Kanye West releases 2024 campaign video after meeting with Trump
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Criticism continues to pour in after the former president hosted a meeting at Mar-a-Lago with Kanye West, who has gone on an antisemitic rampage of late, and his associate Nick Fuentes, one of the US’s most notorious white supremacist activists.
On Tuesday, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell condemned the meeting and said that it may have ruined Donald Trump’s chances in 2024.
“Anyone meeting with people advocating that point of view, in my judgment, are highly unlikely to ever be elected president of the United States.”
House Republican Leader took a weaker stance – condemning Mr Fuentes but refusing to condemn Mr Trump and falsely claiming that the former president had condemned the white supremacist “four times”. Mr Trump has not done so even once.
As the fallout over the meeting continued, over in Washington DC Mr Trump’s former adviser Stephen Miller was testifying before a grand jury investigating the January riot – where a mob of supporters of his boss stormed the Capitol to try to overturn the 2020 election.
In a landmark verdict, two Oath Keepers were convicted on Tuesday of seditious conspiracy for their part in the riot.
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Herschel Walker says ‘I live in Texas’ in recording as Georgia Senate candidate’s residency status scrutinised
Herschel Walker, the scandal-plagued Republican candidate in a closely watched Senate runoff election in Georgia, said he lives in Texas in a newly unearthed recording.
In a January speech to the University of Georgia’s College Republicans, the former football star stated plainly, “I live in Texas.”
Dive in to the lastest mind-boggling scandal to envelop the Republican US Senate candidate:
John Bowden30 November 2022 10:40
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Marjorie Taylor Greene defended former president Donald Trump from accusations that he could have pardoned people in prison for their role in the January 6 riot, saying he is “sick” over their treatment and would pardon them if he wins in 2024.
The Georgia representative spoke on former Trump adviser Steve Bannon’s podcast after Ye, the rapper formerly known as Kanye West, posted a video talking about his dinner with Mr Trump and white nationalist Nick Fuentes.
Eric Garcia has more for The Independent:
John Bowden30 November 2022 09:40
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Impeachment talk at Trump Org. trial: Did witness misspeak?
There was talk of impeachment Monday at the Trump Organization’s criminal tax fraud trial — not former President Donald Trump’s, which happened twice — but whether lawyers for his company were angling to impeach their own witness, longtime Trump accountant Donald Bender.
The Trump Organization, the holding company for Trump’s buildings, golf courses and other assets, is charged with helping some top executives avoid income taxes on compensation they got in addition to their salaries, including rent-free apartments and luxury cars. If convicted, the company could be fined more than $1 million.
John Bowden30 November 2022 08:40
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GOP’s new committee leaders prepare blitz of investigations
House Republicans are promising aggressive oversight of the Biden administration once they assume the majority next year, with a particular focus on the business dealings of presidential son Hunter Biden, illegal immigration at the U.S.-Mexico border and the originations of COVID-19.
Republicans won’t have enough votes to advance key legislative priorities if there is no Democratic buy-in, but their oversight of government agencies could put Democrats on the defensive and dampen support for the Biden administration going into the 2024 presidential elections.
Read more about how they plan to cause headaches for Joe Biden in The Independent:
John Bowden30 November 2022 07:40
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Herschel Walker under fire as financial records show he was only renting out Georgia home
Financial disclosure forms have revealed that contrary to his claims of deep ties to the state of Georgia, Republican nominee Herschel Walker in fact appears to have used his property there as a source of rental income rather than as a residence.
And separately, CNN obtained video of him telling a group of Republicans that he planned to run for Georgia’s Senate seat — from the Lone Star State.
The news comes as Georgians turn out in record numbers to vote in the state’s Senate runoff, in which Mr Walker is trying to unseat Democratic incumbent Raphael Warnock to give his party a 50th Senate seat.
John Bowden30 November 2022 06:40
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Pence says Trump was ‘wrong’ and showed ‘profoundly poor judgement’ by dining with Kanye West and Nick Fuentes
Donald Trump was “wrong” and showed “profoundly poor judgement” for meeting last week at Mar-a-Lago with outspoken antisemites like rapper and fashion designer Kanye West and right-wing media figure Nick Fuentes, according to former vice-president Mike Pence.
“President Trump was wrong to give a white nationalist, an antisemite, and a Holocaust denier a seat at the table,” Mr Pence said in an interview on NewsNation on Monday.
Read more about the latest rift between Donald Trump and his ex-vice president:
John Bowden30 November 2022 05:40
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ICYMI: Incoming GOP congressman condemns Fuentes – but not Trump
As many Republican members of Congress keep quiet about Donald Trump’s dinner with Nick Fuentes and Kanye West, Mike Lawler, one of the new class of GOP representatives who won the party its ultra-narrow majority, has weighed in on the row in unsparing terms – albeit without mentioning Donald Trump’s name.
Mr Lawler is something of a hero in the House GOP conference having unseated DCCC chair Sean Patrick Maloney in a redrawn New York district.
John Bowden30 November 2022 04:40
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Everything we know about the ‘politically motivated’ assault on Nancy Pelosi’s husband
On 28 October, Americans woke to news of a violent, apparently politically motivated attack on the home of one of the nation’s most powerful political figures.
The attack sparked anger, mockery, lurid conspiracy theories, increased security, warnings of a “heightened threat” from domestic extremists in advance of November’s midterm elections, and fears that the extreme rhetoric of far right groups such as QAnon is increasingly spilling over into violence.
Here’s everything we know on the brutal assault of Paul Pelosi:
John Bowden30 November 2022 03:40
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Mitt Romney calls Trump a ‘gargoyle’
The Utah senator has long been one of the most vocal anti-Trump voices in the GOP, and is now opening fire on the ex-president as he faces one of the greatest political firestorms of his career.
“There is no bottom to the degree to which he’s willing to degrade himself, and the country for that matter,” said the 2012 Republican presidential nominee.
John Bowden30 November 2022 02:40
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Who could Donald Trump pick as vice president in 2024?
Now that Donald Trump has officially kicked off his third campaign for the presidency, one of the few certainties about what he will do if he wins the GOP nomination in 2024 is that he won’t be running with his former vice president, Mike Pence.
According to reporting in Politico and other news outlets, the twice-impeached ex-president who stood atop the 2020 GOP ticket is now looking for a far more subservient partner than the former Indiana governor, whose selection as his running mate in 2016 was driven by a desire to reassure social conservatives that Mr Trump was on board with their programme despite his history as an abortion-friendly Democratic donor.
Last year, ex-Trump adviser Michael Caputo said anyone Mr Trump would consider selecting would “have to denounce what happened in 2020” — meaning fully endorse the ex-president’s oft-repeated lies about the election he lost having been stolen from him.
Here’s who could fit the bill:
John Bowden30 November 2022 01:40