As Donald Trump reels from Wednesday’s House vote making him only the third American president to be impeached, a Washington Post reporter has claimed he overheard a White House staffer wishing colleagues a “Merry Impeachmas”, suggesting the president’s inner circle is not as united as he likes to insist.
Mr Trump has meanwhile taken to Twitter to denounce the influential religious periodical Christianity Today, founded by legendary evangelist Billy Graham, after it called for his ousting and criticised his “profoundly immoral” conduct. “I won’t be reading ET again!” he frothed, offering a memorable typo.
The president has also been attracting criticism from his fellow Republicans after attacking Democratic congresswoman Debbie Dingell and suggesting her late husband is looking on from hell during his midweek rally in Battle Creek, Michigan, with Oklahoma’s Tom Cole branding his remarks “extraordinarily inappropriate”.
As Mr Trump prepared to sign a series of spending bills to avoid a government shutdown and to approve 2020 defence budgets, among other budgetary concerns, reports revealed that the White House had threatened a presidential veto for the measures if they included language that mandated any aid earmarked for Ukraine be "released quickly" to that country.
The president is accused of withholding aid to Ukraine in a bid to pressure Kiev to investigate his political opponents, an abuse of power at the heart of his impeachment on Wednesday.
Democrats intended to prevent that aid freeze from happening again by including the language in the proposal, but administration officials threatened a veto for the $1.4 trillion spending bill.
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White House staffer heard wishing colleagues 'Merry Impeachmas'
As Donald Trump reels from Wednesday’s House vote making him only the third American president to be impeached, Washington Post reporter Dan Zak has claimed he overheard a White House staffer wishing colleagues a “Merry Impeachmas”, suggesting the president’s inner circle is not as united as he likes to insist.
The revelation appeared on Twitter after the president's eldest son, Don Jr, reacted angrily to a tweet by Zak's fellow journalist Rachael Bade depicting Post staff gathering to toast the impeachment vote in a Washington bar.
She has since deleted the tweet in response to a backlash inspired by Trump Jr, saying her holiday greeting has been "misinterpreted".
Republicans turn on Trump over vicious rally attack on congresswoman's late husband
The president has meanwhile been attracting criticism from his fellow Republicans after attacking Democratic congresswoman Debbie Dingell and suggesting her late husband John is in hell during his rally in Battle Creek, Michigan, this week, with Oklahoma’s Tom Cole branding his remarks “extraordinarily inappropriate”.
“Anyone who served with John Dingell respected him, knew he was a very serious legislator and that he represented the House of Representatives with the highest personal and professional integrity,” Cole told The Hill.
During the Michigan rally on Wednesday night, Trump lashed out at the family following Debbie Dingell casting two votes in favour of the two articles of impeachment against him, suggesting the former dean of the House was “looking up” from hell after noting he [Trump] had lowered flags to half-mast in the capital in the wake of his death.
“She calls me up. 'It's the nicest thing that's ever happened. Thank you so much. John should be so thrilled. He's looking down. He'd be so thrilled,” Trump told his supporters. “'Thank you so much, sir.' I said, 'That's OK, don't worry about it.' Maybe he's looking up. I don't know.”
Michigan Republican congressmen Fred Upton and Paul Mitchell joined Cole in condemning the attack, the former tweeting:
Washington Republican Jamie Herrera Beutler commented: “I think it's really sad. It's a really, really terrible thing to say. It's Christmas, to make jokes about where people are spending eternity - you must be really sure about where you're spending your eternity, right? It's terrible.
“Debbie and I don't agree on everything, but she's an awesome lady and she doesn't deserve to have her husband's legacy turned into a political talking point, a political joke. It's terrible.”
New York's Tom Reed, Susan Brooks of Indiana and Georiga's Barry Loudermilk and Rob Woodall also talked to The Hill to express their disapproval, along with plenty of others on the opposite side of the aisle.
On MSNBC, The Bulwark's editor-at-large Charlie Sykes said: "Even people in that rally audience were taken aback but I am mystified that anyone is mystified that the president would go this way. You know, this is the Donald Trump we have seen over the last four or five years so anybody that is professing 'well this is a bad moment, I have no idea why Donald Trump would do this' - this is what he does when he's under pressure, when he's feeling victimised and again this is the Donald Trump we're going to be seeing now, lashing out after impeachment."
Jonathan Lemire of the AP added that the crowd in the arena was not with him in the attack and that it was unwise of the president to risk alienating an important swing state by attacking a "favourite son" like John Dingell - or any of the other deceased public figures he's gone after like late soldiers Humayun Khan and La David Johnson or Arizona senator John McCain.
Here's Matt Drake on that shocking moment from Trump's Wednesday address to his MAGA base.
Influential Christian magazine turns on president over 'profoundly immoral' conduct
The president has also lost the support of influential religious periodical Christianity Today, founded by legendary evangelist Billy Graham, which has called for his ousting over his "profoundly immoral".
In an editorial published a day after the House of Representatives impeached Trump on charges of abusing his office and obstructing Congress, the periodical said the president needed to go, throwing down a gauntlet to those Republicans in the Senate who have indicated they will vote against the measures, enabling him to stay in office.
“The typical CT approach is to stay above the fray and allow Christians with different political convictions to make their arguments in the public square, to encourage all to pursue justice according to their convictions and treat their political opposition as charitably as possible,” the magazine’s team said.
“We want CT to be a place that welcomes Christians from across the political spectrum, and reminds everyone that politics is not the end and purpose of our being.”
“We want CT to be a place that welcomes Christians from across the political spectrum, and reminds everyone that politics is not the end and purpose of our being.”
Here's Andrew Buncombe's has more.
Democrat Jeff Van Drew defects to Republicans after voting against impeachment
One man who hasn't turned his back on Trump - quite the reverse - is New Jersey Democratic congressman Jeff Van Drew, who has defected to the Republicans after voting against impeachment on Wednesday.
Trump is naturally delighted and unveiled his new aquisition in the Oval Office yesterday like a Premier League fat cat chairman posing for a shirt signing with his new Portuguese winger.
Trump otherwise used the grip-and-grin to protest his innocence, as you might have anticipated.
Alex Woodward reports on a congressman volunteering for oblivion.
Elizabeth Warren and Pete Buttigieg square off at sixth Democratic 2020 debate
The Democratic presidential hopefuls sparred during a tense debate in Los Angeles last night, some 50 days before the first votes are cast in the 2020 election.
The most contentious moments of the evening did not focus on Trump's impeachment, as you might have expected - all seven candidates expressing strong support for the articles approved by the House of Representatives on Wednesday. Rather, candidates fought over what they each plan to do if given the chance to unseat Trump from the Oval Office, from healthcare to making the economy work for middle class Americans.
Things really got bitter on the thorny question of campaign funding, with several jabbing at Indiana mayor Pete Buttigieg for meeting privately with donors inside a luxurious “wine cave” in California.
Buttigieg hit back at Massachusetts senator Elizabeth Warren, noting how she had transferred millions of dollars from her past senatorial campaign into her presidential coffers before announcing she would not be seeking big dollar donations. Sneaky.
Andrew Yang also had a noteworthy moment when he drew attention to the lack of diversity on stage after Kamala Harris dropped out of the running and Cory Booker failed to qualify.
Here's Chris Riotta with his assessment of the night's winners and losers.
Warren jokes she’d be youngest woman president if elected
The progressive senator got the laugh of the night in California when she joked that - even at 70 years old - she'd be the youngest female president in United States history.
Ex-Trump press secretary forced to apologise for mocking Biden stutter moment
Sarah Huckabee Sanders, former press secretary to Donald Trump turned Fox News talking head, has apologised after mocking Joe Biden’s reference to stuttering during Thursday night’s Democratic presidential debate.
Biden, who has carried a speech impediment throughout his life, was discussing people who have reached out and asked him for help over the course of his political career.
“My wife and I have a call list of somewhere between 20 and 100 people,” he said towards the end of the debate. “I give them my personal phone number.” The former vice president then described how a “little kid” with a stutter had once asked him: “I, I, I, I, I can’t talk. What do I do?’”
The decision to imitate the child's speech impediment was undoubtedly unwise but Sanders made matters a great deal worse. Having failed to to spot Biden’s reference to his own personal experiences, she tweeted: “I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I hhhave (sic) absolutely no idea what Biden is talking about. #DemDebate”.
Biden lashed out at her in kind afterwards, remarking: "It's called empathy. Look it up." Sanders subsequently deleted her tweet.
Here's Samuel Lovett's report.
What Trump's impeachment looked like from inside DC
Our boy Andrew Feinberg was there to witness history being made firsthand in Washington this week.
He offers these reflections for Indy Voices.
House speaker says impeachment has left Americans with a 'spring in their step'
Nancy Pelosi has said the American people have a "spring in their step" after the House of Representatives impeached Trump on Wednesday. But the speaker insisted the Senate must provide more details about the expected trial in that chamber before she agrees to send the House charges over.
Pelosi's unexpected procedural delay - looking for leverage in trial arrangements - drew a sour response from Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell and from Trump himself on Thursday. McConnell said Democrats are "too afraid" to send the charges to the Senate, where Trump would be expected to be acquitted by the Republican majority in a January trial.
Trump had plenty to say on the subject yesterday:
"We've been hearing from people all over the country," Pelosi told reporters at the Capitol. "Seems like people have a spring in their step because the president was held accountable for his reckless behaviour."
Pressed about next steps, Pelosi would not say. "The next thing will be when we see the process that is set forth in the Senate," she said. "Then we'll know the number of managers we may have to go forward and who we would choose."
She said the previous night, "So far we haven't seen anything that looks fair to us. So hopefully it will be fair. And when we see what that is, we'll send our managers."
The Democratic speaker and the top Senate Democrat, Chuck Schumer, met privately on Thursday at the Capitol after McConnell signalled in the strongest terms yet that his chamber intended to hold a swift trial and acquit the president of both charges. He denounced the "most unfair" House impeachment and reassured Mr Trump and his supporters that "moments like this are why the United States Senate exists".
As for what the Senate would do, he said: "It could not be clearer which outcome would serve the stabilising, institution-preserving, fever-breaking role for which the United States Senate was created and which outcome would betray it." McConnell described Trump's impeachment as "the most rushed, least thorough and most unfair impeachment inquiry in modern history."
Fighting back and using McConnell's own words, Schumer said the Republican leader was plotting the "most rushed, least thorough and most unfair" impeachment trial in history by declining to agree to call witnesses including former Trump national security adviser John Bolton, who declined to testify before the House.
"McConnell claimed the impeachment was motivated by partisan rage," said Schumer. "This from the man who said proudly, 'I am not impartial'... What hypocrisy."
Pelosi said that McConnell "says it's OK for the foreman of the jury to be in cahoots with the lawyers of the accused. That doesn't sound right to us."
Anxious Trump awake and tweeting after just six hours of sleep
Trump's last tweet yesterday came in at around 11.49am DC time and saw him quoting total nonsense from Laura Ingraham on Fox:
His first of today was posted at 6.12am in Washington, meaning the president got just six hours of sleep:
According to one study from Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine, that puts him at risk of an early death.
His wretched junk food diet is surely partly to blame for the lack of sleep but it's hard not to conclude from this that the president is genuinely concerned about the impeachment process, whatever he says to the contray in public.
He clearly had not been expecting Nancy Pelosi's plan to hold back the articles from an imminent crushing by his pals in the Senate, hence his repeated posts denouncing the tactic yesterday.
The New York Times reports this morning, for one, that Trump is "shellshocked" by the vote behind the scenes.
As The NYT puts it, yesterday "was the first day of his new reality, the first day when he woke up with the scarlet letter of impeachment marked with indelible ink on his page in the history books".
Avidly watching TV in the morning, he repeatedly asked advisers of Pelosi: "Why do you think she’s doing that?"
Here's Sam Lovett.
Ex-senator Al Franken likens top Republican to serial killer cannibal Jeffrey Dahmer
Former Minnesota Democratic senator Al Franken has ridiculed the aforementioned McConnell after the top Republican said of the impeachment process on Thursday: "Let's be clear: the House's vote yesterday was not some neutral judgment... It was the predetermined end of a partisan crusade."
"Listening to Mitch McConnell talk about the decline of bipartisanship is like listening to Jeffrey Dahmer complain about the decline of dinner party etiquette," Franken joked in response on Twitter.
For the mercifully uninitiated, the ex-Saturday Night Live stalwart and politician - forced out of office in 2018 after sexual misconduct allegations were levelled against him - is referring here to the notorious Wisconsin serial killer and cannibal who raped and murdered 17 men between 1978 and 1991, preserving and eating their body parts.
Trump attacks Christianity Today in misspelled rant: 'I won't be reading ET again!'
Alienating America's Christian right is rarely a smart move for a Republican but here is the president, bold as brass, attacking Christianity Today over its editorial calling for his ousting.
He says CT "knows nothing about reading a perfect transcript of a routine phone call" (it was a memo, not a verbatim transcript) and says the magazine would rather back "a Radical Left nonbeliever, who wants to take your religion & your guns". Who is he even talking about here? The Dems are still months away from settling on their nominee and none of the candidates are proposing any such thing.
Of course, there's a typo in there to make him look even more ludicrous:
Who seriously believes this man ever read Christianity Today in the first place?
Here's our breaking story.
Pierce Brosnan praises Trump's handling of economy
One of Trump's retweets this morning concerned former 007 actor Pierce Brosnan's unexpected praise of the economy.
Here's Roisin O'Conner with the details.
How Trump’s impeachment compares with Clinton’s
For Indy Premium, Mary Dejevsky recalls her time covering the impeachment of Bill Clinton over the Monica Lewinsky affair in 1998 with the events of the last week.
'It's not just symbolic - Trump's impeachment will change 2020'
For Indy Voices, Benny Belvedere says the smug assumption of Republicans that the House vote to impeach Trump "won't go anywhere" is wide of the mark and that the historic move to hold the president to account will change the course of the coming election year.
'Rhetorical nothing burgers'
Hawaii senator Mazie Hirono has been channelling Charlie Brown ("Good grief!") in laying into the Republicans over their desperate anti-impeachment language, some fine examples of which we saw in the House on Wednesday when the process was compared to both the crucifixion and the bombing of Pear Harbour by particularly unhinged members of the GOP.
Ivanka Trump claims impeachment has 'actually energised' her father
This sounds like pure spin from the first daughter on This Morning, intended to counter the sort of reporting we've seen from The NYT today about Trump's anxiety over Pelosi withholding of the articles of impeachment from the Senate.
Trump trails defence spending bill
How many times has this man written "smocking" in his tweets? Lunacy or a deliberate ploy to own the libs in the MSM? You decide.
Trump voters 'responsible before God' for his crimes, Iranian cleric warns
During Friday prayers in Iran this morning, hardline cleric Ayatollah Mohammad Emami-Kashani urged Americans not to vote for Trump next year or else they will be complicit in his future "crimes", according to BBC Monitoring, citing a local radio broadcast.
"The people of America should know that if this incompetent and ignorant man wins the vote again, they will be accomplices in all the bloodshed that will take place. His voters will be partners in all the crimes he commits," Emami-Kashani said during his sermon on 20 December, which was broadcast live by Radio Tehran.
(Atta Kenare/AFP/Getty)
"The birthday anniversary of Jesus Christ is approaching... if the people of America truly believe in Jesus Christ, they will push away this incompetent leader of America... If the people of America vote for this man and, God forbid, he wins again, they will be responsible before God, before humanity and before history", he added.
