Raw Story: GOP lawmakers serve notice they won’t save Trump with a ‘stupid vote’: analyst

Despite a court stepping in late Thursday and reviving Donald Trump’s campaign of tariffs against U.S. allies, one political strategist predicted it will all fall apart in the long run and Republican lawmakers won’t be there to bail the president out.

During an appearance on MSNBC’s “Way Too Early,” former Sen. Joe Manchin (I-WV) adviser Jonathan Kott told host Ali Vitali that GOP members of Congress won’t want to admit to voters they made a “stupid vote” and will instead leave the president to fend for himself and take the blame for the economic chaos.

Let the grifter-in-chief twist in the wind! 😀

https://www.rawstory.com/trump-tariffs-stupid-vote

Raw Story: Longtime reporters ‘almost speechless’ over Trump’s ‘transparent bribery’ plot

On Friday morning, longtime Washington D.C. reporters Jonathan Lemire and Peter Baker of the New York Times, as well as conservative columnist Matt Lewis, admitted they were stunned that Republicans turned a blind eye to Donald Trump’s crypto dinner.

During a segment on the president’s much-criticized dinner at his golf club in northern Virginia that took place Thursday night, Lemire prompted guest Baker with, “I mean, you’ve covered the White House for a long time. I mean, I’m almost speechless at this. Could you imagine if Barack Obama or Joe Biden did anything like it?

“No, we couldn’t, they could –– they never did anything like this,” Baker responded. “It’s not the first presidential family that kind of profited off the White House; you can certainly find other examples of that in history. But the scale of this, the scope of this is so far beyond anything history has ever seen.”

,,,

 I don’t think the Democrats yet have the juice to take what is just transparently bribery and make it matter to the American people.”

https://www.rawstory.com/trump-crypto-dinner-almost-speechless

Raw Story: White House claim puts Trump ‘potentially outside the immunity shield’: attorney

An attempt by White House press secretary Karoline [Bimbo #1] Leavitt to blow off ethical and legal concerns about Donald Trump’s crypto dinner on Thursday night might come back to haunt her boss.

Thursday afternoon [Bimbo #1] Leavitt lectured reporters in the Brady Briefing Room about the dinner which was to include foreign investors at a Donald Trump golf resort in Virginia, telling NBC’s Garrett Haake, “Well, as you know, Garrett, this question has been raised with the president. I have also addressed the dinner tonight. The president is attending it in his personal time. It is not a White House dinner, it’s not taking place here at the White House. But certainly I can raise that question and try to get you an answer for it.”

[Bimbo #1] Leavitt’s claim of “personal time” caught the ear of multiple Trump critics.

On X, The Bulwark’s Tim Miller pointed out, “President’s don’t get ‘personal time.’ There’s not like a magic suit you wear when you are doing official business and one where you are just Donald from Queens.”

Conservative lawyer and ardent Trump opponent George Conway took the next step and suggested, “Actually, it’s fine. If Trump is saying he’s doing something on his ‘personal time,’ then obviously that means he’s not acting within what the Supreme Court calls ‘the outer perimeter of his official responsibility,’ which, in turn, means he’s not immune from criminal prosecution.”

Oops! You probably shouldn’t run your mouth so much, Karoline [Bimbo #1] Leavitt, but I understand that’s all you do, and you do it so exceptionally well. 😀

https://www.rawstory.com/trump-immunity-2672194246

Raw Story: Staffers quit over Kristi [“Bimbo #2”] Noem’s 4-hour ‘fishing expedition’ polygraphs: report

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi [“Bimbo #2”] Noem’s obsession with tracking down leakers in her department has led to an exodus of employees who would rather quit than listen to threats or be subjected to intrusive polygraph tests.

According to a report from the Wall Street Journal, the polygraphs that began back in February have continued unabated as she and top adviser Corey Lewandowski have personally singled out employees in numbers that one former official labeled “unprecedented.”

With the Journal’s Michelle Hackman and Tarini Parti labeling what is going on behind closed doors at the agency as a “fishing expedition,” they reported, “… many have said the seeming randomness has created a chilling effect inside the department.”

The report notes that some interrogations that have taken place “in a small interrogation room in Virginia with a one-way mirror,” have lasted up to four hours and that has helped lead to an exodus from the department.

https://www.rawstory.com/noem-leakers-staffers-quit

Raw Story: ‘Traitor’: FBI’s Patel and Bongino infuriate MAGA fans with Fox interview

A Fox Morning Futures interview with Donald Trump’s two top appointees to the FBI created new problems for the administration after they both stated unequivocally that accused pedophile Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide in his jail cell while awaiting trial.

“You said Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide. People don’t believe it,” host Maria Bartiromo pressed FBI Director Kash Patel and Deputy Director Dan Bongino.

If Jeffrey Epstein’s demise is causing discord among the MAGA fanbois, he’s probably more useful dead than alive.

https://www.rawstory.com/epstein-fbi-patel

Raw Story: Clause buried in GOP bill would handcuff courts as Trump’s legal battles grow

A review of the stalled Republican Party-authored House Budget Committee bill that is currently being stalled by GOP hardliners revealed a non-budgetary provision that would hand Donald Trump a powerful tool to do as he pleases.

According to a report from the Associated Press, with the Trump administration finding its hands tied by temporary restraining orders halting mass deportations without probable cause and purging of government employees put on hold, the courts would be handcuffed from enforcing their rulings.

Add to that, administration officials would be immune from being held in contempt if they ignore judges’ warnings.

Sieg, heil! Herr Trump ist der Sieg!

https://www.rawstory.com/trump-restraining-order

Raw Story: Trump DOJ plan would let it indict lawmakers who opposed him with no oversight

According to a bombshell report from the Washington Post, the Department of Justice under Attorney General Pam Bondi is considering a plan that would let federal prosecutors investigate and indict members of Congress unfettered by traditional oversight designed to stop political persecution.

Traditionally, before such an investigation could proceed, a prosecutor would have their case reviewed by the lawyers in the Justice Department’s Public Integrity Section. But that would go away under the new proposal.

The report notes that, should the proposal go into effect, “a long-standing provision in the Justice Department’s manual that outlines how investigations of elected officials should be conducted” would be shunted aside and allow possible prosecutions based purely on politics.

https://www.rawstory.com/trump-doj-political-prosecutions

Raw Story: Trump’s DOJ screwed up by rushing the ‘worst possible case’ to the Supreme Court: expert

A decision to send Solicitor General John Sauer to defend an executive order signed by Donald Trump before the Supreme Court this week was a massive mistake that could haunt the president going forward.

That is the opinion of conservative lawyer George Conway who appeared on MSNBC’s “The Weekend” Saturday morning where he was asked to weigh in by co-hosts Jonathan Capehart, Eugene Daniels and fill-in host María Teresa Kumar.

Discussing Trump’s attempts to undermine birthright citizenship enshrined by the 14th Amendment, Conway asserted the DOJ used the wrong case at the wrong time.

“This is the worst possible case and that was Justice [Elena] Kagan, former Solicitor General Kagan’s point,” he began. “To bring up to the Supreme Court on the procedural technical issue of when you can issue a nationwide injunction.”

“You want to go up on a case where you’re going to you have a chance of winning, where the court thinks that, ultimately, your position is right,” he stated.

https://www.rawstory.com/trump-supreme-court-2672034883

Raw Story: ‘Our Country, as we know it, is finished!’ Trump rages at legal setback in overnight rant

Buffeted by multiple court rulings overturning actions taken by his administration, Donald Trump took to Truth Social in the wee hours of Saturday morning to lash out at the legal system.

On Thursday, Trump-nominated U.S. District Judge Fernandez Rodriguez permanently blocked the Department of Justice and Department of Homeland Security from transferring or removing Venezuelans held under the Alien Enemies Act in the Southern District of Texas.

Judge Rodriguez wrote, “The court concludes that as a matter of law, the executive branch cannot rely on the A.E.A., based on the proclamation, to detain the named petitioners and the certified class, or to remove them from the country.”

That, apparently, set off the president who fired off an attack on his social media platform.

Early Saturday, Trump wrote, “Can it be so that Judges aren’t allowing the USA to Deport Criminals, including Murderers, out of our Country and back to where they came from? If this is so, our Country, as we know it, is finished! Americans will have to get used to a very different, crime filled, LIFE.”

“This is not what our Founders had in mind!!!” he insisted.

Poor crybaby King Donald!

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/our-country-as-we-know-it-is-finished-trump-rages-at-legal-setback-in-overnight-rant/ar-AA1E62Pg

Raw Story: Trump ‘completely botched it’: GOP insider gives no-holds-barred take on president’s move

According to a former adviser to ex-House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH), Donald Trump will end up paying the price for derailing a U.S. economy that was on the upswing when he took office.

Appearing on MSNBC with host Chris Jansing, GOP insider Brendan Buck hammered the president over his trade war and stated he will have to live with the consequences of the financial instability his tariffs have created.

With Jansing pointing to the new jobs report that shows unemployment stalled at 4.2 percent, she asked her guest, “I wonder if we’re going to see the president taking credit for this in the economy, right after claiming it’s actually Joe Biden’s economy?”

“Yeah, well, the White House already put out a paper declaring a jobs boom today,” the amused Buck replied before quipping, “So yeah, of course. When the GDP numbers go down it’s Joe Biden’s economy. When jobs numbers look good, it’s Trump’s economy.”

Turning serious, he continued, “Look, I think this shows two things. One, as we discussed, Donald Trump inherited an economy that was ready to take off; he didn’t have to do a whole lot to have a really solid economic legacy. But he’s completely botched it through this trade policy.”

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-completely-botched-it-gop-insider-gives-no-holds-barred-take-on-president-s-move/ar-AA1E4o3a