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Trump claims unrevealed Cohen book manuscript shows testimony was ‘total lie’

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President Trump on Sunday renewed his attacks against his former lawyer, Michael Cohen, claiming that a manuscript Cohen allegedly wrote proved that the attorney’s congressional testimony last week was a “total lie.”

“After more than two years of Presidential Harassment, the only things that have been proven is that Democrats and other broke the law,” Trump tweeted. “The hostile Cohen testimony, given by a liar to reduce his prison time, proved no Collusion!”

Trump has insisted that Cohen wrote a manuscript last year that was a “love letter” to Trump, contradicting his criticism of Trump in his congressional testimony. No manuscript has been publicly released, and Cohen’s publisher said he never turned one in.

Trump on Sunday maintained that Cohen’s unseen book manuscript proved his testimony was a lie. He said in a separate tweet that the “Fake Media won’t show it.” 

“I am an innocent man being persecuted by some very bad, conflicted & corrupt people in a Witch Hunt that is illegal & should never have been allowed to start – And only because I won the Election! Despite this, great success!” Trump said. 

Trump cites Imaginary ‘just released’ book manuscript to attack Cohen

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President Donald Trump said Saturday that a “just released” manuscript of a book written by Michael Cohen would show his longtime personal lawyer had lied to Congress, without offering further evidence for the explosive claim.

“Virtually everything failed lawyer Michael Cohen said in his sworn testimony last week is totally contradicted in his just released manuscript for a book about me. It’s a total new love letter to “Trump” and the pols must now use it rather than his lies for sentence reduction!” Trump tweeted.

It’s not yet clear whether the manuscript exists, if Trump has actually seen it or if he is simply continuing a line of attack started on Friday, when the president demanded Congress obtain the alleged manuscript as proof that Cohen was lying in his testimony.

“The brand new manuscript for a new book by failed lawyer Michael Cohen shows his testimony was a total lie! Pundits should only use it,” Trump tweeted minutes later.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment

Last May, the Daily Beast reported that Cohen had written a book tentatively titled “Trump Revolution: From The Tower to The White House, Understanding Donald J. Trump,” but its release was stalled by legal issues.

During congressional testimony this week, Republicans pressed Cohen on whether he had a book deal lined up. Cohen would not rule out that possibility. However, Cohen’s potential publisher has said it “never saw a manuscript” and a lawyer for Cohen said the book never went beyond a preliminary proposal.

[Politico]

Trump Rails Against Mueller: Trying to Take Me Down With ‘BullshIt!’

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President Donald Trump railed against Special Counsel Robert Mueller, his team of investigators and former Attorney General Jeff Sessionsduring a lengthy and profane tirade at CPAC on Saturday.

During an extensive improvised riff, Trump praised his own election victory in 2016, calling it “the greatest of all time.”

“You put the wrong people in a couple of positions…and all of a sudden, they are trying to take you out with bullshit!” Trump said, which drew rapturous applause and chants of “Bullshit!” from inside the hall, per reports.

“Robert Mueller never received a single vote,” Trump said, of the investigator appointed to lead a probe into his campaign’s ties with Russian interference in the 2016 election.

Trump then turned his ire to Sessions, who served as attorney general through several years of presidential Twitter abuse, after he recused himself from the Russia investigation given his work on the 2016 campaign.

[Mediaite]

Media

Trump mimics Southern accent at CPAC to ridicule his former AG

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After a bruising week of distractions and disappointments at home and abroad, President Donald Trumpturned to performance art and a campaign-style speech at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference that tried to recast setbacks for his White House and rally conservatives ahead of his bid to be re-elected in 2020.

“You know I’m totally off script right now, and this you know is how I got elected, by being off script. And if we don’t go off script our country is in big trouble, folks,” Trump said.

In his first public appearance since his second summit with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, the president stepped out on stage and gave the American flag a bear hug, setting off an expletive-laden, off-script campaign-style speech on red meat topics like the Mueller report, tariffs, Hillary Clinton’s emails, tax reform, healthcare and even touched on Tivo and inauguration crowd sizes.

He affected a mock southern accent to ridicule his former attorney general Jeff Sessions to some howls of delight from the crowd.

The president left Vietnam this week early, without any agreement on denuclearization or sanctions. He also saw headlines from home that his former lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen painted him on the national stage as a crook.

But on the CPAC stage, the president embraced the “love in the room” that sometimes broke into cheers and chants of support.

Flailing his arms and changing his voice, the president re-enacted his call for Russia to hack into Hillary Clinton’s emails and claimed he was only being sarcastic and was misunderstood by the media.

“If you say something like Russia, please, if you can, it is Hillary Clinton’s emails! Please, Russia, please! Please, get us the emails! Please!” Trump said. “Then the fake CNN and others say, he asked Russia to go get the emails.”

The president also revealed that he told first lady Melania Trump that he fired former FBI director James Comey because he was doing a bad job, and not because of Russia, as he has said before.

“When I fired Comey, I said you know, first lady, I said Melania, ‘I’m doing something today. I’m doing it because it really has to be done. He is bad. He’s a bad, bad, he is a bad bad guy, it’s been proven that with all of the emails,’” Trump said.

[ABC News]

‘These People Are Sick’: Trump Mocks Media for Coverage of His ‘Russia, If You’re Listening…’ Comments at CPAC

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President Donald Trump teed off on the media today at his CPAC speech, mocking them for taking his infamous “Russia, if you’re listening…” campaign comments about Hillary Clinton‘s emails seriously.

When he brought up the “fake news,” the president said, “If you tell a joke, if you are sarcastic, if you’re having fun with the audience, if you’re on live television with millions of people and 25,000 people in an arena people in an arena, and if you say something like ‘Russia, please, if you can get us Hillary Clinton’s emails! Please, Russia, please!’”

He said it in a mocking voice, which was immediately followed up by chants of “Lock her up!”

“Then that fake CNN and others say, ‘He asked Russia to get the emails. Horrible,’” Trump continued. “I mean, I saw it like two weeks ago. I’m watching and they’re talking about one of the points. ‘He asked Russia for the emails.’ These people are sick. And I’m telling you, they know the game. They know the game. And they play it dirty.”

[Mediaite]

Reality

It wasn’t a joke, Donald Trump was well aware in July 2016 that Russia had hacked DNC emails and were preparing to release them. Donald Trump Jr. told him. Roger Stone told him. George Papadapolous told him.

More Than 2 Years Later, Trump Complains About Media Coverage of Inauguration Crowd Size in CPAC Speech

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In his big speech to CPAC this afternoon, President Donald Trumpcomplained again about the media coverage of his inauguration crowd size a little over two years ago.

Trump first railed against the Washington Post‘s Dave Weigel for a misleading December 2017 tweet about the size of the crowd at one of his rallies. Weigel took down the tweet after Trump initially tweeted about it. The President followed up at the time by saying Weigel should be fired:

He blasted Weigel today for a bit––”if that were a conservative, he would’ve been fired on the spot”––before going even further back to complain about media coverage of his inauguration crowd size.

Yes, really:

“I watched one of the evening shows that are ridiculous how horrible they are, how mean, how horrible. I watched it by mistake, and they showed… from the White House all the way down, they showed there were people––nobody’s ever seen it. The capital down to the Washington Monument, but I saw pictures that there were no people. Those pictures were taken hours before, right? They always mention crowd sizes. ‘He talks about crowd sizes.’ So I’m constantly bugging Mercedes whenever we had a slow moment. I say, Mercedes and Sarah, show them the pictures. Show them and compare them with what they put on television. Those pictures were taken hours before. And remember this also, not that Obama would do this, but we had fencing all the way down to the Washington Monument, and it was raining. And it was wet and the grass was wet. And women and men… they had to walk all the way down, they had to walk with high heels in many cases. They had to walk all the way down to the Washington Monument and then back!”

Sean Spicer‘s 2017 briefing room debut, you’ll remember, involved him railing against the media coverage of the inauguration crowd size at length. He was roundly lambasted for that briefing.

[Mediaite]

Trump praises his Scottish golf course for its beauty and diplomatic links with UK

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President Donald Trump’s seemingly out-of-the blue praise Saturday for his Aberdeen golf course in Scotland — and its purported contribution to British relations with the United States — comes only days after he was ordered to pay the legal fees in his losing effort to an offshore wind farm in sight of the course.

“Very proud of perhaps the greatest golf course anywhere in the world,” he tweeted. “Also, furthers U.K. relationship!”

Trump’s tweets — which reach 59 million people — will likely have less impact on the British foreign office than his golf business, although he says he has stepped down from running the Trump Organization to avoid potential conflict of interests.

Trump’s relations with locals near the Aberdeen course have long been strained. Environmental and planning authorities objected to plans for an additional 18-hole course as a threat to the delicate 14-mile sand dunes systems and sought to block a project to develop 550 luxury homes and lodges near the course.

The Herald Scotland newspaper said local critics view Trump as an “international pariah” with a brand so toxic it can only damage the reputation of Aberdeenshire. 

Trump, however, had his own concerns about disturbing the North Sea coastline when he strongly opposed the construction of 11 offshore turbines that he said would spoil the view from his course at Menie, about 9 miles north of Aberdeen.

“I am not thrilled — I want to see the ocean, I do not want to see windmills,” he said in 2006, according to the BBC.

In 2015, he lost that battle over the wind project, which began generating power last July. 

While losing on the merits of the case, Trump took a second hit last week when the Court of Session ruled that Trump International Golf Club Scotland Ltd. should also pay legal fees over the lawsuit, the BBC reports.

In his tweet, Trump, perhaps, was also touting the course as part of a current two-week recruitment drive to hire 100 additional staff for the resort.

The course, which Trump built from scratch on 1,800 acres in 2005, has proved to be a divisive force within the local community. Legal challenges have sought to block the development of the second course as well as the sprawling housing development nearby that was to include luxury homes and resort lodges. The Scotsman newspaper reported last week that the Trump Organization has quietly agreed to relocate some of the lodges.

Sarah Malone, executive vice-president of Trump International, told Scotland on Sunday that such readjustments are “standard practice” and that the organization is “entirely satisfied and confident in our plans.”

The Aberdeen course, one of Trump’s biggest investments, lost $4.5 million in 2017, its fourth consecutive year in the red, The Washington Post reported.

Trump, whose mother was born in Scotland, has proved a magnet for protesters when he visits his Scottish properties. Thousands of demonstrators turned out for Trump’s appearance at his other Scottish club, Turnberry, last July, including a paraglider bearing a banner that read “Trump well below par,” The Herald reports.

[USA Today]

Trump claims Otto Warmbier comments were ‘misinterpreted’

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President Trump on Friday claimed that he was “misinterpreted” when he said he took Kim Jong Un “at his word” when the dictator denied knowing what happened to US college student Otto Warmbier’s while he was in a North Korean prison.

“I never like being misinterpreted, but especially when it comes to Otto Warmbier and his great family. Remember, I got Otto out along with three others. The previous Administration did nothing, and he was taken on their watch,” Trump wrote on Twitter after increasing criticism of his acceptance of Kim’s denial.

“Of course I hold North Korea responsible for Otto’s mistreatment and death. Most important, Otto Warmbier will not have died in vain. Otto and his family have become a tremendous symbol of strong passion and strength, which will last for many years into the future. I love Otto and think of him often!” he continued, without mentioning Kim or his denial.

Earlier Friday, Warmbier’s parents directly blamed Kim for their son’s death and blasted his “evil regime.”

“We have been respectful during this summit process. Now we must speak out. Kim and his evil regime are responsible for the death of our son Otto,” Fred and Cindy Warmbier said in a scathing statement that rebuked Trump’s assertion.

“Kim and his evil regime are responsible for unimaginable cruelty and inhumanity. No excuses or lavish praise can change that,” added the couple, who were Trump’s guests at his 2018 State of the Union address.

The president drew criticism when he praised Kim’s leadership and said he believed the despot’s claims that he was unaware of how the 22-year-old college student from Ohio had been treated in a North Korean prison.

“Some really bad things happened to Otto — some really, really bad things. But he tells me that he didn’t know about it, and I will take him at his word,” Trump said during a press conference after his summit with Kim broke down.

“I really don’t think it was in his interest at all,” he said, adding that Kim felt “very badly” about the young man’s death.

[New York Post]

Trump Calls Kim Jong-un a ‘Real Leader’ in Hannity Interview

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President Trump continued to sing Kim Jong-un’s praises in a new interview with Sean Hannity, calling the North Korean politician a “real leader,” among other compliments.

“He’s a character and he’s a real personality and he’s very smart. He’s sharp as you can be,” Trump told Hannity in a sit down interview on Thursday night. “He’s a real leader.”

The president immediately added Kim was “pretty mercurial” —  but that he didn’t “say that necessarily in a bad way.”

Trump’s comments follow his trip to Vietnam for a second in-person meeting with Kim. Talks of nuclear disarmament, according to The New York Times on Thursday, fizzled out over a disagreement on lifting stiff sanctions on North Korea.

“It was about the sanctions,” Trump said. “Basically they wanted the sanctions lifted in their entirety, but we couldn’t do that.”

On Thursday, Trump said he didn’t believe Kim knew about the treatment of American student Otto Warmbier, who was sentenced to 15 years hard labor in early 2016 on charges he stole a North Korean propaganda poster. Warmbier was returned to the U.S. in a comatose state in June 2017 and died shortly after. Kim, according to Trump, “felt very badly about” Warmbier’s death.

The Warmbier family, in a statement to MSNBC on Friday, responded to the president’s recent comments.

“We have been respectful during this summit process,” the family said.”Now we must speak out. Kim and his evil regime are responsible for the death of our son, Otto. Kim and his evil regime are responsible for unimaginable cruelty and inhumanity.”

The Warmbiers added:  “No excuses or lavish praise can change that.”

[The Wrap]

Trump Raves Over an Ordinary Tucker Carlson Show Open: ‘Everyone MUST Watch … A Classic!’

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On Twitter, President Donald Trump gave a rave review to FNC’s Tucker Carlson for the opening monologue he delivered on the the topic of Michael Cohen‘s testimony Thursday night. But other than that it was tied to the week’s news, it wasn’t an especially stand-out segment for the show.

Carlson’s monologue focused on what Cohen’s testimony did not confirm for Democrats. Although the “there was no collusion” theme is fairly standard Carlson fare, perhaps the extra mocking sealed the deal for Trump.

The monologue, above, covered (with clips) what claims have been made by media and Democrat politicians over the course of the last two years, and which were not confirmed by Cohen. For example, on the topic of the so-called “pee tape,” Carlson said that “if there is a hooker tape out there, it’s fair to assume that Michael Cohen would know about it. He is that kind of guy. Now would be the time he would tell us all about it. But no.”

He showed Cohen stating under oath that he has never been to Prague, and added that Cohen would no longer have any reason to lie.

With regard to collusion, Carlson said “If anyone can provide that kind of evidence, it would be Michael Cohen. He was a personal attorney to a man who accepted rubles.” He then showed the clip of Cohen saying that he was “not really sure” he could answer the question, or that he would use the word “colluding.” In the clip, Cohen did say there was “back and forth” with Putin.

“Talk about a let down,” said Carlson. “No meeting in Prague. No blackmail. No collusion. No Russian conspiracy at all. It was a hoax. It was a much less interesting Loch Ness monster.”

It was like that for most of the nearly ten minute monologue, and was followed by more of the same in the subsequent interview with a conservative blogger.

A true… classic.

[Mediaite]

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