This is profit. Yet Republican James Comer claims that Biden getting a loan repaid by his brother and his son when he was not in office is corruption. He mocked the reporting of tRump doing what they are trying to impeach Pres. Joe Biden for, which again Biden did not gain any profit. The republicans are so full of bull. They want to do to Biden what they did to Clinton with the Benghazi hearings. They held 9 hearings, were going to hold a 10th, even after the first 9 found no wrong doing or crime by Clinton. But the constant accusations on Fox and other right wing media tarnished her for something she did not do and brought her poll numbers down. The republicans are desperate to do that to Biden because their candidates suck. Hugs. Scottie
Arthur Delaney
Updated ·5 min read
Donald Trump’s businesses received nearly $8 million in payments from foreign governments while Trump was president, according to new research by Democrats on Capitol Hill.
Unlike Republicans in their efforts to pin corruption on President Joe Biden, Democrats on the House oversight committee have receipts — more than 400 pages of them — that show payments to Trump’s businesses from foreign officials likely seeking to influence the U.S. government.
Trump refused to divest from his business empire when he became president, creating an opportunity for anyone hoping to win his favor to put money straight into his pocket by staying at his hotels.
“When he arrived in the White House, Trump was determined not only to keep this well-branded global corporate empire going but to seize a new and unprecedented opportunity to make it ever more lucrative for himself and his family,” the oversight committee’s Democratic staff, led by Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), said in their report.
Democrats and nonpartisan ethics experts have long argued that Trump’s refusal to divest violated the U.S. Constitution’s ban on presidents accepting gifts or “emoluments” from kings, princes or foreign states. Trump faced emoluments lawsuits, but the Supreme Court declared the cases moot after he left the White House in January 2021.
Meanwhile, since 2019, Democrats on the House oversight committee have sought records from Trump’s accounting firm reflecting his foreign income. After a federal court awarded access in 2022, Democrats said they’d found records reflecting more than $750,000 in payments from foreign officials at Trump’s hotel in Washington, D.C. Despite a court order requiring more material to be turned over, Republicans quietly shut down document production last year as they launched their quest for dirt on Biden.
Using documents obtained by the court order, plus already-public records, Democrats tallied $7.8 million in foreign payments from 20 countries during Trump’s presidency. Most of the sum came from Chinese sources, including China’s embassy in the U.S. and the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, a state-owned enterprise that leased property at Trump Tower in New York. Democrats suggest in their report that the payments from ICBC could have affected the Trump administration’s decision not to sanction the bank for ties to North Korea in 2017.
Democrats stressed Thursday that their report was based on records from only two years of Trump’s time in the White House, and that the $7.8 million is likely an undercount of the full money Trump received from foreign governments.
“What we have is essentially the tip of the iceberg,” Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.) told reporters. “So this $7.8 million is just a small window ― obviously a significant amount of money, but a small window ― into what is likely a fairly large sum of money and gifts.”
Though Democrats presented their report as a continuation of their investigation into Trump’s violation of the Constitution’s emoluments clause, it’s clearly intended as a rebuke of the impeachment inquiry against Biden. The House of Representatives could hold an impeachment vote sometime in the coming months.
Republicans have accused Biden of improperly benefiting from his son Hunter Biden’s business deals, through which the younger Biden received millions of dollars from foreign nationals in China and Ukraine during and after Joe Biden’s time as vice president. Republicans have said Joe Biden may have accepted foreign bribes through his son’s work.
Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) speaks to journalists on the steps of the U.S. Capitol on Dec. 13.
The only problem with the allegations is that there’s not much proof. Republicans have sifted through years of Hunter Biden’s bank records without finding any significant cash flows to the president ― except for four $1,380 transfers that were apparently reimbursements for truck payments the president made on his son’s behalf in 2018. House oversight committee chair James Comer (R-Ky.) has nevertheless said that because Hunter Biden’s money came from foreign sources, the payments to his father were tainted, even if they were loan reimbursements.
As HuffPost has previously reported, the foreign payments that went directly to businesses controlled by Trump himself might be better examples of the kind of corruption Republicans are talking about.
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), a leader of the impeachment inquiry against Biden and one of the former president’s top defenders in Congress, deflected a question last year about Trump’s conflict of interest by pointing out that the former president donated his pay back to the government.
“President Trump didn’t take a salary,” Jordan said. “President Trump did so many good things for the country, did more of what he said he would do as president than any president, certainly in my lifetime.”
Raskin on Thursday ridiculed the no-salary argument.
“You don’t get to choose to refuse your salary and then take money from foreign governments instead,” he said. “The founders were emphatic that the president of the United States be someone who gets his money not from foreign governments, but rather from Americans.”
As for the impeachment inquiry against Biden, Raskin called it a hopeless wild goose chase.
“They found nothing, and look what we’ve been able to determine when we finally were able to extract just two years of information,” Raskin said.
Using documents from the Mazars settlement, Democrats tally $7.8 million Trump's business received from foreign governments while he was president https://t.co/8EOqw0RGHD
Donald Trump’s businesses during his presidency received at least $7.8 million in payments from the foreign governments and officials of 20 countries, according to a report released by Democrats on the House Oversight Committee. https://t.co/VqLafn1JOS
Donald Trump’s businesses received at least $7.8 million from 20 foreign governments during his presidency, according to a new report released by House Democrats.
Of course Stinky has received buttloads of cash from foreign governments, while president. Hell, the goddam Saudis were perpetually renting out 2 floors of Trump’s DC hotel, despite no one staying there most of the time.
This is why Trump likely assumed that Biden also received boatloads of foreign cash, because he has, OR he’s following Goebbels’ protocols.
Or when he’s accused of quoting Hitler, unwittingly reveals that he’s familiar enough with Hitler’s speeches to claim that he has used somewhat different phrasing. He’s ever the dangerous imbecile.
Watch the MEDIA let this SLIDE like ALL his other OUTRAGES! Never a WORD of media complaint or warning about his relentless FASCIST rhetoric, even about his stochastic terrorism!
Every DAY we heard about Hillary’s emails in 2016! WHEN do we hear about the REAL danger posed to the national security by the over 100 documents dealing with nuclear secrets that Trump held on to ILLEGALLY after he left office?! MEDIA, WHERE ARE YOU?!
Yesterday Ladapo called for banning COVID vaccines due to “DNA integration,” a claim that was immediately ridiculed by vaccine experts and Ladapo’s own DeSantis-appointed predecessor in Florida.
So this is the crazy nutcase that Tildeb used to justify anti-trans hate. He is the Florida Surgeon General, handpicked by DeathSantis because of his anti-covid vaccine stance. He was given the job even though not qualified, and DeathSantis tried to force the state university to hire him at a huge sum of money. He refused to answer questions asked him by the Florida legislature and lied to them when forced to answer. He was part of the demon seed doctor’s team that scammed maga people by charging them huge fees for an online consultation, then prescribed Ivermectin to cure or prevent covid. It has been well proven that Ivermectin doesn’t do anything to cure or prevent covid. He has been soundly mocked by the scientific and medical communities. Remember if DeathSantis is elected to the presidency this is the type of people he hires. Below I will post the first part of the Wikipedia entry on him. Hugs. Scottie
JosephLadapoJoseph Abiodun Ladapo (born December 16, 1978) [1] is the surgeon general of Florida. [2] He has attracted attention for spreading misinformation on COVID-19 and promoting vaccine hesitancy. [
DeSantis’ Florida surgeon general Dr. Joseph Ladapo says covid mRNA vaccines “the Anti-Christ of all products… That’s so wrong, you know, it’s just complete disrespect to the human genome and the importance of protecting it and preserving it, and that is our connection to God.” pic.twitter.com/r1aGzHsBqz
mRNA, of course, is messenger molecules telling some of your immune cells to make specific antibodies. They don’t mess with DNA, they don’t get into your ova or sperm, they just wash out of your body within a few days. That’s what they were telling him when “They talked about a bunch of other things” that he didn’t understand.
The biggest thing about the new mRNA technology is getting the mRNA to survive long enough to make any proteins. The cells have a zillion RNAses waiting to chew up improper RNA not tagged with the exact signal for temporary protection. It has been nearly 20 years since I was a bench researcher handling RNA, and I still remember what a PITA it was to handle.
Russian hackers were inside Ukrainian telecoms giant Kyivstar’s system from at least May last year in a cyberattack that should serve as a ‘big warning’ to the West, Ukraine’s cyber spy chief told Reuters.
This video was recorded weeks ago. Yet at this point Israel had destroyed 98,000 buildings, and most if not all would have had people in them or near them. At this time the Palestinian death toll is over 20,000 and 1/3 of them are children. Hugs. Scottie
Ari Tolany, research consultant for Women for Weapons Trade Transparency, to discuss her recent piece that she co-authored in In These Times entitled “How Israel Got an Endless Supply of U.S.-Made Smart Bombs.”
Tolany walks Sam through the particular proliferation of Precision Guided Missiles in these overseas stockpiles, and the contradictory nature of why these missiles are manufactured (reducing collateral damage) and how they have been used by US allies – namely Saudi Arabia and Israel – before wrapping up with a brief conversation on the importance of international investigation in actually holding the US accountable for their bombs.
This is why the media is desperate to make the Democrats hold primaries. This is why they are pushing third party candidates. This is why they want to pretend there is a real nail biter of a race between Biden and tRump. It is all about the money. This was one state in a short period of time. Think of the hundreds of millions, easily over a billion nationwide. For every station, YouTube podcast, every other podcast, every streaming event that shows commercials for all the print media this is big bonus money. It is not about the candidates nor about informing the public, it is simply about making money. Hugs. Scottie
Same sex relationships and male gay brothels were normal until Christianity took hold. Then the bigotry started. Sexual activity was an accepted part of everyday life, until regressive repressive Christians ruined it for everyone. And they are still at it today. Hugs
Welcome back to 🤪Crazy Histories🤪 As long as humanity has existed, there have been physical and romantic relationships between people of the same gender. And like straight people, those of varying sexualities have also looked for release in more promiscuous places. They say the oldest job in the world is prostitution, and these gay brothels that date from antiquity to modern day certainly prove that… #ancienthistory#historydocumentary#homosexual
WOW. Jared Bernstein just went on Fox & gave one of the *best* defenses of our booming & strong economy under President Biden that I’ve ever heard — & did it in only 90 seconds. That was a true masterclass in communication & how it’s done. Watch & share👇 pic.twitter.com/in0ZVX4cwW
Let’s shout this from the rooftops. This is for the fox / right wing media watching jerks that think gas prices are up because we don’t pump enough oil out of the ground, ruining the environment. They shout under tRump the US was energy independent. They are showing how clearly they don’t understand the oil to gas production. The US has always pumped the most oil. What we don’t do is refine most of it to the kinds of fuel we need most here, because as I understand it, the refineries are set up for a different type of oil. The oil from the US is mostly not the right kind to make the fuels we use. Also oil is sold on a worldwide market and oil companies can make more money selling it over seas than here. We need more refineries to refine the oil into the fuels we need here, but again that cuts into the profit margin of the oil / gas companies. And in the US, profit is king. The Saudis pump the kind of oil we need, it is imported. They can screw with us to keep us doing what they want by restricting the amount they pump / sell. The right wing people are too uninformed to know that they are bowing to the Saudi government every time they scream at and blame Biden for gas prices. And compared to a lot of advanced countries, the US has relatively cheap gas. Oh and closing the Keystone 2 pipeline before it could operate did not cause a fuel price increase / shortage. The pipeline was never used. Plus the oil that would run in it was destined to be sent out of the country. Hugs. Scottie
You won’t hear President Biden talking about it much, but a key record has been broken during his watch: The United States is producing more oil than any country ever has. The flow of huge amounts of crude from American producers is playing a big role in keeping prices down at the pump, diminishing the geopolitical power of OPEC, and taming inflation.
The average price of a gallon of regular gasoline nationwide has dropped to close to $3, and analysts project it could stay that way leading up to the presidential election, potentially assuaging the economic anxieties of swing state voters who will be crucial to Biden’s hopes of a second term.
But it is not something the president publicly boasts about. The politics of oil are particularly tricky for Democrats, whose chances for victory in the 2024 elections could hinge on whether young, climate-conscious voters come out in big numbers.
You won’t hear President Biden talking about it much, but a key record has been broken during his watch: The United States is producing more oil than any country ever has. https://t.co/ue1Tiqx4aK
A short-term boost in domestic oil production and a corresponding decline in gas prices could have a long-term benefit for environmentalists — helping prevent the return to power of Trump and other deniers of climate change, said Josh Freed, the director of climate and energy at the center-left think tank Third Way.
“The fastest way to end all of American climate action is to see oil prices dramatically rise and have Republicans get elected to office,” he said, commending Biden’s handling of the issue.
It’s not like Trump is much younger, either. But people have drunk the Fox News kool-aid on this, and (of course) the Dems haven’t done enough to counter that messaging.
What a sticky widget. Oof. He’s done more for EV, solar and wind infrastructure than any other administration. And yet, this situation. I’m honestly incredibly impressed at the administration’s ability to thread the needle, ya know?
Scottie's Playtime 