The US Senate has rejected Donald Trump’s national emergency declaration in a major vote, setting the stage for the first veto of his presidency during another banner day of controversies plaguing the White House.
The Senate voted 59-41 to cancel Trump’s February proclamation of a border emergency, which he invoked to spend billions of dollars more on additional border barriers than Congress had approved.
Twelve Republicans joined Democrats in defying Mr Trump in a showdown many GOP senators had hoped to avoid because he commands die-hard loyalty from millions of conservative voters who could punish defecting lawmakers in next year’s elections.
The president has no reluctance to casting his first veto to advance his campaign exhortation, “Build the Wall,” which has prompted roars at countless rallies hosted by Mr Trump.
Approval votes in both the Senate and House fell short of the two-thirds majorities needed to override.
“I look forward to VETOING the just passed Democrat inspired Resolution which would OPEN BORDERS while increasing Crime, Drugs, and Trafficking in our Country,” Mr Trump wrote on Thursday afternoon.
He added, “I thank all of the Strong Republicans who voted to support Border Security and our desperately needed WALL!”
Though Mr Trump seems sure to prevail in that battle, it remains noteworthy that lawmakers of both parties resisted him in a fight directly tied to his cherished campaign theme of erecting a border wall.
The roll call came just a day after the Senate took a step towards a veto fight with the president on another issue, voting to end U.S. support for the Saudi Arabian-led coalition’s war in Yemen.
Additional reporting by AP. See The Independent’s live coverage from Thursday below.
Hello and welcome to The Independent's rolling coverage of the Donald Trump administration.
President Trump has again been tweeting his outrage at the "witch hunt hoax" embroiling his administration.
The House Judiciary Committee's decision to release hundreds of pages of interview transcripts from last July's behind-closed-doors hearing with ex-FBI lawyer Lisa Page on whether the bureau had an "insurance policy" in place to block Mr Trump's election has the commander-in-chief particularly up in arms.
Clearly watching Fox News's extensive coverage of the story closely, the president tweeted:
The existence of such a plan was alluded to during the 2016 campaign in a series of text messages between Ms Page and agent Peter Strzok, who were romantically-involved at the time.
These were discovered by the Justice Department's inspector-general, Michael Horowitz, in December 2017, prompting both to be removed from Robert Mueller's team investigation possible Russian election hacking.
The smoking text, as it were, was sent from Mr Strzok to Ms Page in August 2016 and read:
“I want to believe the path you threw out in Andy’s [McCabe's] office—that there’s no way he gets elected—but I’m afraid we can’t take the risk. It’s like an insurance policy in the unlikely event you die before you’re 40.”
At the time, FBI agents referred to the Trump campaign by the code name "Crossfire Hurricane" (one for Rolling Stones fans there), hence this reference in Ms Page's testimony to the Judiciary Committee:
"So, upon the opening of the Crossfire Hurricane investigation, we had a number of discussions up through and including the director regularly in which we were trying to find an answer to the question, right, which is, is there someone associated with the [Trump] campaign who is working with the Russians in order to obtain damaging information about Hillary Clinton. And given that it is August [2016], we were very aware of the speed and sensitivity that we needed to operate under," she explained before Congress last July.
"If the answer is this is a guy just being puffery at a meeting with other people, great, then we don’t need to worry about this, and we can all move on with our lives; if this is, in fact, the Russians have co-opted an individual with, you know, maybe wittingly or unwittingly, that’s incredibly grave, and we need to know that as quickly as possible."
She told the House the texts reflected the FBI "continuing check-in” as to “how quickly to operate."
“We don’t need to go at a total breakneck speed because so long as he doesn’t become president, there isn’t the same threat to national security, right,” Ms Page said. “But if he becomes president, that totally changes the game because now he is the president of the United States. He’s going to immediately start receiving classified briefings. He’s going to be exposed to the most sensitive secrets imaginable. And if there is somebody on his team who wittingly or unwittingly is working with the Russians, that is super-serious.”
All of which appears to have only poured fuel on the fire of the president's paranoia. As the below clip indicates, the Russia investigation is never far from his mind.
The president's other tweets yesterday primarily dwelt on campaigning for Republicans in the Senate to snub the Democrats' resolution of disapproval on his national emergency declaration due for a vote on the floor of the upper chamber of Congress today.
The debate begins at 10am EST or 2pm GMT.
The other major development in Trumpland expected today is the latest court appearance of flamboyant political operator Roger Stone, set for 10am EST or 2pm GMT.
The status conference on Mr Stone's gag order (barring the defendant from discussing the criminal case against him) will take place at the US District Court in Washington under Judge Amy Berman Jackson, who is expect to quiz him and his attorneys about his new book, which is understood to include his thoughts on Robert Mueller and the Russia investigation.
That's the very same Judge Jackson who sentenced ex-Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort to an additional 73 months in prison yesterday, giving him a total of seven years and six months behind bars following the outcome of an earlier case in Virginia in which he was convicted for bank and tax fraud.
Manafort was being sentenced for concealing from the government foreign lobbying work he did on behalf of a pro-Russia Ukrainian political party. The judge stressed that the case did not involve Russian collusion, which she noted during her sentencing was strange for Manafort's attorneys to have brought up in their memos.
Here's Clark Mindock.
Trump's former campaign manager Paul Manafort sentenced to 73 months in prison
President's former campaign chair now faces a total of 90 months in jail for his multiple trialsImmediately after Manafort was sentenced on Wednesday, an indictment was unsealed in New York charging him with state crimes, including a residential mortgage fraud scheme.
These could put him outside the president's power to pardon him, which was looking like a very real possibility given President Trump's expression of sympathy for his old ally and refusal to rule out the option.
Mr Trump said last Friday he felt "very badly" for his former campaign chairman, saying: "On a human basis, it's a very sad thing."
"I have not even given it a thought as of this moment," he said of issuing a pardon, a remark widely interpreted as a deflection.
Hillary Clinton's old running mate, Senator Tim Kaine, had a dire warning for the president should he try to issue Manafort with a pardon after all.
Ahead of the Senate vote on the national emergency declaration, House speaker Nancy Pelosi is standing firm against proposed changes to the powers the president has invoked.
Pelosi refuses to support changes to Trump’s emergency powers that would give president ‘a pass’
The Senate will consider a resolution to nullify the president's emergency declaration to build the wall on ThursdayThe president has tweeted again, promising to veto any vote today in the Senate against his emergency declaration to reallocate federal funds towards building a US-Mexico border wall.
In more damaging news for the president, it has been suggested the 35-day government shutdown in December and January prevented Boeing issuing a software update to its MAX fleet of 737s, the very model of aircraft that crashed in Ethiopia over the weekend, killing all 157 passengers and the crew.
Here's Chris Riotta.
Trump's shutdown delayed fixes to airplane involved in multiple deadly crashes
Fatal Ethiopian Airlines crash follows multiple warnings from US pilots to Washington during shutdown of 'significantly reduced' oversightMr Trump has also been embarrassed after the White House denied he knew massage parlour boss Li Yang who promised access to his inner circle for Chinese clients via his Mar-a-Largo resort in Florida - despite his being pictured with her at least twice.
Trump ‘doesn’t know’ massage parlour boss he’s been photographed twice with, White House says
Recently removed, Li Yang's website offered 'opportunity to interact' with president at Mar-a-LagoBefore Donald Trump decided to ground all Boeing 737 MAX planes, the president reportedly fretted over the damage it could do to the US stock market.
America lagged behind almost every other major country in deciding to suspend the 737 MAX after a crash involving the jetliner killed more than 150 passengers in Ethiopia over the weekend.
Full story:
Donald Trump has tweeted - with impeccable timing - that he looks forward to negotiating an "unlimited" trade deal with the UK.
The tweet comes as Theresa May and her government grapple with Brexit. A series of votes on Wednesday evening left Britain facing leaving the EU without a deal or requesting an extension in order to be given more time for parliament to agree on a deal.
Mr Trump is a public supporter of Brexit and has pushed Ms May to take a harder stance with the bloc, so this tweet could be seen as encouraging the UK government to risk a no-deal Brexit.
Donald Trump has made a last-minute Brexit intervention - claiming his administration is looking forward to "negotiating a large scale Trade Deal with the UK" - after reportedly being lobbied to do so by Nigel Farage.
Donald Trump has tweeted again, claiming without evidence that Democrats do not recognise that crimes or drug trafficking occurs at or near the southern border of the US.
Most Democrats in fact argue that although the country needs border security, money would be far better spent on upgrading border technology than building a wall, which they say would have little impact on the issues that do exist.
Late-night TV hosts are very clearly getting under Trump's skin at the minute. After tweeting on Wednesday about the "one-sided hatred" that makes them "unwatchable", he has posted again.
Meanwhile the president's son, Donald Trump Jr, has tweeted a bizarre meme apparently targeting liberals who he believes are 'triggered' too easily.
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