Category Archives: Donald Trump

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Once again,theres not much love lost between Bill Barr and the man he accused of betraying the Oval Office, Donald Trump. When the former attorney general confirmed this week that he would support the Republican presidential ticket in November, his former boss took the opportunity to mock Barr as slow-moving and lazy.

Thats classic Trump, Barr chuckled on Friday when CNNs Kaitlan Collins asked about the insults. Whats the question?

He went on to express frustration that voters are faced with a rematch between Joe Biden and Trump. But given that choice, Barr explained that he would happily vote for Trump, who, he revealed in the same interview, routinely broached the idea of executing his rivals.

But hes mocking you, Collins pressed.

So? Its not about me.

The endorsement aligns with much of what Barr has already told us despite the occasional condemnation. As he said during a 2022 book tour, I believe that the greatest threat to the country is the progressive agenda being pushed by the Democratic Partyits inconceivable to me that I wouldnt vote for the Republican nominee. Those remarks are almost exactly what he told CNN to claim that the progressive movement and the Biden administration were the biggest threats facing the United States today.

For Barr, these remarks fit the story he keeps telling. That above all, hes just a principled, just-doing-my-job law enforcement official stuck with tough choices. That, of course, couldnt be further from the truth.

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Bill Barr Is Happy to Debase Himself for Donald Trump Again Mother Jones - Mother Jones

Listening to Thursday’s oral arguments in the Donald Trump immunity case was positively surreal.  

As is often the case in Supreme Court arguments, while the justices piled one hypothetical on top of another, the real-world stakes in the case were barely mentioned. And while the questions asked at oral argument are not always a reliable predictor of how the court will ultimately come out in any case, Thursday was not a good day for American democracy.  

As it has done in other cases, the court’s conservative majority seemed ready to jettison its own originalist interpretive method and to ignore the grave threat that former President Trump’s election denialism — and efforts to block the peaceful transfer of power — posed to our constitutional republic. They displayed a level of hypocrisy, cynicism and bad faith that matched Trump’s own, and seemed to lust for the kind of strong executive that has become a familiar part of the agenda of Trump and his MAGA allies. 

One can only hope that the justices will come to their senses when they get around to deciding the case, and will reject Trump’s plea to take the unprecedented step of establishing presidential immunity. 

To get a taste of the hypocrisy displayed during the oral argument, let’s start with originalism. 

Given the originalist commitments of the court’s conservative majority, you would have thought that the oral argument would have been consumed by an exploration of constitutional history. Yet they said almost nothing about it. 

Justice Clarence Thomas opened the door for such an exploration when he asked the first question. Thomas asked John Sauer, Trump’s lawyer, to identify the place in the Constitution from which presidential immunity from criminal prosecution could be derived. Sauer responded that “The source of the immunity is principally rooted in the Executive Vesting Clause of Article II, Section 1.” 

“(T)he Executive Vesting Clause,” Sauer continued, “does not include only executive powers laid out explicitly therein but encompasses all the powers that were originally understood to be included therein. And Marbury against Madison itself provides strong evidence of this kind of immunity, a broad principle of immunity that protects the president’s official acts from scrutiny.” 

He invoked “(T)he wisdom of the Framers. What they viewed as the risk that needed to be guarded against was not the fact — the notion that the president might escape, you know, criminal prosecution for something, you know, sort of very, very unlikely in these unlikely scenarios. They viewed much more likely and much more destructive to the Republic the risk of factional strife discussed by George Washington.” 

However, it didn’t take long for Justice Elena Kagan to blow Sauer’s originalist gambit out of the water. Kagan noted that “The Framers did not put an immunity clause into the Constitution. They knew how to. There were immunity clauses in some state constitutions. They knew how to give legislative immunity. They didn’t provide immunity to the president.” 

“And, you know,” she explained, “not so surprising, they were reacting against a monarch who claimed to be above the law. Wasn’t the whole point that the president was not a monarch and the president was not supposed to be above the law?” 

In response, Sauer first repeated what he said to Thomas. “I would say two things in response to that. Immunity — they did put an immunity clause in in a sense. They put in the Executive Vesting Clause, which was originally understood to — to adopt a broad immunity principle that’s set forth in the very broad language of Marbury against Madison.” 

Then Sauer added, “(T)hey did discuss and consider what would be the checks on the presidency. And they did not say, oh, we need to have criminal prosecution. Right there at the Constitutional Convention, Benjamin Franklin says, we don’t have that. That’s not an option. Everybody cried out against that as unconstitutional.“  

But Kagan had done the job of exposing the fallacy of appeals to original intent to justify immunizing presidents for crimes they commit while in office. After that, the court’s most fervent originalists had little to say about, or interest in, the question of what those who drafted Article II intended by way of presidential immunity.  

In addition to their abandonment of originalism, several of the court’s conservative Justices seemed almost desperate to avoid talking about what Trump actually is alleged to have done after the 2020 election, preferring instead to trot out more hypotheticals and focus on general principles. 

In response to a point made by Michael Dreeben, who argued the case for the Special Counsel, about the role of the Justice Department in defining the “core powers of the presidency,” Justice Neil Gorsuch observed, “I’m not concerned about this case so much as future ones. … And, again, I’m not concerned about this case, but I am concerned about future uses of the criminal law to target political opponents based on accusations about their motives.” 

But, in this moment, Gorsuch revealed his embrace of Trump’s substantive position: that the real problem was not what the former president did after the 2020 election, but what was being done to him by his “political opponents.” Gorsuch might as well have said that he wants to make sure that future presidential administrations don’t do to former presidents what Trump alleges the Biden administration is doing to him. 

Justice Brett Kavanaugh followed Gorsuch’s lead. He too said, “I’m not focused on the here and now of this case. I’m very concerned about the future. “  

Then, seemingly from out of nowhere, Kavanaugh denounced the Supreme Court’s?1988 decision in Morrison v. Olson, which upheld the constitutionality of the independent counsel provisions of the Ethics in Government Act of 1978. As law professor Steve Vladek notes, “Morrison has long been a lightning rod for conservatives, who have rallied around Justice Antonin Scalia’s fiery and pellucid … solo dissent. And Kavanaugh has repeatedly criticized the decision in his judicial writings.” 

Joining Gorsuch in echoing Trump, Kavanaugh directed his questions to the possibility that presidential prosecutions will “cycle back” and be used against future presidents. 

Justice Samuel Alito also announced, “I’m not focused on the here and now of this case. I’m very concerned about the future.” Alito conceded that the present case “is immensely important,” but quickly aligned himself with his fellow futurists, saying “whatever we decide is going to apply to all future presidents.” 

Alito went out of his way to remind Dreeben of his view that the country could not count on the integrity and professionalism of the Justice Department or of attorneys general to ensure that presidents are not subject to partisan witch hunts after they leave office. “So as for attorneys general,” Alito said, “there have been two who were convicted of criminal offenses while in office. There were others, a Mitchell Palmer is one that comes to mind, who is wildly regarded as having abused the power of his office.” 

As The Atlantic’s David Graham explained, “Justice Samuel Alito fretted that if former presidents do not enjoy immunity, they could face the danger of prosecution by their successors, which would pose a challenge to the stability of the republic. In short, Alito was arguing that if Trump is prosecuted for a direct assault on American democracy, it might result in indirect damage to American democracy later on.” 

Evoking “Alice in Wonderland,” Graham labelled this a “moment in which the hearing went through the looking glass.” 

As last week’s parade of hypotheticals illustrated, if the court grants presidents immunity from prosecution for crimes they commit while in office, all of those who value American democracy will, as Graham suggests, find themselves in a world that those who wrote the Constitution could never have imagined.  

Austin Sarat is the William Nelson Cromwell Professor Jurisprudence & Political Science at Amherst College.  

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Hey, SCOTUS your hypocrisy is showing - The Hill

Thursdays argument in Trump v. United States was a disaster for Special Counsel Jack Smith, and for anyone who believes that the president of the United States should be subject to prosecution if they commit a crime.

At least five of the Courts Republicans seemed eager to, at the very least, permit Trump to delay his federal criminal trial for attempting to steal the 2020 election until after this Novembers election. And the one GOP appointee who seemed to hedge the most, Chief Justice John Roberts, also seemed to think that Trump enjoys at least some immunity from criminal prosecution.

Much of the Courts Republican majority, moreover, seemed eager not simply to delay Trumps trial until after the election, but to give him extraordinarily broad immunity from criminal prosecution should he be elected once again. Justice Brett Kavanaugh, for example, argued that when a president exercises his official powers, he cannot be charged under any federal criminal statute at all, unless that statute contains explicit language saying that it applies to the president.

As Michael Dreeben, the lawyer arguing on behalf of Smiths prosecution team, told the Court, only two federal laws meet this standard. So Kavanaughs rule would amount to near complete immunity for anything a president did while exercising their executive authority.

Justice Samuel Alito, meanwhile, played his traditional role as the Courts most dyspeptic advocate for whatever position the Republican Party prefers. At one point, Alito even argued that permitting Trump to be prosecuted for attempting to overthrow the 2020 presidential election would lead us into a cycle that destabilizes ... our democracy, because future presidents who lose elections would mimic Trumps criminal behavior in order to remain in office and avoid being prosecuted by their successor.

In fairness, not all of the justices, or even all of the Republican justices, engaged in such dizzying feats of reverse logic. Roberts did express some concern that Trump lawyer John Sauers arguments could prevent the president from being prosecuted if he took a bribe.

Justice Amy Coney Barrett, meanwhile, pointed to the fact that Sauer drew a distinction between prosecuting a president for official behavior (which Sauer said is not allowed), and prosecuting a president for his private conduct (which Sauer conceded is permitted). Barrett also argued that many of the charges against Trump, such as his work with private lawyers and political consultants to overthrow the 2020 election, qualify as private conduct and thus could still be prosecuted.

Still, many of the Republican justices, including Barrett, indicated that the case would have to be returned to the trial court to determine which of the allegations against Trump qualify as official and which qualify as private. Barrett also indicated that Trump could then appeal the trial courts ruling, meaning that his actual criminal trial would be delayed for many more months as that issue makes its way through the appeals courts.

In that world, the likelihood that Trump will be tried, and a verdict reached, before the November election is approximately zero percent.

The Courts decision in the Trump case, in other words, is likely to raise the stakes of this already impossibly high-stakes election considerably. As Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson warned, the risk inherent in giving presidents immunity from the criminal law is that someone like Trump would be emboldened to commit crimes with abandon.

Its unclear if the Court is going to go so far as to definitively rule that the president of the United States is allowed to do crimes. But they appear likely to make it impossible for the criminal justice system to actually do anything about Trumps attempt to overthrow the election at least before Trump could be elected president again.

Under current law, all government officials enjoy some immunity from civil lawsuits. The president, meanwhile, is on a short list of government officials, alongside judges and prosecutors, who enjoy particularly robust immunity from such suits. But the law has never been understood to immunize any government official from criminal prosecution.

Moreover, while no president has been prosecuted prior to Trump, judges and prosecutors (who enjoy the same level of immunity from civil suits as the president) are routinely prosecuted for taking bribes or for otherwise violating the criminal law during their official conduct in office.

For this reason, Ive argued that his immunity case was primarily about delaying Trumps trial until after the election. The arguments for presidential immunity from the criminal law are so weak and their implications are so shocking Trumps lawyer told a lower court that unless Trump had first been successfully impeached, he could not be prosecuted even if he ordered the military to assassinate one of his political rivals that it seemed unimaginable that even this Supreme Court would buy Trumps immunity arguments.

After Thursday morning, however, a decision that merely delays Trumps criminal trial until after the election is probably the best possible outcome Smith could hope for. There appears to be a very real chance that five justices will rule that the president of the United States may use his official powers in order to commit very serious crimes.

Even the best case scenario for Smith, moreover, is still an enormous victory for Donald Trump. If Trump prevails in the 2024 election, he can order the Justice Department to drop the charges against him or even potentially pardon himself. And, regardless of what happens in November, the American people will go to the polls without the clarity of a criminal trial which determines whether or not Trump is guilty of attempting to drive a knife into US democracy.

Trumps core argument is that the president is immune from prosecution for official acts taken while he was in office. All six of the Courts Republicans showed at least some sympathy for this argument, though some displayed more sympathy than others.

It appears likely that at least four justices Justices Clarence Thomas, Alito, Kavanaugh, and Neil Gorsuch will give Trump the immunity he seeks (or apply a rule like Kavanaughs requirement that criminal statutes dont apply to the president unless they explicitly say so, which would have virtually the same effect). At one point, Thomas even suggested that the Justice Departments decision to appoint Smith to investigate Trump was unconstitutional.

Roberts and Barrett, meanwhile, were a little more enigmatic. But both, at the very least, floated sending this case back down to the lower court for more delay.

Chief Justice Roberts, for what its worth, did express some concern that the line between an official action and a private one is difficult to draw. Early in the oral argument, he asked Sauer about a president who appoints someone as an ambassador because that appointee gave the president a bribe.

While making the appointment is an official act, taking a bribe is not. Roberts worried that prosecutors would be unable to secure a bribery conviction if they were forbidden from telling the jury about the official act taken by the president in order to secure that bribe.

Barrett, meanwhile, spent a considerable amount of time walking Sauer through the actual allegations in the indictment against Trump. And she even got him to admit that some of the charges, such as consulting with private lawyers and a private political consultant on how to certify fake electors, amount to private conduct that could be prosecuted.

Later in the argument, however, Barrett seemed to lay out how the process of determining which parts of the indictment can survive should play out. Under her suggested framework, the trial court would have to go through the indictment and sort the official from the private. The trial would then be put on hold while Trump appeals whatever the trial court says to higher courts in a process that is likely to take months or even longer to sort out.

By the time that was all done, the November election would be long past, and Trump could very well be back in office and emboldened to commit more crimes in the very way that Justice Jackson warned about.

Indeed, the striking thing about Thursdays argument is that most of the Republican justices appeared so overwhelmed by concern that a future president might be hampered by fears of being prosecuted once they leave office, that they completely ignored the risk that an un-prosecutable president might behave like a tyrant. Gorsuch even warned that presidents might try to pardon themselves on the way out the door to avoid such prosecutions.

Under the legal rule that Gorsuch and many of his colleagues are considering, however, such a pardon would be unnecessary because the president would be almost entirely above the law including, potentially, a president like Trump, who has already shown his eagerness to destroy constitutional governance for his own personal gain.

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The Supreme Court is likely to place Donald Trump above the law in its immunity case - Vox.com

"The Wuhan Cover-Up" blares the subject line of a recent presidential campaign email. Inside, it's all impenetrable conspiracy theory language that reads more like a QAnon post than a normal political fundraiser:

Why wasnt Dr. Anthony Fauci charged with a crime, when he lied under oath about his relationships with Peter Daszak and Ralph Baric in order to cover-up Wuhan Coronavirus research?Apparently, lying under oath is only a crime when it contradicts established narratives.

Zombie COVID-19 conspiracy theories? False and defamatory accusations? QAnon-style rhetoric designed to overwhelm and bamboozle the reader? These abusive tactics are all the red flags of MAGA communication. To be certain, fundraising emails across the partisan spectrum can be alarmist and hyperbolic, but accusing innocent people of crimes and spreading lies about deadly diseases are lines most candidates don't cross. The exception, of course, is Donald Trump and his imitators, like Arizona's Republican candidate for governor Kari Lake. But outside of the MAGA universe, such tactics are frowned upon for two reasons. One, it's downright evil. Two, it wouldn't work on voters who are outside of the MAGA bubble, as normal people tend to be turned off by slander and overt disinformation.

But curiously this email did not come from Trump or Lake or any other figures associated with the ethics-free world of MAGA campaigning. It came, readers may not be surprised to learn, from the campaign of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an independent presidential candidate. The conventional wisdom in Washington has long been that Kennedy is running a spoiler campaign against President Joe Biden, trying to siphon off enough Democratic votes that Donald Trump wins the election. After all, Kennedy used to be a Democrat and his name is so famous his family had to hold a presser disavowing his candidacy.

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This email, however, seems squarely aimed at would-be Trump voters, the only people so soaked in pandemic paranoia and conspiracy theories that any of this would even make sense to them. It's a weird choice for someone trying to undermine Biden's chances! It makes sense, however, if we assume that Kennedy's main priority with his fake run for president is not to spoil the race, but to draw attention and recruit new marks for his longstanding anti-vaccination grift. If you're looking for gullible people who will give you money to lie to them, you will be far more successful appealing to Trump voters than Biden voters.

Kennedy can be this liberal-triggering agent they can use to taunt people they hate, which has long mattered more to MAGA than policy concerns.

For months, polls have shown that Kennedy is taking away more voters from Biden than Trump, based mostly on Democrats who are dissatisfied with Biden and who knew little about Kennedy besides his name. That's shifted recently. A new NBC News poll shows Biden is two points behind Trump in a two-way race, but two points ahead of Trump if Kennedy is an option. In a Marist poll, Biden's three-point lead widens to five points if Kennedy is on the ballot. It appears the more voters learn about Kennedy that he's anti-vaccine, a conspiracy theorist, and an all-around weirdo the more Democrats are turned off and the more MAGA voters are intrigued.

Hoping he would be a spoiler to benefit Trump, wealthy Republicans have been donating heavily to Kennedy, making them his main source of funding. It's not unreasonable to believe, therefore, that he's in this race to hurt Biden. But the likelier possibility is that Kennedy is in this as an old-fashioned grift, and cares less about the outcome of the race than in getting attention and making money.

Some crucial context is that Kennedy is the head of an anti-vaccine group that notoriously peddled medical disinformation during the COVID-19 pandemic to great profit. As the Washington Post reported, Kennedy's group "received $23.5 million in contributions, grants and other revenue in 2022 alone eight times what it collected the yearbefore the pandemic began." Kennedy's salary from running the organization doubled due to this windfall, from $255,000 before the pandemic to over half a million in 2022. With the pandemic functionally over, so are the vast majority of vaccine mandates. That is bad news for anti-vaccination organizations, who depended on the hysteria over mandatory vaccines to raise money.

It's not a leap, therefore, to see that Kennedy is likely running for president to find a new source of suckers who will give him money. (And attention, which also seems a big motivating factor.) The first set of rubes were those rich GOP donors. But those people are fairweather funders, who will abandon him the moment he's no longer useful. The real money, in the longer term, is in becoming a cult-like leader for QAnon adhernts and other credulous people who may not be rich but are numerous. By targeting MAGA in his search for dummies, Kennedy is simply following that adage: Go hunting where the ducks are.

The QAnon angle is one that is often overlooked when discussing Kennedy, but shouldn't be. One of the most popular QAnon prophecies is that Kennedy's deceased first cousin, John F. Kennedy Jr., is secretly alive and will make his triumphant return to the public eye in 2024 when he is announced as Trump's running mate. It's likely not a coincidence, then, that earlier this month, Kennedy tweeted, "President Trump calls me an ultra-left radical. Im soooo liberal that his emissaries asked me to be his VP. I respectfully declined the offer."

For many QAnon believers, it's not much of a leap to get them to wonder if the Kennedy of their prophecy is actually RFK, and not his dead cousin. If so, they are going to be angry with Trump for screwing up the plan.

Kennedy was responding to Trump claiming that he's a "leftist radical," which shows Trump is worried about his own people abandoning him for Kennedy. Reporting from Politico confirms that it's not just Trump, either, but the larger GOP that is starting to fret. Kennedy is starting to pull small-dollar donors away from Trump. In turn, Trump's campaign and allies are starting to badmouth Kennedy more.

To be certain, the Biden campaign still has much to worry about when it comes to Kennedy. Low-information Democratic voters who just see the name and throw their vote away are a very real threat. But Sarah Longwell, the never-Trump data specialist who publishes The Bulwark, argued on a recent podcast that there's "a real opportunity" for the Biden campaign to push some Trump voters towards Kennedy. She notes that, in her focus groups, what Trump voters say they like about Kennedy is that "he is defying his family."

"What do Republicans like more than anything else?" she said. "Somebody of the libs who's hitting the libs." She reminded listeners that Trump used to be coded this way, as a former Democrat who has turned on his party. Now Kennedy can be this liberal-triggering agent they can use to taunt people they hate, which has long mattered more to MAGA than policy concerns. Already, Kennedy has higher favorability ratings with Republican voters than Democrats.

There are signs that the Biden campaign is aware of this and is trying to find ways to sell Kennedy to MAGA voters. The Kennedy family press conference, for instance. Most media took it at face value, as the Kennedys trying to discourage Democratic voters from backing their black sheep of a relative. But there may have been another, more important audience: MAGA voters. The message to those voters is that the best way to make the Kennedys cry, perhaps even better than voting for Trump, is to vote for RFK Jr. Similarly, billboards that put Kennedy in a MAGA hat and call him a "spoiler for Trump" aren't just about making Democrats dislike Kennedy. They will also make Trump voters more interested in switching to Kennedy.

None of this is an argument for complacency. Kennedy is still a major threat to Biden, due to those low-information voters who may not know he's an anti-vaccination conspiracy theorist. This race promises to be chaotic as it is, and introducing third-party spoilers makes it all the more unpredictable. Kennedy, whose main goals are money and attention, might discover he can start getting more wealthy Republican donors if he shifts tactics again. All sorts of terrible things could happen.

For now, the state of play appears to be this: Kennedy's main goal appears to be pulling in marks for his anti-vaccination grift. That means he's got a lot more reason to make a play for MAGA voters than Biden voters. Especially if Trump continues down his path of total self-absorption, Kennedy has a real opportunity to chip off some of his voters by speaking to their esoteric concerns about vaccine mind control and other imaginary threats. The polls suggest this is already happening, and there could be many more chances down the line for MAGA voters to consider giving Kennedy a chance.

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RFK is openly gunning for Trump voters now and Republicans are starting to worry - Salon

Former President Donald J. Trump, in an interview that aired on Fox News on Sunday, suggested falsely that Latin American governments were picking the citizens they didnt want and shipping them to the U.S. border, resurrecting a claim that was central to his 2016 campaign.

He also accused the Chinese Communist Party without providing any evidence of orchestrating illegal immigration into the United States, and said he believed China would try to interfere in the presidential election, adding that he liked President Xi Jinping a lot.

Asked on Sunday Morning Futures by the interviewer, Maria Bartiromo, whether he thought military-aged men from China were being directed by the Communist Party to come here, Mr. Trump said: I believe so.

Referring to a recent incident in New York City in which a group of men identified by police officials as migrants from Latin America attacked police officers, Mr. Trump said: The heads of these countries are smart. Theyre not sending the people that are doing a great job and that they love in the country. Theyre sending people, for the most part, that they dont want, and theyre putting them into caravans.

That statement echoed one of the most incendiary lines from his first campaign announcement speech in 2015: When Mexico sends its people, theyre not sending their best, he said at the time, continuing: Theyre bringing drugs. Theyre bringing crime. Theyre rapists. And some, I assume, are good people. He also has repeatedly and falsely said that migrants from South and Central America are coming from mental institutions and jails.

Mr. Trump also spoke approvingly, as he has before, of the military-style mass deportation of Mexican immigrants under President Dwight D. Eisenhower.

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Trump Pushes Immigration Conspiracy Theories and Mass Deportations - The New York Times

Republican presidential candidate former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley speaks at a campaign event on Thursday, Feb. 1, 2024, in Columbia, S.C. Artie Walker Jr./AP hide caption

Republican presidential candidate former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley speaks at a campaign event on Thursday, Feb. 1, 2024, in Columbia, S.C.

Republican presidential hopeful Nikki Haley has made a cameo appearance on NBC's Saturday Night Live, making jibes at former President Donald Trump over his age and mental competency.

The former South Carolina governor has been campaigning ahead of her home state's Republican primary later this month in an effort to close the gap in polling between herself and Trump.

Haley appeared in a comedy sketch set at a fake CNN Town Hall, where Trump, played by cast member James Austin Johnson, was being asked questions by an audience.

Making an unannounced appearance, Haley was introduced halfway through the sketch as "someone who describes herself as a concerned South Carolina voter." Haley then asks, "My question is, why won't you debate Nikki Haley?"

The fake Trump then replies "Oh, my God, it's her! The woman who was in charge of security on Jan. 6... Nancy Pelosi!" with a nod to Trump's recent seeming confusion over Pelosi and Haley.

"Are you doing OK, Donald? You might need a mental competency test," Haley says.

Haley has pitched herself as a younger, more capable alternative to both Trump and the Democratic frontrunner, President Joe Biden.

Trump tells Haley that he "aced" the competency test and says "They told me I'm 100% mental, and I'm competent because I'm a man."

He adds that women "should never run our economy. Women are terrible with money... in fact, a woman I know recently asked me for $83 million."

A New York civil jury recently awarded writer E. Jean Carroll $83 million in damages from Trump, ruling that the former president had defamed Carroll after she accused him of sexual assault.

A later joke about the 1999 movie The Sixth Sense leads to Trump saying "I see dead people." Haley replies: "Yeah, that's what voters will say if they see you and Joe [Biden] on the ballot."

Haley was also the subject of a barb by guest host Ayo Edebiri, who made fun of the former South Carolina governor for previously avoiding saying that the Civil War was caused by slavery.

"I was just curious, what would you say was the main cause of the Civil War, and do you think it starts with an 's' and ends with a 'lavery?' comic actor Edebiri asks. Haley replies, "Yep, I probably should have said that the first time".

In December at a New Hampshire town hall, Haley was asked what she thought caused the Civil War. She avoided saying "slavery," instead answering that it was about "the freedoms of what people could and couldn't do."

Haley also delivered the NBC show's signature opening line "Live from New York, it's Saturday night!" at the end of the skit.

"Had a blast tonight on SNL," Haley tweeted after her appearance.

"Know it was past Donald's bedtime so looking forward to the stream of unhinged tweets in the a.m."

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Nikki Haley makes surprise appearance on SNL, mocking Donald Trump and Joe Biden - NPR

Former President Trumps feud with the head of the United Auto Workers (UAW) union has reached a fever pitch since the union endorsed President Biden last week.

The UAW backed Bidens bid for reelection at the unions conference in Washington, D.C., last Wednesday, after previously withholding its endorsement over concerns about the administrations push toward electric vehicles (EVs).

While touting Bidens record on labor, UAW President Shawn Fain also took aim at Trump, slamming the former president as a scab.

Donald Trump is a billionaire, and thats who he represents, Fain said. If Donald Trump ever worked in an auto plant, he wouldnt be a UAW member. Hed be a company man trying to squeeze the American worker. Donald Trump stands against everything we stand for as a union.

This choice is clear, he added. Joe Biden bet on the American worker while Donald Trump blamed the American worker.

Fain hit the former president again just days later in an interview with CBS Newss Face the Nation,” saying Trump has a history of serving himself while Biden has a history of serving others and the working class.

Donald Trump has a history of serving himself and standing for the billionaire class. And thats contrary to everything that working-class people stand for,” Fain said.

The UAW leader has clearly gotten under Trumps skin.

The former president has since blasted Fain as a dope and a stiff, accused him of buying into Bidens vision on EVs and selling the auto industry right into the big, powerful hands of China.

Shawn Fain doesnt understand this or have a clue, Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social. Get rid of this dope & vote for DJT. I will bring the Automobile Industry back to our Country.

In an interview with Fox Businesss Maria Bartiromo set to air Sunday, the former president dismissed the UAW as a hopeless case and said he never spoke with the union.

The back-and-forth with Fain comes as both Biden and Trump have turned their attention to Novembers general election. While former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley remains in the GOP primary race, Trump is the clear front-runner for the nomination, particularly after wins in Iowa and New Hampshire.

Trump’s team has indicated that peeling off even some of Biden’s support among organized labor could make a difference in what is expected to be a close election. The former president lost union members by 8 percentage points in the 2016 election, according to exit polling, and that margin grew to 14 percentage points in 2020.

Trump is also vying to win back Michigan, the home of the U.S. auto industry, after a successful UAW strike against the Big Three automakers. Michigan broke from decades of steady Democratic support to elect Trump in 2016 before Biden flipped the state back in 2020.

While a significant portion of UAW members may vote for Trump anyway, the former president has a steep hill to climb with union brass. Even when courting the UAW’s endorsement last year, Trump claimed rank-and-file members were being “sold down the river” by leadership.

Trump further rankled UAW leadership when he traveled to Detroit to deliver remarks at a nonunion shop during last falls strike.

Biden campaign officials believe the president can strongly contrast his support for the autoworkers and investments during his administration with the closure and relocation of factories during Trumps presidency. Biden also endeared himself to UAW members by becoming the first president to march on a picket line during the union’s strike against General Motors, Ford and Stellantis.

Winning Michigan, one of several swing states that are likely to determine November’s election, will require Biden to build a diverse coalition among union members, Black voters, young voters and other blocs. The president won the state in 2020 by 154,000 votes, but recent polls have shown him trailing Trump there.

Ahead of the state’s Feb. 27 presidential primary, Biden met with UAW members in Warren, Mich., who were phone banking in support of him.

“To me it’s a basic, basic thing, and I mean this sincerely, he said. Wall Street didn’t build the middle class. Labor built the middle class, and the middle class built the country. 

Amid the spat with the UAW, Trump has turned his sights on the Teamsters union, meeting with Teamsters president Sean OBrien on Wednesday. When asked about a potential endorsement from the union, the former president suggested that stranger things have happened. 

However, Fain said Thursday that he cant see any way in hell that Trump would get a union endorsement.

Im not gonna try to answer for Sean OBrien, but I would 100 percent bet that I cant see any way in hell a union would endorse Donald Trump for president, Fain said. The man stands against everything that working-class people stand for, that organized labor stands for. 

You know, look, they chose to entertain visiting with candidates, and thats a path they chose, he added. I mean, I saw no point in it because I look at the track record of Donald Trump.”

Fain, for his part, appears to be a key piece of the Biden team’s strategy in reaching UAW workers and working-class voters more broadly. The UAW president accompanied Biden on a trip to the Detroit area on Thursday and has been a willing and capable surrogate for the presidents reelection effort.

“We know whos been there for labor, and we sure as hell know who hasnt, Fain told UAW members on Thursday. We’re going to fight like hell, and we’re going to ensure Joe Biden is the next president.”

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Trump feud with UAW reaches fever pitch - The Hill

As signs point to the 2024 presidential election being a repeat of the 2020 race between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, Biden holds a lead over Trump 50 - 44 percent among registered voters in a hypothetical general election matchup, according to a Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pea-ack) University national poll of registered voters released today.

In Quinnipiac University's December 20, 2023 poll, the same hypothetical 2024 general election matchup was 'too close to call' as President Biden received 47 percent support and former President Trump received 46 percent support.

In today's poll, Democrats (96 - 2 percent) and independents (52 - 40 percent) support Biden, while Republicans (91 - 7 percent) support Trump.

The gender gap is widening.

Women 58 - 36 percent support Biden, up from December when it was 53 - 41 percent.

Men 53 - 42 percent support Trump, largely unchanged from December when it was 51 - 41 percent.

In a five-person hypothetical 2024 general election matchup that includes independent and Green Party candidates, Biden receives 39 percent support, Trump receives 37 percent support, independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. receives 14 percent support, independent candidate Cornel West receives 3 percent support, and Green Party candidate Jill Stein receives 2 percent support.

Among independents in the five-person hypothetical 2024 general election matchup, Biden receives 35 percent support, Trump receives 27 percent support, Kennedy receives 24 percent support, West receives 5 percent support, and Stein receives 5 percent support.

In a hypothetical 2024 general election matchup between President Biden and Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley, a former United Nations Ambassador and South Carolina Governor, 47 percent of voters support Haley and 42 percent support Biden.

In today's poll, Democrats (87 - 10 percent) support Biden, while Republicans (79 - 4 percent) and independents (53 - 37 percent) support Haley.

In a five-person hypothetical 2024 general election matchup that includes independent and Green Party candidates, Biden receives 36 percent support, Haley receives 29 percent support, independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. receives 21 percent support, independent candidate Cornel West receives 3 percent support, and Green Party candidate Jill Stein receives 2 percent support.

Among Republicans in the five-person hypothetical 2024 general election matchup, Biden receives 3 percent support, Haley receives 57 percent support, Kennedy receives 24 percent support, and West receives 1 percent support.

With the 2024 Republican presidential primary now whittled down to two candidates, 77 percent of Republican and Republican leaning voters support Trump and 21 percent support Haley. In December's poll with more candidates in the race, Trump received 67 percent support and Haley received 11 percent support.

In the 2024 Democratic presidential primary, Biden receives 78 percent support among Democratic and Democratic leaning voters, author Marianne Williamson receives 11 percent support, and U.S. Representative from Minnesota Dean Phillips receives 6 percent support.

Voters give President Biden a negative 41 - 55 percent job approval rating. While still deep in the red, it is his highest job approval rating since June 2023.

Voters were asked about Biden's handling of...

More than 8 in 10 voters (84 percent) are either very concerned (41 percent) or somewhat concerned (43 percent) that the United States will be drawn into a military conflict in the Middle East, while 15 percent are either not so concerned (11 percent) or not concerned at all (4 percent).

Given a list of 10 issues and asked which is the most urgent one facing the country today, 24 percent of voters say preserving democracy in the United States, 20 percent say the economy, and 20 percent say immigration.

There are wide gaps by party identification.

Among Republicans, the top issues are immigration (38 percent), the economy (29 percent), and preserving democracy in the United States (12 percent).

Among Democrats, the top issue is preserving democracy in the United States (39 percent) followed by the economy (12 percent), with no other issue reaching double digits.

Among independents, the top issues are preserving democracy in the United States (23 percent), immigration (19 percent), and the economy (18 percent).

A majority of voters (61 percent) consider the situation at the border between the U.S. and Mexico a crisis, while 33 percent think it is a problem but not a crisis, and 4 percent think it is not a problem at all.

There are wide gaps by party identification.

Among Republicans, 82 percent think it is a crisis and 17 percent think it is a problem but not a crisis.

Among Democrats, 43 percent think it is a crisis, 51 percent think it is a problem but not a crisis, and 6 percent think it is not a problem at all.

Among independents, 60 percent think it is a crisis, 35 percent think it is a problem but not a crisis, and 3 percent think it is not a problem at all.

Nearly 6 in 10 voters (59 percent) think U.S. policy on immigration is not strict enough, 20 percent think it is about right, and 15 percent think it is too strict.

Voters are split when it comes to building a wall along the border with Mexico, with 49 percent opposing building a wall and 47 percent supporting it. This compares to a Quinnipiac University national poll in October 2023 when 52 percent supported building a wall along the border with Mexico (an all-time high) and 44 percent opposed it.

Nearly 6 in 10 voters (58 percent) think immigrants from other cultures have a mainly positive impact on American society, while 27 percent think immigrants from other countries have a mainly negative impact, and 14 percent did not offer an opinion.

Thirty-six percent of voters describe the state of the nation's economy these days as either excellent (6 percent) or good (30 percent), while 63 percent describe it as either not so good (29 percent) or poor (34 percent).

This compares to a Quinnipiac University poll in August 2023 when 30 percent of voters described it as either excellent (3 percent) or good (27 percent) and 69 percent described it as either not so good (32 percent) or poor (37 percent).

Asked what they consider is the best measure of how the nation's economy is doing, 46 percent of voters say the prices of goods and services they buy, 19 percent say the unemployment rate and job reports, 15 percent say their personal finances, 9 percent say the housing market, and 5 percent say the stock market index.

1,650 self-identified registered voters nationwide were surveyed from January 25th - 29th with a margin of error of +/- 2.4 percentage points. The survey included 696 Republican and Republican leaning voters with a margin of error of +/- 3.7 percentage points. The survey included 693 Democratic and Democratic leaning voters with a margin of error of +/- 3.7 percentage points.

The Quinnipiac University Poll, directed by Doug Schwartz, Ph.D. since 1994, conducts independent, non-partisan national and state polls on politics and issues. Surveys adhere to industry best practices and are based on random samples of adults using random digit dialing with live interviewers calling landlines and cell phones.

Visit poll.qu.edu or http://www.facebook.com/quinnipiacpoll

Email poll@qu.edu or follow us on X (formerly known as Twitter) @QuinnipiacPoll.

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1/31/24 - 2024 Matchups: Biden Opens Up Lead Over Trump In Head-To-Head, Quinnipiac University National Poll ... - Quinnipiac University Poll

DENVER (AP) In the summer of 2020, Gerard Magliocca, like many during the coronavirus pandemic, found himself stuck inside with time on his hands.

A law professor at Indiana University, Magliocca emailed with another professor, who was writing a book about overlooked parts of the Constitution's 14th Amendment. He decided he would research the history of two long-neglected sentences in the post-Civil War addition that prohibit those who engaged in insurrection or rebellion from holding office.

Magliocca posted a copy of his research which he believed was the first law journal article ever written about Section 3 of the 14th Amendment online in mid-December of 2020, then revised and re-posted it on Dec. 29. Eight days later, President Donald Trump's supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol to prevent the certification of his loss to Joe Biden. Magliocca watched as Republicans such as Sens. Mitch McConnell and Mitt Romney described the attack as an insurrection.

That night, Magliocca composed a quick post on a legal blog: Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment, he wrote, might apply to President Trump.

Just over four years later, the U.S. Supreme Court will have to determine whether it does. On Thursday, the nation's highest court is scheduled to hear arguments over whether Trump can remain on the ballot in Colorado, where the state's Supreme Court ruled that he violated Section 3.

It's the first time in history that the nation's highest court has heard a case on Section 3, which was used to keep former Confederates from holding government offices after the amendment's 1868 adoption. It fell into disuse after Congress granted an amnesty to most ex-rebels in 1872.

Before the violent Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, even many constitutional lawyers rarely thought about Section 3, a provision that isn't taught at most law schools and hadn't been used in court for more than 100 years. Legal scholars believe the only time it was cited in the 20th century was to deny a seat in Congress to a socialist on the grounds that he opposed U.S. involvement in World War I.

The clause's revival is due to an unlikely combination of Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives, all rediscovering 111 words in the nation's foundational legal document that have now become a threat to the former president's attempt to return to office.

THE FIRST TARGETS

Once she had dried her tears after watching rioters storm the Capitol, Norma Anderson sat down with one of the multiple copies of the Constitution she keeps around her house in the Denver suburbs and reread the 14th Amendment.

I made the connection, Anderson, now 91, said in an interview.

Anderson is a former Republican leader of Colorado's General Assembly and state Senate, and eventually would become the lead plaintiff in the case now before the Supreme Court. The evening of Jan. 6, she read the provision that prohibited anyone who swore an oath to support the Constitution and later engaged in insurrection against it, or provided aid and comfort to its enemies, from holding office.

Anderson didn't yet have the chance to spread the word beyond her own circle, but in the days after Jan. 6, thanks to scholars such as Magliocca and the University of Maryland law professor whose book project had inspired him, Mark Graber, Section 3 started its slow emergence from obscurity.

We were the two people doing a little work on Section 3, Graber said of Magliocca and himself. We thought this is real interesting; it makes great chitchat at the American Legal Historians Society. He added, Then Donald Trump did academics a favor.

Though the provision was occasionally mentioned, conversation in Washington and the legal profession in general remained dominated by Trump's second impeachment where he was acquitted by the Senate after 43 Republicans voted not to convict him.

It took months before the first mention of Section 3 in a public document. Free Speech For People, a Massachusetts-based liberal nonprofit, sent letters to top election officials in all 50 states in June 2021, warning them not to place Trump on the ballot should he run again in 2024 because he had violated the provision.

The group didn't hear back from any of them.

People were just treating it as something that was not serious, recalled John Bonifaz, the group's co-founder.

In January 2022, Free Speech For People filed a complaint in North Carolina to disqualify Republican Rep. Madison Cawthorn under Section 3 for his involvement in the rally that preceded the Capitol attack. But Cawthorn lost his primary in that year's midterms, mooting the case.

At the same time, another liberal watchdog group was starting its own Section 3 campaign.

After Jan. 6, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics, also known as CREW, in Washington was focused on Trump's impeachment and other possible legal penalties against those who participated in the Capitol attack before exploring other remedies, said its chief counsel, Donald Sherman.

By January 2022, the group decided to test Section 3 in court.

It wasn't just Trump we were focused on, Sherman said in an interview. One thing we've been very careful about is we don't think it's appropriate to pursue outside or longshot cases.

Looking for a lower-level defendant, Sherman's organization zeroed in on Couy Griffin. The subject of one of the earliest Jan. 6 prosecutions, Griffin already has a rich legal record. He was was recorded in a restricted area of the U.S. Capitol as head of a group called Cowboys for Trump. Griffin was convicted of illegally entering the Capitol, but acquitted of engaging in disorderly conduct.

He still served as a commissioner in a rural New Mexico county, which kept CREW's attention on him. On Sept. 6, 2022, a New Mexico judge ordered Griffin removed from his position. It was the first time in more than 100 years an official had been removed under Section 3. Griffin has appealed to the Supreme Court.

CREW prepared to turn to other Section 3 targets. But it quickly became clear Trump would be next. He announced his campaign for president on Nov. 15, 2022.

IS THIS FOR REAL?

Both Free Speech For People and CREW had similar discussions about how to challenge a presidential candidacy. They knew the complaints would have to come at the state level because federal courts have ruled that citizens can't challenge presidential criteria in that venue.

The two groups began scouring state ballot laws, looking for a place that allowed the rapid contesting of a candidacy. CREW settled on Colorado. It had a clear process for a quick challenge in trial court that would be fast-tracked on appeal to the state Supreme Court.

After a brief trip to Denver checking on potential local lawyers to lead the challenge, Sherman and another CREW attorney, Nikhel Sus, contracted Martha Tierney, a veteran election lawyer who also served as general counsel of the state Democratic Party.

Hmm, that's a longshot, Tierney recalled thinking. She signed up, anyway.

Tierney wasn't acting as the Democratic Party's lawyer, but CREW wanted to balance its team with someone from the right. Sherman reached out to Mario Nicolais, a former Republican election lawyer who had left the party over Trump.

Nicolais' first interaction with Sherman was a direct message about the case on X, the social media network previously known as Twitter. Nicolais thought it could be from a crank.

Is this for real or is this from somebody just angry at the president? Nicolais recalled wondering.

Then he saw Sherman was with CREW. an organization he considered serious. In Nicolais' office hangs a copy of his first appearance on the front page of The Denver Post, when he beat CREW's local chapter in a case before the Colorado Supreme Court.

Nicolais was in charge of recruiting plaintiffs. The attorneys wanted Republicans and independents, not only because they were eligible to vote in Colorado's Republican primary but also to keep the case from being seen as partisan. Anderson, the former state lawmaker, signed on right away.

On Sept. 6, 2023 one year from the disqualification of the New Mexico county commissioner Anderson's was the lead name of the six plaintiffs on the 105-page complaint filed in district court in Denver.

A HISTORIC RULING

Scott Gessler got the call from Trump's team that day. A former Colorado secretary of state, Gessler was one of the go-to Republican election lawyers in the state.

Trump's campaign had been fending off scores of Section 3 lawsuits across the country, often from fringe players such as John Castro, a write-in Republican presidential candidate from Texas who had filed numerous ones against Trump.

This case was more serious. The Denver judge who got CREW's complaint, Sarah Block Wallace, said she was obligated to hold a hearing under Colorado election law.

In the five-day hearing, which took place in late October and early November, two officers who defended the Capitol testified, along with a University of California professor who was an expert in right-wing extremism, two Trump aides and several other witnesses. One was Magliocca, who laid out the history of Section 3.

Trump's attorneys were pessimistic, expecting Wallace, who had a history of donating to Democrats, to rule against them. Trump's top spokesman, Jason Miller, addressed reporters outside court, complaining that the plaintiffs had intentionally filed in a liberal jurisdiction in a blue state.

Trump's lawyers filed a motion asking Wallace step aside because before becoming a judge, she had made a $100 donation to a liberal group that had declared Jan. 6 was an insurrection. She declined.

I will not allow this legal proceeding to turn into a circus, Wallace said as the hearing began.

Testimony was occasionally interrupted by sirens from a fire station around the corner from Wallace's courtroom. Security was an ever-present concern. About a half-dozen sheriffs deputies stood guard throughout the trial, and the plaintiffs had reached out to the FBI and other law enforcement agencies.

To handle much of the examination and argument, Tierney and Nicolais had brought on a new firm of trial lawyers, whose lead partner was former Colorado Solicitor General Eric Olson.

Wallace issued her decision on Nov. 17. She ruled that Trump had engaged in insurrection but found that contrary to Magliocca's testimony it wasn't certain that the authors of the 14th Amendment meant it to apply to the president. Section 3 refers to elector of President and Vice President, but not specifically to the office itself.

Wallace was hesitant to become the first judge in history to bar a top presidential contender from the ballot unless the law was crystal clear.

It was a loss that only a lawyer could love, Sus recalled.

CREW was just a legal sliver away from victory it just needed the Colorado Supreme Court to uphold all of Wallace's ruling besides the technicality of whether the president was covered.

A COURT DIVIDED

The seven justices of the state's high court all appointed by Democrats from a pool chosen by a nonpartisan panel peppered both sides with pointed questions at oral argument three weeks later.

Olson and another partner from his firm, Jason Murray, argued for the plaintiffs. Murray had the rare distinction of having clerked for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan, a member of the court's liberal bloc, and Justice Neil Gorsuch, a member of its conservative bloc.

Gessler handled the argument for Trump. At the end of the grueling session, he addressed the meaning of insurrection and summed up the unprecedented, improvised nature of the case.

Youre going to tell me, Mr. Gessler, youre making it up, Gessler told the justices. Im going to tell you, well, so did the judge. And at the end of the day, we all are to a certain extent.

Neither side left feeling certain of victory.

On Dec. 19, the court announced it would issue its ruling that afternoon. Sean Grimsley, one of Olson's law partners who also had argued the case, was in Washington, at the memorial service for former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, for whom he had clerked.

The ruling, which was 4-3, came down while Grimsley was on the flight back, frantically checking his phone via the plane's wi-fi. They had won. Grimsley leapt from his seat and dashed back several rows, where he high-fived a fellow O'Connor clerk who was on the flight.

Eight days later, Maine's Democratic secretary of state barred Trump from that state's ballot under Section 3. That decision and Colorado's are on hold until the U.S. Supreme Court rules.

The reaction to Colorado and Maine's decisions has been furious, especially from Republicans. Trump has decried them as election interference and anti-democratic. They have warned that, if they stand, they could open the door to challenges of other politicians under Section 3, including Biden for not sufficiently defending the nation's southern border.

Sherman, who chafes at the notion that his nonpartisan group works on Democrats' behalf, notes that several Republican lawyers, former judges, members of Congress and governors have filed briefs with the Supreme Court backing them. In contrast, Sherman said he has heard grumbling from Democrats that the case risks replacing Trump with a Republican who would be harder to beat in this year's election.

Free Speech For People has filed Section 3 cases against Trump in five states. None has succeeded, with every legal entity ruling that it doesn't have the authority to decide whether to remove Trump from the ballot. The Minnesota Supreme Court, for example, kept Trump on that state's ballot by ruling that state law allows political parties to put whomever they want on their primary ballot.

With most jurisdictions dodging the questions at the heart of the case, it can create a misleading impression that things have gone well for the former president.

The cases have gone poorly for Trump, Derek Muller, a Notre Dame law professor who has followed the cases closely, wrote Friday in a blog post. He lost on the merits in the only two jurisdictions that got to the merits, Colorado and Maine.

Next up is the one that matters most.

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Here's how 2 sentences in the Constitution rose from obscurity to ensnare Donald Trump - Yahoo News

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) blasted House Republicans on Sunday for being “wholly owned subsidiaries of Donald Trump.”

Jeffries discussed the bipartisan Senate negotiations that have been underway since late last year in the hopes of reaching an agreement on border security on ABC’s “This Week.” He told co-host George Stephanopoulos that a potential proposal by the Senate should not be “dead on arrival” in the House before lawmakers even review the text, which has not been released yet.

“How can a bill be dead on arrival and extreme MAGA Republicans in the House haven’t even seen the text? They don’t even know what solutions are being proposed in terms of addressing the challenges at the border,” Jeffries said.

“House Republicans at this point are wholly owned subsidiaries of Donald Trump. They’re not working to find real solutions for the American people. They are following orders from the former president,” he said.

Former President Trump has been railing against bipartisan negotiations on the border for weeks, saying that additional legislation on the border is unnecessary. However, many Republican lawmakers have emphasized that Trump has no role in border negotiations.

Trump has also been accused of wanting to sink the border negotiations to help boost his chances in the 2024 election. He has since denied that claim, saying that he would not be opposed to a “great” bill that would solve the “problem.”

Jeffries was likely referring to Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), who last month said any potential Senate deal on the border would be “dead on arrival” in the House.

Jeffries continued to take aim at House Republicans for following the former president’s direction in his interview on Sunday.

“That’s the height of irresponsibility. That’s what the American people dislike about Washington, D.C., at this moment,” Jeffries added.

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Jeffries on House Republicans: Wholly owned subsidiaries of Donald Trump - The Hill