Trump news — live: McCarthy denies GOP overconfident about midterms as ex-president endorses JD Vance in Ohio

Donald Trump’s social media platform Truth Social has been panned as “hilariously bad” amid several major setbacks.

Mediaite contributing editor Sarah Rumpf wrote in an opinion piece that she was given a “waitlist number of #1,285,472” after she tried to create an account on 14 March.

“I checked the app periodically over the past few weeks and that waitlist number never changed. I received no updates on how much longer I should expect to wait and no notifications when the account was finally able to be created; it just finally worked when I checked again Thursday evening,” she said, noting that what she found on the app was “even more hilariously bad than I had expected”.

Mr Trump endorsed Hillbilly Elegy author and venture capitalist JD Vance in the Ohio GOP Senate Primary on Friday evening.

“In the Great State of Ohio, the candidate most qualified and ready to win in November is JD Vance. We cannot play games. It is all about winning!” Mr Trump said in a statement.

Key Points

• Trump endorses JD Vance in Ohio GOP Senate primary

• Trump tells crowd about his weight gain and complains he ‘doesn’t have time’ to lose it

• Biden’s sister wanted ‘everything Trump had touched’ out of the White House

• Recap: Stephen Miller questioned by Jan 6 committee

• Trump’s Truth Social panned as ‘hilariously bad’ as Melania’s account goes silent

16:15 , Oliver O'Connell

Fred Upton: GOP in ‘troubled waters’ with popularity of Greene, Boebert, Gosar

16:00 , Oliver O'Connell

McCarthy denies over-confidence heading towards midterms

15:53 , Oliver O'Connell

Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy sees an “opportunity” to be Speaker of the House of Representatives if Republicans manage to take control of the lower chamber of Congress in the November’s midterms.

He emphasised on Fox News Sunday that the priority is taking back the House not his own elevation to speaker, adding “we’ll be prepared to govern”.

The GOP needs to turn five seats from blue to red to take the House and Mr McCarthy is confident they will be able to do so.

Asked if the party was being over-confident about their prospects in November, Mr McCarthy said no, pointing to President Joe Biden’s low approval rating, high inflation, and rising crime.

“Americans want, need and deserve [a] clear, common sense alternative,” said Mr McCarthy. “And that’s what’s happening with the House Republicans.”

White House Covid head says large events should go ahead

15:12 , Oliver O'Connell

White House Covid-19 response coordinator Dr Ashish Jha tells Fox News Sunday he doesn’t think events like this month’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner need to be cancelled.

He says that we’ve reached the point of the pandemic “where I think we can gather safely” provided people put in “good safeguards” such as making sure people are vaccinated, testing, and improving ventilation.

Despite concerns from GOP allies, Trump endorses longshot Republican JD Vance

15:00 , Oliver O'Connell

Former president Donald Trump endorsed author JD Vance for the Republican nomination in Ohio’s Senate race, which the best-selling author and venture capitalist hopes could revive his lagging Senate campaign.

The announcement comes after NBC News had reported on Thursday that Mr Trump was considering endorsing Mr Vance and that surrogates for other candidates – such as businessman Mike Gibbons, former Ohio GOP chairwoman Jane Timken and former treasurer Josh Mandel – intervened to try and get the former president to change his mind.

Eric Garcia reports.

Trump endorses longshot Republican JD Vance – despite concerns from GOP allies

McCarthy channels Trump on Nato

14:39 , Oliver O'Connell

In an interview on Fox News on Sunday morning House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy was asked about the 63 Republicans who voted against a resolution of unequivocal support for the Nato alliance and whether they were wrong to do so.

“No, there’s strong support for Nato moving forward — always has been,” he says before pivoting to how alliance members need to increase military spending, a line used on numerous occasions by former President Donald Trump.

Zelensky believes Biden will visit Ukraine

14:32 , Oliver O'Connell

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky tells CNN’s Jake Tapper that he believes President Joe Biden will visit Ukraine.

He adds that it is the president’s decision, but he should come as the leader of the US, pending security arrangements.

Watch: Gay Missouri Democrat confronts GOP lawmaker in emotional speech

13:30 , Oliver O'Connell

Gay Missouri Democrat confronts GOP lawmaker in emotional speech over anti-trans bill

Psaki claims Biden still may cancel some student debt

12:30 , Oliver O'Connell

White House press secretary Jen Psaki said that Joe Biden using executive action to forgive some federal student loan debt is “still on the table”, noting that he could make the decision sometime in the coming months.

According to The Hill, she made the comments during an appearance on Pod Save America after she was questioned about past comments the president made about forgiving some student loan debt.

“Yes, still on the table, still on the table,” she said, which prompted cheers from the live audience listening to the podcast.

‘Still on the table’: Psaki claims Biden still may cancel some student debt

Trump-backed Herschel Walker trailing Warnock in fundraising for Georgia Senate race

11:30 , Oliver O'Connell

Georgia Republican Herschel Walker said Friday that his U.S. Senate campaign had raised $5.5m in the first three months of 2022, a big haul that is still dwarfed by the $13.6m that Democratic incumbent Raphael Warnock raised in the same period.

A former football star, Walker is the GOP front-runner, but faces five other Republicans in the May 24 primary. A June 21 runoff, if necessary, would settle the Republican nomination.

Georgia will be a key battleground in the 2022 midterm elections to determine which party controls the US Senate. Republicans had long dominated statewide races until Georgia helped elect Joe Biden to the presidency and enabled Democrats to control the Senate by electing Warnock and fellow Democrat Jon Ossoff in a January 2021 runoff.

Walker has raised $14.6m since announcing his run. Campaign spokesperson Mallory Blount said Walker had close to $7.4m in cash.

AP

Texas Governor makes U-turn on truck inspections at US-Mexico border

10:30 , Oliver O'Connell

The White House is signalling a measure of appreciation towards Texas governor Greg Abbott after he ended the unnecessary commercial vehicle inspections that caused a significant portion of US-Mexico cross-border trade to grind to a standstill earlier this week.

In a statement to The Independent, a White House spokesperson said: “We appreciate him backing down in response to the economic harm he was causing to U.S. businesses and consumers.

Andrew Feinberg reports from Washington, DC.

Texas Governor makes U-turn on truck inspections at US-Mexico border

Biden to host ASEAN leaders for summit

09:30 , Oliver O'Connell

President Joe Biden will host leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian nations in Washington next month for a summit, the White House said Saturday.

The May 12-13 gathering is meant to demonstrate the United States’ commitment to being a partner with countries in the region.

The White House previously had announced that the summit would be held March 28-29, but the regional grouping of countries known as ASEAN sought a postponement due to scheduling concerns among some of its members.

Biden to host Southeast Asian leaders for May 12-13 summit

08:00 , Oliver O'Connell

Biden administration opens up public lands for more oil and gas drilling

06:00 , Oliver O'Connell

The Biden administration is moving ahead with the first onshore sales of public oil and gas drilling leases, the Interior Department said on Friday.

However the US government plans to sharply increase royalty rates for companies, as federal officials weigh efforts to fight climate change against pressure to bring down high gas prices.

Biden administration opens up public lands for more oil and gas drilling

Senator Mike Lee’s early work to overturn election and keep Trump in power turned to warnings

04:30 , Oliver O'Connell

Newly revealed text messages turned over to the House January 6 Select Committee show Utah senator Mike Lee initially supported former president Donald Trump’s push to install himself in the White House for a second term against the wishes of American voters, but warned that the plan could go horribly awry when none of the proof of election fraud promised by Mr Trump ever materialised.

Andrew Feinberg has the story.

Mike Lee warned that Trump’s efforts to overturn election ‘could backfire badly’

Scandal-plagued Trump-era EPA head is running for Senate

03:00 , Oliver O'Connell

The former Trump administration Environmental Protection Agency boss who resigned amid a series of bizarre scandals related to his use of federal resources is looking to return to government service as a US senator from Oklahoma.

Scott Pruitt, who ran the EPA from 2017 to July 2018 and previously served as the Sooner State’s attorney general, filed paperwork this week to run for the Senate seat being vacated by Republican Senator James Inhofe.

Mr Pruitt joins Oklahoma Representative Markwayne Mullin, ex-Oklahoma House Speaker TW Shannon, and former chief of staff to Mr Inhofe, Luke Holland, in a crowded primary field.

The GOP attorney became widely known in conservative circles during his tenure as Oklahoma’s top law enforcement official for the myriad lawsuits he filed against the Obama administration, but became a reviled figure during his time leading the EPA for his profligate spending and penchant for secrecy and grandiosity.

Read more:

Scott Pruitt, scandal-plagued Trump-era EPA head, is running for Senate in Oklahoma

Biden releases tax returns

01:30 , Oliver O'Connell

President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden on Friday marked the traditional 15 April deadline for Americans to file their federal income tax returns by releasing a copy of their own.

“With this release, the President has shared a total of 24 years of tax returns with the American public, once again demonstrating his commitment to being transparent with the American people about the finances of the commander in chief,” the White House said in a statement.

The release of the Bidens’ tax returns marked the second year in a row that the president and First Lady have put their tax documents in the public record since moving into the White House, returning to a practice dating back to the post-Watergate era which lapsed under Mr Biden’s predecessor, Donald Trump, who never released a single year of tax returns during his four years in office while falsely claiming he could not because they were under audit by the Internal Revenue Service.

Mr Biden, whose presidential salary is $400,000 per year, and Ms Biden, who works as an English professor at Northern Virginia Community College, reported a total of $610,702 in gross income on their joint tax return, $150,439 of which was returned to Mr Biden’s employer in the form of tax payments.

Andrew Feinberg reports.

Biden tax returns reveal how much money the president and first lady made last year

Biden and Clinton pollsters warn about president’s ‘spectacularly low’ numbers

Sunday 17 April 2022 00:00 , Oliver O'Connell

Multiple Democratic pollsters are sounding the alarm about President Joe Biden’s low approval ratings and how Democrats are entering dangerous political territory ahead of the midterm elections.

Former Hillary Clinton pollster Mark Penn told Fox News that Mr Biden’s numbers were “spectacularly low” approval numbers, which makes Mr Biden’s re-election “a virtual impossibility.”

“The administration has got to pivot or this is going to be a tornado of a midterms if these numbers continue to hold up,” he said. “And frankly, they’ve had month after month here to do something to turn around on inflation, on immigration, on Ukraine, on crime.”

Similarly, John Anzalone, who ran polling for Mr Biden’s 2020 campaign and is now polling for Nevada’s Democratic Governor Steve Sisolak, told Politico about the dire political terrain.

“It’s the worst political environment that I’ve lived through in 30 years of being a political consultant,” he said in the Playbook. “There’s a big difference between losing 7 and 10 seats in the House and getting your ass kicked and losing 35, 40.”

Eric Garcia reports for The Independent.\

Biden and Clinton pollsters warn about president’s ‘spectacularly low’ numbers

Trump adviser Miller grilled about Trump’s speech on Jan. 6

Saturday 16 April 2022 22:30 , Oliver O'Connell

Lawmakers pressed Stephen Miller, a top aide to former President Donald Trump, during a daylong closed-door interview about Trump’s speech at a rally that preceded the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the Capitol, according to two people familiar with Miller’s testimony.

Miller was questioned for roughly eight hours Thursday by the House committee investigating the riot, which occurred when large crowds of Trump supporters stormed the building in hopes of preventing Congress from certifying the results of the 2020 presidential election won by Democrat Joe Biden.

Miller’s appearance grew contentious at times times, particularly as he pushed back against claims that Trump’s speech contained incendiary, coded language that had spurred his supporters to act, according to two people familiar with the questioning. They spoke on condition of condition to anonymity to describe the back-and-forth during the closed interview.

That language included Trump’s repeated of the word “we” to address his supporters. At one point during the speech, Trump said: “We fight like hell. And if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.”

Miller rejected the significance of that language, the people said, arguing that personal rhetoric like that has been used in American politics going back to the Declaration of Independence and the Gettysburg Address.

Read more:

Trump adviser Miller grilled about Trump's speech on Jan. 6

Josh Mandel runs Ohio GOP Senate campaign 'through churches'

Saturday 16 April 2022 21:30 , Oliver O'Connell

Before digging into his six-egg omelet at a bustling northeast Ohio diner, Republican Senate candidate Josh Mandel stopped to bow his head.

“Bless our food, our time, our conversation, in Jesus’ name,” said Pastor J.C. Church, who joined Mandel after a campaign event at a local church. ”Amen.”

The scene encapsulated Mandel’s campaign strategy as he competes in a crowded field of Republican contenders ahead of Ohio’s May 3 primary. He is a Jewish candidate who makes no secret of his faith, but who is centering his campaign around evangelical churches as he tries to win over religious, conservative voters.

Josh Mandel runs Ohio GOP Senate campaign 'through churches'

Murkowski maintains cash advantage over Trump-backed hopeful

Saturday 16 April 2022 20:30 , Oliver O'Connell

Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski continues to have a substantial cash advantage over her opponent backed by former President Donald Trump.

Murkowski, in office since 2002, brought in more than $1.5m in the three-month period ending March 31, according to a filing with the Federal Election Commission.

Murkowski ended the quarter with $5.2m on hand with no debt, the records show.

“We are humbled by the overwhelming support our campaign continues to receive,” Nate Adams, Murkowski’s campaign manager, said in a statement Thursday when the campaign released her top-line fundraising numbers.

Republican Kelly Tshibaka, who is challenging Murkowski, raised $673,383 during the last quarter, a total that included donations from a fundraiser at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, which Trump attended, Tshibaka campaign spokesperson, Tim Murtaugh, told The Associated Press on Friday.

According to FEC records, Trump didn’t contribute to Tshibaka’s campaign during the quarter, but Murtaugh said Trump donated $5,000 in July. Factcheck.org reported the donation was made by Trump’s Save America political action committee.

As of March 31, Tshibaka had $967,600 on hand with just over $95,000 in debts.

Murtaugh said not all campaign contributions for the Mar-a-Lago event were recorded this quarter; some came in during the fourth quarter of 2021.

“Kelly Tshibaka raised more money in the first quarter of 2022 than she did in the last quarter of 2021 and she will have all the resources she needs to defeat Lisa Murkowski,” Murtaugh said in an email.

FEC records show she raised $601,447 during the final quarter of last year.

“We are very comfortable with where this race is headed,” he said.

Trump has said he would campaign for Tshibaka after vowing revenge against Murkowski, who voted to convict him in his second impeachment trial and called on Trump to resign after the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the US Capitol.

“He said that he’ll come up into a rally for us, and I think that’ll be great for voter turnout,” Tshibaka told reporters Monday after filing for office in Anchorage.

In addition to Murkowski and Tshibaka, 11 other candidates so far have filed with the state Division of Elections to run in the Senate race. None had immediately filed fundraising reports with the FEC Friday.

Under a new election system approved by Alaska voters in 2020, the top four vote-getters in the August primary, regardless of party, will advance to the November general election, where ranked-choice voting will be used.

AP

Trump-backed Herschel Walker trailing Warnock in Georgia Senate race

Saturday 16 April 2022 19:30 , Oliver O'Connell

Georgia Republican Herschel Walker said Friday that his U.S. Senate campaign had raised $5.5m in the first three months of 2022, a big haul that is still dwarfed by the $13.6m that Democratic incumbent Raphael Warnock raised in the same period.

A former football star, Walker is the GOP front-runner, but faces five other Republicans in the May 24 primary. A June 21 runoff, if necessary, would settle the Republican nomination.

Georgia will be a key battleground in the 2022 midterm elections to determine which party controls the US Senate. Republicans had long dominated statewide races until Georgia helped elect Joe Biden to the presidency and enabled Democrats to control the Senate by electing Warnock and fellow Democrat Jon Ossoff in a January 2021 runoff.

Walker has raised $14.6m since announcing his run. Campaign spokesperson Mallory Blount said Walker had close to $7.4m in cash.

AP

Texas Governor makes U-turn on truck inspections at US-Mexico border

Saturday 16 April 2022 19:00 , Oliver O'Connell

The White House is signalling a measure of appreciation towards Texas governor Greg Abbott after he ended the unnecessary commercial vehicle inspections that caused a significant portion of US-Mexico cross-border trade to grind to a standstill earlier this week.

In a statement to The Independent, a White House spokesperson said: “We appreciate him backing down in response to the economic harm he was causing to U.S. businesses and consumers.

Andrew Feinberg reports from Washington, DC.

Texas Governor makes U-turn on truck inspections at US-Mexico border

Biden to host ASEAN leaders for summit

Saturday 16 April 2022 18:30 , Oliver O'Connell

President Joe Biden will host leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian nations in Washington next month for a summit, the White House said Saturday.

The May 12-13 gathering is meant to demonstrate the United States’ commitment to being a partner with countries in the region.

The White House previously had announced that the summit would be held March 28-29, but the regional grouping of countries known as ASEAN sought a postponement due to scheduling concerns among some of its members.

Biden to host Southeast Asian leaders for May 12-13 summit

Saturday 16 April 2022 17:50 , Oliver O'Connell

Biden administration opens up public lands for more oil and gas drilling

Saturday 16 April 2022 17:24 , Oliver O'Connell

The Biden administration is moving ahead with the first onshore sales of public oil and gas drilling leases, the Interior Department said on Friday.

However the US government plans to sharply increase royalty rates for companies, as federal officials weigh efforts to fight climate change against pressure to bring down high gas prices.

Biden administration opens up public lands for more oil and gas drilling

Texts show Utah Senator Mike Lee’s early work to overturn election and keep Trump in power

Saturday 16 April 2022 14:48 , Louise Boyle

Utah Senator Mike Lee worked on early efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, helping push legally dubious schemes to keep then-President Donald Trump in power, before he shifted course and quickly backed away, the Associated Press reports.

For the full report, follow the link here.

Murkowski maintains cash advantage over Trump-backed hopeful

Saturday 16 April 2022 21:34 , Oliver O'Connell

Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski continues to have a substantial cash advantage over her opponent backed by former President Donald Trump.

Murkowski, in office since 2002, brought in more than $1.5m in the three-month period ending March 31, according to a filing with the Federal Election Commission.

Murkowski ended the quarter with $5.2m on hand with no debt, the records show.

“We are humbled by the overwhelming support our campaign continues to receive,” Nate Adams, Murkowski’s campaign manager, said in a statement Thursday when the campaign released her top-line fundraising numbers.

Republican Kelly Tshibaka, who is challenging Murkowski, raised $673,383 during the last quarter, a total that included donations from a fundraiser at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, which Trump attended, Tshibaka campaign spokesperson, Tim Murtaugh, told The Associated Press on Friday.

According to FEC records, Trump didn’t contribute to Tshibaka’s campaign during the quarter, but Murtaugh said Trump donated $5,000 in July. Factcheck.org reported the donation was made by Trump’s Save America political action committee.

As of March 31, Tshibaka had $967,600 on hand with just over $95,000 in debts.

Murtaugh said not all campaign contributions for the Mar-a-Lago event were recorded this quarter; some came in during the fourth quarter of 2021.

“Kelly Tshibaka raised more money in the first quarter of 2022 than she did in the last quarter of 2021 and she will have all the resources she needs to defeat Lisa Murkowski,” Murtaugh said in an email.

FEC records show she raised $601,447 during the final quarter of last year.

“We are very comfortable with where this race is headed,” he said.

Trump has said he would campaign for Tshibaka after vowing revenge against Murkowski, who voted to convict him in his second impeachment trial and called on Trump to resign after the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the US Capitol.

“He said that he’ll come up into a rally for us, and I think that’ll be great for voter turnout,” Tshibaka told reporters Monday after filing for office in Anchorage.

In addition to Murkowski and Tshibaka, 11 other candidates so far have filed with the state Division of Elections to run in the Senate race. None had immediately filed fundraising reports with the FEC Friday.

Under a new election system approved by Alaska voters in 2020, the top four vote-getters in the August primary, regardless of party, will advance to the November general election, where ranked-choice voting will be used.

AP

Scott Pruitt, scandal-plagued Trump-era EPA head, is running for Senate in Oklahoma

Saturday 16 April 2022 05:30 , Andrew Feinberg

The former Trump administration Environmental Protection Agency boss who resigned amid a series of bizarre scandals related to his use of federal resources is looking to return to government service as a US senator from Oklahoma.

Scott Pruitt, who ran the EPA from 2017 to July 2018 and previously served as the Sooner State’s attorney general, filed paperwork this week to run for the Senate seat being vacated by Republican Senator James Inhofe.

Mr Pruitt joins Oklahoma Representative Markwayne Mullin, ex-Oklahoma House Speaker TW Shannon, and former chief of staff to Mr Inhofe, Luke Holland, in a crowded primary field.

The GOP attorney became widely known in conservative circles during his tenure as Oklahoma’s top law enforcement official for the myriad lawsuits he filed against the Obama administration, but became a reviled figure during his time leading the EPA for his profligate spending and penchant for secrecy and grandiosity.

Read more:

Scott Pruitt, scandal-plagued Trump-era EPA head, is running for Senate in Oklahoma

Biden releases tax returns for second year of presidency

Saturday 16 April 2022 04:45 , Andrew Feinberg

US President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden on Friday marked the traditional 15 April deadline for Americans to file their federal income tax returns by releasing a copy of their own.

“With this release, the President has shared a total of 24 years of tax returns with the American public, once again demonstrating his commitment to being transparent with the American people about the finances of the commander in chief,” the White House said in a statement.

The release of the Bidens’ tax returns marked the second year in a row that the president and First Lady have put their tax documents in the public record since moving into the White House, returning to a practice dating back to the post-Watergate era which lapsed under Mr Biden’s predecessor, Donald Trump, who never released a single year of tax returns during his four years in office while falsely claiming he could not because they were under audit by the Internal Revenue Service.

Mr Biden, whose presidential salary is $400,000 per year, and Ms Biden, who works as an English professor at Northern Virginia Community College, reported a total of $610,702 in gross income on their joint tax return, $150,439 of which was returned to Mr Biden’s employer in the form of tax payments.

Read more:

Biden releases tax returns for second year of presidency

Biden and Clinton pollsters warn about president’s ‘spectacularly low’ numbers

Saturday 16 April 2022 04:03 , Eric Garcia

Multiple Democratic pollsters are sounding the alarm about President Joe Biden’s low approval ratings and how Democrats are entering dangerous political territory ahead of the midterm elections.

Former Hillary Clinton pollster Mark Penn told Fox News that Mr Biden’s numbers were “spectacularly low” approval numbers, which makes Mr Biden’s re-election “a virtual impossibility.”

“The administration has got to pivot or this is going to be a tornado of a midterms if these numbers continue to hold up,” he said. “And frankly, they’ve had month after month here to do something to turn around on inflation, on immigration, on Ukraine, on crime.”

Similarly, John Anzalone, who ran polling for Mr Biden’s 2020 campaign and is now polling for Nevada’s Democratic Governor Steve Sisolak, told Politico about the dire political terrain.

“It’s the worst political environment that I’ve lived through in 30 years of being a political consultant,” he said in the Playbook. “There’s a big difference between losing 7 and 10 seats in the House and getting your ass kicked and losing 35, 40.”

Read more:

Biden and Clinton pollsters warn about president’s ‘spectacularly low’ numbers

Trump adviser Miller grilled about Trump's speech on Jan. 6

Saturday 16 April 2022 03:03 , AP news wire

Lawmakers pressed Stephen Miller, a top aide to former President Donald Trump, during a daylong closed-door interview about Trump’s speech at a rally that preceded the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the Capitol, according to two people familiar with Miller’s testimony.

Miller was questioned for roughly eight hours Thursday by the House committee investigating the riot, which occurred when large crowds of Trump supporters stormed the building in hopes of preventing Congress from certifying the results of the 2020 presidential election won by Democrat Joe Biden.

Miller’s appearance grew contentious at times times, particularly as he pushed back against claims that Trump’s speech contained incendiary, coded language that had spurred his supporters to act, according to two people familiar with the questioning. They spoke on condition of condition to anonymity to describe the back-and-forth during the closed interview.

That language included Trump’s repeated of the word “we” to address his supporters. At one point during the speech, Trump said: “We fight like hell. And if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.”

Miller rejected the significance of that language, the people said, arguing that personal rhetoric like that has been used in American politics going back to the Declaration of Independence and the Gettysburg Address.

Read more:

Trump adviser Miller grilled about Trump's speech on Jan. 6

White House says it’s glad Texas Gov Abbott ‘backing down’ over border inspection ‘stunt’

Saturday 16 April 2022 01:45 , Andrew Feinberg

The White House is signalling a measure of appreciation towards Texas governor Greg Abbott after he ended the unnecessary commercial vehicle inspections that caused a significant portion of US-Mexico cross-border trade to grind to a standstill earlier this week.

In a statement to The Independent, a White House spokesperson said: “We appreciate him backing down in response to the economic harm he was causing to U.S. businesses and consumers.

“Even in the face of a global pandemic and Putin’s war in Ukraine, Americans are getting back to work and able to support themselves and their families with good-paying jobs. Elected officials should build on this recovery, not thwart it by causing additional problems,” the spokesperson said.

Mr Abbott, who has built a political brand on stymying the Biden administration’s efforts to roll back Donald Trump’s border policies, imposed the inspections by Texas state police officers last week after the Centers for Disease Control announced an end to the use of Title 42, a public health law which had allowed Border Patrol agents to expel South and Central American migrants without asylum proceedings due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Though inspection of trucks entering the US for contraband and unauthorised passengers is the responsibility of US Customs and Border Protection and Mr Abbott has no authority to enforce federal immigration law, Mr Abbott nonetheless ordered state troopers to check all commercial vehicles for narcotics and illegal migrants.

Read more:

White House glad Texas Gov Abbott ‘backing down’ after border inspection ‘stunt’

Ted Cruz shares video of Biden looking confused as conservatives push narrative president is unfit to serve

Saturday 16 April 2022 00:15 , Gino Spocchia

Texas Senator Ted Cruz added fuel to the conservative narrative that Joe Biden is unfit for office by sharing a video of the president looking confused and appearing to shake thin air following a speech in Pennsylvania this week.

Mr Biden, who was addressing the ongoing supply chain and inflation issues at the North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, immediately turned around from the podium and stuck his hand out on Thursday.

Republicans and conservative commentators – who have long called Mr Biden’s age a barrier to the presidency – said the so called incident was an example of his allegedly declining mental state.

That included the conservative news website The Washington Free Beacon, who Mr Cruz retweeted on Thursday night in apparent agreement, and with a “side eyes” emoji.

“After Biden finished his speech, he turned around and tried to shake hands with thin air and then wandered around looking confused,” the website said. Mr Cruz offered only the emoji as added commentary.

Read more:

Ted Cruz pushes narrative Biden is unfit to serve with video of him looking confused

Senator Mike Lee warned that Trump’s efforts to overturn election ‘could backfire badly’ after initially backing them, text messages reveal

Friday 15 April 2022 23:02 , Andrew Feinberg

Newly revealed text messages turned over to the House January 6 Select Committee show Utah senator Mike Lee initially supported former president Donald Trump’s push to install himself in the White House for a second term against the wishes of American voters, but warned that the plan could go horribly awry when none of the proof of election fraud promised by Mr Trump ever materialised.

Mr Lee, a Republican who once served as a law clerk for US Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito, first encouraged then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows to find a way to overturn the 2020 election results on 7 November, the day President Joe Biden was declared the winner of the 2020 election by most news outlets.

The Utah Republican sent Mr Meadows a series of text messages offering “unequivocal support” for Mr Trump and his allies to “exhaust every legal and constitutional remedy at [their] disposal” in order to “restore Americans faith in our elections”.

At the time, no serious allegations of fraud had emerged, but Mr Trump had been claiming the election had been stolen from him since the night of the 3 November election.

Still, Mr Lee told Mr Meadows: “This fight is about the fundamental fairness and integrity of our election system. The nation is depending upon your continued resolve”.

Read more:

Mike Lee warned that Trump’s efforts to overturn election ‘could backfire badly’

Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Greene pay $25k to firm linked to lawyer behind Trump ‘coup memo’

Friday 15 April 2022 22:30 , Eric Garcia

Right-wing firebrand Representatives Marjorie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz paid a combined more than $25,000 in the last two years to a legal group tied to the lawyer who devised a plot for then-Vice President Mike Pence to overturn the election results.

The money was paid via Put America First, a fundraising organisation operated by Ms Greene and Mr Gaetz.

Ms Greene, a freshman congresswoman from Georgia, raised $1.07m in the first three months of 2022 as she heads into reelection, according to her campaign’s filing to the Federal Election Commission.

The report showed that her campaign also paid $10,000 on 14 January of this year to the Constitutional Counsel Group, which is affiliated with John C Eastman, the lawyer who concocted a plan for Mr Pence to essentially steal the presidential election results. The New York Times’s Shane Goldmacher first reported the expenditure.

Read more:

Gaetz and Greene paid $25k to firm of Trump lawyer behind ‘coup memo’

Trump endorses JD Vance in Ohio GOP Senate primary

Friday 15 April 2022 22:10 , Gustaf Kilander and Eric Garcia

Donald Trump has endorsed Hillbilly Elegy author and venture capitalist JD Vance in the Ohio GOP Senate Primary.

“MAGA patriots from across the nation are set to deliver an election landslide for Republicans that will serve as a devastating rebuke of the failures of Joe Biden and the Radical Left Democrats,” Mr Trump said in a statement on Friday evening.

“In the Great State of Ohio, the candidate most qualified and ready to win in November is JD Vance. We cannot play games. It is all about winning!” he added. “Like some others, JD Vance may have said some not so great things about me in the past, but he gets it now, and I have seen that in spades.”

“He is our best chance for victory in what could be a very tough race,” the former president said. “The Democrats will be spending many millions of dollars, but the good news is that they have a defective candidate who ran for President and garnered exactly zero percent in the polls.”

“The bottom line is, we must have a Republican victory in Ohio,” he added.

The announcement comes after NBC News had reported on Thursday that Mr Trump was considering endorsing Mr Vance and that surrogates for other candidates--such as businessman Mike Gibbons, former Ohio GOP chairwoman Jane Timken and former treasurer Josh Mandel--intervened to try and get the former president to change his mind.

Read more:

Trump endorses longshot Republican JD Vance in Ohio Senate race

Amid false 2020 claims, GOP states eye voting system upgrade

Friday 15 April 2022 21:55 , AP news wire

For years, Tennessee Democratic Senate Minority Leader Jeff Yarbro’s call to require the state’s voting infrastructure to include a paper record of each ballot cast has been batted down in the Republican-dominated Legislature.

But as false claims still swirl around the 2020 presidential election — and some GOP voters remain distrustful of voting machines — Tennessee Republican lawmakers who have held off are coming around on a paper-backed mandate. A similar scenario is playing out in some of the five other states -- four of which are Republican-led -- that do not currently have a voting system with a paper record.

The Tennessee GOP bill that is gaining traction would set a 2024 deadline for Tennessee to join the vast majority of states that already have voting systems that include a paper record of every ballot cast, so any disputed results can be verified.

Yarbro said he’ll take the change, even if he doesn’t love the impetus for it.

“I’m disappointed that it’s taken this long, and somewhat concerned over the rationale,” the Nashville lawmaker said. “But at the end of the day, this is good public policy.”

Read more:

Amid false 2020 claims, GOP states eye voting system upgrade

Walker raises $5.5M in Georgia Senate race, trailing Warnock

Friday 15 April 2022 21:15 , AP news wire

Football icon and Georgia Republican Herschel Walker said Friday that his U.S. Senate campaign had raised $5.5 million in the first three months of 2022, a big haul that is still dwarfed by the $13.6 million that Democratic incumbent Raphael Warnock raised in the same period.

Walker is the GOP front-runner, but faces five other Republicans in the May 24 primary. A June 21 runoff, if necessary, would settle the Republican nomination.

Georgia will be a key battleground in the 2022 midterm elections to determine which party controls the U.S. Senate. Republicans had long dominated statewide races until Georgia helped elect Joe Biden to the presidency and enabled Democrats to control the Senate by electing Warnock and fellow Democrat Jon Ossoff in a January 2021 runoff.

Walker has raised $14.6 million since announcing his run. His campaign did not immediately say Friday how much cash he had on hand, and Walker’s campaign had not yet filed a report with the Federal Election Commission.

Other candidates in the GOP primary include Agriculture Commissioner Gary Black, Navy veteran and former bank executive Latham Saddler, construction company owner Kelvin King, former state Rep. Josh Clark and former Army general Jonathan “Jon” McColumn. None of the Republicans had announced or filed numbers by early Friday.

Walker, a political newcomer, is a football icon who won the Heisman Trophy at the University of Georgia and went on to star in the NFL. President Donald Trump, a close friend of Walker’s, is backing his run.

Read more:

Walker raises $5.5M in Georgia Senate race, trailing Warnock

Psaki backtracks on Biden trip to Ukraine: ‘We are not sending the president’

Friday 15 April 2022 20:35 , Andrew Feinberg

President Joe Biden may say he’s ready to visit Ukraine, but White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said he won’t be going anytime soon.

On Thursday, Mr Biden told reporters he and his advisers had not yet decided on whether to dispatch a high-level emissary to Ukraine as a show of support for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Ukraine’s efforts to beat back a Russian invasion.

Asked whether he was ready to make the trip himself, Mr Biden replied: “Yeah”.

But Ms Psaki poured cold water on the idea of a presidential trip to Kyiv hours later when she appeared at a Washington, DC theatre for a live taping of the Pod Save America podcast.

Mr Biden, she said, is “ready for anything” and is “ready to go to Ukraine”.

Read more:

Psaki backtracks on Biden trip to Ukraine: ‘We are not sending the president’

Trump’s Truth Social panned as ‘hilariously bad’ as Melania’s account goes silent

Friday 15 April 2022 20:11 , Gustaf Kilander

Donald Trump’s social media platform Truth Social is struggling badly following several major setbacks.

Mediaite contributing editor Sarah Rumpf wrote in an opinion piece that she was given a “waitlist number of #1,285,472” after she tried to create an account on 14 March.

“I checked the app periodically over the past few weeks and that waitlist number never changed. I received no updates on how much longer I should expect to wait and no notifications when the account was finally able to be created; it just finally worked when I checked again Thursday evening,” she said, noting that what she found on the app was “even more hilariously bad than I had expected”.

Mr Trump himself has only posted once on the app on the day it launched.

“A consultant friend of mine sent me screenshots showing that his waitlist number had actually increased over time. It’s a fair conjecture to say that the Truth Social waitlist numbers were totally fabricated to create a perception that over a million people were wanting to join,” Ms Rumpf wrote.

She noted that former First Lady Melania Trump made ten posts, called “Truths,” around a month ago, with four of them being promotions for her “POTUS TRUMP NFT Collection”.

Ivanka Trump doesn’t have an account on the platform.

“Searching for her name brings up fewer than two dozen accounts, several of which exist only to troll her or her father, often with misogynistic content,” Ms Rumpf added.

While Donald Trump Jr and Eric Trump have accounts they often make posts that are very similar or identical to what they write on Twitter.

“Whether you love Trump or hate him, there’s just no reason to check out Truth Social. Overall, the pro-Trump content is duplicative of that available on other platforms. Trump himself isn’t posting. He isn’t even posting the press releases he’s been sending out since being excommunicated from Twitter,” Ms Rumpf wrote, adding that “the trolls are anemic and unoriginal, most of them giving up after a single-digit number of posts because there’s no entertainment in trying to tell jokes to an empty room”.

Ex-Trump aide Stephen Miller testifies for eight hours to 6 January House Committee

Friday 15 April 2022 19:45 , Gustaf Kilander

The former Trump aide and immigration hardliner Stephen Miller testified in front of the 6 January House Select Committee for eight hours.

Mr Miller spoke about if Donald Trump urged his followers to march to the Capitol ahead of the siege on Congress, The Guardian reported.

The deposition was virtual and also handled Mr Miller’s role in Mr Trump’s attempts to overturn the 2020 election.

Mr Miller was Mr Trump’s chief advisor on domestic matters and also served as the administration’s top speechwriter.

Committee members asked him about Mr Trump’s language in his speech at the Ellipse not far from the Capitol on 6 January. Mr Miller helped write the speech, according to the paper.

The committee zeroed in on the word “we” being repeatedly used in Mr Trump’s speech, thinking it could have encouraged the crowd to march on the Capitol to push Congress to not certify President Joe Biden’s election win.

“We are going to walk down Pennsylvania Avenue … and we are going to the Capitol,” Mr Trump said.

Mr Miller told the committee that the word “we” was not used in an effort to incite the crowd but was a commonly used rhetorical tool, according to The New York Times.

He claimed that the 2020 election had been stolen and his deposition momentarily grew heated, The Guardian reported.

Mr Miller was testifying in response to a subpoena following negotiations that included his lawyer.

Psaki says Peter Doocy ‘sounds like a stupid son of a b****’ because of Fox’s questions

Friday 15 April 2022 19:15 , Gustaf Kilander

White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki has said that the questions provided to Fox News reporter Peter Doocy make him “sound like a stupid son of a b****”.

During a taping of the podcast Pod Save America, Ms Psaki was asked if Mr Doocy was a “stupid son of a b****” or if he just acted like one on TV while sparring with the press secretary.

“He works for a network that provides people with questions that, nothing personal to any individual including Peter Doocy, but might make anyone sound like a stupid son of a b****,” she said.

President Joe Biden was caught on a hot mic in January calling Mr Doocy a “stupid son of a b****” after he asked a question about inflation.

Read more:

Psaki says Peter Doocy ‘sounds like a stupid son of a b****’ because of Fox questions

GOP ‘groomer’ smears are sparking a new wave of anti-LGBT+ violence: ‘This is going to lead to tragedy’

Friday 15 April 2022 18:35 , Io Dodds and Alex Woodward

Aurora was walking home past the K-Mart, listening to a podcast and minding her own business, when a stranger shoved her into the road and began to yell at her calling her a “groomer”.

There were two people, she says, one shorter and wearing a backpack, one taller and seemingly recording her with a smartphone, both hurling abuse and calling her a child predator as she crossed the street to get away.

“I’ve been transitioning for about eight or nine years now, and I have been assaulted and harassed by people on the street before. I have never been accused of sexually predatory behaviour,” says Aurora, a 34-year-old transgender woman studying to be a nurse in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She asked for her surname not to be used because she fears for her safety.

“That’s pretty devastating, because you worry when that’s happening that strangers are going to join in,” she says. “It feels like I am put into a position where I need to defend myself from allegations of such grossness, such evil behaviour, while also trying to defend a part of my identity that is innate and unchangeable.”

Aurora is one of three LGBT+ people who told The Independent that they had been harassed or attacked in public over the past two weeks by strangers who accused them, with no provocation or evidence, of “grooming” children or being a “groomer”.

Read more:

The GOP ‘grooming’ smear is sparking a new wave of anti-LGBT+ violence

Trump impeachment witness mocks ex-president’s ‘word vomit’ over Putin and says he’s ‘spiraled down mentally’

Friday 15 April 2022 17:55 , Graeme Massie

A witness from Donald Trump’s impeachment over Ukraine mocked the one-term president’s “word vomit” over Vladimir Putin.

Lt Col Alexander Vindman told MSNBC’s Nicole Wallace that Mr Trump, who bragged about his friendship with the Russian leader to Sean Hannity on Fox News, has “spiraled down mentally.”

“Honestly, it was word vomit, is what we heard, what that clip showed,” said Mr Vindman.

“It’s shocking that he didn’t have the intellect, the intelligence to have the self-preservation to criticize somebody that the vast majority of the American public despises and identifies as a barbarian, as a war criminal.

“So, I mean, he’s always been his own worst enemy and he continues to do so now.”

Read more:

Trump impeachment witness mocks ex-president’s ‘word vomit’ over Putin

Capitol rioter who said he was only following Trump’s orders is convicted

Friday 15 April 2022 17:15 , Andrew Feinberg

A Washington, DC jury on Thursday handed down a guilty verdict in the case of an Ohio man who claimed he was just following then-president Donald Trump’s orders when he stole a bottle of liquor and a coat rack while participating in the worst attack on the Capitol since 1814.

The jury took fewer than three hours to convict Dustin Byron Thompson of five charges, including obstructing an official proceeding, stemming from his conduct on 6 January 2021, the day a pro-Trump mob stormed the Capitol in hopes of stopping Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory.

Thompson had previously testified in his own defence and had admitted to what he described as his own “disgraceful” behaviour, telling jurors he could not believe the things he did that day, and calling the “mob mentality and group think” exhibited during the riot “very real and very dangerous”.

But Thompson had also attempted to sway the jury against conviction by borrowing a tactic made famous by Nazi defendants at Nuremberg and Vietnam-era war criminal William Calley during his trial for the My Lai massacre: He claimed he was following “presidential orders” given by then-president Donald Trump and his allies that day.

“If the president is giving you almost an order to do something, I felt obligated to do that,” he said.

Read more:

Capitol rioter who said he was only following Trump’s orders is convicted

Why are Republicans so obsessed with Hunter Biden?

Friday 15 April 2022 16:35 , Andrew Feinberg

If you’ve been following Republicans’ investigative plans if they gain control of either chamber of Congress next year, you probably haven’t heard much about proposals to address inflation or calm economic upheaval caused by Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.

Instead, prominent GOP members of the House and Senate are still fixated on President Joe Biden’s youngest and only surviving son, Hunter Biden, and plan to haul him before any number of congressional committees if they’re in control starting in 2023.

Much of what the younger Mr Biden is accused of is frequently described in the most shrill terms by Republican partisans.

Here’s a brief explainer on who he is, what Republicans have accused him of, and what about the accusations may be real.

Read more:

Why are Republicans so obsessed with Hunter Biden?

Trump tells crowd about his weight gain and complains he ‘doesn’t have time’ to lose it

Friday 15 April 2022 15:55 , John Bowden

Former President Donald Trump quipped that he doesn’t “have time to lose weight” as he told a crowd about advice given to him by Dr Mehmet Oz, the celebrity physician whose candidacy in the Pennsylvania Senate race Mr Trump endorsed on Saturday.

At an event this week, Mr Trump spoke to an indoor venue and noted that Dr Oz had urged him to lose weight in order to enjoy a healthy lifestyle.

‘Can you believe I weigh 208?’ Trump said. ‘Now maybe a little more’.

“Dr Oz has said you should lose weight. I told him, ‘I don’t have time to lose weight.’’

It wasn’t clear exactly where Mr Trump was speaking, but the event apparently took place some time after Mr Trump’s rally in North Carolina on Saturday at which he made his endorsement official.

Read more:

Trump complains about weight gain: ‘I don’t have time to lose it’

Jill Biden screamed at priest during Biden near-death experience, says new book

Friday 15 April 2022 15:15 , Namita Singh

Jill Biden once screamed at a priest for reading the last rites to Joe Biden while he was admitted in hospital after being diagnosed with an aneurysm, according to a new biography about the first lady.

President Biden, who was then a 45-year-old senator from Delaware, had been overlooking the warning signs for months and would at times take up to 10 Tylenol a day for his headaches, write the authors Jill Pace and Darlene Superville in their new book, Jill: A Biography of the First Lady.

Mr Biden would feel “sharp pain in his neck” while lifting weights at the Senate gym. One night, the pain got worse, with his right side going numb and legs feeling heavy.

Not wanting to cause concern from his wife regarding his health, he told her that he seemed to have pulled a muscle till he collapsed in a hotel room on 12 February.

The next day, Mr Biden felt nauseated and was having trouble carrying his briefcase. Eventually, his wife was notified and the future president was hospitalised in Wilmington for tests.

Read more:

Jill Biden screamed at priest during Biden near-death experience

Biden’s sister wanted ‘everything Trump had touched’ out of the White House

Friday 15 April 2022 14:35 , Gustaf Kilander

President Joe Biden’s sister Valerie Biden Owens writes in her new memoir Growing Up Biden that she wanted everything former President Donald Trump had touched out of the White House.

She was part of the team that redecorated the building as the new administration moved in.

The president’s sibling and longtime advisor writes that she wanted “everything Trump had touched out of there”.

She had the “chosen portrait” of the seventh President Andrew Jackson removed and replaced it “with one of President Franklin D Roosevelt”.

She also added “busts of MLK, Cesar Chavez, RFK, Rosa Parks—all of which reflected Joe’s understanding and reverence for the soul of this nation”.

Ms Owens writes that she wanted to remove the Resolute Desk used by Mr Trump and replace it with Mr Roosevelt’s but was unable to do so as it “resides at FDR’s family home in Hyde Park…. Thus, the desk Trump had sat behind remained”.

But that Mr Trump’s desk had also been used by Presidents Obama and John F Kennedy made her feel better about it.

“So that was certainly good enough, and went a long way toward exorcising from my mind the repugnant image of its previous occupant,” she writes.

“If ever there was a force of anti-empathy in the world, it is Donald Trump,” she states. “He is a bully, pure and simple—a narcissistic, incompetent, and incomplete man. He is the embodiment of resentment. His power comes from tapping into our baser instincts.”

She said he “appealed to our lowest common denominator” and “didn’t just represent policy failure or erratic personal behaviors; he represented something darker, more primal, more insinuating, striking deeper into the heart of what made us who we are”.

She was at first hesitant about her brother joining the campaign because she “could see the campaign Trump would run. It was as vivid as a movie. Brutal. Crass. Classless. And every time I saw that movie, I would feel sick”.

“He had the mind not of a President, but of a vengeful dictator, and running against him felt almost degrading,” she writes.

Concerning Mr Trump not attending Mr Biden’s inauguration, Ms Owens writes that “a small man does not rise to the occasion”.

‘Our democracy is in trouble’, says riot judge

Friday 15 April 2022 13:46 , Gino Spocchia

“I think our democracy is in trouble,” said US District Judge Reggie Walton on Thursday following the conviction of Dustin Byron Thompson, 38, of Ohio.

Thompson, who said he was “following presidential orders” from Donald Trump when he stormed the Capitol on 6 January 2021, admitted in court that his behaviour had been “disgraceful” but said the former president was at fault, as The Associated Press reported.

The judge, who did not deny Mr Trump’s role in the riot, said the defendant’s testimony was “totally disingenuous” and his conduct on 6 January 2021 “reprehensible.”

“You don’t have to choose because this is not President Trump’s trial. This is the trial for Dustin Thompson because of what he did at the Capitol on the afternoon on Jan. 6,” a prosecutor told jurors during his closing arguments on Thursday.

Thompson, who was accused of stealing a coat rack from the Capitol amid other charges, wll be sentenced at a later date.

Recap: Stephen Miller questioned by Jan 6 committee

Friday 15 April 2022 13:25 , Gino Spocchia

Stephen Miller, a former top White House aide to Donald Trump, was questioned for hours on Thursday by the congressional committee investigating 6 January 2021.

The appearance came as a surprise to many, after Mr Miller filed a lawsuit to block a subpoena for his phone records issued by the same committee. Mr Miller was interviewed virtually for about eight hours, according to a person familiar with the matter who spoke with The Associated Press. A spokesperson for the committee said the panel had no comment.

The former top Trump aide is among the latest high-profile names to speak with lawmakers investigating the US Capitol riot. Hundreds of witnesses have been interviewed and a final report is due later this year.

Trump aide Stephen Miller agrees to cooperate with Capitol riot committee

Ohio man convicted by jury for Jan 6

Friday 15 April 2022 11:31 , Gino Spocchia

An Ohio who has been convicted by a federal jury for taking part in the Capitol riot after claiming he was “following presidential orders”.

Dustin Byron Thompson, 38, was found guilty on Thursday of a number of charges that included stealing a coat rack from an office inside the Capitol building.

He was the first accused rioter to use Donald Trump as his defence, and only the third to face a trial by jury.

“Everyone agrees that Donald Trump is culpable as an overall narrative. Lots of people were there and then went home. Dustin Thompson did not,” a jury told The Associated Press outside the court.

Trump wanted Bill Barr to be impeached

Friday 15 April 2022 10:48 , Gino Spocchia

Donald Trump has said how he told Attorney General Bill Barr to investigate baseless voter fraud claims in 2020 so he could “be impeached”.

He told Fox News’s Sean Hannity: “I said, ‘Look, get impeached. I went up at lot in the polls when I got impeached. You have to get impeached, maybe.’”

Mr Barr declined to investigate Mr Trump’s election fraud claims because there was zero evidence to support them. He was strongly rebuked by Trump supporters for not doing so.

Trump says he wanted Barr to get himself impeached over bogus election fraud claims

Child at Trump rally upsets parents

Friday 15 April 2022 10:17 , Gino Spocchia

A child attending a Trump rally in North Carolina last week appeared to surprise and upset his parents after he said he was excited see Joe Biden.

His parents, who were excited to see Donald Trump, quickly asked the children to correct themselves and said “Trump!”.

The video was shared by the Right Side Broadcasting Network (RSBN), known for Trump rally skits, and has since been viewed millions of times.

Kid at Trump rally says on TV that he’s excited to see Joe Biden

Republicans decision on host cities for 2024 and 2028 conventions likely this year

Friday 15 April 2022 09:47 , Sravasti Dasgupta

Republicans have reportedly narrowed their search to Milwaukee and Nashville as potential hosts for their 2024 nominating convention.

On Wednesday the Republican National Committee (RNC) passed a new rule to allow the party to begin selecting its presidential convention sites six years in advance.

The move allows party officials to decide both the 2024 and 2028 convention locations this year.

The site reveal for the 2032 nominating convention would be made in 2026.

In a statement to CNN, RNC chairwoman Ronna McDaniel said: “Giving our Site Selection Committee the opportunity to start looking at cities seven years ahead of Convention is a smart business decision that will ensure the best possible event as our delegates select the Republican-nominee for President.”

The site selection committee is expected to announce a decision in August, when RNC members are due to gather for their next meeting.

Two of Trump's White House lawyers meet House committee

Friday 15 April 2022 08:41 , Sravasti Dasgupta

Two of former president Donald Trump’s White House lawyers met the House committee investigating last January’s Capitol Riot on Wednesday.

Pat A. Cipollone, the former White House counsel, and Patrick F. Philbin, who was his deputy, met separately with the panel, reported The New York Times citing sources.

It is not clear how much information the two provided to the panel or what they said.

While the two were not under oath and the meeting was only semi-formal, they could return later for a formal interview or deposition.

Their meeting with the panel comes as the National Archives gets ready to release additional documents from the Trump administration after president Joe Biden declined to allow his predecessor to exert executive privilege over them.

Former Trump aide Stephen Miller grilled for 8 hrs by House panel

Friday 15 April 2022 06:54 , Sravasti Dasgupta

Stephen Miller, former adviser to Donald Trump in the White House, testified virtually for around eight hours before the House select committee investigating last year’s Capitol insurrection.

Mr Miller, who became the latest Trump official to appear before the committee, had earlier resisted attempts including by suing to block the committee from forcing him to hand over documents and meet for an interview.

During the interview Mr Miller reportedly remained a difficult witness at times, a source said to CNN.“It got a little chippy,” the source was quoted as saying.

The source added that executive privilege issues came up during the meeting.

In its subpoena to Mr Miller the House Committee had said he had “participated in efforts to spread false information about alleged voter fraud in the November 2020 election, as well as efforts to encourage state legislatures to alter the outcome of the November 2020 election by appointing alternate slates of electors.”

South Carolina Representative Tom Rice adds to Republican war chest as he faces Trump-backed foe

Friday 15 April 2022 06:33 , Sravasti Dasgupta

Representative Tom Rice of South Carolina brought in nearly $342,000 during the first quarter of this year as he attempts to stave off a slew of primary challengers including one endorsed by Donald Trump.

Overall, Rice has raised $1.6 million this campaign cycle and has $2 million total on hand, according to figures provided to The Associated Press.

Last week, Representative Nancy Mace told AP that she had raised nearly $1 million in the weeks following Mr Trump’s endorsement of Katie Arrington, one of her GOP challengers.

In the 7th District, Mr Trump has endorsed Representative Russell Fry against Mr Rice.

92 per cent or $315,700 of Mr Rice’s first quarter haul has come after Mr Trump’s endorsement of Mr Fry, according to Mr Rice’s campaign.

A long time supporter of the former president, Mr Rice has campaigned with him and voted 94 per cent of the time in favour of Trump-backed legislations.

However he was in favour of Mr Trump’s impeachment after what he referred to as the former president’s inaction during last year’s Capitol Hill riot.

Ohio Republicans attempt to stop Trump's Vance endorsement

Friday 15 April 2022 05:25 , Sravasti Dasgupta

As JD Vance looks to be on the cusp of receiving Donald Trump’s endorsement for Ohio’s Senate race, Republicans in the state are reportedly attempting to stave off an endorsement from the former president.

Dozens of local GOP officials sent a letter to the former president against endorsing Mr Vance, reported Politico.The letter has been signed by county GOP chairs and members of the Ohio GOP State Central Committee.

The letter cited Mr Vance’s past criticism of the former president and listed his comments against Mr Trump, including: “Trump’s actual policy proposals, such as they are, range from immoral to absurd.”

“While we were working hard in Ohio to support you and Make America Great Again, JD Vance was actively working against your candidacy,” the letter states.

It also added that Mr Vance did not support Mr Trump in 2016 and said that “he referred to your supporters as ‘racists.’”

ICYMI: Stephen Miller appears before January 6 committee

Friday 15 April 2022 05:16 , John Bowden

A top White House aide to Donald Trump at least partially reversed course and appeared before the January 6 committee on Thursday, declining to take the path of total resistance to the panel that other former Trump officials have taken.

Stephen Miller, Mr Trump’s former speechwriter and strategist, spoke with lawmakers on Thursday. His participation comes after he previously sued to block lawmakers from obtaining his phone records.

Read more in The Independent:

Trump aide Stephen Miller agrees to cooperate with Capitol riot committee

Trump-backed House candidate faces backlash from Tennessee Republicans

Friday 15 April 2022 04:50 , Sravasti Dasgupta

Morgan Ortagus, a former State Department spokesperson who has been endorsed by Donald Trump, is facing a backlash from her Republican colleagues in Tennessee to keep her out of the race for the Republican primary for Tennessee’s 5th Congressional District.

Ms Ortagus is facing questions over whether she passes a new residency requirement for congressional candidates.Ms Ortagus only moved to the Nashville area last year from Washington DC, reported CNN.

Tennessee GOP representative Mark Green told CNN that the bill establishing a residency requirement was intended “to get rid of Morgan Ortagus”.

Her allies are suing the state over the residency bill and working to overturn a separate effort by some state GOP officials to remove her from the ballot.

Mr Trump’s spokesperson Taylor Budowich has hit out at “RINOS (Republicans in name only) in Tennessee who are trying to pull strings and illegally remove President Trump’s endorsed candidate ... from the ballot.”

He claimed that it was an attempt by “power-hungry insiders ... to deprive voters of the opportunity to elect the strong America First champion”.

“Morgan is going to keep doing the work and be out there pounding pavement and talking to folks because that is who she feels should make the decision, not politicians,” a spokesperson for Ms Ortagus said.

ICYMI: Trump to reportedly endorse underdog JD Vance in Ohio

Friday 15 April 2022 04:15 , John Bowden

Ohio’s Senate race is in for a major upheaval as an underdog (but still competitive) candidate, JD Vance, looks to be on the cusp of receiving Donald Trump’s endorsement.

The effect it will have on the race is unclear as the presumed GOP frontrunner, Josh Mandel, was also strongly vying for the support of the former president.

Mr Trump’s endorsement is his second drawing criticism from his own allies in recent days; supporters in Pennsylvania were rankled after Mr Trump endorsed Dr Mehmet Oz over David McCormick, a hedge fund executive.

Read more from The Indpendent’s Eric Garcia:

Trump reportedly endorsing JD Vance in Ohio Senate race

RNC unanimously votes to withdraw from debates

Friday 15 April 2022 03:15 , John Bowden

The Republican National Committee voted on Thursday to withdraw participation from events hosted by the Commission on Presidential Debates, citing alleged liberal bias by the organisation.

The move will have unknown consequences on the 2024 election cycle and the future of debates between Democratic and Republican candidates.

Read more in the RNC’s official statement:

Justice Department asks for more funding to pursue Jan 6 participants

Friday 15 April 2022 02:15 , John Bowden

The Department of Justice this week asked Congress to surge its funding for the purpose of devoting more resources including federal proseutors to the effort to punish those who participated in the Capitol riot. Hundreds remain awaiting charges while they continue to be suspects in the FBI’s investigation into the attack.

"Funding is critically needed to provide the USAO-DC with additional prosecutors and support personnel to respond to the increased caseload, litigation costs, and other court proceedings arising from these cases,” reads the agency’s budget request, first reported by HuffPost’s Ryan J. Reilly.

Judge in Capitol riot case excoriates Trump

Friday 15 April 2022 01:15 , John Bowden

A judge who oversaw the conviction of 38-year-old Capitol riot participant Dustin Thompson ripped in to former President Donald Trump during his remarks on Thursday after a verdict was handed down in the case.

Declaring Mr Thompson a flight risk and ordering him held without bond until sentencing, Judge Reggie Walton then turned his attention to Mr Trump and the falsehoods he spead that encouraged rioters to attack the Capitol last year.

"I think our democracy is in trouble because unfortunately we have charlatans like our former president who doesn’t in my view really care about democracy but only about power,” said the judge, according to media reports from the courtroom.

Fox News host goes on bizarre rant against refugees

Friday 15 April 2022 00:14 , John Bowden

Fox News host Jesse Watters attacked migrants from Venezuela on Thursday as he attempted to reject any sympathy that viewers may have for those searching for a better life.

Speaking on the network as the channel covered a second busload of undocumented migrants arriving outside its Washington DC studios from Texas, Mr Watters took time to criticise the clothes that a crowd of Venezuelan migrants were wearing despite supposedly freeing from a “war-torn” country. Venezuela is not at war.

He was then informed that migrants are often provided with clean clothes upon their arrival in the US.

Read more from The Independent’s Nathan Place:

Fox News host mocks clothes of Venezuelan refugees: ‘They dress so nicely!’

Kyrsten Sinema urges White House to extend Title 42

Thursday 14 April 2022 23:15 , John Bowden

Arizona centrist Sen Kyrsten Sinema, a Democrat who has broken with the White House on issues of voting rights and the Build Back Better agenda on Thursday called on the White House and the Centers for Disease Control to extend Title 42, a rule giving the Department of Homeland Security the authority to turn away asylum-seekers due to Covid fears.

Ms Sinema is one of a handful of right-leaning Democrats who have broken with the Biden administration as the president faces pressure on the issue of illegal immigration. Migrant encounters at the US-Mexico border reached record-high levels in December.

“The Administration’s extension of public health emergency authorities proves the need to delay lifting Title 42. We’re pushing for transparency and accountability to secure the border and ensure the health and safety of AZ communities and migrants,” tweeted Ms Sinema.

Capitol rioter who said Trump ordered him to do it convicted by jury

Thursday 14 April 2022 22:45 , John Bowden

A 38-year-old Ohio man whom a judge blasted as weak-minded from the bench was convicted by a jury of several charges related to participating in the Capitol riot after he told the court that he was “following presidential orders”.

Dustin Thompson admitted to entering the building after Donald Trump’s speech telling his supporters to “fight” outside the White House on January, as well as stealing some items from inside.

Read more from NBC News:

Biden says he has yet to decide on sending senior US official to Ukraine

Thursday 14 April 2022 22:15 , John Bowden

Joe Biden hasn’t made up his mind yet regarding whether he will send a top US official to Ukraine following UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s tour of Kyiv with Ukrianian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Mr Biden told reporters on Thursday that he and his team “haven’t made that decision yet,” but added that they were deliberating on that issue currently.

Read more from The Independent’s Andrew Feinberg:

Biden says he has yet to decide on sending senior US official to Ukraine

Trump ally Devin Nunes loses appeal in CNN defamation case

Thursday 14 April 2022 21:58 , John Bowden

A Trump-appointed panel of appeals court judges on Thursday upheld a ruling in favour of CNN against former California congressman Devin Nunes.

The case stemmed from the network’s characterisation of Mr Nunes as involved in efforts related to "digging up dirt" on Joe Biden and his son, Hunter. Mr Nunes previously was a member of the House Intelligence Committee.

The former congressman now works for one of Mr Trump’s media ventures. He was found to have failed to demand a retraction from the network over the claims that he opposed.

Read more from Reuters:

ICYMI: Anti-’groomer’ QAnon protests descends on Disney

Thursday 14 April 2022 21:24 , John Bowden

Right-wing protesters descended upon Disneyland on Wednesday as the culture war against children’s media that acknowledges the existence of LGBT persons continues.

Furious demonstrators harassed parkgoers on the street outside of the California theme park and vowed to encourage others to harass them online after taking their photos and promising to spread their identities publicly.

The scene was captured by NBC News’s Ben Collins in a Twitter thread. The rhetoric and actions of the demonstrators have been encouraged on right-wing media, which has turned to a full-throated embrace of QAnon conspiracies and begun labeling Democrats and even Republicans who work with them, as was the case with Sen Mitt Romney, as “pro-pedophile”.

Read more from Mr Collins’s Twitter thread here:

Eric Garcia: We have to talk about Diane Feinstein

Thursday 14 April 2022 20:45 , John Bowden

A report detailing concerns of colleagues that Sen Diane Feinstein is mentally unfit to serve in the Senate needs to be discussed seriously by the US national media, The Independent’s Eric Garcia.

“[S]hying away from doing so would be an unforgiveable error,” he writes.

Read more from Eric about the senior California senator:

Dianne Feinstein’s decline is heartbreaking — but we need to talk about it

Trump-backed candidate in Nebraska accused of groping women

Thursday 14 April 2022 20:13 , John Bowden

A Republican candidate for governor in Nebraska endorsed by Donald Trump was accused by multiple women of unwanted groping in an article published on Thursday in a local newspaper.

Charles Herbster, a frontrunner in the Republican primary for governor, has denied the allegations from eight women in the Nebraska Examiner.

Women said the incidents occurred while Mr Herbster was a beauty padgeant judge as well as during his campaign for governor.

Read more:

Charles Herbster accused of groping several women, including Nebraska senator: Report

Scrutiny on Democratic senator after home state newspaper questions if she’s ‘mentally unfit to serve'

Thursday 14 April 2022 19:55 , John Bowden

One of the Senate’s oldest members, Diane Feinstein, was the subject of debate on Twitter on Thursday as users discussed a San Francisco Chronicle article that cited the senior state senator’s own Democratic colleagues questioning whether her mental faculties were slipping.

A Demcoratic member of the House from her home state even described having to reintroduce himself to the senator multiple times in one conversation.

“She was an intellectual and political force not that long ago, and that’s why my encounter with her was so jarring. Because there was just no trace of that,” they said.

Read more at the Chronicle:

Trump is planning to endorse JD Vance in Ohio’s tight Senate race: NBC News

Thursday 14 April 2022 19:16 , John Bowden

NBC News reported on Thursday citing multiple Republican sources close to Donald Trump that the former president plans to endorse author JD Vance in Ohio’s tight Senate race.

Polls have shown Mr Vance trailing others in the race including Josh Mandel, another right-wing conservative who has vied for Mr Trump’s blessing. And Mr Mandel’s campaign reportedly did not take the news well, according to NBC.

"The Mandel people hit the roof," one Republican source told the network.

Read more:

ICYMI: GOP pollster says party mocks Trump in private

Thursday 14 April 2022 18:15 , John Bowden

Veteran pollster Frank Luntz said in an interview with The Daily Beast that New Hampshire Gov Chris Sununu’s roast of Donald Trump at the DC-based Gridiron Dinner was a symptom of a larger phenomenon within the GOP: the tendency of its members to privately mock the bombastic Trump behind the scenes.

“They won’t say it [in public], but behind his back they think he’s a child. They’re laughing at him. That’s what made [Sununu’s comments] significant,” he said.

Read more from The Independent’s Graeme Massie:

GOP pollster says party mocks ‘child’ Trump in private

Tennessee Republican cites Hitler in argument that homeless should aspire to a ‘productive life’

Thursday 14 April 2022 17:56 , John Bowden

A Tennessee state legislator justified his support for a bill targeting homeless camps on public property by citing the example of the genocidal dictator Adolf Hitler.

In a shocking set of remarks to his fellow lawmakers on the state Senate floor, he justified his support for a bill meant to drive homeless encampments away from highways and other state property by decribing the suppsedly inspiring tale of the German Nazi dictator who was responsible for the murder of millions.

“For two years, Hitler lived on the streets and practiced his oratory and his body language and how to connect with the masses, and then went on to lead a life that got him in the history books,” Senator Frank Nicely exclaimed.

Read more in The Independent from Andrew Feinberg:

GOP senator cites Hitler in argument homeless should aspire to ‘productive life’

ICYMI: Texas Governor Abbott buses migrants from border and leaves them at Fox’s DC HQ

Thursday 14 April 2022 17:10 , John Bowden

Texas Governor Greg Abbott is going forward with his plan to bus undocumented migrants to Washington DC despite concerns from most legal experts regarding his total lack of authority to do so.

The Texas Republican’s administration oversaw the first arrival of a busload of undocumented migrants to the nation’s capital on Wednesday; the bus arrived at the headquarters of right-leaning network Fox News.

Read more from The Independent:

Texas Governor Abbott buses migrants from border and leaves them at Fox’s DC HQ

Trump aide Stephen Miller reverses and agrees to cooperate with Capitol riot committee

Thursday 14 April 2022 16:04 , John Bowden

Stephen Miller, a former top aide in the Trump White House, will testify before the Jan 6 committee today. It’s a huge reversal for Mr Miller, who has sought to keep lawmakers on the committee from obtaining his phone records, and shows how even some of Donald Trump’s fiercest allies fear the wrath of the Justice Department.

Read more from The Independent:

Trump aide Stephen Miller agrees to cooperate with Capitol riot committee

Trump told Barr: Get impeached

Thursday 14 April 2022 15:37 , John Bowden

Former President Donald Trump turned to Fox News to excoriate his former attorney general over a wide range of issues, and shared some advice he gave the former head of the US Justice Department.

“I said: ‘Look, get impeached. I went up a lot in the polls when I got impeached. You have to get impeached, maybe.’ But he was so afraid of being impeached that he refused to do his job,” Trump said on Fox News.

Read more from Business Insider:

Elon Musk shocks Twitter, offers to buy platform

Thursday 14 April 2022 15:09 , John Bowden

Tesla CEO Elon Musk made an offer to buy Twitter on Thursday.

His potential purchase of the site is seen by some as an effort to push for weaker content moderation across social media. Doing so could allow or encourage former President Donald Trump to return to the site.

Read more from The Independent’s Andrew Feindberg

Trump ally’s latest stab at congressional districts would disenfranchise Black Democratic lawmaker

Thursday 14 April 2022 14:18 , John Bowden

A top ally of Donald Trump in the GOP is leading up his state’s redistricting proccess. The partisan battle is likely to have at least one casualty: Democratic Rep Al Lawson, who could see his seat split up.

Mr Lawson’s seat is one of many oddly-shaped districts thanks to past gerrymandering in the US, and currently he represents a 200-mile-long stretch of the state.

““We are not going to have a 200-mile gerrymander that divvies up people based on the color of their skin. That is wrong,” claimed Florida’s governor, Ron DeSantis.

Read more from the Associated Press:

DeSantis congressional map tears up Black rep's district

UPenn professor tells Tucker Carlson ‘Blacks’ resent ‘Western peoples’ and India is a ‘s***hole’

Thursday 14 April 2022 13:00 , Maroosha Muzaffar

A Pennsylvania professor is facing a fierce backlash after she made a series of comments attacking non-white Americans in an interview with Tucker Carlson.

Read the full story here:

UPenn professor tells Tucker Carlson ‘Blacks’ resent ‘Western peoples’

ICYMI: Trump flexes massive fundraising haul in bid to oust Georgia’s Republican governor

Thursday 14 April 2022 12:15 , Maroosha Muzaffar

Former president’s fundraising eclipses both major parties.

Read the full story here:

Trump flexes massive fundraising haul to oust Georgia’s GOP governor

Trump PAC gives $500,000 to attack Georgia's Brian Kemp

Thursday 14 April 2022 11:55 , Maroosha Muzaffar

Former President Donald Trump’s political action committee has given $500,000 to a group that is running attack ads in Georgia against Republican Gov. Brian Kemp.

Read the full story here:

Trump PAC gives $500,000 to attack Georgia's Brian Kemp

ICYMI: Trump returning to Ohio for GOP rally ahead of May 3 primary

Thursday 14 April 2022 09:30 , Maroosha Muzaffar

Former President Donald Trump is returning to Ohio to try to boost Republican candidates and turnout ahead of the 3 May primary.

Mr Trump will headline an evening rally at the Delaware County Fairgrounds in Delaware, north of Columbus, on 23 April — certainly to stump for US House candidate Max Miller, his pick for the 7th Congressional District, and perhaps for US Senate or governor choices he is yet to make, the Associated Press reported.

Read the full story here:

Trump returning to Ohio for GOP rally ahead of May 3 primary

ICYMI: Trump says he ‘probably wouldn’t have any interest’ in returning to Twitter

Thursday 14 April 2022 07:45 , Maroosha Muzaffar

Donald Trump has said that he wouldn’t go back to Twitter if his ban was lifted during an interview in which he also boasted about Hispanic support for the Republican Party.

Read the full story here:

Trump says he ‘probably wouldn’t have any interest’ in returning to Twitter

Trump White House chief of staff stripped from North Carolina voter rolls, under investigation for voter fraud

Thursday 14 April 2022 07:00 , Maroosha Muzaffar

A top White House aide who was part of the effort to overturn the 2020 election is now himself under investigation for voter fraud and was stripped from the voter rolls in his home state of North Carolina this week.

Read the full story here:

Trump chief of staff purged from NC voter rolls, under investigation for voter fraud

Trump flexes massive fundraising haul in bid to oust Georgia’s Republican governor

Thursday 14 April 2022 06:00 , Maroosha Muzaffar

Former President Donald Trump appears to be making good on his promise to force disloyal GOP politicians to face the might of his fundraising juggernaught, writes John Bowden.

Read the full piece here:

Trump flexes massive fundraising haul to oust Georgia’s GOP governor

Trump’s former chief of staff says The Rock could win GOP 2024 nomination

Thursday 14 April 2022 05:40 , Johanna Chisholm

What do Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and South Carolina Senator Tim Scott all have in common?

If you find yourself drawing a blank, don’t beat yourself up. Mick Mulvaney, perhaps the only person who could manage to sandwich these figures into the same thought, will have surprised some Politico readers on Wednesday when the former Trump chief of staff listed those three as the only nominees capable of upsetting the former president’s run at re-election in 2024.

“DeSantis could give him a run for his money. Tim Scott can give him a run for his money. Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson could give him a run for his money,” Mr Mulvaney, now a pundit for CBS, told Politico’s Playbook.

Read more:

Trump’s former chief of staff says The Rock could win GOP 2024 nomination

GOP pollster says party mocks ‘child’ Trump in private

Thursday 14 April 2022 05:00 , Maroosha Muzaffar

A Republican pollster says that the party mocks Donald Trump as a “child” in private and is “laughing” at the one-term president.

Frank Luntz made the comment in the wake of New Hampshire’s Republican governor, Chris Sununu, telling the annual Gridiron Club dinner that Mr Trump is “f***ing crazy.”

Read the full story here:

GOP pollster says party mocks ‘child’ Trump in private

Trump says he ‘probably wouldn’t have any interest’ in returning to Twitter

Thursday 14 April 2022 04:30 , Gustaf Kilander

Donald Trump has said that he wouldn’t go back to Twitter if his ban was lifted during an interview in which he also boasted about Hispanic support for the Republican Party.

Mr Trump also told SiriusXM’s Americano Media people would be “very happy” about his plans for the 2024 election, which he said would be made public after the midterms in the fall.

“I’ll tell you this: I think a lot of people are going to be happy. I’ll announce it after the midterms, but a lot of people are going to be very happy,” Mr Trump told La Política.

He also claimed credit for Hispanic support for the GOP in the interview obtained by Fox News Digital.

“I think we really have a relationship … I think I started it and did very well in 2016. We did much better in almost every way – as you know I got 12 million more votes in the second election in 2020. But we did really well with the Hispanics,” he said.

Read more:

Trump says he ‘probably wouldn’t have any interest’ in returning to Twitter

Texas Governor Abbott buses migrants from border and leaves them at Fox’s DC HQ

Thursday 14 April 2022 03:15 , John Bowden

Texas Governor Greg Abbott is going forward with his plan to bus undocumented migrants to Washington DC despite concerns from most legal experts regarding his total lack of authority to do so.

The Texas Republican’s administration oversaw the first arrival of a busload of undocumented migrants to the nation’s capital on Wednesday; the bus arrived at the headquarters of right-leaning network Fox News, which was the first to report on the scene and had a story published within minutes of their arrival.

The building also houses C-SPAN and NBC News’s offices, but Fox’s coverage touted news of the event as an “exclusive” while NBC did not publish an article on the subject until after noon on Wednesday.

The White House has blasted Mr Abbott’s efforts as a publicity stunt. State officials do not have legal authority outside of their own jurisdiction, and it’s not clear if the group of migrants that arrived on Wednesday did so with the cooperation, consent or knowledge of Washington DC city officials.

The Biden administration recently announced that the CDC would rescind the Title 42 authority granted under the Trump administration to turn away asylum-seekers at the border, a move which Republicans argue is going to further drive illegal migration and asylum claims, which are legal but require a person to be physically present at the US border or inside the country for claims to be processed.

Read more:

Texas Governor Abbott buses migrants from border and leaves them at Fox’s DC HQ

‘Idea that’ Trump is ‘invincible among Republicans is far from proven,’ political science professor says

Thursday 14 April 2022 02:02 , Gustaf Kilander

Political science professor Jonathan Bernstein wrote in an opinion piece for Bloomberg that the idea that Donald Trump is “invincible among Republicans is far from proven”.

Dr Bernstein went on to note that Mr Trump’s 2016 nomination was “narrow” and that it was “aided by all sorts of odd events” and “a fair amount of luck”.

“He also has an electoral record now, and it’s not exactly an impressive one; after all, he lost re-election, and Republicans lost the House (in 2018) and the Senate (in 2020) while he was in office,” the professor wrote.

“His tantrum over losing the presidency and his false claims about fraud have widely been credited for the loss of two Senate seats in Georgia. Republicans may trust Trump more on policy than they once did, but they should have even less confidence that he’ll be a team player now,” he added.

This could all mean “more opposition from party actors” in 2024 compared to previous races.

“None of this is to say that Trump won’t be the nominee,” Dr Bernstein concluded. “It’s just a case for uncertainty.”

Trump supporters trick airport workers to page fake passengers at airports

Thursday 14 April 2022 00:45 , Gustaf Kilander

Trump supporters are tricking airport workers to page fake passengers at airports, according to The Daily Beast.

The new trend comes after years of conservatives fighting mask mandates on planes and involves tricking airport staff into paging fake passengers with names that sound like right-wing memes, such as “Let’s go Brandon”, which is code for “f**k Joe Biden”.

Daily Beast political reporter Will Sommer said the trend is a sign of “the prankishness of the American right right now”.

He added that one of the more well-known pranksters “does it and has his little snicker at the Cinnabon”.

“These videos rack up tens of thousands of views,” he said.

Ingraham says Trump and Hannity endorsing Dr Oz was a ‘mistake'

Wednesday 13 April 2022 23:30 , Gustaf Kilander

Fox News host Laura Ingraham has said that she thinks that fellow Fox Anchor Sean Hannity and Donald Trump endorsing Mehmet Oz for senate in Pennsylvania was a mistake.

On Tuesday night, Ms Ingraham said she couldn’t support Dr Oz because of his previous statements on guns and abortion.

She ran a short clip on her programme showing the celebrity doctor questioning that a fetus has a heartbeat at the age of six weeks.

Alongside former Trump aide Kellyanne Conway, they said that Dr Oz has never rejected his previous comments. He has said that he’s pro-life.

“A Trump endorsement, and waving the Trump flag, doesn’t make you Donald Trump,” Ms Conway said.

Mr Trump “did something I don’t see Oz doing” on the issue of abortion – “he’s had a conversion”, she added.

“Hannity, I believe, endorsed Oz … I think it was a mistake. I’m not afraid to say it. It was a mistake to endorse Oz,” Ms Ingraham said.

Trump to host Ohio rally as race to replace retiring senator heats up

Wednesday 13 April 2022 22:12 , Gustaf Kilander

Donald Trump will hold a rally in Ohio as the race to replace retiring GOP Senator Rob Portman is intensifying.

The rally will be held on 23 April in Delaware, a town north of the state capital of Columbus.

The GOP candidates are competing for Mr Trump’s endorsement in the race. Fighting for his support are the author and venture capitalist JD Vance, businessman Mike Gibbons, the previous state Treasurer Josh Mandel as well as the former Ohio Republican Chair Jane Timken.

Most polls have shown a tight race so far.

Democrats have largely stepped in line behind Representative Tim Ryan, one of many Democrats who ran for president in 2020.

Trump PAC throws money on Georgia governor’s race

Wednesday 13 April 2022 21:02 , Gustaf Kilander

The political action committee of Donald Trump, Save America PAC, has transferred half a million dollars to a PAC aiming to unseat Georgia GOP Governor Brian Kemp.

It’s Mr Trump’s first large financial stake in a midterm race, according to Politico.

People close to Mr Trump say it’s an initial cash boost as the campaign nears the 24 May primary between Mr Kemp and former Senator David Perdue, who has been endorsed by Mr Trump.

Mr Trump’s PAC has more than $110m on hand, meaning it’s one of the wealthiest political organisations.

Book reveals Trump put McConnell in tight spot as GOP leader scrambled to win Georgia senate runoffs

Wednesday 13 April 2022 20:35 , Gustaf Kilander

After the 2020 election, Donald Trump was sure he could overturn the results, telling then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell that he had been speaking to officials in Pennsylvania and Michigan, states that Joe Biden won, who told him that they would be able to keep Mr Trump in the White House.

“I’ve been calling folks in those states and they’re with us,” Mr Trump said, according to a new book by New York Times political reporters Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns.

A CNN excerpt details how Mr Trump’s false claims put Mr McConnell in a tight spot while he was trying to focus on the two Senate runoffs in Georgia, both of which were later won by Democrats.

Mr McConnell stayed quiet about Mr Trump’s lies to try to stop him from ruining the GOP’s chances in Georgia, the book – This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden, and the Battle for America’s Future – states.

“We’ve got to stay focused on Georgia,” Mr McConnell told colleagues after getting off the phone with Mr Trump.

“What it looks to me like he’s doing is setting this up so he can blame the governor and the secretary of state if we lose,” Mr McConnell told the reporters. “He’s always setting up somebody to blame it on.”

Click here to read the full blog on The Independent's website