Category Archives: Donald Trump

Former President Donald Trump angrily lashed out Wednesday, calling the nations legal system a broken disgrace after a judge ruled he must answer questions under oath next week in adefamation lawsuitlodged by a writer who says he raped her in the mid-1990s.

He also called the 2019 lawsuit by E. Jean Carroll, a longtime advice columnist for Elle magazine, a hoax and a lie.

The outburst late in the day came hours after U.S. District Judge Lewis A. Kaplan in Manhattan rejected a request by his lawyers to delay a deposition scheduled for Oct. 19.

Kaplan is presiding over the case in which Carroll said Trump raped her in the dressing room of a Manhattan Bergdorf Goodman store in the mid-1990s. He called the lawsuit a complete con job.

I dont know this woman, have no idea who she is, other than it seems she got a picture of me many years ago, with her husband, shaking my hand on a reception line at a celebrity charity event, Trump said.

She completely made up a story that I met her at the doors of this crowded New York City Department Store and, within minutes, swooned her. It is a Hoax and a lie, just like all the other Hoaxes that have been played on me for the past seven years, he said.

Then he grumbled: Now all I have to do is go through years more of legal nonsense in order to clear my name of her and her lawyers phony attacks on me. This can only happen to Trump!

Carroll is scheduled to be deposed on Friday.

Columnist E. Jean Carroll leaves federal court, on Feb. 22, 2022, in New York. Former President Donald Trump will have to answer questions under oath next week in a defamation lawsuit lodged by the writer, who says he raped her in the mid-1990s. (Larry Neumeister/AP)

Roberta Kaplan, Carrolls attorney, said she was pleased with the judges ruling and looked forward to filing new claims next month and moving forward to trial with all dispatch after New York state passed the Adult Survivors Act, allowing her to sue for damages for the alleged rape without the statute of limitations blocking it.

After Trumps statement was released, a spokesperson for Kaplans firm, Kaplan Hecker & Fink, said the latest statement from Donald Trump obviously does not merit a response.

Trumps legal team has tried various legal tactics to delay the lawsuit and prevent him from being questioned by Carrolls attorneys. But Judge Kaplan wrote that it was time to move forward, especially given the advanced age of Carroll, 78, and Trump, 76, and perhaps other witnesses.

The defendant should not be permitted to run the clock out on plaintiffs attempt to gain a remedy for what allegedly was a serious wrong, he wrote.

Carrolls lawsuit claims that Trump damaged her reputation in 2019 when he denied raping her. Trumps legal team has been trying to squash the lawsuit by arguing that the Republican was just doing his job as president when he denied the allegations, including when he dismissed his accuser as not my type.

Trump doubled down on the comment in his statement Wednesday, saying: And, while I am not supposed to say it, I will. This woman is not my type! She has no idea what day, what week, what month, what year, or what decade this so-called event supposedly took place. The reason she doesnt know is because it never happened, and she doesnt want to get caught up with details or facts that can be proven wrong.

Whether Trump will remain the defendant in the original lawsuit is a key question because if Trump wasacting within the scope of his dutiesas a federal employee, the U.S. government would become the defendant in the case.

The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said in a split decision last month that Trump was a federal employee when he commented on Carrolls claims. But it asked another court in Washington to decide whether Trumps public statements occurred during the scope of his employment.

Kaplan, the judge, said Trump has repeatedly tried to delay the collection of evidence in the lawsuit.

Given his conduct so far in this case, Mr. Trumps position regarding the burdens of discovery is inexcusable, he wrote. As this Court previously has observed, Mr. Trump has litigated this case since it began in 2019 with the effect and probably the purpose of delaying it.

The judge noted that the collection of evidence for the lawsuit to go to trial was virtually concluded, except for the depositions of Trump and Carroll.

Mr. Trump has conducted extensive discovery of the plaintiff, yet produced virtually none himself, Kaplan said. Completing these depositions which already have been delayed for years would impose no undue burden on Mr. Trump, let alone any irreparable injury.

The judge also said the deposition could be useful when Carrolls lawyer next month files the new lawsuit.

Whether the rape occurred is central to the defamation claims, as well as the anticipated new lawsuit, the judge said.

Associated Press Writer Jill Colvin reported from Washington

Original post:

Donald Trump angrily lashes out after his deposition is ordered

Donald Trump lashed out angrily on Wednesday, calling the US legal system a broken disgrace after a judge ruled he must answer questions under oath next week in a defamation lawsuit lodged by a writer who says he raped her.

He also called the 2019 lawsuit by E Jean Carroll, a longtime advice columnist for Elle magazine, a hoax and a lie.

The outburst came hours after a US district judge in Manhattan, Lewis A Kaplan, rejected a request by Trumps lawyers to delay a deposition scheduled for 19 October.

Carroll says Trump raped her in the dressing room of a Manhattan Bergdorf Goodman store in the mid-1990s. He called the lawsuit a complete con job.

I dont know this woman, have no idea who she is, other than it seems she got a picture of me many years ago, with her husband, shaking my hand on a reception line at a celebrity charity event, Trump said.

She completely made up a story that I met her at the doors of this crowded New York City Department Store and, within minutes, swooned her. It is a Hoax and a lie, just like all the other Hoaxes that have been played on me for the past seven years.

Now all I have to do is go through years more of legal nonsense in order to clear my name of her and her lawyers phony attacks on me. This can only happen to Trump!

Carroll is scheduled to be deposed on Friday. Roberta Kaplan, Carrolls attorney, said she looked forward to filing new claims next month and moving forward to trial with all dispatch after New York state passed the Adult Survivors Act, allowing Carroll to sue for damages for the alleged rape without the statute of limitations blocking it.

A spokesperson for Kaplans firm said the latest statement from Donald Trump obviously does not merit a response.

Trumps lawyers have tried various tactics to delay the lawsuit and stop him being questioned by Carrolls attorneys. But Kaplan wrote that it was time to move forward, especially given the advanced age of Carroll, 78, and Trump, 76, and perhaps other witnesses.

The defendant should not be permitted to run the clock out on plaintiffs attempt to gain a remedy for what allegedly was a serious wrong, he wrote.

Carrolls lawsuit claims Trump damaged her reputation when he denied raping her. Trumps legal team has argued that he was just doing his job as president when he denied the allegations, including when he dismissed his accuser as not my type.

On Wednesday, Trump said: And, while I am not supposed to say it, I will. This woman is not my type! She has no idea what day, what week, what month, what year, or what decade this so-called event supposedly took place. The reason she doesnt know is because it never happened, and she doesnt want to get caught up with details or facts that can be proven wrong.

If Trump was acting within the scope of his duties as a federal employee, the US government would become the defendant in the original lawsuit.

The second US circuit court of appeals said last month Trump was a federal employee when he commented on Carrolls claims. But it asked another court in Washington to decide whether the public statements occurred during the scope of his employment.

Kaplan said Trump had repeatedly tried to delay the collection of evidence.

Given his conduct so far in this case, Mr Trumps position regarding the burdens of discovery is inexcusable, he wrote. As this court previously has observed, Mr Trump has litigated this case since it began in 2019 with the effect and probably the purpose of delaying it.

The judge noted that the collection of evidence for the lawsuit to go to trial was virtually concluded, except for depositions of Trump and Carroll.

Mr Trump has conducted extensive discovery of the plaintiff, yet produced virtually none himself, Kaplan said. Completing these depositions which already have been delayed for years would impose no undue burden on Mr Trump, let alone any irreparable injury.

The judge also said the deposition could be useful when Carrolls lawyer next month files the new lawsuit. Whether the rape occurred is central to the defamation claims, as well as the anticipated new lawsuit, the judge said.

Continued here:

Trump lashes out after deposition ordered in E Jean Carroll lawsuit - The Guardian US

American democracy is in peril, teetering between democracy and authoritarianism and under siege by Donald Trump, the Republican Party and the larger white right. To call them "conservative" is an insult to language.

In a recent Salon essay,historian Robert McElvaineaddressed this directly, calling out "the media's ingrained tendency to aid and abet the enemies of democracy through the careless use of language," and especially "the ubiquitous use of the word 'conservative' to describe extreme right-wing radicals and their beliefs, which only seek toconservewhite supremacy and more specifically the class or caste supremacy of a small minority of wealthy and nominally Christian white men."

Even President Biden, a career politician and a conflict-averse lifelong moderate who still yearns to "unite" America, has publicly warned that the "MAGA Republicans" which at this point means nearly all Republicans are the greatest internal threat to the country since the civil war.

America's democracy crisis is a drama of raw political power, and a nationwide campaign by the Republican fascists to end America's multiracial democracy. If they prevail,Black and brown people, most women, LGBTQ people, those with disabilities, non-Christians (or liberal Christians), immigrants, poor people and anyone else targeted as the Other more generally (and thus deemed "un-American") will literally become second-class citizens both under the law and in daily life.

Many Americans who believe they are safe from American fascism because of the color of their skin, their money or other forms of privilege will rapidly learn that their freedom, safety and quality of life will be greatly diminished as well.In a recent Salon interview, author and activist Brynn Tannehill summarized this harsh reality:

Everybody who watches a zombie movie assumes that they're going to be part of the resistance and not part of the shambling, undead brain-eating horde. All these people assume that under a fascist system they are going to be among the winners. There are many more losers in a fascist system than winners. The winners make sure that their people get taken care of first, and if you're not near the front of the line for the goodies you aren't going to get them. The vast majority of Americans are not going to be rewarded by fascism.

American fascism is not a foreign import or unimaginably alien. It is in our soil, and in many ways a continuation of this continent's long history of white supremacy and racism going back to the 17th century. Trump and the other neofascists are like political necromancers: They summoned up these dark, lingering energies and are now using them for their own purposes.

Trumpism, like other forms of neofascism and fake right-wing populism, is based on a cult of personality and pathological feelings of shared identity between the leader and the follower. Any criticism of the leader is experienced as an attack on the follower, and an existential threat to one's racial identity and core sense of self.

Trump's anger is rooted in the assumption that a rich white man is above the law and that it's a violation of the natural order for a Black woman to have any power over him.

As Donald Trump faces the real possibility of finally being held accountable for his many obvious crimes, whether those be fraud, seditious conspiracy or violations of the Espionage Act, he will incite and channel even more white rage and white tribalism. He will urge hisacolytes and followers to tear the country down rather than see him face justice. He will urge them to do so again if he or his partyare somehow defeated at the polls in the upcoming midterms or the 2024 presidential election.

Words presage action; depending on the context, words and language can be a type of violence. Donald Trump has repeatedly said that the prosecutors who are investigating him for alleged crimes in New York and Georgia all three happen to be Black are "racist," "horrible" and "mentally sick" people who are unfairly targeting him, and by extension his overwhelmingly white followers.

The assumption here is that white people, especially rich white men, are above the law and moreover that it is a violation of the natural order of things, or American "tradition," that Black people (and Black women in particular) could in any way potentially have so much power.

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AP reporter Bobby Calvan interviewed a communications scholarabout how "Trump's rhetoric has escalated, perhaps because he recognizes that some among his base are receptive to more overt racism":

"It intensifies that discourse and makes it explicitly racial," said Casey Kelly, a communications professor at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln who for years has pored over transcripts of Trump's speeches.

At a recent rally in Arizona, he said falsely thatwhite people in New York were being sent to the back of line for antiviral treatments.

And now Trump is using the investigations against him and the prosecutors behind them as "evidence of a larger systemic pattern that white people don't have a place in the future of America and he's the only one that can fight on their behalf," Kelly said.

Michael Steele, who more than a decade ago was the first African American to chair the Republican National Committee, said Trump was being Trump.

"If he can race bait it, he will. These prosecutors, these Black people are coming after me the white man," Steele said.

Trump is questioning their legitimacy, said Diana Becton, another Black district attorney who serves in Contra Costa County in the San Francisco Bay area.

"His accusations are certainly not subtle. They're frightening," Becton said. "It's like saying, we are out of our place, that we're being uppity and we are going to be put back in our place by people who look like him."

At the National Hispanic Leadership Conference last Wednesday in Miami, Trump continued with his racist victimology, telling attendees that "No other president has been harassed and persecuted like we have." He also attempted to compare the FBI search of his redoubt at Mar-a-Lago for classified documents with the compounds of drug cartels in Mexico:

They raided Mar-a-Lago, but the cartels, they have their own Mar-a-Lagos those are fine.Leave them alone. Let them continue to destroy our country.

Think how sick it is what's happening in this country.We're a country of investigations. We don't talk about greatness anymore. Everybody gets investigated. The cartels nothing's happening to them. But they go after politicians!

Trump's fundraising and other political emails repeatedly emphasize the fictional narrative that his supporters and other "real Americans" are being victimized and are under attack by "Democrats" and their supporters, including Black Lives Matter activists and "elites" who want to destroy American heritage, values, culture and traditions. (All of which are understood as white by default.)

Trump's fundraising repeatedly emphasizes the narrative that his supporters are under attack from "elites" who want todestroy American heritage, values, culture and traditions.

Such language is not a racial dog whistle or coded appeal. These are blaring sirens. Public opinion polls and other research have consistently shown that a high percentage of white Republicans believe that white people are the real "victims" of racism in America and are somehow oppressed or otherwise discriminated against because of their skin color, religion or cultural values and beliefs. There is no evidence to support such delusional fantasies.

In reality, American society from before the founding and through to the present is based upon the creation, protection, perpetuation and expansion of white privilege and other unearned advantages for those deemed to be white by birth or otherwise identified with whiteness and white power. Yet the compulsiontoward white victimology and white grievance-mongering is so powerful in the Age of Trump that a majority of Republicans and Trump supporters now believe in some version of the antisemitic "great replacement" conspiracy theory.

In a previous essay for Salon, I wrote:

Did Republicans and Trump supporters feel shame and disgust about themselves when they learned that the terrorist who killed 10 black people in Buffalo shared their delusional beliefs about white people being "replaced" or "oppressed" in America? Of course not. If anything, the Buffalo attack appears to have reinforced their commitment to protecting white privilege and white power by any means necessary.

A new Yahoo News/YouGov poll conducted ... only days after the Buffalo killings found that 61% of Trump voters believed in the central claim of the "great replacement" theory that "a group of people in this country are trying to replace native-born Americans with immigrants and people of color who share their political views." ...

According to this poll, almost three-fourths of Trump voters and more than 60% of Republicans believed the fantastical claim that "discrimination against white people has become as big a problem as discrimination against Black people in the U.S." ...

Another new poll, this one conducted in April by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) and Tulchin Research, found that while a plurality of Americans had "a positive view of the country's changing demographics," that was not true for Republicans, "a majority of whom viewed those changes not only negatively, but as a threat to white Americans."

The white supremacist mass shooting earlier this year in Buffalo represents a much larger trend in American history: White racial paranoia and feelings of white grievance and victimhood have been the fuel for massive acts of violence against Black and brown Americans. Notable examples include the end of Reconstruction and the Red Summer. Indeed, Donald Trump's coup attempt and the assault on the Capitol by his followers on Jan. 6, 2021, was a textbook white-rage attack against the very idea of multiracial democracy.

In his new book "American Midnight," historian Adam Hochschild describes these historical continuities of white supremacy and white rage:

On Memorial Day 1917, a march of some 1,000 Klansmen though the New York City borough of Queens turned into a brawl with the police. Several people wearing Klan hoods were arrested, one of them a young real estate developer named Fred Trump. Ninety years later, his sone, with similar feelings towards people of color, would enter the White House.

During Donald Trump's presidency, the forces that had blighted the America of a century earlier would be dramatically visible yet again: rage against immigrants and refugees, racism, Red-baiting, fear of subversive ideas in schools, and much more. And, of course, behind all of them is the appeal of simple solutions: deport aliens, forbid critical journalism, lock people up, blame everything on those of a different color or religion.

In his book "On the Pleasures of Owning Persons: The Hidden Face of American Slavery," anthropologist and psychiatrist Volney Gay explains how ethnic violence entrepreneurs such as Donald Trump use fear, anxiety and feelings of group victimization and aggrievement as a way to expand their power:

Because splitting is a universal form of thinking, savvy political leaders use it when necessary to advance their agenda. In this sense, many politicians are canny. They recognize their subjects' anxieties and then exploit them to increase panic, anxiety, and regression to primitive solutions. These appeals to group solidarity and to a mythic past are identical. In each instance, a dominant group fears annihilation of its way of life and its identity (or at least manufactures those anxieties in its subjects).

With the rising neofascist tide, both here and around the world, the American people are at a crossroads. They are experiencing two countervailing forces where a fascist reactionary force is pushing back with great success against centuries of positive revolutionary struggle whose aim was to create a better, more inclusive, multiracial pluralistic democracy in the United States. The American people, and white Americans in particular, now have to decide what type of nation this will be. Do we move backward into some of the worst parts of our history, or do we move forward along that long, often broken arc of progress to a better tomorrow?

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Trump and the world he made

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Donald Trump has learned how to manipulate white rage that's very dangerous - Salon

Motion for Preliminary Injunction Seeks to Stop Ongoing Fraud, Prevent Trump from Moving Assets to Evade Liability, and Appoint a Monitor to Oversee Financial Disclosures

NEW YORK New York Attorney General Letitia James took action today to stop Donald Trump and the Trump Organization from continuing to engage in the significant fraudulent and illegal business activity outlined in Attorney General James September 2022 lawsuit pending trial. In a motion for a preliminary injunction filed today, Attorney General James is seeking several measures to stop Mr. Trump and the Trump Organizations ongoing fraudulent scheme and ensure funds are available to satisfy any disgorgement award, including prohibiting the Trump Organization from transferring any material assets to another entity without court approval, requiring that any new financial disclosures to banks and insurers contain all supporting and relevant material, and asking for the appointment of an independent monitor to oversee compliance with these measures. Attorney General James is also seeking the courts permission to serve Mr. Trump and Eric Trump electronically, as both defendants and their counsels have refused to accept service of the complaints for almost a month.

Our investigation uncovered the fact that Donald Trump and the Trump Organization engaged in significant fraud to inflate his personal net worth by billions of dollars to illegally enrich himself and cheat the system, said Attorney General James. Since we filed this sweeping lawsuit last month, Donald Trump and the Trump Organization have continued those same fraudulent practices and taken measures to evade responsibility. Today, we are seeking an immediate stop to these actions because Mr. Trump should not get to play by different rules.

Since Mr. Trump and the Trump Organization became aware of the Office of the Attorney General's (OAG) investigation, they have continued to use many practices they knew to be improper or fraudulent, including on Mr. Trumps 2021 Statement of Financial Condition.

Beyond the continuation of that fraud, the Trump Organization appears to be taking steps to restructure its business to evade the reaches of OAGs lawsuit. On September 21, 2022, the same day OAG filed its lawsuit, the Trump Organization registered a new entity with the New York Secretary of State: Trump Organization II LLC. That entity is a foreign corporation that was incorporated in Delaware. The Trump Organization has since refused to provide any assurance that it will not seek to move assets out of New York to evade legal accountability.

Specifically, OAG is seeking an order that would prohibit the Trump Organization from submitting a statement of financial condition or other asset disclosure for Mr. Trump to lenders and insurers, either to satisfy existing obligations or to obtain new financing and insurance, that fails to adequately disclose the assumptions and techniques used for valuing his assets, as outlined in the complaint. The order would also prohibit the Trump Organization from transferring any material asset to a non-party affiliate or otherwise disposing of a material asset without court approval.

In order to oversee these requests, the motion seeks the appointment of an independent monitor until trial that would oversee the submission of financial disclosure information to any accounting firm compiling the 2022 Statement of Financial Condition; financial disclosures to lenders and insurers required by continuing obligations or to obtain new financing and insurance; and any corporate disposition of significant assets.

In September 2022, Attorney General James filed a lawsuit against Mr. Trump, the Trump Organization, senior management, and involved entities for engaging in years of financial fraud to obtain a host of economic benefits. The lawsuit alleges that Mr. Trump, with the help of his children Donald Trump, Jr., Ivanka Trump, and Eric Trump, and other senior executives at the Trump Organization, falsely inflated his net worth by billions of dollars to induce banks to lend money to the Trump Organization on more favorable terms than would otherwise have been available to the company, to satisfy continuing loan covenants, to induce insurers to provide insurance coverage for higher limits and at lower premiums, and to gain tax benefits, among other things. From 2011 to 2021, Mr. Trump and the Trump Organization knowingly and intentionally created more than 200 false and misleading valuations of assets on his annual Statements of Financial Condition to defraud financial institutions.

This investigation and subsequent legal action have been conducted by Senior Enforcement Counsel Kevin Wallace, Special Counsel Andrew Amer, Assistant Attorney General Colleen K. Faherty, Assistant Attorney General Alex Finkelstein, Assistant Attorney General Wil Handley, Assistant Attorney General Stephanie Torre, Special Counsel to the Solicitor General Eric R. Haren, Enforcement Section Chief Louis M. Solomon and Legal Support Analyst Samantha Stern. Additional support was provided by Assistant Attorney Generals Sherief Gaber and Matthew Conrad, Data Analyst Anushua Choudhury, Senior Data Analyst Akram Hasanov, Data Scientist Chansoo Song, Deputy Director of Research and Analytics Megan Thorsfeldt, and Director of Research and Analytics Jonathan Werberg; as well as Information Technology Specialist Hewson Chen, Information Technology Specialist Paige Podolny, and Information Technology Specialist John Roach. Appellate support was provided by Deputy Solicitor General Judith Vale and Assistant Solicitor General Eric Del Pozo. The investigationand legal action are overseen by First Deputy Attorney General Jennifer Levy.

A memorandum of law andaffirmationwere filed in this matter.

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Attorney General James Takes Action to Immediately Stop Donald Trump and the Trump Organization from Continuing Financial Fraud - New York State...

Former President Donald Trump is known to brag about and sometimes inflate the number of people in the crowd at his rallies. News photos show big crowds at recent-days ralliesin Arizona and Nevada.

But two recent Facebook posts swing in the opposite direction, claiming that his supporters abandoned him at an event.

"Trump rally just got shut down after no one shows up," read one Facebook post from Oct. 8.

The post was flagged as part of Facebooks efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook.)

A video in the post reveals that the event in question was not a rally featuring Donald Trump, but one thrown by his supporters.

The video shows an Oct. 7 Daily Beast story about a "pro-Trump rally" on the Capitol grounds that day attended by "a mere 27 individuals." The event nevertheless went on, according to the story.

Looking for reports that recent rallies that Trump appeared at were shut down, we found only old news coverage.A 2016 Politico story, for example, told the story of a planned Chicago rally that was called off amid safety concerns as protesters gathered outside.

We rate the claim that Trumps rally was recently shut down False.

Follow this link:

No, Trumps rally wasnt canceled because of poor attendance - PolitiFact

A golf course in New York run by Donald Trump's company will play host to a Saudi-backed golf tournament this week, the same day as Saudi Arabia announced it has rejected an appeal by the Biden administration to delay OPEC's recent decision to reduce oil production.

The three-day women's Aramco Team Series will begin on October 13 at Trump Golf Links in Ferry Point, New York, the second time this year a course managed by the former president's company hosted a tournament linked to Saudi Arabia.

The Aramco Team Series is separate from the Saudi-backed LIV Golf Tour, which Trump was previously criticized for hosting this summer over allegations that the tour was being used to help Saudi Arabia to get good publicity after being accused of human rights abuses.

The start of this week's tournament comes as Saudi Arabia announced that the U.S. government had formally requested that OPEC delay its recent decision on reducing oil production by a month, an appeal which was ultimately rejected.

The group of major oil-producing nations known as OPEC+, led by Saudi Arabia and Russia, confirmed on October 5 that it will dramatically reduce the amount of oil it will be producing, a move that threatens to raise gasoline prices in the U.S. just ahead of the midterms.

Biden, who will be hoping that the Democrats can hold onto control of both the House and Congress in November, saw his approval ratings plummet earlier this year amid record gas prices and rising inflation levels.

In a statement, the Saudi Foreign Ministry didn't specifically mention that the U.S. government sought a delay on the OPEC decision until early November.

"The government of the kingdom clarified through its continuous consultation with the U.S. administration that all economic analyses indicate that postponing the OPEC+ decision for a month, according to what has been suggested, would have had negative economic consequences," the ministry said.

The move to reduce oil production was seen by critics as purposely siding with Russia amid the war in Ukraine and retaliation for Biden's criticism of Saudi Arabia over their human rights violations and the murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018.

The decision to cut oil production also arrived after Biden visited Saudi Arabia for the first time as president in an attempt to keep crude oil flowing.

Earlier this year, it was reported that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman rejected a request to speak to Biden on the phone as the president tried to convince the Kingdom to pump more oil to ease the pressure of the Russian oil ban.

Biden, who called Saudi Arabia a "pariah" during his 2020 election campaign, told CNN that Saudi Arabia will face "consequences for what they've done" with regards to the OPEC+ decision.

"I'm not going to get into what I'd consider and what I have in mind. But there will be consequences," Biden said.

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Donald Trump Golfs With the Saudis as Nation Snubs Joe Biden on World Stage - Newsweek

Donald Trump was never good at keeping secretsexcept when it came to himself, his taxes, his dubious business deals. National secrets? As Maggie Haberman reminds us in her forensic examination of the Trump presidency, Confidence Man, he babbled confidential information in publicTweeting photos, joking around with Russias foreign minister. Some saw nefarious ends in this behavior while others believed he was operating with the emotional development of a twelve-year old, using the intelligence data to get attention for himself. Both explanations plus his generally sloppy handling of governance, might explain the cache of documents he illegally hauled to Mar-a-Lago.

Haberman was part of the Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times team that reported on Trumps links to Russia, but her coverage of Trump began before his election. Confidence Man is a great doorstop of a book, its nearly 600 pages a record of incompetence, duplicity and erratic behavior. With a masterly command of her subject, Haberman carefully weighs her sources and composed a highly readable, believable account of Trump from childhood through his petulant Mar-a-Lago exile.

Trump understood authoritarian personalities such as Recep Erdoan and Vladimir Putin, perhaps because he was raised by one in an atmosphere where backs were slapped and money changed hands in deals that were vulnerable to scrutiny. He became heir to the New York real estate fiefdom developed by Fred Trump and from the onset, in the 70s, his aspirations were flashier than his fathers.

The routine corruption of the Trump administration was rooted in the corruption that was his inheritance. To cite one of Habermans examples, the president and his entourage stayed whenever possible at Trump-owned hotels, renting the best rooms for staff and Secret Service and sending the bill to the federal government i.e. the taxpayers.

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Fred Trump taught his son to win at all costs, and that deeply engrained emotional reaction to failure guided his actions after losing the 2020 election to Joe Biden. Trump was willing to speak with almost anyone he thought could offer him a solution to the worst predicament he could imagine: being turned into a loser by the entire country, Haberman writes. According to her, he told an audience, Im just not going to leave the White House. Trumps sycophantic chief of staff, Mark Meadows, obstructed the normal pace of transition to the incoming Biden administration. Fortunately, others in his administration covertly frustrated his ambitions, especially Vice President Mike Pence. Concerns were voiced over Pences safety, even before the traitors stormed the Capitol calling for his death.

On January 6, the dry tinder of the conspiracy minded MAGA mob was lit by inflammatory remarks by Trump and his cronies. Watching the melee on TV, Trump told aides that perhaps Pence should be hanged. Meanwhile, Nancy Pelosi and her GOP counterpart, Kevin McCarthy, as well as Mitch McConnel, were rushed to Fort McNair until the insurrection was finally put down.

As Biden took the oath as president, Trump shuffled off to Florida from Joint Base Edwards. As he requested, a military band played Hail to the Chief as he boarded the plane but in the cold weather, some of the instruments froze. Epilogue: Donald Trump began his attempted comeback, as he had all of his previous ones, by refusing to concede that anything was wrong.

David Luhrssen lectured at UWM and the MIAD. He is author of The Vietnam War on Film, Encyclopedia of Classic Rock, and Hammer of the Gods: Thule Society and the Birth of Nazism.

Oct. 13, 2022

9:20 a.m.

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Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump, by Maggie Haberman - Shepherd Express

Donald Trump in the final days of his presidency repeatedly threatened to out government sources involved in the Trump-Russia investigation, an anti-Deep State revenge fantasy he still obsesses over to this day, according to two former senior Trump aides and another person familiar with the matter.

One of these sources tells Rolling Stone that in the days after the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, the then-president, sometimes while brandishing pieces of paper, would loudly complain that none of the identifying facts in the highly sensitive Russia documents should be blacked-out. Trump would insist, the source says, that it should all be out there so that the American people could see the truth of who did it to the president.

Ultimately, top intelligence officials and other Trump lieutenants talked him out of publicizing the sources identities before he left the White House, the sources say. Instead, Trumps team bargained him down to vetting a series of heavily redacted reports that they argued would help safeguard the work and safety of Russia-related informants.

But a third source familiar with the situation says that this obsession with outing the confidential sources is ongoing. The former president, the source says, still sporadically talks about the need to get the names out into the public record. A Trump spokesperson did not immediately respond to Rolling Stones request for comment.

As Trump faces accusations that he hoarded sensitive classified documents at his private residence in Florida, the last-minute battle over redactions highlights how his disregard for security concerns at times has even rattled aides close to him.

Trumps threats to out sources were part of a broader push during the chaotic end of his presidency. In December of 2020, as the odds against a successful overturning of the election grew longer, Trump and his chief of staff Mark Meadows pushed the Justice Department to declassify a binder full of records related to the FBIs 2016 Russia investigation. In his memoir, Meadows described himself in the final hours of the Trump presidency going line by line through the notes, memos and emails in the binder to ensure it would not inadvertently disclose sources and methods.

With hours left before President Joe Biden took office in Jan. 2021, the White House sent a presidential memo to the Director of National Intelligence, CIA director, and acting Attorney General. The memo ordering the declassification of the binder references concern from the FBI, which stated its continuing objection to any further declassification of the binder on the grounds that specific passages included Intelligence Community equities. In an apparent nod to the efforts to walk the then-president back from outing the names, the memo says his declassification order does not require the disclosure of certain personally identifiable information.

The order also exempts from declassification any material that must be protected from disclosure pursuant to orders of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, according to the memo.

At the same time, Trump gave conservative reporter John Solomon access to some of the documents. In a statement to Rolling Stone, Solomon says that on January 19, 2021, Trump allowed him on two occasions, to briefly review a stack of documents that I was told were the declassified documents and that he received a small subset of the declassified documents from the Justice Department in the mail at the time.

Through his outlet, Just The News, Solomon subsequently reported that the documents included transcripts of intercepts made by the FBI of Trump aides and a declassified copy of the final FISA warrant approved by an intelligence court. The Justice Department also mailed him a declassified transcript of FBI informant Stefan Halpers conversations with former Trump campaign advisor Carter Page and notes of an FBI interview with Christopher Steele, the former British intelligence officer who circulated a dossier with allegations about Trumps relationship with Russia, both of which featured in Solomon stories in 2021.

The binder of materials that Trump obsessed over in the waning days of his presidency was never released in full, but Trump and his allies interest in getting access to the records has continued since he left the White House.

Senators Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) wrote to the Justice Department earlier this year complaining that the department has failed to declassify a single page since Trump issued his memo. In attempting to review the documents, the senators said their staff had spent multiple days and countless hours in the Departments classified facility trying to locate documents purportedly covered by the order as Justice Department officials had failed to identify them.

Solomon, appointed as Trumps designee to the National Archives this summer, says he has continued to seek access to memos from tranche of documents but that the Archives has told him one set is not available in an easily discernible manner while another set that remains with the Justice Department awaits requested Privacy Act redactions.

Trump, meanwhile, has reportedly continued to seek the release of Russia investigation-related documents. The former president reportedly tried to barter with the National Archives to hand back presidential records held at his Mar-a-Lago residence in exchange for the release of an unspecified batch of documents he believed would reflect poorly on the FBIs 2016 Russia investigation, according to The New York Times.

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Trump Threatened to Out Confidential Sources From Russia Investigation - Rolling Stone

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This is part two of an investigation into a revolutionary money laundering system involving Chinese organized crime, Latin American drug cartels and Chinese officials, and how a major figure in the scheme managed to meet former President Donald Trump. Read part one: "How a Chinese American Gangster Transformed Money Laundering for Drug Cartels.

In July 2018, President Donald Trump met at his New Jersey golf club with a Chinese businessman who should have never gotten anywhere near the most powerful man in the world.

Tao Liu had recently rented a luxurious apartment in Trump Tower in New York and boasted of joining the exclusive Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey.

But Liu was also a fugitive from Chinese justice. Media reports published overseas three years before the meeting had described him as the mastermind of a conspiracy that defrauded thousands of investors. He had ties to Chinese and Latin American organized crime. Perhaps most worrisome, the FBI was monitoring him because of suspicions that he was working with Chinese spies on a covert operation to buy access to U.S. political figures.

Yet there he sat with Trump at a table covered with sandwiches and soft drinks, the tall windows behind them looking onto a green landscape.

A longtime Trump associate who accompanied Liu was vague about what was discussed, telling ProPublica that they talked about the golf club, among other things.

He was a climber, said the associate, Joseph Cinque. He wanted to meet Trump. He wanted to meet high rollers, people of importance.

Documented by photos and interviews, the previously unreported sit-down reveals the workings of a Chinese underworld where crime, business, politics and espionage blur together. It also raises new questions about whether the Trump administration weakened the governments system for protecting the president against national security risks.

For years, Liu had caromed around the globe a step ahead of the law. He changed names, homes and scams the way most people change shoes. In Mexico, he befriended a Chinese American gangster named Xizhi Li, aiding Lis rise as a top cartel money launderer, according to prosecution documents and interviews with former national security officials.

How a Chinese American Gangster Transformed Money Laundering for Drug Cartels

Ive been doing illegal business for over 10 years, Liu said in a conversation recorded by the Drug Enforcement Administration in 2020. Which country havent I done it in?

Liu surfaced in the U.S. political scene after Trump took office. In early 2018, he launched a high-rolling quest for influence in New York. He courted political figures at gatherings fueled by Taittinger champagne and Macanudo cigars, at meals in Michelin-starred restaurants and in offices in Rockefeller Center. He may have made at least one illegal donation to the GOP, according to interviews.

By the summer, Liu had achieved his fervent goal of meeting Trump. Two months later, he met the president again at Bedminster.

On both occasions, Liu apparently found a loophole in a phalanx of defenses designed to protect the president. The Secret Service screens all presidential visitors on official business, subjecting foreigners to intense scrutiny. In addition to their top priority of detecting physical threats, agents check databases for people with ties to espionage or crime who could pose a risk to national security or a presidents reputation.

Asked about Lius encounters with the president, the Secret Services chief of communications, Anthony Guglielmi, said, There were no protective or safety concerns associated with these dates. The Bedminster Club is a private facility, and you will have to refer to organizers when it comes to who may have been allowed access to their facilities.

The Secret Service does not have a record of Liu meeting Trump on the presidents official schedule, a Secret Service official said. Instead, the encounters apparently occurred during periods when the president did not have official business, according to the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. While staying at his clubs at Mar-a-Lago and Bedminster as president, Trump often left his living quarters to mingle with members and their guests in public areas. The Secret Service screened those people for weapons, but did not do background checks on them, current and former officials said.

Did the Secret Service know every name involved? the Secret Service official said. No. Those are called off-the-record movements, and we are worried about physical safety in those situations. We dont have the time to do workups on everybody in that environment.

As a member or a members guest, Liu could have entered the club without showing identification to the Secret Service and met with Trump, the official said. It appears, in short, that Liu avoided Secret Service background screening.

During both visits, Liu accompanied Cinque, with whom he had cultivated a friendship and explored business ventures. Cinque said that he and his guests had easy access to the president at Bedminster.

I just go in every time I want, Cinque said in an interview with ProPublica. Im with Donald 44 years. The Secret Service, they trust me. Because I got a great relation with the Secret Service and Im not gonna bring anybody bad next to Trump.

But Cinque now regrets ever having met Liu.

Hes a professional con man, Cinque said. There was a lot of flimflam with him. He conned me pretty good.

Cinque has given conflicting accounts about the July 2018 meeting. In an interview with a Chinese media outlet that year, he said Liu had spent three hours with the president. Last week, though, he told ProPublica that he had exaggerated the length of the conversation and Lius role in it.

A spokesperson for Trump and officials at the Trump Organization and Bedminster club did not respond to requests for comment. The Chinese embassy also did not respond to a request for comment.

Lius case is one of several incidents in which Chinese nationals sought access to Trump in murky circumstances, raising concerns in Congress, law enforcement and the media about espionage and illegal campaign financing.

Liu did catch the attention of other federal agencies. His political activity in New York caused FBI counterintelligence agents to begin monitoring him in 2018, ProPublica has learned, before his encounters with Trump at Bedminster. His meetings with the president only heightened their interest, national security sources said.

Then, in early 2020, DEA agents came across Liu as they dismantled the global money laundering network of his friend Li. Reconstructing Lius trail, the DEA grew to suspect he was a kind of spy: an ostentatious criminal who made himself useful to Chinese intelligence agencies in exchange for protection.

The DEA agents thought Liu could answer big questions: What was he doing with the president? Was he conducting an operation on behalf of Chinese intelligence? And what did he know about the murky alliance between Chinese organized crime and the Chinese state?

But the DEA clashed with the FBI over strategy. And by the time DEA agents zeroed in on Liu, he had holed up in Hong Kong. The pandemic had shut down travel.

If the agents wanted to solve the walking mystery that was Tao Liu, they would have to figure out a way to go get him.

This account is based on interviews with more than two dozen current and former national security officials based in the U.S. and overseas, as well as lawyers, associates of Liu and others. ProPublica also reviewed court documents, social media, press accounts and other sources. ProPublica granted anonymity to some sources because they did not have authorization to speak to the press or because of concerns about their safety and the sensitivity of the topic.

Liu grew up in comfort and privilege.

Born in 1975 in Zhejiang province, he studied business in Shanghai and began prowling the world. He accumulated wealth and left behind a trail of dubious ventures, failed romances and children, according to court documents, associates and former national security officials. He lived in Poland and Hong Kong before moving in 2011 to Mexico City, where he dabbled in the gambling and entertainment fields.

Soon he met Li, the Chinese American money launderer, who also sold fraudulent identity documents. Liu bought fraudulent Guatemalan and Surinamese documents from Li and acquired a Mexican passport, according to prosecution documents and interviews. He played a crucial early role helping Li build his criminal empire, according to former investigators.

Both men had links to the 14K triad, a powerful Chinese criminal syndicate, according to former investigators and law enforcement documents. Moving between Mexico and Guatemala, they were on the vanguard of the Chinese takeover of the underworld that launders money for the cartels.

But in 2014, Liu embarked on a caper in China. He touted a cryptocurrency with an ex-convict, Du Ling, known as the queen of underground banking, according to interviews, media reports and Chinese court documents.

It was all a fraud, authorities said. Chinese courts convicted the banking queen and others on charges of swindling more than 34,000 investors from whom they raised over $200 million.

Although accused of being the mastermind, Liu eluded arrest, according to court documents, associates and other sources. He popped up in Fiji as a private company executive promising infrastructure projects inspired by President Xi Jinpings visit months earlier to promote Chinas development initiative, according to news reports and interviews. Liu even hosted a reception for the Chinese ambassador, according to news reports.

Lius activities in Fiji fit a pattern of Chinese criminals aligning themselves with Chinas foreign development efforts for mutual benefit, national security veterans say. Liu claims corrupt Chinese officials were his partners in Fiji, but then they threw him under the bus, said his lawyer, Jonathan Simms.

After allegations surfaced about his role in the cryptocurrency scandal in China, Liu fled to Australia. Airport police there downloaded his phone and found discussions about fraudulent passports from countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America, according to Simms and other sources.

In 2016, Liu returned to Mexico. He soon obtained a U.S. business/tourist visa by making false statements to U.S. authorities about whether he was involved in crime, prosecution documents say.

Now known as Antony Liu, he was ready to make a name for himself.

Yuxiang Min is an entrepreneur in Manhattans Chinatown. For years, he has nurtured a Chinese American dream: to prosper in the herbal medicine industry by planting 16,000 acres of licorice in a desert in Chinas Gansu province.

After meeting Min in early 2018, Liu promised to make the dream a reality, Min said.

He made me believe he was very well-connected in China, Min said. And I think he was. He showed me photos of himself with top Chinese officials.

Min said one photo appeared to show Liu with Xi, Chinas president, before he took office. Between 2002 and 2007, Xi served in senior government positions in two places where Liu had lived, Zhejiang and Shanghai. But Min said he did not have the photo, and ProPublica has not confirmed its existence.

Liu rented Chinatown offices from Min, who said he helped the wealthy newcomer buy a top-of-the-line BMW and find a translator. Despite his weak English, Liu was charismatic and persuasive, associates said. He bankrolled dinners, a concert, an outing on a yacht; he flaunted the flashy details on his social media. He founded Blue Ocean Capital, an investment firm that did little actual business, according to associates, former national security officials and court documents.

He even gained access to the United Nations diplomatic community, sharing his office suite in Rockefeller Center with the Foundation for the Support of the United Nations. The foundations website says it is a nongovernmental organization founded in 1988 and that it is affiliated with the UN. A UN spokesperson confirmed that the foundation had consultative status, which gave its representatives entry to UN premises and activities.

Liu became a financial benefactor of the foundation and was named its honorary vice chairman. Through the foundation, he was able to organize a conference at UN headquarters with speakers including publishing executive Steve Forbes and former Mexican President Felipe Caldern, according to interviews, photos and media accounts.

The Bulgarian mission to the UN helped secure the venue for the event, and ambassadors from seven countries attended, according to online posts and interviews. The mission did not respond to a request for comment.

Although it is startling that someone with Lius background could play a role in hosting an event at the UN, it is not unprecedented. In past cases, wealthy Chinese nationals suspected of links to crime and Chinese intelligence have infiltrated UN-affiliated organizations as part of alleged bribery and influence operations.

Janet Salazar, the president of the foundation, did not respond to phone calls, texts or emails. Efforts to reach foundation board members were unsuccessful. Emails to Salazar and the foundation in New York bounced back.

UN officials did not respond to queries from ProPublica about what vetting Liu received, if any.

We are not aware of the story of Mr. Tao Liu, the UN spokesperson said.

Caldern said in an email that he was invited through a speakers bureau to give a talk on sustainable development. The event included Asian participants who did not appear to speak English, Caldern said, and he had little interaction with them other than posing for photos.

Forbes staff did not respond to requests for comment.

Liu also met U.S. political figures through his latest romantic partner: a Chinese immigrant with contacts of her own. She introduced him to Flix W. Ortiz, then the assistant speaker of the New York State Assembly, who socialized with the couple on several occasions.

Ortiz, a Democrat who formerly represented Brooklyn, did not respond to requests for comment.

Because Liu was not a legal resident, U.S. law barred him from contributing to political campaigns. But he attended political events, according to photos, social media and associates. He also met with two veteran GOP fundraisers in the Asian community, Daniel Lou and Jimmy Chue.

He was interested in political donations and fundraising, Lou said in an interview. He wanted to participate. He was willing to help politicians here. Thats for sure.

Lou said he did not engage in fundraising with Liu. In an email, Chue said he knew of no illegal activities related to Liu. He declined to comment further.

On April 27, 2018, Lius friend Min contributed $5,000 to the New York Republican Federal Campaign Committee, campaign records show. In reality, Liu told Min to make the donation and paid him back, Min said in an interview.

Min said he received the money in cash and did not have evidence of the alleged reimbursement. But if his account is true, it appears that Liu funneled a political donation illegally through Min, a U.S. citizen.

The New York GOP did not respond to emails, phone calls, or a fax seeking comment.

As he built his profile in Manhattan, Liu made it clear to associates that he was eager to meet Trump. For help, he turned to Cinque, the longtime Trump associate, according to interviews, photos and social media posts.

Cinque, 86, heads the American Academy of Hospitality Sciences, which gives international awards to hotels, restaurants and other entities. It has given at least 22 awards to Trump ventures, including the Bedminster club, and it once billed Trump as its Ambassador Extraordinaire.

Cinque has a colorful past. In 1990, he pleaded guilty to receiving stolen property, a valuable art collection, according to press reports. A profile in New York Magazine in 1995 quoted him discussing his interactions with wiseguys and a shooting that left him with three bullet wounds.

In 2016, Trump told the Associated Press that he didnt know Cinque well and was unaware of his criminal record. In an article in Buzzfeed, Cinques lawyer said his client had no connection to the mob.

Liu dined with Cinque in May 2018 and they hit it off, according to photos and Lius associates. Cinque said he could make an introduction to the president, a close associate of Liu said.

Cinque told ProPublica that people in the Chinese American community introduced him to Liu, describing him as a wealthy entrepreneur and a good person. Liu impressed Cinque with his luxury car and entrepreneurial energy. He said they could make a lot of money by pursuing a lucrative cryptocurrency venture, Cinque said.

Liu and Cinque got together more than a dozen times, according to social media photos and interviews. At a June gala at the Harvard Club to launch Lius company, Cinque gave him a Six Star Diamond Award for lifetime achievement an award he had previously bestowed on Trump.

He was gonna pay me big money for giving him the award, Cinque said. So I did an award. I didnt check his background, Im not gonna lie to you.

Liu indicated he would pay as much as $50,000 for the honor, but he never actually paid up, Cinque said.

Liu followed a familiar playbook for well-heeled foreigners seeking access to Trump, according to national security officials: pour money into his properties.

In July, Cinque helped Liu rent a one-bedroom apartment above the 50th floor in Trump Tower by providing a credit report to the landlord as a guarantor, according to Cinque, a person involved in the rental and documents viewed by ProPublica. Liu paid a years worth of the $6,000 monthly rent upfront. Cinque believes Liu chose Trump Tower in an effort to gain favor with the president.

Liu also told friends he joined the Bedminster golf club, three associates said. Liu told Min he paid $190,000 for a VIP membership, Min said.

But Cinque doesnt think Liu genuinely became a member. In fact, he said he brought Liu to Bedminster partly because Cinque hoped to impress Trump by persuading his well-heeled new friend to join the club.

I was trying to get him to join, where I look good in Trumps eyes if he joined, Cinque said. But he said Liu never gave 5 cents. He was a deadbeat.

On July 20, CNBC aired an interview with Trump in which he complained about the trade deficit with China.

We have been ripped off by China for a long time, Trump said.

By the next day, Lius efforts to gain access to the president had paid off. He met Trump at Bedminster, according to interviews and photos obtained by ProPublica.

The images show the president with Liu and Cinque at a table covered with food, drinks and papers. Three other men are at the table. Trump also posed for photos with Liu and Cinque.

Liu was discreet about the conversation, according to Min. Cinque did most of the talking because of Lius limited English, Lius close associate said.

ProPublica found a few details in an interview of Cinque by SINA Finance, a Chinese media outlet. In the video posted that September, Cinque and a manager of his company announced a business partnership with Liu involving blockchain technology and the hospitality industry. And then Cinque said he had introduced Liu to the president at Bedminster.

Antony Liu played a big role, Cinque told the SINA interviewer. Donald met him, and he wound up staying with him for three hours, just enjoying every moment.

The video displayed a photo of the president with Liu and Cinque during the visit.

Cinque and Lius companies posted a shorter version of the interview on their social media pages. That video omitted the reference to Liu meeting Trump and the photo of the three of them.

In the interview with ProPublica, Cinque gave a distinctly different version than the one he gave to the Chinese outlet. He said he brought Liu along because Liu implored him for the opportunity of a meeting and photo with Trump. Cinque also said he exaggerated the truth when he said Liu spent three hours with the president.

The meeting lasted maybe twenty minutes, a half hour, Cinque said.

Cinque was vague about the topic of the conversation with the president, indicating it had to do with the golf club and the awards he gives.

Changing his account once again, he insisted that Liu did not say much.

He just sat there, said Cinque, who also denied discussing Lius business deals with Trump. How I could tell anything good to Donald about him where hes gonna do a deal? First I wanted to see if I could earn anything with him.

Liu and Cinque met the president again that Sept. 22 during an event at Bedminster, according to interviews and photos. One photo shows Trump smiling with Liu, Cinque and three men who, according to a close associate, were visiting Liu from China for the occasion.

The photos appeared on the Chinese website of the Long Innovations International Group, also known as the Longchuang International Group. The consulting firm owned by Lou, the GOP fundraiser, has organized events allowing Chinese elites to meet U.S. leaders. A caption with the photos said: Longchuang Group and Blue Ocean expert consultant team Trump luncheon.

But Lou insists he didnt know anything about such an event. He said colleagues in China controlled his companys Chinese website.

I categorically deny I was involved in this, Lou said. I was not there. I did not know about it. Tao Liu did offer to me at one point: You are the pro-Trump leader in the community. How about organizing an event at Bedminster? ... But I did not.

Cinque, meanwhile, said he brought Liu and his visitors to the club. He disagreed with the company websites description of an event with the president.

Theres no political its a golf situation there, he said. And people love being in [Trumps] company.

Although Cinque denied receiving money from Liu for himself or the president, he said he didnt know if other visitors paid Liu for the chance to meet Trump, or if Liu made campaign donations through others.

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The Globetrotting Con Man and Suspected Spy Who Met With President Trump - ProPublica

At its hearing on Capitol Hill on Thursday, the House January 6 committee is expected to show footage of Roger Stone, shot by Danish film-makers.

According to the Washington Post, the clips will show that Stone predicted violent clashes with leftwing activists and forecast months before the 2020 vote that [Donald Trump] would use armed guards and loyal judges to stay in power.

CNN said footage also showed Stone the day before election day saying: Fuck the voting, lets get right to the violence.

So who is Roger Stone?

A Republican strategist, consultant and author, he is most often described as a self-confessed political dirty trickster and longtime Trump adviser, given to flamboyance in tailoring and swinging as well as campaign stunts.

Now 70, Stone started out as a student volunteer on Richard Nixons re-election campaign in 1972, pulling penny-ante tricks against Democrats or, in the Nixonian vernacular, ratfucking the presidents opponents.

Before Nixons downfall in 1974, amid the Watergate scandal, Stone worked for the Committee to Re-elect the President, or Creep.

After Nixon, Stone who has a tattoo of the 37th president on his back worked with Paul Manafort and Charles Black to build a Washington lobbying firm that flourished in the 1980s, often representing clients other firms might have found unsavoury.

Mobutu Sese Seko, the president of Zaire, was one. Donald Trump was another.

Stone advised Trump during his flirtation with a presidential run in 2000. In the presidential election the same year, Stone played a prominent role in stopping a recount in Florida, thereby securing the White House for George W Bush. In the mid-2000s, Stone was involved in the downfall of Eliot Spitzer, a Democratic New York governor who used prostitutes.

Stone was back at Trumps side in 2015, when he finally ran for president. Stone was fired or resigned but remained in Trumps orbit, an erratic asteroid endangering anyone in his path, during the billionaires campaign and time in power.

In 2019, Stone was indicted by Robert Mueller, the special counsel investigating Russian election interference and links between Trump and Moscow.

Stone was convicted on seven counts of lying to Congress, obstruction of justice and witness tampering, in relation to his links to Trumps campaign and to WikiLeaks, which released Democratic emails obtained by Russian hackers.

In February 2020, prosecutors recommended Stone be sentenced to between seven and nine years in prison. After Trump complained by tweet, the Department of Justice intervened, saying the recommendation was too harsh. Four prosecutors resigned in protest.

Stone was sentenced to 40 months in prison but never went to jail. In December 2020, in the midst of Trumps attempt to overturn his election defeat by Joe Biden, Trump granted Stone clemency.

In Trumps attempt to overturn the election, Stone denies working with far-right groups including the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys around the Capitol attack. But last week, such links came up at the start of the trial of the Oath Keepers leader, Stewart Rhodes, on seditious conspiracy charges.

Randall Eliason, a former federal prosecutor who teaches law at George Washington University, told the Washington Post: It seems like the prosecution is treating Stone as an un-indicted co-conspirator.

Stones decision to allow documentary film-makers to follow him in his efforts to Stop the Steal was characteristic and landed him in characteristic trouble, in the sights of the January 6 committee and the justice department. Summoned to appear before January 6 investigators, Stone repeatedly invoked his fifth-amendment right against self-incrimination.

Stone has recently teamed up with Michael Flynn, a retired general, ex-national security adviser and leading pro-Trump plotter.

In July, Sean Morales-Doyle, a Brennan Center expert on voting rights and elections, told the Guardian Stone and Flynns attempts to train Republican canvassers and poll watchers were a sham, aimed at undermining public faith in our elections and setting the stage for future attempts to subvert the will of the people.

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Who is Roger Stone, the Trump ally in the January 6 panels crosshairs? - The Guardian US