: inflammatory speech and a self-regard that has congealed at times
into functional self-delusion. He has never considered words to be as
significant as actions, or even in the same category of prospective offense.
Words were whatever got him through the next interaction, people who
worked with him say. Words were not deemed important enough to invite
serious trouble. So well-developed were Trump’s survival instincts, in
theory, that he had all but perfected the art of semi-plausible deniability —
an upside of being on seemingly every side of every major political issue at
various points in his adult life. Hadn’t he said the right thing that one time?
That was what he meant. Hadn’t he winked at the crowd a bit? Everyone
takes him too seriously. Hadn’t he used the word “peacefully” one time in
that address before the Capitol riot, tucked between the more dominant
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instructions to “fight” and “show strength” and “go by very different rules”
as he whipped up anger against elected officials, including his own vice
president, who were disinclined to subvert the will of the electorate? “He
has had a habit of saying outrageous things and then saying he was being
sarcastic, he was kidding, that people shouldn’t take him literally — and in
fact, if you do, what an idiot you are,” said Gwenda Blair, a biographer of
the Trump family. “It’s both deniability for himself, but it’s also deniability for
his followers. He gives them something to hold onto so that they can then
continue to believe in him.” But Trump and much of the political class that
was shocked and disoriented by his 2016 win have sometimes conflated
his reputational resilience with a notion that nothing he says can hurt him,
no matter how ostensibly damaging. His term has been pocked with
episodes — from his equivocation on white supremacy after the deadly
violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, to his downplaying the unambiguous
risks of COVID-19 — that made him an unpopular president whose
contract was not renewed. Less assured is his capacity to recognize the
link between his conduct and this outcome. In fact, since entering politics,
Trump has often delighted in cutting down opponents who sounded too
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practiced or restrained. “Just words,” he said of Joe Biden as the Democrat
accepted his party’s nomination last summer.
“It’s just words, folks,” Trump said of Hillary Clinton at an October 2016
debate days after the release of the “Access Hollywood” tape, at once
deflecting any denunciation of his own remarks and calling Clinton’s empty.
“It’s just words.” As president, Trump benefited daily from an army of
defenders in Congress and across the conservative media who dedicated
themselves to interpreting his often-inexplicable words as charitably as
possible. And since his time as a private citizen, Trump has generally
been insulated from the fallout from his words because associates have
been left to navigate it instead. “He said stupid things, and we did damage
control, and that was it,” said Barbara Res, a former executive vice
president of the Trump Organization. “He never gave it a thought.”
Experts in the Trump canon have struggled to summon an analogy for his
present conditions, when his words or deeds had caused things he cared
about to be taken from him. “Ivana during that first divorce kind of got back
at him a bit,” Blair recalled of the amply chronicled dissolution of his first
marriage, before reconsidering. “In fact, he loved that whole thing because
it got him more ink.” Tony Schwartz, who ghostwrote “Trump: The Art of the
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Deal” and has in recent years become a ferocious critic, said Trump’s
relative evasion of consequences until now “has progressively increased
his conviction that he can and should get away with anything he does.”
It is no surprise, then, that since last week, as in much of his White House
tenure, Trump has proved himself capable of only temporary modulation,
defaulting to defiance but snapping to attention when advisers impressed
upon him that he could face legal exposure for his incitements. In a video
Wednesday, he condemned “violence and vandalism” and held up his
“true” supporters as champions of law enforcement — a message aimed,
perhaps, at unnerved Senate Republicans before his impeachment trial.
Yet for all the things Trump did not say — that he lost the election, that
Biden would be inaugurated, that he assumed any responsibility for the
state of affairs — and all the things he has said before, it was impossible to
believe the president’s heart was in it, implausible to assume the words
were meant to last, to hang rather than explode in the White House air.
“All of us can choose by our actions to rise above the rancor … ” he said
dutifully this time.
“ … to overcome the passions of the moment … ”
“ … to move forward united … ”
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Anyone listening knew that these were just words.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times .
© 2021 The New York Times Company
Manhattan prosecutors are reportedly

investigating if Trump paid tuition of CFO's
grand-kids
Peter Weber
Fri, May 14, 2021, 12:20 AM
Prosecutors with Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr.'s office
have subpoenaed a Manhattan private school to see whether the Trump
Organization paid the tuition of longtime financial chief Allen Weisselberg's
grandchildren,The Wall Street Journal reports , citing people familiar with
the matter. If former President Donald Trump's business paid the tuition, it
would be considered taxable income, tax experts told the Journal, and if
that income wasn't reported to tax authorities, it could constitute tax fraud.
Vance's office is trying to gain the cooperation of Weisselberg as it tries to
untangle the Trump Organization's byzantine financial records, according
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to multiple reports. Jennifer Weisselberg, who was married to
Weisselberg's son Barry until their divorce , told the Journal that Trump or
Allen Weisselberg signed checks for more than $500,000 to Columbia
Grammar & Preparatory School to cover tuition for her and Barry's two
children from 2012 to 2019. The couple understood the tuition payments to
be part of Barry's Trump Organization compensation package, she added.
Divorce documents filed by Barry Weisselberg said his parents paid the
children's tuition to the Upper West Side private school because he
couldn't afford to, and the Weisselberg family characterized the payments
as a gift, the Journal reports . If the grandparents paid the tuition directly to
the school as a gift, that would not be taxed, but if the Trump Organization
paid the tuition, the Weisselbergs could be in legal jeopardy.
"Without an insider it can be difficult to put all the pieces in a white-collar
case together," Daniel Horwitz, a white-collar defense lawyer at
McLaughlin & Stern, told the Journal. "The way that cooperation is typically
obtained is by demonstrating to the potential cooperator that they have no
better option."
The Republican theory of unemployment is classic Marx
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Trump asked for troops to do 'whatever was

necessary' to protect demonstrators who went on to
storm the Capitol
Thomas Colson
Thu, May 13, 2021, 8:14 AM
President Donald Trump asked for National Guard troops to be
deployed to protect his supporters at the rally on January 6 that culminated
in hundreds of those supporters violently storming the Capitol, his former
acting defense secretary told lawmakers on Wednesday. Christopher Miller
told the House Oversight and Reform Committee on Wednesday that he
held a meeting with Trump on January 3, three days before the violent
siege in Washington, DC, which resulted in at least five fatalities .Miller
said that Trump asked at the meeting if there had been any requests for
National Guard support at the "Stop the Steal" rally on January 6, where
Trump and his supporters would gather to make allegations of voter fraud
in November's presidential election.
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Trump asked for troops to do 'whatever

was necessary' to protect demonstrators
who went on to storm the Capitol
Thomas Colson
Thu, May 13, 2021, 8:14 A
• Donald Trump asked for the National Guard to protect his supporters at the
January 6 Capitol rally.
• That's according to Christopher Miller, Trump's former acting defense
secretary.
• Hundreds of attendants at the rally went on to storm the Capitol.President
Donald Trump asked for National Guard troops to be deployed to protect
his supporters at the rally on January 6 that culminated in hundreds of
those supporters violently storming the Capitol, his former acting defense
secretary told lawmakers on Wednesday. Christopher Miller told the House
Oversight and Reform Committee on Wednesday that he held a meeting
with Trump on January 3, three days before the violent siege in
Washington, DC, which resulted in at least five fatalities .
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Miller said that Trump asked at the meeting if there had been any requests
for National Guard support at the "Stop the Steal" rally on January 6,
where Trump and his supporters would gather to make allegations of voter
fraud in November's presidential election.
Miller said he told Trump that Muriel Bowser, the mayor of the District of
Columbia, had requested unarmed National Guard support for the planned
demonstrations on January 5 and 6.
He said that Trump then ordered Miller to fulfill Bowser's request and told
him to "do whatever was necessary to protect the demonstrators that were
executing their constitutionally protected rights."
Miller and Trump were among those heavily criticized for the fact that the
Pentagon took more than three hours to approve the deployment of
National Guard troops to the Capitol after it was breached by the former
president's supporters on January 6.
But Miller used his testimony to defend his own actions on the day. "I stand
by every decision I made on January 6," he told Rep. Ro Khanna after he
was asked to apologize to American citizens for his actions that day.
In Miller's written testimony to Congress, he said he had only deployed
troops in areas away from the Capitol to avoid fanning conspiracy theories
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that the Army was involved in efforts to overturn the election. He added
that doing so risked "amplifying the narrative that your Armed Forces were
somehow going to be co-opted in an effort to overturn the election."
He said he approved Mayor Bowser's request on January 4 and deployed
National Guard troops at 30 traffic-control points around the White House,
as well as at six subway stations, to block vehicles from entering the area.
He said the purpose was to "demonstrate a law enforcement presence"
and "intervene, only if required, in disturbances."
Miller: Trump wanted troops to protect his

supporters on Jan. 6
Wed, May 12, 2021, 5:04 PM
Former Acting Defense Secretary Christopher Miller told a House of
Representatives panel that he spoke with Trump on Jan. 3, three days
before the now-former president's fiery speech that preceded the violence
and led to his second impeachment.
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According to Miller's testimony, Trump asked during that meeting whether
the District of Columbia's mayor had requested National Guard troops for
Jan. 6, the day Congress was to ratify Joe Biden's presidential election
victory.
Trump told Miller to "fill" the request, the former defense secretary testified.
Miller said Trump told him: "Do whatever is necessary to protect
demonstrators that were executing their constitutionally protected rights."
Miller made the remarks during a contentious hearing held by the House
Oversight Committee, which is investigating security failures in the days
leading to and during the riot.
Former Trump officials say they did

nothing wrong during Jan. 6 Capitol riot
Dylan Stableford
·Senior Writer
Wed, May 12, 2021, 12:57 PM
Former top Trump administration officials on Wednesday sought to defend
their response to the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol , insisting that they were
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prepared for and responded appropriately to the insurrection that left five
people dead.
Christopher Miller, the acting defense secretary at the time, told members
of the House Committee on Oversight and Reform that he stands by “every
decision I made that day,” including not immediately deploying troops to
the Capitol.
“Our nation’s armed forces are to be deployed for domestic law
enforcement only when all civilian assets are expended and only as the
absolute last resort,” he said.
Miller testified that he was concerned sending troops to the Capitol would
fan fears of a military coup.
“There was irresponsible commentary in the media about the possibility of
a military coup or that advisers to the president were advocating the
declaration of martial law,” he said. “I agreed only to deploy our soldiers in
areas away from the Capitol, avoiding amplifying the irresponsible
narrative that your armed forces were somehow going to be co-opted in an
effort to overturn the election.”
The former acting Pentagon chief said Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel
Bowser requested National Guard support at 1:30 p.m. ET, shortly after the
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siege began. Miller said that he approved the full deployment of the
National Guard at 3 p.m. and that the first troops arrived at the Capitol
about two hours later.
Criticism of that response, he said, “reflects inexperience with, or a lack of
understanding of, the nature of military operations, or worse, is simply the
result of politics.”
Miller also bristled at the idea that he was ill prepared for the pro-Trump
insurrectionists who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6.
“I have been in more crisis situations than I can meaningfully recall,” he
said. “I have personally been in riots, fistfights and brawls, gunfights,
aircraft mishaps, mortar, rocket, attacked with improvised explosive
devices, and as a leader I have engaged in the most complex military
operations and activities known to humankind.”
During the same hearing, Jeffrey Rosen, former acting attorney general,
said he is “proud” of the Justice Department’s response to the events on
Jan. 6, saying it deployed more than 500 FBI and ATF agents and U.S.
marshals to “assist in restoring order at the Capitol.
But both Rosen and Miller testified that they were not in communication
with then-President Donald Trump on Jan. 6, even after the violent mob
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breached the Capitol.
Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., the panel’s chairwoman, said it is clear that
the previous administration failed to adequately prepare for the attack
despite Trump’s own weeks-long promotion of a rally to protest the
certification of the election.
“The federal government was unprepared for this insurrection, even though
it was planned in plain sight on social media for the world to see,” Maloney
said in her opening remarks. “Security collapsed in the face of the mob,
and reinforcements were delayed for hours as the Capitol was overrun.”
She then chastised Republican lawmakers who have promoted Trump’s
baseless claim that the 2020 election was stolen from him.
“Remaining silent and ignoring the lie emboldens the liar,” Maloney said,
quoting Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., who was removed from her GOP
leadership post earlier Wednesday for repeatedly challenging Trump’s
false claims.
“We must speak the truth: The election was not stolen, and America has
not failed,” Maloney said. “It is time for the American people and this
Congress to look at the events of Jan. 6 and say, 'Never again.'”
In prepared testimony, Miller blamed Trump’s speech at the “Stop the
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Steal” rally that preceded the Jan. 6 riot for inciting the insurrection.
“I personally believe his comments encouraged the protesters that day,”
Miller said in the remarks. (He made similar statements in a March
interview with Vice News .)
But on Wednesday during questioning from lawmakers, Miller was
reluctant to place blame on the former president.
Rep. Stephen Lynch, D-Mass., accused Miller of reversing his testimony.
“That’s ridiculous,” Miller said.
“You’re ridiculous,” Lynch shot back.
Read more from Yahoo News:
• Cheney, stripped of leadership position, vows to keep Trump from returning
to presidency
• White supremacy is top security threat, AG Garland says
• Republicans lash out at CDC for ‘conflicting, confusing guidance
• COVID-19 vaccines do not cause infertility, health experts say
• Biden restores transgender health protections in latest reversal of Trump
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Trump said, 'yeah, okay' and hung up the

phone when his health secretary warned
him about the coronavirus in January 2020,
a new book says
Oma Seddiq
Wed, June 30, 2021, 12:10 PM
• Trump dismissed warnings about the coronavirus in January 2020,
according to a new book.
• Then-HHS Secretary Alex Azar tried to tell Trump about the threat of
COVID-19 in a phone call.
• "Yeah, okay," Trump responded, then hung up.
Then-President Donald Trump cut the conversation short when his
health secretary, Alex Azar, warned him of the coronavirus in January
2020, according to a new book, "Nightmare Scenario: Inside the Trump
Administration's Response to the Pandemic That Changed History," by The
Washington Post's Damian Paletta and Yasmeen Abutaleb. The president
was at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida at the time, while health staffers in
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his administration were growing increasingly concerned over COVID-19,
according to the book.
"Mr. President, I've got to tell you something," Azar told Trump during a
mid-January 2020 phone call, before COVID-19 broke out across the
country and forced officials to impose lockdowns. "There's this new virus
out of China that could be extremely dangerous. It could be the kind of
thing we have been preparing for and worried about."
Azar then relayed to Trump that the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention had started to screen travelers from China to the US but that
additional safety measures probably needed to be taken to mitigate
potential spread of the virus, per the book.
"Yeah, okay," Trump replied, seemingly unconvinced of the threat. Then he
hung up the phone.
Azar, then the head of the Health and Human Services Department, failed
to get through to the president. He had been on shaky ground with Trump,
who was still upset over a recent health policy that banned most flavored
electronic cigarettes. The move had angered Trump's base, and the
president thought it would cost him his reelection, according to the book.
The Post journalists reported that Azar "could barely get a word in before
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Trump started shouting" at him over e-cigarettes during that January phone
call.
That same month, Trump dismissed Azar's advice on another occasion,
according to the book . Trump wanted to send a tweet praising Chinese
President Xi Jinping on the pandemic, though Azar begged him not to.
"For the love of God, don't do that," he told the president, per the book. But
Trump went ahead and tweeted.
In the following months, as COVID-19 infections and deaths surged across
the US, Trump continued to dismiss advice from his own administration.
Trump and his close allies would also often downplay the severity of the
outbreak and flout guidelines like mask wearing and social distancing.
More than 400,000 Americans died of COVID-19 during his administration.
Read the original article on Business Insider
21
Trump had to cancel a July 4 weekend rally

at an Alabama military memorial park after
the venue backed out
Tom Porter
Wed, June 30, 2021, 7:53 AM
• Trump canceled a rally in Mobile, Alabama, after the venue scrapped its
permit.
• The USS Alabama Battleship Memorial Park approved the event before
knowing Trump would attend. Park officials said Trump being there would
breach venue rules that events must be nonpartisan. Former President
Donald Trump scrapped plans to hold a July 4 weekend rally in Mobile,
Alabama, after being denied a permit for the venue. It came after local
officials worried that the event could be hijacked for partisan political
reasons. Trump had been billed as the keynote speaker at Saturday's
Republican Party event at the USS Alabama Battleship Memorial Park.
But, in a letter first obtained by NBC 15 News, park officials said they
would not let the event go ahead. They said the decision came after they
22
learned that it would not simply be a patriotic Independence Day-themed
event without strong political affiliation. "After the request was made, then
there was contact with the Republican Party, they contacted us and then it
became apparent that it was going to be a partisan political event, rather
than just a patriotic event planned for that evening," wrote Bill Tunnell, the
park commission chairman, in the letter. The park houses the USS
Alabama, a warship that took part in naval operations during the Second
World War. Park authorities have banned political events at the venue
since 2012, when former GOP Sen. Rick Santorum held a rally there. In a
statement to NBC 15 News, the Alabama GOP said Trump had been
looking forward to speaking at the event and was disappointed it was not
going forward. Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall told Al.com that
the park officials sought his opinion, and that he told them to be wary of
restricting free speech based on the "identity of the speaker." Trump has
stirred rumors of a bid to return to power since leaving the White House in
January. Though barred from social-media platforms over his alleged
incitement of the January 6 Capitol riot, he has continued to baselessly
claim by other means that last year's election was stolen from him as a
result of mass fraud. On Saturday he appeared at his first rally since
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leaving office , where he railed against critics and opponents in a familiar
style. Read the original article on Business Insider
POLITICS
'For the love of God, don't do that': Trump's
HHS secretary begged him not to praise
the Chinese president's pandemic
response on Twitter, book says
Oma Seddiq and Sonam Sheth
10 hours ago
• Trump's HHS secretary tried to stop Trump from praising China's
leader over his pandemic response.
• "For the love of God, don't do that," Alex Azar told Trump, according
to a new book.
• Azar looked to other officials to try to stop the tweet, but it was too
late, the book says.
• See more stories on Insider's business page. Former President Donald
Trump's secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services
desperately tried to stop him from tweeting praise of Chinese President Xi
Jinping's pandemic response in January 2020, according to "Nightmare
Scenario: Inside the Trump Administration's Response to the Pandemic
That Changed History" by The Washington Post's Damian Paletta and
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Yasmeen Abutaleb. At the time, the coronavirus had gained a foothold in
the US, and Trump's officials were trying to impress upon him the gravity of
the situation. "Mr. President, this is really bad. This is getting really bad in
China, and this is coming to us," HHS Secretary Alex Azar told Trump
during an Oval Office meeting that month. Trump then asked if China was
cooperating with the US to combat the spread of the virus Azar said China
was cooperating to some extent but added that it wasn't nearly enough. He
said the US needed to put pressure on the Chinese government to force it
to do more and allow officials from the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention to monitor the situation on the ground, according to the book .At
that point, "Trump thought out loud, 'I'm going to put out a tweet praising
Xi,'" the book says. Azar immediately responded: "For the love of God,
don't do that." But Trump ignored the plea. He was fresh off of a trade deal
with China that he believed would boost his political support in the Midwest
and thought it would be smart to tip his hat to Xi, the book says When
Trump refused to cave, Azar left the Oval Office "and then sprinted across
the West Wing, trying to outrun President Trump's tweet," according to the
book. He appealed to White House national security advisor Robert
O'Brien, saying: "Robert, you've got to stop this. You can't let him tweet
praising President Xi. It's premature. It's not accurate. We can't do this."
Azar also planned to ask then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to
intervene and prevent Trump from sending out the tweet, the book says.
But it was too late. Dan Scavino, who was then Trump's primary social-
media advisor, had already drafted the tweet and secured Trump's
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approval."China has been working very hard to contain the Coronavirus,"
Trump wrote on Twitter on January 24, 2020. "The United States greatly
appreciates their efforts and transparency. It will all work out well. In
particular, on behalf of the American people, I want to thank President Xi."
To date, more than 600,000 Americans have died from COVID-19 and
more than 33 million have been infected. Tony Fabrizio, the Trump
campaign's top pollster, released a report in February that found Trump's
handling of the pandemic may have cost him the presidential election In
addition to not heeding his advisors' recommendations in the early days of
the pandemic, Trump frequently and publicly cast doubt on top scientists
like Dr. Anthony Fauci, refused to follow CDC guidelines, and contracted
the disease himself in October. Several other people in the White House,
including Trump's chief of staff Mark Meadows and communications
director Hope Hicks, tested positive, and more than 50 people in Trump's
orbit caught the virus. The coronavirus pandemic All the differences
between COVID-19 vaccines, summarized in a simple table you can take
to your vaccination appointment. One chart shows which vaccine side
effects you can expect based on your age, manufacturer, and dose A day-
by-day breakdown of coronavirus symptoms shows how COVID-19 goes
from bad to worse. The best and worst face masks, ranked by their level of
protection. The coronavirus is going to stick around forever. Get ready for
the new normal.
26
Jim Acosta Digs Up Old Trump Boast That

Doesn't Sit So Well With His Latest Tax
Excuses
Josephine Harvey
Sun, July 4, 2021, 8:51 PM
CNN’s Jim Acosta has rolled the tape on Donald Trump after the
former president seemed to play foolish about tax laws at a Florida rally on
Saturday, following the indictment of his company and one of its top
executives last week.
Acosta said on CNN Sunday that Trump mentioned some of the facts of
the case but did not actually dispute them. The Trump Organization and its
CFO Allen Weisselberg were charged with multiple financial crimes
Thursday by the Manhattan district attorney over an alleged tax fraud
scheme. Both parties pleaded not guilty.
“They go after good, hard-working people for not paying taxes on a
company car. ‘You didn’t pay tax on the car! Or a company apartment! You
used an apartment because you need an apartment because you have to
travel too far where your house is, you didn’t pay tax, or education for your
grandchildren,’” Trump said at the campaign-style rally in Sarasota.
27
“I don’t even know. Do you have to, does anybody know the answer to that
stuff? Okay? But they indict people for that.”
Acosta agreed that the tax code can be confusing. But not for Trump,
apparently, according to his multiple past boasts.
The CNN anchor played a clip from May 13, 2016, in which Trump said: “I
think nobody knows more about taxes than I do, maybe in the history of the
world.”
“I understand the tax laws better than almost anyone, which is why I’m the
one who can truly fix them,” he also said in October of the same year,
bragging that he used those laws “brilliantly” to pay as little tax as legally
possible.
Republicans Who Backed Trump’s Election Lies

Called Out For False Patriotism On July 4
Lee Moran
Mon, July 5, 2021, 3:11 AM
Critics called out lawmakers who celebrated Independence Day and
freedom but conveniently forgot to mention they had promoted Donald
Trump ’s 2020 election lies that fueled the deadly U.S. Capitol riot earlier
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this year, as well as their subsequent votes against a bipartisan
investigation into the violence.
See how officials — including Sens. Ted Cruz (Texas) and Josh Hawley
(Mo.), as well as House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (Calif.) — and the
Republican National Committee marked the holiday:
Damning Trump Supercut Uses His Own

Words To Show Why He’s In Big Legal
Trouble
Ed Mazza
Thu, July 8, 2021, 2:57 AM
Donald Trump ’s biggest challenge in his company’s looming criminal

case
may not be prosecutors, but rather himself. A new supercut
video compiled by progressive PAC MeidasTouch highlights Trump’s past
and present comments on taxes and the tax laws his company and its
CFO, Allen Weisselberg , are accused of violating. Some of them will no
doubt raise eyebrows in court:

Donald Trump s biggest challenge in his company’s looming criminal case
may not be prosecutors, but rather himself.
29
A new supercut video compiled by progressive PAC MeidasTouch
highlights Trump’s past and present comments on taxes and the tax laws
his company and its CFO, Allen Weisselberg , are accused of violating.
Some of them will no doubt raise eyebrows in court:
The Trump Organization and Weisselberg both pleaded not guilty after
they were indicted last week on charges that include scheme conspiracy,
grand larceny, criminal tax fraud and falsifying business records. Since that
indictment, Trump has essentially claimed the tax laws his company is
accused of violating were complex and impossible to understand.
“I don’t even know,” Trump said at a rally after ticking off the various perks
he’s accused of failing to pay taxes on. “Do you have to? Does anybody
know the answer to that stuff?”
Turns out someone does: Trump himself, according to his own comments
in the video above.
This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.
30
Trump invokes one of Winston Churchill's

WWII speeches in his lawsuits against
Facebook, Twitter, and other tech
companies
Cheryl Teh
Wed, July 7, 2021, 10:54 PM
Former President Donald Trump sent an email to his followers
reminiscent of Winston Churchill's wartime speech."
•We'll fight in the courts, we'll fight in the legislatures, and we'll fight at the
•ballot boxes," read the email.
•Trump filed class-action lawsuits against Facebook, Twitter, and Google,
as well as their top executives. Former President Donald Trump took the
opportunity in a campaign email about his lawsuits against Facebook,
31
Twitter, and Google to invoke the spirit of wartime British Prime Minister
Winston Churchill.
In an email sent late on Wednesday night titled "I'm taking on Big Tech,"
Trump sent his supporters a rallying call to action. The twist - it was worded
in a similar way to Churchill's famous World War II speech, known as We
shall fight on the beaches ."
"Today, my team and I announced our plan to Take On Big Tech. We are
SUING the big tech tyrants: Facebook, Twitter & Google," wrote Trump in a
campaign email sent on Wednesday night.
"This lawsuit is just the beginning and just one part of a bigger fight. This
suit isn't the whole battle: it's an opening shot," Trump wrote.
"We'll fight in the courts, we'll fight in the legislatures, and we'll fight at the
ballot boxes until the American people have their rights and sovereignty
restored," the former president continued.
32
Satire from The Borowitz Report

Trump Obtained Podiatrist’s Note to Avoid
Serving in Own Military Coup
By Andy Borowitz
July 15, 2021
NEW YORK (The Borowitz Report)—Donald J. Trump obtained

a doctor’s note to avoid serving in his own military coup, according to
a bombshell book published today.
The book, written by Trump’s New York-based podiatrist, Dr. Harland
Dorrinson, reveals that the former President became concerned that,
if a military coup that he was masterminding gained critical mass, he
might be required to assume an active combat role.
Bringing Midwifery Back to Black Mothers
To foreclose that possibility, he contacted Dorrinson, who has written a
number of doctor’s notes for Trump over the years.
An excerpt from the note reads, “Donald J. Trump is suffering from
extremely painful bone spurs that would make any active-duty
participation in a military coup out of the question. In the event of such
33
a coup, I strongly recommend that he be limited to an administrative

role.”
The podiatrist’s searing exposé is the thirty-seventh book about the
last days of Trump’s Presidency published this week, according to
industry estimates.
More Satire from the Borowitz Report
• Donald Trump forgets to strand rally crowd in parking lot.
• Mitch McConnell warns that voting bill would bring U.S. to brink of
democracy.
• Ted Cruz calls Obamacare a Democratic plot to keep people alive.
• Susan Collins regrets no longer being the most annoying senator.
• Trump to be reinstated as the president—of Trump University.
Trump Tells January 6th Panel He Has

Diplomatic Immunity as Russian Official
By Andy Borowitz
October 26, 2021
34

A 1st For Outrageous Trump Acts & Call

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Object 1

A First for an American President,

Matt Flegenheimer and Maggie Haberman

Sat, January 16, 2021, 11:38 AM

When President Donald Trump faced (and overcame) the gravest

“Access Hollywood” tape as ultimately harmless gabbing.

“Locker room talk,” he said — nothing to dwell on.

When the president faced (and overcame) impeachment in 2019 after

pressing the Ukrainian president to investigate President-elect Joe Biden,

he insisted it was merely an innocuous case of two guys talking.

“A perfect call,” he said, not a high crime.

amid the impeachment sequel and uncommon comeuppance he has

encountered since inciting a riotous mob in Washington on Jan. 6 — he will

surrender a valued perk: an executive phone system, he once enthused,

“The world’s most secure system,” Trump marveled in a 2017 interview

their consequences has been fairly straightforward: He says what he

final frames of his presidency, Trump is confronting an unfamiliar fate. He

typical defenses — denial, obfuscation, powerful friends, claiming it was all

a big joke — insufficient in explaining away a violent mob acting in his

Aides could not do it for him, anonymously offering more palatable

accounts. Allies could not argue that he had been misunderstood.

In almost certainly the most expansive series of penalties he has incurred

badly dented, his presidency doomed to the historical infamy of a second

tournament. Some once-reliable Republican congressional loyalists are

president’s popularity with much of his support base remains undimmed.

rise: inflammatory speech and a self-regard that has congealed at times

into functional self-delusion. He has never considered words to be as

significant as actions, or even in the same category of prospective offense.

serious trouble. So well-developed were Trump’s survival instincts, in

an upside of being on seemingly every side of every major political issue at

as he whipped up anger against elected officials, including his own vice

episodes — from his equivocation on white supremacy after the deadly

violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, to his downplaying the unambiguous

risks of COVID-19 — that made him an unpopular president whose

accepted his party’s nomination last summer.

“It’s just words.” As president, Trump benefited daily from an army of

defenders in Congress and across the conservative media who dedicated

themselves to interpreting his often-inexplicable words as charitably as

president of the Trump Organization. “He never gave it a thought.”

relative evasion of consequences until now “has progressively increased

tenure, Trump has proved himself capable of only temporary modulation,

defaulting to defiance but snapping to attention when advisers impressed

Wednesday, he condemned “violence and vandalism” and held up his

“true” supporters as champions of law enforcement — a message aimed,

perhaps, at unnerved Senate Republicans before his impeachment trial.

Biden would be inaugurated, that he assumed any responsibility for the

dutifully this time.

“ … to overcome the passions of the moment … ”

“ … to move forward united … ”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times .

© 2021 The New York Times Company

Manhattan prosecutors are reportedly

Fri, May 14, 2021, 12:20 AM

Prosecutors with Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr.'s office

have subpoenaed a Manhattan private school to see whether the Trump

Organization paid the tuition of longtime financial chief Allen Weisselberg's

grandchildren,The Wall Street Journal reports , citing people familiar with

would be considered taxable income, tax experts told the Journal, and if

Vance's office is trying to gain the cooperation of Weisselberg as it tries to

untangle the Trump Organization's byzantine financial records, according

Allen Weisselberg signed checks for more than $500,000 to Columbia

be part of Barry's Trump Organization compensation package, she added.

children's tuition to the Upper West Side private school because he