“So, if I went back to NBC right now to do something, they would do anything I wanted to do, showbiz-wise, I’m talking about. Doing a show, anything I wanted to do right now, 100%.
“Because one thing I know about that business, and I learned more about that business than anybody else could learn in a short period of time.
“It’s about one thing: ratings. If you have ratings, you can be the meanest, most horrible human being in the world. There’s only one thing that matters: ratings.
“You can be nice, or you can be mean. You can be evil. You can be horrible. You can be crude or elegant. There’s only one thing that matters and that’s ratings.
“If you don’t have ratings, it doesn’t matter.” – Trump, in newly released audio from his interview with author Ramin Setoodeh.
Trump: If you have ratings, you can be the meanest, most horrible human being in the world. There's only one thing that matters. Ratings. You can be evil, horrible, cruel, or elegant. There's only one thing that matters and that's ratings… pic.twitter.com/eOYkHvnp69
This is who tRump is, a vindictive kid with a lot of authority who only wants his way, never be corrected, allowed to do anything he wants, be a king, be worshiped and idolized, and punish anyone who displeases him. And the right wing republican Ideologues on the SCOTUS just gave him immunity for doing any of it. We simply must not let him become president. Hugs. Scottie
Former President Donald J. Trump has escalated his vows to prosecute his political opponents, circulating posts on his social media website invoking “televised military tribunals” and calling for the jailing of President Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, Senators Mitch McConnell and Chuck Schumer and former Vice President Mike Pence, among other high-profile politicians.
One post that he circulated on Sunday singled out Liz Cheney, the former Wyoming congresswoman who is a Republican critic of Mr. Trump’s, and called for her to be prosecuted by a type of military court reserved for enemy combatants and war criminals.
A separate post included photos of 15 former and current elected officials that said, in all-capital letters, “they should be going to jail on Monday not Steve Bannon!” Those officials included Mr. Biden, Ms. Harris, Mr. Pence, Mr. Schumer and Mr. McConnell — the top leaders in the Senate — and Representative Nancy Pelosi, the former House speaker.
Former President Donald Trump canceled an interview with military reporter Mike Gooding after the campaign asked what questions the reporter was going to ask Trump.
Trump held a rally in Chesapeake, Virginia on Friday — the day after a CNN debate with President Joe Biden at which Trump rattled off as many as 50 falsehoods that went unchallenged by the moderators.
During that debate, President Biden also challenged Trump about his reported remarks calling U.S. military casualties “suckers” and “losers” — remarks that were confirmed by Trump’s then-Chief of Staff John Kelly.
Gooding, military correspondent for ABC affiliate WVEC’s 13News Now — was scheduled to interview Trump after the rally. On Friday morning, they even teased the interview on the air.
But when 13News Now’s Preston Steger and Alex Littlehales covered the rally online, they noted that Trump abruptly canceled the interview — after asking for questions in advance:
It was a winding speech, meandering back and forth on a lot of different talking points and policies.
After the rally, 13News Now’s military reporter Mike Gooding was scheduled to interview Trump, but his campaign team canceled the interview after asking Gooding what his questions would be, and telling him there was no more time and Trump only wanted to talk about the debate.
Ahead of Trump’s visit, WVEC covered Virginia Democrats who held a press conference with veterans to denounce Trump over the “suckers” and “losers” remarks.
The Biden campaign flagged the cancellation and tied it to the debate in a campaign memo:
Here are just a few questions Donald is running away from answering – many of which he either dodged or lied about on the debate stage:
Why can’t you commit to accepting the results of the 2024 election?
What do you say to voters who believe that you violated your oath through your actions and inaction on January 6 and worry that you’ll do it again?
What do you say to the service members who you insulted as “suckers” and “losers”?
Do you think women forced to give birth in states with total abortion bans, risking their lives, is still a “beautiful thing”?
13News Now’s reporting doesn’t say what questions Gooding was going to ask Trump, or whether they provided the subject matter for the interview to Trump’s team — although the reporting notes the campaign said “Trump only wanted to talk about the debate.”
Mediaite has reached out to Gooding for comment but has not received a response as of this writing.
I don’t care if Biden is in a wheelchair and shakes like an out of balance washing machine on spin cycle or a tea cup Chihuahua, I will vote for him. The people he puts in positions, in departments, the judges he appoints are far too important to not vote for him. No do not switch him out now, too late, plus the people saying to do it admit they don’t all want the same person to replace him. Regardless of how old Biden is, tRump is a hateful tyrant con man crook. Hugs. Scottie
Photo illustration: Brendan Lynch/Axios. Photo: Samuel Corum/Getty Images
Former President Trump, if re-elected, plans to immediately test the boundaries of presidential and governing power, knowing the restraints of Congress and the courts are dramatically looser than during his first term, his advisers tell us.
Why it matters: It’s not just the Supreme Court ruling on Monday that presidents enjoy substantial legal immunity for actions in office. Trump would come to office with a Cabinet and staff pre-vetted for loyalty, and a fully compliant Republican coalition in Congress — devoid of critics in positions of real power.
That’s a big reason many Democrats worry President Biden is making one of the biggest gambles in U.S. history by staying in the race amid acute concerns about his age.
The big picture: Trump promises an unabashedly imperial presidency — one that would turn the Justice Department against critics, deport millions of people in the U.S. illegally, slap 10% tariffs on thousands of products, and fire perhaps tens of thousands of government staff deemed insufficiently loyal.
He’d stretch the powers of the presidency in ways not seen in our lifetime. He says this consistently and clearly — so it’s not conjecture.
You might like this or loathe this. But it’s coming, fast and furious, if he’s elected.
Thanks to Monday’s Supreme Court ruling, Trump could pursue his plans without fear of punishment or restraint.
What to watch: To hear Trump and his allies tell it, this is how early 2025 would unfold if he wins:
1. A re-elected Trump would quickly set up vast camps and deport millions of people in the U.S. illegally. He could invoke the Insurrection Act and use troops to lock down the southern border.
3. He’d centralize power over the Justice Department, historically an independent check on presidential power. He plans to nominate a trusted loyalist for attorney general, and has threatened to target and even imprison critics. He could demand the federal cases against him cease immediately.
4. Many of the Jan. 6 convictscould be pardoned — a promise Trump has made at campaign rallies, where he hails them as patriots, not criminals. Investigations of the Bidens would begin.
5. Trump says he’d slap 10% tariffs on most imported goods, igniting a possible trade war and risking short-term inflation. He argues this would give him leverage to create better trade terms to benefit consumers.
6. Conversation would intensify about when Justices Clarence Thomas, 76, and Sam Alito, 74, would retire.
Lists of potential successors are already drawn up.
President Biden said last month that “the next president is likely to have two new Supreme Court nominees.”
If Trump were to win and the two oldest justices retired, five of the nine justices would have been handpicked by Trump.
Top Democrats privately predict Republican majorities in the House and Senate if Biden loses.
Most of Trump’s most prominent critics — Mitt Romney, Liz Cheney, et al. — will be gone. Even the few who remain, including Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), will be substantially less powerful.
Trump would be backed by an overwhelmingly Trump-friendly Senate and House — loaded with loyalists, top to bottom. Many were elected since his 2016 win, and many thanks to his endorsement.
Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) in the spin room after the CNN debate in Atlanta. Photo: Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images
What they’re saying: Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio), a top prospect as Trump’s VP, told us Trump would have more allies — and more loyal allies — in Congress this time.
“You have to ask yourself: How many true allies of the agenda existed in the United States Capitol in January 2017, and how many will exist in January of 2025?” Vance told us.
“You have a Republican Party that, in some ways, was divided against itself in January of 2017,” Vance added. “I think now it recognizes that Trump is effectively leader of the party. And you’ll see that in governing style and certainly in agenda,” with “much less infighting between Republicans, which will make us much more effective as a governing coalition.”
The freshman senator said that while Trump was “very much a newcomer to politics” when he ran the first time, he now “understands how to pull the levers of power much better, because he’s coming at this as a subject matter expert.”
The media would investigate, report, and illuminate all of it — but probably with less impact. A second Trump term would start with TV ratings in the tank, mainstream media shrinking, and public attention shattering into dozens of information ecosystems, many built around popular and often partisan celebrities.
So the ability to do more with fewer real restraints is real — and hard to change.
The bottom line: Think of Trump 2025 as a better prepared, much better organized, much more powerful version of Trump 2017 — minus Republican brakes and any mystery about immunity.
Today’s ruling doesn’t change the facts, so let’s by very clear about what happened on January 6: Donald Trump snapped after he lost the 2020 election and encouraged a mob to overthrow the results of a free and fair election.
Trump is already running for president as a convicted felon for the very same reason he sat idly by while the mob violently attacked the Capitol: he thinks he’s above the law and is willing to do anything to gain and hold onto power for himself.
Since January 6, Trump has only grown more unhinged. He’s promising to be a dictator ‘on day one,’ calling for our Constitution to be ‘terminated’ so he can regain power, and promising a ‘bloodbath’ is he loses.
The American people already rejected Donald Trump’s self-obsessed quest for power once—Joe Biden will make sure they reject it for good in November.
Scottie's Playtime 