Category Archives: Donald Trump

WASHINGTON, DC - U.S. President Donald Trump (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)Win McNamee Getty Images

President Donald Trump hinted that he may end a key Affordable Care Act subsidy that makes insurance accessible to poorer Americans, a move that may critically destabilize health-insurance exchanges.

The administration has previously floated the idea to halt subsidies that help insurers offset health-care costs for low-income Americans, called a cost-sharing reduction, or CSR. In a tweet on Saturday, Trump hinted at ending that program.

If a new HealthCare Bill is not approved quickly, BAILOUTS for Insurance Companies and BAILOUTS for Members of Congress will end very soon! the president said in a tweet on Saturday.

It was unclear if Trumps message means he also plans to directly target subsidies that are available to health insurance policies for some Congressional staff members. The White House declined to comment further on Trumps tweet.

A months-long effort by Senate Republicans to pass health-care legislation collapsed early Friday after Republican John McCain of Arizona joined two of his colleagues to block a stripped-down Obamacare repeal bill. McCains no vote came after weeks of brinkmanship and after his dramatic return from cancer treatment to cast the 50th vote to start debate on the bill earlier in the week. The skinny repeal bill was defeated 49-51, falling just short of the 50 votes needed to advance it. Republicans Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska also voted against it.

For more on the efforts to repeal the ACA, click here.

Ending the CSR subsidies, paid monthly to insurers, is one way that Trump could hasten Obamacares demise without legislation, by prompting more companies to raise premiums in the individual market or stop offering coverage. The administration last made a payment about a week ago for the previous 30 days, but hasnt made a long-term commitment.

Responding on Twitter, Andrew Slavitt, acting administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in the Obama administration, said the impact of cutting off subsidy payments will be felt by the middle class who will pay more to subsidize low income.

The next payments are due Aug. 21. On Friday, health-care analyst Spencer Perlman at Veda Partners LLC said in a research note that theres a 30 percent chance Trump will end CSR payments, which may immediately destabilize the exchanges, perhaps fatally.

Americas Health Insurance Plans, a lobby group for the industry, has estimated that premiums would rise by about 20 percent if the CSR payments arent made. Many insurers have already dropped out of Obamacare markets in the face of mounting losses, and blamed the uncertainty over the future of the cost-sharing subsidies and the individual mandate as one of the reasons behind this years premium increases.

Moments after the Senate voted down the Republican bill on Friday morning, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell called on Democrats to offer their ideas for moving forward with health care. But he warned, Bailing out insurance companies, with no thought of any kind of reform, is not something I want to be a part of.

A survey in April by the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation showed that 61 percent Americans believe Trump and Republicans are responsible for future problems with the ACA, while 31 percent said President Barack Obama and Democrats would be at fault.

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Donald Trump Hints at Ending Subsidy That Gives Health Care to the Poor - Fortune

Donald Trump is a terrible president, and one of his own worst criticsat least, according to his own analysis of former President Barack Obama.

If Obama-era Donald Trump could offer his criticisms on the current White House administration, beleaguered by internal disorder and a stalled agenda, via some sort of Twitter time machinethey probably wouldnt sound toopretty.

That historic version of thecommander-in-chief would decry his own excuses for being unable to pass any major legislation in six months, saying its "BS since he had full control"in both Houses; just as he said about Obama.

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If somehow possible, 2012-Trump would slam 2017-Trump for his series of controversies following the G7 summit in Sicily, when he pulled out of the Paris Climate Accordand the G20 in Germany, when he met with Russian President Vladimir Putin and discussed creating a cybersecurity group after his nation meddled in the 2016 presidential election.

Trump "is a disaster at foreign policy,"hed likely say, as he did in September 2012. "Never had the experience or knowledge. He is not capable of doing the job."

"We pay for his golf,"hed complain.

When looking through the presidents tweets from days past, his views on the Obama White House and all of Washingtons flaws seem to foreshadow the exact problems hed soon face after assuming the Oval Office. Its as if a distant, previous Donald Trump is echoing through the Twittersphere, begging the new president to heed his own advice through the constant rebukes and rejection of then-President Obama.

Call it the theory of "Trumpodynamics, as some users have coined it: for every action he takes as president, there is an equal and opposite Trump tweet disagreeing with it.

Trump, the first president in over 40 years who hasnt released his tax returns, used to rail on Obama as "the least transparent presidentever."

Imagine what that Trump must think of the man now seated at the Resolute Desk.

Hed attack todays Trump for "constantly issuing executive orders that are major power grabs of authority,"as he did to Obama in July 2012 when the president signed an order on federal communications during national security and emergency preparedness.

In his first 100 days as the leader of the free world, Trump set a record for the most executive orders ever signed into law since World War Two.

His contradictions in shooting down Obama to his own time in office run the gamut.He apparently no longer believes the president needs to hold China accountable for currency manipulation (Trump hasstated as president that China does not manipulate its currency after tweeting that it does for years),to whether a leader should focus on governing, instead of campaign rallies and huge speeches in states he won a majority of the vote.

And when it comes to vacation time, pre-election Trump sold Americans the biggest dream of all in his tunnel-vision focus on Obama's travels.

It's virtually impossible to keep up with Trumps opinions on any number of issues, as the president is fluid in his stances on matters ranging from national topics like LGBT workplace protections to global policy concerns, including NATO. But the vast majority of his pre-White House tweets all seem to agree with one thing: by Trump's standards, his own presidency is failing.

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Donald Trump Is A Terrible President, According To His Own Tweets About Obama - Newsweek

Chances are that you can't. In fact, if you're like most of the political world, Monday feels as if it happened a month ago.

This is the nature of time in the Donald Trump presidency. There are so many storylines every single day that it's impossible to keep up with them even for a 24-hour news cycle. Some of this is, of course, strategy on the part of the President -- if you throw 1,000 balls in the air, any one person can only hope to focus on a few in hopes of catching them.

But, ascribing strategy to every ball Trump throws may be giving him and his White House too much credit. The truth is that this is a President who creates chaos in and around him. He acts, and then watches the wildness that ensues. The plan, seemingly, is that there is no plan.

He's the man knocking down the first domino in a massive chain that spiders in a thousand different directions. Or, maybe even more apt: He's smashing the ice on a thinly frozen pond and watching as the cracks spread out around him -- endangering both himself and anyone else unlucky enough to be sharing the ice with him.

Every week at the manic pace Trump keeps feels like a blur -- none more than this week, in which the President and his administration lurched from controversy to cataclysm to convulsion and back, all in the space of five days.

Let's go through the week that was:

"McMaster is at odds with President Trump on many key national security issues," reported CNN. "McMaster has also found himself undercut by others in the President's orbit like chief strategist Steve Bannon."

Later in the day Trump delivered a humdinger of a speech to police officers in Long Island on the dangers posed by the MS-13 gang, which he derided as "animals." He also appeared to condone violence against criminals; "And when you see these towns and when you see these thugs being thrown into the back of a paddy wagon you just see them thrown in, rough I said, please don't be too nice," Trump said.

Just before 5 p.m. Eastern Time, Trump announced -- via Twitter -- that he had fired Reince Priebus as chief of staff and replaced him with John Kelly, the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security.

It was a month's worth of bad news -- and maybe several months' worth -- in a single week. (And the week isn't even over yet.)

Consider this: If an episode of "West Wing" had the plot outlined above, Aaron Sorkin would likely have rejected it as too fantastical. There won't ever be THAT much -- and that much bad for the President -- happening in a single week, you can imagine him saying.

And, up until Donald Trump became the President, he'd have been right. But in this reality show presidency, the truth is stranger than fiction. And a week can seem to last a month.

This story has been updated.

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Donald Trump's manic, fantastical and utterly disastrous week - CNN

Comedy has always had a political edge, but never like this.

Story Continued Below

On late-night shows, in stand-up routines and scripted sitcoms, the opposition to President Donald Trump is more intense than a rally full of pink pussy hats. Hes an endless source of material for joke-writers, but also a five-alarm crisis, with barely a voice in mainstream or alternative comedy that isnt against him. Punchlines morph into earnest manifestos about diversity or health care. The jokes and jeremiads give Trump opponents the release they neednever mind how they might alienate Trump supporters on the receiving end. And they drive Twitter rages from a president who once felt all publicity was good publicityuntil he became pop cultures No. 1 whipping boy.

Maz Jobrani, the stand-up comedian and actor, has been trying to channel his own experience hating and protesting Trump into his work. Marching at LAX against the travel ban becomes one bit. Arguing with his mother about her saying she likes that Trump speaks his mind becomes another. But its hard to be funny when you feel like your country is going to hell, and everything starts to sound more shrill than amusing.

He has emboldened racists. I say that. Theres no joke. Theres no punch line, Jobrani told me, in an interview for POLITICOs Off Message podcast. But I think if you do that, you better have a punch line coming soon.

But he quotes a line from the comedian D.L. Hughley: Comedy is like giving people their medicine in orange juice. They dont taste it.

Stephen Colbert, who since the election dropped the pretense of playing it down the middle in his new role at CBS, has turned non-stop mocking Trump into skyrocketing ratings. Jimmy Kimmel turned a monologue about Obamacare into what amounted to a viral ad denouncing Republicans perceived cruelty. Weekend Update is coming back early, ahead of the new season of Saturday Night Live, which will have Alec Baldwin back in his Trump wig, though Sean Spicers departure will probably mean fewer Melissa McCarthy cameos behind her rolling podium.

Appearing on Colberts show on Wednesday night, satirical filmmaker Michael Moorea cartoon of the left himself who nonetheless predicted Trump would win last yearargued that McCarthy should get the credit for taking down Spicer. We need an army of satire, he said. A few minutes later, James Corden opened his CBS show following Colbert in a top hat and tux, singing a parody mocking Trumps tweeted transgender ban for the military.

Jobrani knows its all deepening the chasm between conservatives and the entertainment worldbut he doesnt care.

Trump supporters or people on the right, whenever Ive doneeven under Bush, when I would do jokes, they felt like I was attacking them. And Im not attacking you, Im attacking this politician, he said. If youre going to take it personally, like its yourlike Im making fun of your mother, then thats an issue you have.

Jobrani says that people who cant laugh at Trump are just too invested in the president, and not invested enough in the free speech and critical thinking that to him is the whole point of democracy. Hes heard the response that comes back: Well, then, why dont you make fun of Obama? Because he just didnt do a lot of stuff that was funny to me.

Jobrani arrived in America when he was six, on a visa he may or may not have overstayed illegally: His father brought him and his sister on what was supposed to be a two-week trip for their winter break in 1978, but decided in the face of the Iranian Revolution not to go backon such short notice that theyd left his baby brother behind with relatives. He recorded his new comedy special out on Netflix next week, Immigrant, on stage at the Kennedy Center in April with a giant photo of his Iranian passport picture projected above him, inspired by his reaction to Trump.

Raised near San Francisco, Jobrani was in a political science Ph.D. program at UCLA before dropping out for a performing career that started out with many roles as a terrorist. But its the stereotyping hes seeing going on now, in real life, that has him worried.

No matter how American I amIve been here for most of my lifethere are people that still dont consider me American, Jobrani said. Its like, OK, if youre going after green card holders, whats next?

His routine about the travel ban centers around how differently he and other darker-skinned marchers at LAX in February reacted to the police, compared with the white people who were there. In his joke, everyones in it together, marching, chanting, yellinguntil the police show up, and he says the white people got right in their faces, while he and the other non-white people in the crowd quietly edged away.

That feeling is real, he said, accentuated by a climate Trump has encouraged.

I feel, somewhere in the back of my mind, I would feel like they could take my citizenship away, and send me back to Iran, Jobrani said. I honestly do feel that there is a thing in my mind that my rights could be taken away at any minute. And not just my rights; anybodys rights.

Jobrani has been profiled by casting agents and TSA agents alike, but he said he doesnt mind how thats played into his current big role. On the CBS sitcom Superior Donuts, the Iranian-born actor plays an Iraqi, and one with a much stronger accent in English than he has in real life. He asked the writers about making the character, a dry cleaner, Iranian, offering to bring knowledge and a little Farsi to the role, but they saw the humor in lines that referenced living through a war. He noted to them that the Iran-Iraq War could provide that material, but they told him they didnt think most Americans would be familiar enough with that.

Its an awkward fact that playing around with ethnic stereotypes has boosted Jobranis career, as with so many comedians of color. Does that make him uncomfortable? Not really, he insistsbut hes thought about comedian Aziz Ansaris plea to non-white actors to avoid playing up their accents and other stereotypes (a big theme of Ansaris first season of Master of None). Jobrani sees his Faz as in the tradition of Danny DeVitos Louie DePalma on Taxi and Rhea Perlmans Carla on Cheers.

To have a character with an accent making people in middle America, or wherever it is, laugh, I actually think thats progress, because whether hes like, saying ludicrous stuff, or some of his stuff is like sexist or whatever, I still feel that we are taking a step in the right direction, Jobrani said. It reminds you that there are peopleimmigrantsthat are just businessmen, that are going to say stuff that is ridiculous. But I think its a drop in this big pond that goes in the right direction.

Others in Hollywood have pushed for more. Arnold Schwarzenegger, in a recent speech at the Creative Artists Agency, urged the crowd to channel their frustration with Trump and whats happening into scripts and other ways of shaping the popular imagination.

I want them to know that they have power, Schwarzenegger said in his own recent Off Message podcast interview. If they go out and they rally and they go and let their frustration be heard and go and join a movement or whatever it is, be involved and don't just sit there and look at the news and look at the news and look at the television and then complain. Thats not good enough.

Like most comedians, Jobrani has left most of the material recorded in his special behind and is working on new bits. Hes trying to tell jokes about being a father, about his son and daughter, but up on stage, its the political stuff that ends up getting most of the laughs in spite of his best efforts.

Even though Im not trying to do Trump jokes, I end up doing Trump jokes, he sighed. But Im exhausted of Trump jokes.

Originally posted here:

Is Donald Trump Funny? - POLITICO Magazine

Donald Trump doesnt scare Washington anymore.

That was the lesson from a week of stinging defeats for the President, from the halls of Congress to the homepage of Breitbart. Not long ago, Trump could tank a companys stock price with a Twitter blast and cow Republican allies into silence when he trampled political norms.

But these days, Trump doesnt have much juice in the capital.

The President was disengaged throughout much of the Senates dramatic fight over healthcare reform, even though his administration made the repeal of the Affordable Care Act its first big legislative priority. When Trump finally waded into the fray late in the gameafter Republican leaders had failed to rally the votes for the plan they crafted and Trump blessedhis tweeted threats failed to sway GOP Senate holdouts.

Lisa Murkowski was the primary target of Trumps ire. On Wednesday, the President took aim at the Republican senator from Alaska, tweeting that Murkowski, a moderate in her fourth term, really let the Republicans, and our country, down yesterday. Too bad! Then Trump tapped his Interior Secretary, Ryan Zinke, to ramp up the pressure. Murkowski received a phone call warning that a vote against the bill could jeopardize her states chances of getting approval from the administration on energy projects.

How did Murkowski respond? By standing her ground. First, she went public with the threat, which embarrassed the administration and led Democrats to threaten an investigation. Then she went to the Senate floor early Friday morning and cast one of the three votes required to tank the Republican repeal plan.

Sen. John McCain, whom Trump targeted for derision during the 2016 campaign, joined Murkowski and Maines Susan Collins in voting against the bill. His decisive vote followed impassioned pleas from Vice President Mike Pence and a call from Trump himself, Republican officials say.

When the President went to war on his own attorney general this week, conservative media outlets normally friendly to Trump leapt to Jeff Sessions defense instead. Breitbart News, one of Trumps top cheerleaders, called Sessions a man who embodies the movement that elected Donald Trump President. Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh criticized Trumps handling of the spat. Outside groups rallied Tea Party leaders and lawmakers to Sessions defense, and Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley publicly warned his committee would not consider another nominee for the post this year. The battles lines had been drawn, and conservatives stood on Sessions side.

Meanwhile, congressional Republicans were making life difficult for Trump on another sensitive front. Both houses of Congress voted nearly unanimously to impose new sanctions on Russia, sending a bill to Trumps desk that the White House has criticized. The move put the President in a bind: veto the billwhich Congress can override anywayand risk looking as though he was taking a soft line on Moscow in the midst of deepening investigations into whether members of his campaign colluded with Russia during the 2016 election. Or sign it and risk retaliation from President Vladimir Putin.

White House officials expect Trump to sign the legislation, but to issue a signing statement outlining his reservations on the bill. Whats clear from the vote tally is that House and Senate Republicans didnt much care about putting the President in a predicament. After all, theyd watched Trump twist arms to help get the healthcare repeal bill over the line in the House, only to turn around and call the legislation mean.

Even the military pushed pause on their commander in chiefs orders this week. In a series of tweets this week, Trump announced that transgender men and women would no longer be able to serve in the U.S. armed forces. The decree caught the Pentagon by surprise, with even the Joint Chiefs left unaware beforehand of Trumps order. The Pentagon swiftly put the burden of clarifying the policy on the White House, and informed commanders that Trumps tweets had no practical effect until that happened.

Trump remains a formidable foe. He has the bully pulpit of the presidency at his disposal and a loyal base that has largely stuck with him through the fumbles and controversies that marred his opening months in office.

But the series of sharp rebukes this week highlighted how quickly Trumps political capital has eroded. Presidents are typically near the apex of their influence in the months after an election, riding high off their inauguration and enjoying a honeymoon in the polls. But Trump is shattering convention there as well. His approval rating hasnt been north of 40% in more than a month, setting new records for unpopularity so soon into an administration.

Maybe its no wonder few people in town seem afraid of him.

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Who's Afraid of Donald Trump? Good Question. - TIME

CLAIM

A photograph shows Eric and Donald Trump Jr., sons of President Donald Trump.

A photograph purportedly showing an image of Eric and Donald Trump, Jr., the two older sons of President Donald Trump, has been circulating on social media in various forms since at least June 2017:

The image, which provides an oddly grotesque look at President Trumps olders sons, has been re-purposed in various memes to mock the First Family. For instance, it has been turned into a movie poster for Dumb and Dumber, was shared in a meme comparing the two Trumps children into to the sloth character from the movie The Goonies, and was frequently shared with the captions They look like that hyucc sound Goofy be making or Donald Trump HATES this photo of his two sons. Please dont share it.

However, this picture (despite the Getty Images watermark) is not a genuine photograph of Donald Trumps sons, but a digitally altered version of one.

The original photograph was taken on 12 November 2005, during Donald Trump, Jr.s wedding reception at his fathers Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida:

Donald Trump, Jr. pose with his brother Eric Trump after the wedding ceremony at the Mar-a-Lago Club on November 12, 2005 in Palm Beach, Florida. (Photo by C. Allegri/Getty Images)

Several subtle changes were made to the original image in order to uglify the Trump brothers. For instance, Donald Trump, Jr.s upper lip was enlarged, his bottom teeth were hidden, his right eye was moved off-center, and his left ear was lowered. Eric Trumps eyes were also widened, and some extra fat was added to his neck.

Heres a comparison of the fake image (left) and the real image (right):

Got a tip or a rumor? Contact us here.

Fact Checker: Dan Evon

Published: Jul 16th, 2017

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Is This a Real Photograph of Donald Trump's Older Sons? - snopes.com

President Trump questioned the accuracy of a new poll that shows him having the lowest approval rating of any modern president during the first six months of his term.

But Trump's Sunday tweet about the accuracy of the ABC News/Washington Post poll is questionable when the data is actually examined.

The same poll showed Hillary Clinton narrowly leading Donald Trump 47% to 43% on Nov. 7 2016 one day before the election. It was a national poll that was assessing the overall popular vote, not the victory margins in individual states. And although Clinton lost the electoral vote, she did ultimately win the popular vote 48.2% to 46.1%. That means the poll was one point off for Clinton and three points off for Trump slightly outside of the poll's 2.5 margin of error for the latter, but only by half a point.

Other polls had similar results. The NBC/WSJ poll released on Nov. 6, 2016 also had Clinton leading Trump by 4 points, 44% to 40% the final results fell outside the poll's 2.73 margin of error on both sides. The final pre-election poll conducted by CBS News/New York Times, released on Nov. 3, 2016, like the others, had Clinton leading Trump among likely voters 45% to 42%.

In fact, out of the 21 general election polls showcased by the website RealClearPolitics website on Nov. 7, 2016, only two the LA Times/USC tracking poll and the IBD/TIPP tracking poll had Trump winning the general election. The state polls listed on that website were more inaccurate, with several incorrectly predicting, for example, that Clinton would win states like Florida, Michigan and New Hampshire.

The ABC News/Washington Post poll also detected a loss in voter enthusiasm for Clinton following then-FBI Director James Comey's decision to reopen the probe into her emails in mid-October a factor Clinton has said contributed to her loss. "The change in strong enthusiasm for Clinton is not statistically significant and could reflect night-to-night variability. Still, it bears watching," the poll analysis stated on Oct. 31.

Overall, the ABC News/Washington Post poll certainly did not predict Trump's victory. But it also was more correct than the President let on in his tweet about assessing the ultimate outcome of the popular vote.

The tweet was one of several Trump sent Sunday.

He also said the"fake news" media was "distorting democracy" and brought up the revelation from WikiLeaks that Donna Brazile passed along a question from a CNN primary debate to Hillary Clinton campaign associates, claiming there was a discrepancy in coverage between this incident and Donald Trump Jr.'s meeting with a Russian lawyer.

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President Trump Just Said This Poll Was the 'Most Inaccurate' Around the Election. It Wasn't - TIME

Fueled by antipathy toward President Donald Trump and high expectations about their partys fortunes in the 2018 midterms, Democrats are lining up to run for House seats, creating crowded primary fields in some of the most competitive races in the country.

In California last week, Vietnam-era veteran Paul Kerr, who has never run for political office, jumped into the race to take on nine-term GOP Rep. Darrell Issa the richest member of Congress. Kerr, a real estate investor and a Navy veteran, is the third challenger to date seeking to defeat Issa, the high-profile former chairman of the House Oversight Committee, who barely survived a 2016 challenge.

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Issa is considered the most vulnerable of seven California GOP House members representing districts that voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016. But his colleagues have even more contenders to worry about.

Eight challengers have lined up to take on Central Valley Republican Jeff Denham. An equal number have jumped into the fray against embattled San Diego-area Rep. Duncan Hunter, the focus of a Justice Department criminal investigation regarding his alleged use of campaign funds to pay for family expenses.

Controversial Rep. Dana Rohrabacher of Huntington Beach, recently in the headlines for his own dealings with Russia, has seven Democrats contesting his reelection. Rep. Steve Knight of Palmdale has six.

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A coast away in New Jersey, Democrats sometimes hard-pressed to find candidates willing to take on entrenched Republican incumbents also have a glut of willing challengers this year in two of the state's five Republican-held districts. Those districts, which include many New York City bedroom communities, are wealthy and well-educated. Clinton narrowly won the Central Jersey-based 7th District, while Trump won the North Jersey-based 11th by a slim margin.

Its 100 percent a testament to the grass-roots energy thats showed up at town halls and events across the country, said Drew Godinich, a spokesman for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, which is pounding out press releases highlighting vulnerable GOP incumbents. In 2018, the big difference is not only the number its the quality of these challengers, he said. Trump is obviously a part of it and so is health care.

Democratic strategist Garry South, who advised presidential campaigns for Al Gore and Joe Lieberman, said the enthusiasm is especially revved-up because Democrats need only 24 seats nationally to flip to get control of the House and more than a quarter of those may be in California.

History is on their side, he argues: Over the past 20 cycles in the first term of a presidency, Republican or Democratic, the average number flipped has been 23 seats.

In New Jersey, Mike DuHaime, a veteran Republican strategist who helped lead both of Gov. Chris Christies successful gubernatorial campaigns as well as his unsuccessful presidential campaign, acknowledges the GOP has some tough work ahead.

It feels very much the reverse of what 2010 was on the Republican side, said DuHaime, whos been hired by GOP Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen. There was just an energy on the Republican side after President Obama got elected, and I feel the same energy now on the left.

Frelinghuysen has for 24 years been the epitome of a safe incumbent. With ancestral roots in state politics that stretch to the colonial era a New Jersey town is named after the familys progenitor, and a Newark thoroughfare bears the family name Frelinghuysen has not faced a serious electoral challenge in his entire congressional tenure.

In fact, when liberal filmmaker Michael Moore in 2000 sought to demonstrate the lack of competitive congressional seats, he looked to Frelinghuysens district. The filmmaker unsuccessfully tried to get a ficus tree on the ballot against the congressman, who is an heir to the Procter & Gamble fortune and chairman of the powerful House Appropriations Committee.

But now constituents are holding protests at Frelinghuysens office, some organized by a grass-roots group called NJ 11th for Change. Theyre clamoring for him to hold a town hall meeting, which he has refused to do.

Its a similar story in the Central Jersey-based 7th. Democrats say theyre surprised at just how many Democrats want a shot at GOP Rep. Leonard Lance.

Joey Novick, a progressive activist who lives in the district, organized a candidate forum in which five candidates or potential candidates showed up. Novick said he hadnt heard about anyone seeking to challenge Lance at this point in 2015.

That is sort of the interesting magic about this year, he said.

Three Democratic candidates have already declared bank executive Linda Weber, teacher Lisa Mandelblatt and attorney Scott Salmon. And at least four other people are exploring a run, including social worker Peter Jacob, who ran against Lance in 2016 and got 43 percent of the vote.

Nobody took this district seriously. We showed up. Our campaign showed up. We knew what was at stake in 2016, Jacob said. People have realized theres blood in the water now. Thats the phrase everybody is using.

South said GOP candidates across the country now find themselves hobbled by a horribly unpopular GOP president whose approval ratings are in the 30s, and a demoralized GOP base. And midterms are always a referendum on who controls the White House.

Even so, conservative author Jim Lacy, a Trump delegate to the Republican National Convention from California, said Democrats even in solidly blue California shouldnt get too cocky about their chances. He contends that the crowded Democratic primaries are a good thing for Republicans, because Democrats will train their fire on each other, leaving the eventual nominees bloodied and bruised going into the fall general election.

Democratic Party politics are just as cutthroat, if not more, than the Republicans in the state recently, Lacy said.

More primary candidates also increase the likelihood that simmering intraparty divisions between progressives and moderates will spill into the open.

The more challengers, the greater the chance the wrong challenger advances to the general, said Bill Whalen, a Hoover Institution fellow and a former aide to former California GOP Gov. Pete Wilson. Youre talking about a bunch of people competing for 40 percent of the vote. So it raises the chance youll end up with a 'Chelsea Handler' Democrat, his description of someone whos too liberal or unsuited to the local electorate.

All politics are local, especially in House races and Democrats have been learning this in special elections, Whalen said. Its not about having someone running against Donald Trump as it is having someone whos the right local fit. You have to tailor the candidate to the district.

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Trump triggers flood of Democratic candidates - Politico

One example is the mixed signals he is sending about maintaining sanctions on Russia. On Air Force One to Paris on Wednesday, he told reporters, I would not and have never even thought about taking them off.

Yet in the next breath, he confirmed that he discussed the issue briefly with Mr. Putin and left open the door to easing sanctions as part of a deal over Ukraine or Syria. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson sent a stronger message in Kiev last week when he assured Ukraines leader that sanctions wont be lifted until Russia restores Ukraines territorial integrity. The problem: Mr. Trump has overruled Mr. Tillerson before.

Last month, concerned about Mr. Trumps possible capitulation, the Senate approved, 98 to 2, legislation that would impose tough new sanctions on Russia for meddling in the 2016 election and allow Congress to block the president from lifting any sanctions in the future, including those relating to Ukraine. The bill has been stymied by partisan wrangling in the House, and the White House has tried to weaken it. Ordinarily, a president should have flexibility to lift or tighten sanctions, but Mr. Trumps intentions are so suspect that this bill has become a necessity.

With Russias oil-dependent economy in trouble, Mr. Putin wants all sanctions lifted now. His aides are also pressing Washington to return two diplomatic compounds in Maryland and New York that were seized as part of the Obama administrations response to the election meddling and were reportedly used for spying. But there is no reason to entertain these requests until Mr. Putin has pledged not to interfere in future American elections.

Mr. Trump also seemed far too solicitous in agreeing with Mr. Putin to create a joint working group on cybersecurity, an offer Mr. Trump withdrew after an avalanche of bipartisan criticism.

The bottom line is that Mr. Trumps obsequiousness has yielded few results. Russia is still occupying Crimea, which it annexed in 2014, and is intensifying the war in the east against Ukrainian government forces, despite promising in the 2015 Minsk agreement to halt the fighting. Nor has Mr. Trump persuaded Mr. Putin to increase economic pressure on North Korea, whose nuclear program is now dominating the administrations foreign policy; to stop the dangerous face-offs with American warplanes over the Baltic Sea; or to come back into compliance with the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces agreement of 1987 by withdrawing the deployment of a banned missile.

There are some hopeful signs, including a limited cease-fire in southwestern Syria. And the administration appointed a well-regarded former American ambassador to NATO, Kurt Volker, who is known for tough views on Russia, as special envoy to work with Russia on Ukraine. But on a wide range of issues, Mr. Putin seems unwilling to cooperate, and Mr. Trump doesnt much seem to care.

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A version of this editorial appears in print on July 16, 2017, on Page SR10 of the New York edition with the headline: Russia Isnt Delivering for Mr. Trump.

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Russia Isn't Delivering for Donald Trump - New York Times

President Trump spoke at a news conference in Paris on July 13 and defended Donald Trump Jr.'s meeting with a Russian lawyer. (The Washington Post)

In this occasional series, we will bring you up to speed on the biggest national security stories of the week.

Another bombshell in the growing scandal surrounding PresidentTrump and Russia landed earlythis week. On Tuesday, the presidents son Donald Trump Jr.released anemail exchange withhim and and a publicist who told him that a Russian lawyer could provide the Trump campaign with potentially damaging information about Hillary Clintonthatwas part of Russia and its governments support for Mr. Trump.

The New York Times first reported over the weekendthat Trump Jr. met with Natalia Veselnitskaya, a Russian lawyer, at Trump Tower in 2016. Then-campaign manager Paul Manafort and Trumps son-in-law, Jared Kushner, were present, as well. The president has defended his son, calling him a wonderful young man and a good boy.

Here is everything you need to know about this fast-moving story:

Who are thenew key players?

Rob Goldstone, a British music publicist for Russian pop star Emin Agalarov.Goldstone is encouraged by Agalarov to arrange a meeting between the Russian lawyer and Trump Jr., according to the emails. He sends an email to Trump Jr. in June 2016 saying that the information the Russian lawyer could provide would be interesting to Trump. The exact line in his email reads: This is obviously very high level and sensitive information but is part of Russia and its governments support for Mr. Trump.

Natalia Veselnitskaya, a Russian lawyer.Veselnitskaya was first described in Goldstones email as a Russian government lawyer. AlthoughVeselnitskaya worked in a local prosecutors office in Russia, she said she does not work for the Kremlin. In an interview with The Washington Post, Veselnitskaya defended herself by saying no one tasked her with meeting Trump Jr. and that the story is nonsense. She has also advocated for lifting economic sanctions against Russia imposed by Congress. The Kremlin has denied knowing her.

Emin Agalarov, the Russian pop star, son of real estate developerAras Agalarov. TheAgalarovsfirst met Trump in 2013, when they helped Trump bring the Miss Universe pageant to Moscow. Trump even appeared inone of the music videos by the younger Agalarov. His father tried to set up a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Trump, but it never transpired.

What was actually discussed in the meeting?

Trump Jr. said the meeting with the Russian lawyer didnt result in anything useful.

In his official statementconcerning the meeting, Trump Jr. saidVeselnitskaya made no sense and thatshe changed the topic to discuss the American adoptions of Russians and the Magnitsky Act, the piece of U.S. legislation she has been working to overturn. The law is seen as the firstgateway to lift what Moscow considers are punishingU.S. sanctions placed on Russia for its intervention in Ukraine.

Veselnitskaya told The Post that even from the start of the meeting, it was clear we were talking about two different things. In all, Trump said the meeting lasted about 20 to 30 minutes.

So why is this a big deal?

After months of speculation whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russia to win the presidential race, the emails offera stark example of thecampaign seeming eager to receive information from the Kremlin about its political opponent.

Most ethics lawyers agree that it is very unusual that a foreign government would provide this kind of informationon a rival candidate.

Typically, the research comes from scrubbing public records andlegislative histories.

Did Trump Jr. break the law?

Not necessarily, because it depends whether what Trump was offered would be considered a thing of value. U.S. law states it isillegal for campaigns to solicit or accept contributions from foreign nationals or foreign governments. The Post's David A. Fahrenthold explains: What Trump Jr. was offered might be considered a thing of value, if the information he was seeking had cost someone money to produce or if it was something that a campaign might have paid for.

Trump Jr. maintains his meeting did not produce any value.

What could Trump Jr.have done instead?

Some say the campaign should have called the FBI. During the 2000 presidential debate,Vice President Al Gores staff received a package containing stolen materials fromGeorge W. Bushs campaign. The Gore campaign contacted the bureau.

Read more:

What exactly is going on with Donald Trump Jr.? - Washington Post