Today in Campaign 2016
- The Clinton campaign on Thursday attacked Donald Trump over reports of an historic violation of the Cuba embargo, hours after Newsweek alleged that the Republican nominee spent at least $68,000 in the island dictatorship in 1998, while investigating potential business opportunities.
- Citing the state attorney general’s records, the Washington Post reports that the foundation never obtained the registration required of charities that solicit more than $25,000 per year. If the state attorney general finds that Trump’s foundation raised this sum or more from public donations - likely, since Trump himself has not donated to the charity personally since 2007 - it could be ordered to cease fundraising activities, or even to refund the money it has raised.
- The editorial board of USA Today has never penned a presidential endorsement in its 34-year publication history - until today. This evening, the paper’s editorial board released a scathing editorial, calling Donald Trump “unfit for the presidency” and a candidate who “has demonstrated repeatedly that he lacks the temperament, knowledge, steadiness and honesty that America needs from its presidents.”
- Florida Senator Marco Rubio may have endorsed Trump for president, but he’s not happy with Newsweek’s report that Trump conducted business in Fidel Castro-controlled Cuba, saying he’s “deeply concerned.” “I hope the Trump campaign is gonna come forward and answer some questions about this because if what the article says is true - and I’m not saying that it is, we don’t know with a hundred percent certainty - I’d be deeply concerned about it, I would,” said Rubio in an interview on the ESPN/ABC “Capital Games” podcast.
- For the first time in its 143-year history, the Detroit News is backing a non-Republican, endorsing Gary Johnson for president in an editorial published today.
Since its founding in 1873, The Detroit News has backed a Republican every time it has made a presidential endorsement (three times we have sat on the sidelines — twice during the Franklin Roosevelt elections and in the 2004 Bush/Kerry contest). We abandon that long and estimable tradition this year for one reason: Donald J. Trump.
Donald Trump defends Russia from accusations its missiles brought down MH-17
Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump doesn’t believe the ballistics experts and intelligence officials who have blamed pro-Russian separatists armed with Russian-provided missiles for the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17.
“That’s a horrible thing that happened,” Trump told CNN. “It’s disgusting and disgraceful but Putin and Russia say they didn’t do it, the other side said they did, no one really knows who did it, probably Putin knows who did it. Possibly it was Russia but they are totally denying it.”
An international criminal investigation into the disaster indicated that Flight 17 was downed by a Buk missile fired from separatist-controlled territory in eastern Ukraine. Flight 17 was struck by a surface-to-air missile over Ukraine as it flew from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur. All 298 people on board were killed.
“They say it wasn’t them,” Trump continued. “It may have been their weapon, but they didn’t use it, they didn’t fire it, they even said the other side fired it to blame them. I mean to be honest with you, you’ll probably never know for sure.”
Is Donald Trump a secret Democratic plant? IJ Review has set to find out.
Former Florida governor Jeb Bush revealed at an event at Harvard University today that he is unhappy with leaked reports that his father, former president George H.W. Bush, plans to vote for Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, calling the leak “inappropriate.”
VIDEO: @JebBush's reaction tonight at Harvard to the reports his dad will support Hillary Clinton in November pic.twitter.com/k9N8RoddH9
— Jordan J Frasier (@jordanjfrasier) September 30, 2016
“I thought it was a little inappropriate for a person to overhear a frail, 92yo man in a private setting, at a reception for the Points of Light Foundation, which focuses on volunteerism, to hear this and then immediately go on Facebook and put it on there and then go on national television,” Bush said. “I thought that was inappropriate.”
Report: Donald Trump's foundation lacks certification for charities to solicit donations
The Washington Post’s David Fahrenthold has been on the trail of Donald Trump’s family foundation for months, and may have just scored his biggest scoop yet: The Donald J. Trump Foundation never obtained the certification required in the state of New York to solicit donations from the public.
Citing the state attorney general’s records, the Washington Post reports that the foundation never obtained the registration required of charities that solicit more than $25,000 per year. If the state attorney general finds that Trump’s foundation raised this sum or more from public donations - likely, since Trump himself has not donated to the charity personally since 2007 - it could be ordered to cease fundraising activities, or even to refund the money it has raised.
The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
Tax filings over the last decade show that the foundation raised more than $25,000 from non-Trump sources in every year since 2006. Additionally, the creation of a website for the foundation earlier this year led to the collection of $1.67 million from the general public.
Updated
After months of bashing the German chancellor on the campaign trail, Donald Trump declared that Angela Merkel was his favorite world leader.
In an interview with a local reporter in New Hampshire, the Republican presidential nominee proclaimed: “I think Merkel is a really great world leader.” Though, he added, “I was very disappointed that, when she, this move with the whole thing on immigration, I think it’s a big problem and really, you know, to look at what she’s done in the last year and a half. I was always a Merkel person. I thought really fantastic. But I think she made a very tragic mistake a year and a half ago.”
Trump was criticizing the German chancellor’s openness to taking refugees from Syria. Despite the ongoing civil war and humanitarian crisis in that country, Trump has long warned of the danger of taking in refugees, whom he has compared to the Trojan Horse.
The statement marks a change in tone from Trump, who has repeatedly attacked Merkel on the campaign trail.
In December, after Merkel bested him to be Time’s Person of the Year, Trump tweeted she was “ruining Germany”. He had previously said Merkel should be “ashamed of herself” over refugee policy.
Trump has since gone on to compare Merkel to his election rival Hillary Clinton. In August, he said, “Hillary Clinton is running to be America’s Angela Merkel, and we’ve seen how much crime and how many problems that’s caused the German people.”
Mike Pence responds to USA Today anti-endorsement: 'Donald Trump is ready to lead'
Indiana governor and Republican vice presidential nominee Mike Pence has produced a swift response to USA Today’s editorial board, which earlier this evening broke a four-decade tradition by endorsing Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump, who it called “unfit for the presidency.”
“Between the candidates, the choice could not be more clear,” Pence wrote in his response editorial, also published in USA Today. “By electing Donald Trump, the American people have the opportunity to choose a bold leader. In a political world often reserved for talkers, Donald Trump is a doer. I’ve come to know the man who invited me to join him on the Republican ticket as thoughtful, compassionate and steady. Above all, I know he is ready to lead the United States as our next president and commander in chief.”
Comparing Trump to Ronald Reagan and decrying Clinton as someone who “personifies why the American people have so little confidence in our political leaders,” Pence lauded Trump for having “the courage to speak his mind.”
“On Election Day, the choice is clear. To Make America Great Again, we must elect Donald Trump the 45th president of the United States.”
Speaking to NH1, a New Hampshire news station, Donald Trump declared that he is “very proud” of questioning President Barack Obama’s birthplace and citizenship, and that “pretty much everybody agrees” that he was the instrument behind Obama releasing his long-form birth certificate five years ago.
“I’m the one that got him to put up his birth certificate,” Trump said, neglecting to mention that Obama had released his certificate of live birth when he was running for president.
“Hillary Clinton was unable to get there and I will tell you she tried and you look at her campaign and everybody knows it happened and I would say that pretty much everybody agrees with me. But she tried and she was unable to do it and I tried and I was able to do it so I’m very proud of that.
USA Today in unprecedented editorial: Donald Trump 'unfit for the presidency'
The editorial board of USA Today has never penned a presidential endorsement in its 34-year publication history - until today.
On Thursday evening, the paper’s editorial board released a scathing editorial, calling Donald Trump “unfit for the presidency” and a candidate who “has demonstrated repeatedly that he lacks the temperament, knowledge, steadiness and honesty that America needs from its presidents.”
Citing Trump’s ambivalence on fulfilling treaty obligations, fawning behavior towards Russian president Vladimir Putin and willingness to default on American sovereign debt, the editorial board called Trump “erratic,” “ill-equipped to be commander in chief” and a “serial liar” who “traffics in prejudice”:
It’s closing line:
Resist the siren song of a dangerous demagogue. By all means vote, just not for Donald Trump.
Report: Jeb Bush suggests voting for Libertarian candidate
Former Florida governor and failed Republican presidential nominee Jeb Bush reportedly told an audience of conservative movers and shakers that they should vote for Libertarian presidential nominee Gary Johnson, going further in his official condemnation of Republican nominee Donald Trump than he has in public.
The New York Daily News, citing sources within a Manhattan Institute luncheon that was closed to the press, reports that Bush joked about “President Johnson” during remarks about education reform:
In a private conversation before his speech strongly recommended another person present should vote for the gaffe-prone Libertarian nominee. ‘There was an old man talking to Jeb across the table and said, “I can’t bring myself to vote for Hillary and Trump,” and Jeb looked at him and mouthed the word “Johnson,” silently,’ one person within earshot of the two told the Daily News.
Bush was once seen as the heir apparent to the Republican nomination before Trump crashed the party last summer, suspending his presidential campaign on following a bruising loss in the South Carolina primary and adding a depressing coda to the three-generation Bush political dynasty.
Donald Trump, speaking to New England Cable News, declared that “it’s pretty simple to figure out” how Bill Clinton’s past infidelities reflect negatively on Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, continuing his tendency this week to talk about the former president’s scandals without actually talking about them.
Asked by NECN why he didn’t bring up Clinton’s infidelities in Monday night’s presidential debate, Trump said that he did so to avoid embarrassing the couple’s daughter, Chelsea.
“Because I’ll tell you what, they had their daughter who is a lovely young woman sitting in the audience and I just didn’t think I should go there and Hillary Clinton said some horrible and false things about me and I would have had the right to have done it and he’s a member of the campaign,” Trump said. “I mean, it’s not like he’s not campaigning, he’s campaigning and I would have been able to do it if I wanted to do it. I didn’t want to do anything like that in front of Chelsea, the daughter who I happen to think is a very nice young woman.”
Asked how that would reflect negatively on Clinton in any way, Trump, who is on his third marriage, was blunt: “Well, you’ll have to figure that out. I think it’s pretty simple to figure that out.
None of these people have ever served as a head of state:
Here are a few of my favorite leaders: @ElizabethMay, João Stédile of @MST_Oficial and @jeremycorbyn. #AleppoMoment
— Dr. Jill Stein (@DrJillStein) September 29, 2016
Barack Obama and his wife Michelle saluted the US Olympic and Paralympic teams at the White House this afternoon, with the president joking about performing a routine with Simone Biles and later referenced the infamous “Phelps face.”
At the end of the event, Biles presented the Obamas with a surf board in recognition of the sport being introduced to Olympic line-up.
Campaign advisors, wary of Donald Trump potentially repeating his lackluster debate performance at the second of three planned presidential debates against Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, are reportedly hoping that New Jersey governor Chris Christie is being approached about taking charge of Trump’s debate prep.
According to CNN, Christie is one of the few people close to Trump who has been honest with the candidate about the his performance on Monday night, but there’s no consensus yet that Christie is the person to take charge of the preparation.
“I have not been asked to do anything new, and as far as I know, there is no new debate prep scheduled,” Christie told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer this evening. “Nothing’s been asked of me to do more. If there is, I’d certainly have that conversation with Donald Trump at the time, but I’m not going to presuppose anything at this point.”
The Trump campaign is still clinging to the candidate’s self-described victory in Monday night’s presidential debate against Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, despite all evidence pointing to Clinton edging out Donald Trump among viewers.
Speaking with CNN’s Chuck Todd, Trump campaign communications advisor Jason Miller defended scientifically invalid online polls as the more accurate measure of Trump’s success in the debate.
WATCH: @chucktodd presses Trump campaign spokesman on assertion that “bogus” online polls showed Trump won debate. https://t.co/BdgQrzsecX
— NBC Nightly News (@NBCNightlyNews) September 29, 2016
“The polls that happened that night, the night of the debate, the snap polls that happened online, those all showed Mr. Trump winning in a huge way,” Miller said, in reference to easily gamed online polls that are laughably inaccurate, statistically speaking.
“Those are fan polls, man!” Todd shot back.
“Those are a snapshot of what people are thinking that are actually watching the debate,” Miller said.
“People who were watching thought that Mr. Trump won that debate,” he continued.
“You know these are bogus! They’re beyond nonscientific! They’re not real, Jason!” Todd said, flabbergasted.
“The energy and the enthusiasm in this race is all with Mr. Trump,” Miller reiterated. “We’re gonna continue to show that over and over.”
Updated
This cover:
An early look at next week's cover, “Miss Congeniality,” by Barry Blitt: https://t.co/wlrJpfxEXd pic.twitter.com/QCCCPlJFT6
— The New Yorker (@NewYorker) September 29, 2016
Trump violated Cuba embargo in 1998 business venture, report claims
The Clinton campaign on Thursday attacked Donald Trump over reports of an historic violation of the Cuba embargo, hours after Newsweek alleged that the Republican nominee spent at least $68,000 in the island dictatorship in 1998, while investigating potential business opportunities.
Citing “interviews with former Trump executives, internal company records and court filings”, Newsweek reported that in 1998 a company controlled by Trump “secretly conducted business in communist Cuba during Fidel Castro’s presidency despite strict American trade bans that made such undertakings illegal”.
The expenditure, Newsweek said, was indirect, involving the payment of expenses incurred on a visit by consultants from a US firm.
On Thursday, Jake Sullivan, a senior policy adviser to the Clinton campaign, said in a statement: “Trump’s business with Cuba appears to have broken the law, flouted US foreign policy and is in complete contradiction to Trump’s own repeated, public statements that he had been offered opportunities to invest in Cuba but passed them up.
“This latest report shows once again that Trump will always put his own business interest ahead of the national interest – and has no trouble lying about it.”
At the time of the expenditure in question, the spending of any US corporate money in Cuba was illegal without the explicit approval of the federal government.
The Trump campaign did not immediately issue a statement, but in a television interview with The View, campaign manager Kellyanne Conway seemed to acknowledge that Trump had indeed spent money in Cuba.
“It starts out with a screaming headline, as it usually does, that he did business in Cuba,” she said. “And it turns out that he decided not to invest there. They paid money, as I understand, in 1998.
“I know we’re not supposed to talk about years ago when it comes to the Clintons, but with Trump there is no statute of limitations.”
Trump, who was due to stage a campaign rally in Bedford, New Hampshire, on Thursday, has taken contradictory positions on US policy towards Cuba.
In 1999, when first exploring a presidential campaign as a third-party candidate, he took a hard line.
In a Wall Street Journal editorial headlined America Needs a President Like Me, he wrote: “I would also immediately reverse the move to normalize relations with the most abnormal political figure in our hemisphere: Fidel Castro.
“We have pushed him to the precipice with our embargo, helped of course by the withdrawal of Soviet backing.
“Now comes a movement, backed by state department bureaucrats, to rescue Mr Castro with US dollars. The striped-pants set won’t like hearing this, but normalization is pure lunacy.”
Moves towards normalisation of relations were eventually announced in December 2014, by the Obama administration. Nine months later, the US embassy in Havana was formally reopened by secretary of state John Kerry. Barack Obama visited the country in March this year.
Newt Gingrich: Donald Trump 'a gentleman' for not mentioning Bill Clinton's infidelity
Thrice-married former House speaker Newt Gingrich told Sean Hannity today that Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump is “a gentleman” for not attacking Democratic rival Hillary Clinton for her husband’s past infidelity.
“I’m very proud that at the very end when she attacked and went off on this whole rant about women - and you could see his face - in the Republican primary he would have just smashed her,” Gingrich said on Hannity’s eponymous radio show, first reported by Buzzfeed News.
“He thought about it, and I’m sure he said to himself, ‘a president of the United States shouldn’t attack somebody personally when their daughter is sitting in the audience,’ and he bit his tongue and he was a gentleman, and I thought in many ways that was the most important moment of the whole evening. He proved that he had the discipline to remain as a decent guy even when she was disgusting.”
Gingrich said that Trump, who like himself is on his third marriage, frustrated the Clinton campaign team with his magnanimity.
“I think it was probably a great disappointment to her staff, that this taunt that they were sure was gonna set him off, so that they would end the debate with him doing something foolish,” Gingrich said. “Instead he came off looking like a gentleman and she came off looking pretty mean and miserable.”
Gymnast Simone Biles stood tall at the White House on Thursday - though not quite as tall as First Lady Michelle Obama.
The 19-year-old found herself being playfully used as an arm rest by 5ft 11ins Michelle at a ceremony honouring the 2016 US summer Olympic and Paralympic teams.
“Only one American woman has ever won gold on the vault,” Barack Obama said. “Only one American has won four golds in gymnastics in a single games. That would be this young lady, Simone Biles.”
The event was attended by relatives of Jesse Owens and America’s 17 other black athletes from the 1936 Olympics for the acknowledgement they, unlike their white counterparts, did not receive from Franklin Roosevelt 80 years ago.
Sprinter Allyson Felix, the only female track-and-field athlete to win six golds, told reporters afterwards: “It’s been just so moving, so inspiring. We’re just honored to be able to share this moment with them.”
Tommie Smith and John Carlos, who raised gloved fists on the podium at the Mexico City Olympics in 1968 in what they called “a human rights salute”, were also present. Felix reflected: “We’re inspired by what they did. It was a peaceful protest and it brought so much attention.
“Especially with everything that’s happening now, as athletes we do have a voice and we want to show that change should happen, so we want to use your voice for that in a peaceful way because we still are so proud to represent this country.”
Obama praised the diversity of the 2016 Olympic team, which ranked first in the medal table with 46 golds. Simone Manuel had become the only African American woman to win a swimming gold, he noted.
“Imagine what it means for a young girl or a young boy who sees somebody who looks like them doing something and being the best at what they do,” he said. “There’s no kid in American who can’t look at our Olympic team and see themselves somewhere.”
The president also noted that the athletes are “all very good-looking, just exuding health. Like everybody’s teeth is really white and their eyes are really shiny.”
His wife piped up: “Fruits and vegetables!”
A would-be senator:
I am hoping to be wrong. But given a train ran at high speed INTO the station, I am going to say terrorism. If I'm wrong cool.
— Curt Schilling (@gehrig38) September 29, 2016
Donald Trump campaigns in Bedford, New Hampshire
Watch it live here:
Trump’s VP pick Mike Pence is in York, Pennsylvania, hosting a rally.
“Donald Trump is ready. He’s ready to leave this country after where we’ve seen America’s place in the world weakened,” saysPence.
“At a time when America’s crying out for something new and different the other party comes out with the most predictable of names and the most stale of agendas,” says Pence.
“Let’s decide it here and now... Hillary Clinton will never be elected president of the United States of America,” he says to applause.
Correction: this post previously said Pence was with Trump in New Hampshire, that was incorrect, a miscommunication thanks to a wrong YouTube livestream.
Updated
Here’s the talking points from the Trump campaign about the accusations he pursued illegal business opportunities in Cuba in the 1990s, leaked to Buzzfeed’s deputy politics editor.
Obtained from a source, here are the Trump surrogate talking points on report of Cuba business dealings... pic.twitter.com/tTz6gkpPAQ
— Kyle Blaine (@kyletblaine) September 29, 2016
No denial of facts, it appears?
Clinton ends with a plea for Iowa voters to register and her “love trumps hate” line.
“I have no idea what he’s going to say the next time. But I will spend some time preparing for it,” says Clintons, to chuckles.
“He spends all of his time dumping on America... that everything about America is in bad shape. But it’s probably true he hasn’t paid a penny in federal taxes to actually support our military, or our vets, or our schools or our roads or our education system,” said Clinton, doing the stump speech she’s been refining this week after Trump called himself “smart” for not paying income taxes during their debate on Monday.
“If not paying taxes makes you smart, then what are we?” she asks.
Clinton now on stage in Des Moines (apologies, Reuters livestream isn’t working today).
She’s talking about the college plan she announced with Bernie Sanders yesterday in New Hampshire.
“An education should give you a boost not hold you back. And we’re going to offer a relief for those of you who already owe debt,” says Clinton.
“It is outrageous that you can get a home mortgage at 3%, a car payment at 2%, and I met people paying 8, 10, 12% interest on their student loans. I am not going to allow the federal government to make a profit off young people trying to get their education,” she says.
“Four year college is not and should not be the only path to a good job that supports a real middle class job,” says Clinton.
Update from Gary Johnson’s “Aleppo moment” last night, where he was unable to name a current foreign leader he admired during a MSNBC town hall interview.
It's been almost 24 hours...and I still can't come up with a foreign leader I look up to.
— Gov. Gary Johnson (@GovGaryJohnson) September 29, 2016
Clinton team accuses Trump of breaking Cuba embargo
The Clinton campaign says Donald Trump “appears to have broken the law” following reports that he secretly paid $68,000 to pursue business in Castro-led Cuba despite US sanctions.
“Trump’s business with Cuba appears to have broken the law, flouted U.S. foreign policy, and is in complete contradiction to Trump’s own repeated, public statements that he had been offered opportunities to invest in Cuba but passed them up,” said Clinton’s senior policy adviser Jake Sullivan.
“This latest report shows once again that Trump will always put his own business interest ahead of the national interest - and has no trouble lying about it,” he added.
This morning’s report in Newsweek revealed that back in 1998 Trump’s hotel and resort business paid $68,000 to a consulting firm to go to Cuba and meet with officials and business leaders in preparation for possible investment opportunities if sanctions lifted. Newsweek reports that the money was later declared as charity in order to hide it as only US government-approved and humanitarian money was allowed to be spent because of the embargo on Cuba.
Trump himself has not addressed the allegations, but his surrogate Kelly Conway did not dispute the facts of the payment on The View today.
As we await Clinton’s Des Moines event to kick off - it was supposed to start 30 mins ago - here’s a pic from yesterday with Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton hanging out before their joint event yesterday.
The photo is by Barbara Kinney, who was the Clinton White House photographer in the 1990s and now works as a photographer for the Clinton campaign.
Interesting point by NBC political reporter Benjy Sarlin, who covers the GOP in this election, about the difference between how Clinton and Trump handle a potential scandal.
A lot of Trump supporters are upset "Why isn't person X in Hillary's past a multi-day story." And I get it, coverage can feel arbitrary. 1/x
— Benjy Sarlin (@BenjySarlin) September 29, 2016
Smith is very sympathetic even if you disagree with her. Realizing that, HRC treaded lightly, didn't escalate: https://t.co/b34auVLuig 3/x
— Benjy Sarlin (@BenjySarlin) September 29, 2016
Is this how coverage should work? That's a big question. But it's 100% predictable to anyone who runs a campaign. You can plan for it. 5/x
— Benjy Sarlin (@BenjySarlin) September 29, 2016
Just some more from The View interview with Trump surrogate Kelly Conway, since she addressed the reports of Trump’s hotel and casino company doing secret business in Cuba in 1998 despite the US sanctions, and did not question any of the facts of the story.
Conway tried to dismiss the story when it was raised.
“Read the entire story. It starts out with a screaming headline, as it usually does, that he did business in Cuba and it turns out he decided not to invest there.”
Are you denying his company spent any money in Cuba? asked a panelist.
“They paid money, as I understand from the story, in 1998,” said Conway.
The panelist notes that due to sanctions only US government approved or aid money was allowed to be spent there.
“The question is did he spend money? He’s very critical of Cuba, he’s very critical of Castro, and he’s been critical, he gave a speech the very next year to the Cuban-American national foundation in Miami, critical of those who want to do business with Castro. He’s talked about this Cuban embargo even on this show,” said Conway.
“Again, we’re talking about did his hotel invest money in 1998 in Cuba? No. Did she get money from seven foreign governments while she was secretary of state? Yes. And somehow that’s not relevant,” said Conway.
Updated
Last night Gary Johnson was unable to name a single foreign leader that he admired.
“You gotta do this. Anywhere. Any continent. Canada, Mexico, Europe over there, Asia, South America, Africa – name a foreign leader that you respect,” said MSNBC’s Chris Matthews.
“I guess I’m having an Aleppo moment,” replied Johnson, a reference to when he asked “what is Aleppo” when quizzed about his strategy in Syria.
Late last night he tried to brush off the incident on Twitter, referencing it before asking a “better question.”
About those foreign leaders...Better question: Why are all the Hillary mouthpieces so concerned about Johnson/Weld? https://t.co/YDU6AuOFTD
— Gov. Gary Johnson (@GovGaryJohnson) September 29, 2016
He links to a Facebook post written by his national campaign manager Ron Nielson who decries the focus on Johnson not being able to name a foreign leader as “gotcha-ism at its finest.”
Trump surrogate Kellyanne Conway appeared on The View this morning, praising Donald Trump’s treatment of Hillary Clinton in the debate on Monday - while Whoopi Goldberg slammed his lack of policy detail.
Conway pointed out how Trump had asked Clinton if she preferred the term “Madame Secretary.”
“I thought he was a complete gentleman to her, and he hasn’t gotten a lot of credit for that,” said Conway.
"He was a complete gentleman to her," Trump's campaign manager @KellyannePolls says of his debate performance. https://t.co/z0ajZXVKSk
— The View (@TheView) September 29, 2016
Goldberg then questioned why Trump hadn’t responded to their request for interview. “I notice he goes to all the shows where the guys are, how come he didn’t come here today?” she asked, to loud applause. “He’s been invited on numerous occasions to do this show,” she added.
“Is he scared of us cause we’re women?” asked Joy Behar.
Goldberg then dug into Trump’s focus on rhetoric rather than detail.
“He says nothing. He goes out and says ‘we’re going to make America great again,’ he doesn’t tell you how. He says all these people are bad and this is what’s going on but I’m not going to tell you why they’re bad,” she said.
Bill Clinton will head on a bus tour across Ohio next week to campaign for his wife and get voters signed up the week before the Ohio voter registration deadline.
Clinton had cancelled his planned bus tour through North Florida for this Friday and Saturday - from Panama City to Jacksonville - so that he could travel to Israel for the funeral of former president Shimon Peres.
His Ohio bus tour will include public events in Athens, Jefferson and Stark Counties, plus stops in Eastern Ohio and the Mahoning Valley.
Rubio 'deeply concerned' at Trump's Cuban allegations
Florida Senator Marco Rubio may have endorsed Trump for president, but he’s not happy with Newsweek’s report that Trump conducted business in Fidel Castro-controlled Cuba, saying he’s “deeply concerned.”
“I hope the Trump campaign is gonna come forward and answer some questions about this because if what the article says is true -- and I’m not saying that it is, we don’t know with a hundred percent certainty -- I’d be deeply concerned about it, I would,” said Rubio in an interview on the ESPN/ABC “Capital Games” podcast.
“This is something they’re gonna have to give a response to. I mean, it was a violation of American law, if that’s how it happened,” said Rubio.
Rubio backs the current US embargo on Cuba.
Trump broke Cuban embargo, says report
Donald Trump conducted secret business in Cuba through his hotel and resorts company when the US had strict economic sanctions on the island state, according to a just published Newsweek cover story.
Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts funneled at least $68,000 in 1998 to Cuba through an American consulting firm, Seven Arrows Investment and Development Corp, at a time when any US money spent in the country needed government approval, reports Newsweek.
Basically, Trump’s company helped fund a trip to Cuba to meet with government officials and business leaders to discuss potential business opportunities for the hotel and resorts company for when US sanctions were lifted, the magazine reported.
A former Trump exec told Newsweek that the Republican nominee knew about and supported the trip.
To hide the money, Newsweek says Seven Arrows later linked it to a charity. The Trump campaign did not respond to Newsweek’s request for comment.
Updated
After the Detroit News endorsement, this article from New Republic, on the number of conservative newspapers - including the Dallas Morning News and the Arizona Republican - that have come out in support of Clinton seems particularly apt.
As Brian Buetler writes, it’s too little too late.
Even before newspaper editorials shrunk into vestigial artifacts of a bygone era, their impact was self-limiting. Editorial boards tend to have durable leanings which undermine their persuasive power over partisan politics. Conservative editorial boards usually endorse Republican candidates, liberal ones endorse Democrats, and only in man-bites-dog scenarios, in which they depart from their own in-house orthodoxies, do any minds stand to get changed.
Man is biting dog now, but it is a tiny, shrunken man and the dog is rabid and enormous.
It is partly a failure of today’s media that the public views Clinton only slightly less unfavorably than it views Trump, and sees her as far more dishonest than he. But it is also a failure that goes back a quarter-century. Clinton is flawed in plenty of real ways, but she is also the victim of a hate debt that began piling up in the 1990s, undisrupted by most conservative public figures.
Detroit News endorses Gary Johnson
For the first time in its 143-year history, the Detroit News is backing a non-Republican, endorsing Gary Johnson for president in an editorial published today.
Since its founding in 1873, The Detroit News has backed a Republican every time it has made a presidential endorsement (three times we have sat on the sidelines — twice during the Franklin Roosevelt elections and in the 2004 Bush/Kerry contest).
We abandon that long and estimable tradition this year for one reason: Donald J. Trump.
The 2016 nominee offered by the Republican Party rubs hard against the editorial board’s values as conservatives and Americans. Donald Trump is unprincipled, unstable and quite possibly dangerous. He can not be president.
... We recognize the Libertarian candidate is the longest of long shots with an electorate that has been conditioned to believe only Republicans and Democrats can win major offices.
But this is an endorsement of conscience, reflecting our confidence that Johnson would be a competent and capable president and an honorable one.
The Washington Post mentioned the Detroit News’ endorsement this morning in their Morning Mix email... except, it looked like WashPo itself was backing Johnson at first viewing.
Um email from @washingtonpost looks like they're endorsing Gary Johnson for prez (they're not, it's a story about @detroitnews backing him) pic.twitter.com/GIcvV8mMSZ
— Amber Jamieson (@ambiej) September 29, 2016
Hello and welcome to our live-wire coverage of the 2016 race for the White House.
Trump hates on Holt
Monday night’s debate is still the hot topic, after Donald Trump criticized debate moderator Lester Holt in an interview with Fox News’s Bill O’Reilly yesterday.
Holt, a newscaster on NBC Nightly News, “was much, much tougher on me than he was on Hillary,” declared Trump, particularly miffed that Holt quizzed him on his support of the Birther conspiracy.
Initially Trump said he thought Holt did a decent job. “I though he was ok, he was fine,” Trump told Fox and Friends in an interview the morning after. But now he’s changed his mind “after seeing the way he badgered and even the questions I got,” he told O’Reilly.
Hillary’s debate bump
As a result of her debate performance, Hillary Clinton is likely to get a three to five percentage point bump in the polls, Democratic pollster Lincoln Park Strategies said.
The public research firm tracked trendlines in 10 key states for 48 hours following Monday night’s debate at Hofstra University, and says Clinton did best in the eyes of voters from Florida, New Hampshire and Virginia. Those in Nevada, Colorado and Pennsylvania were the least impressed.
And a thought from Politico’s Annie Karni (eager to hear your thoughts on this and more in the comments below):
How is openly mulling whether to bring up Clinton affairs different from bringing up Clinton affairs?
— Annie Karni (@anniekarni) September 29, 2016
Today’s movements
Trump’s got a rally in Bedford, New Hampshire at 3pm. Clinton’s hosting an event in Des Moines, Iowa, while VP Tim Kaine’s wife Anne Holton, the former secretary of education for Virginia, is hosting events in Wisconsin and Minnesota.
Updated
