President Trump is still privately questioning the authenticity of former President Obama’s birth certificate, The New York Times reported Tuesday.
A senator, who asked not to be named, told The Times that Trump is having difficulty moving on from his past claims that Obama wasn’t born in the United States.
Trump led the “birther” movement against Obama, claiming for years that the former president was born outside of the U.S.
Obama eventually released his birth certificate to counter Trump’s claims.
Trump said that Obama was born in the U.S. during a campaign stop last year.
Trump advisers reportedly told The Times that Trump has continued to talk about conspiracy theories that aren’t based in fact since taking office.
The newspaper first reported last week that Trump has been questioning the authenticity of the “Access Hollywood” tape that features audio of him bragging about groping and kissing women without their consent.
Trump acknowledged that it was him on the tape when it was first released last year and apologized for the comments.
Press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders refused to say if Trump thinks the tape is fake at a press briefing Monday.
“The president addressed this, this was litigated and certainly answered during the election by the overwhelming support for the president and the fact he’s sitting here in the Oval Office today,” Huckabee Sanders said Monday.
“He’s made his position on that clear at that time, as have the American people in support of him.”
Asked why Trump would choose to use a phrase that many people find offensive, Sanders said that “what most people find offensive is Senator Warren lying about her heritage to advance her career.” She added that seeing Trump’s use of “Pocahontas” as a racial slur was a “ridiculous response,” because it was not.
“I don’t believe that it is appropriate for [the president] to make a racial slur, or anybody else,” Sanders said, but “I don’t think that it is [a racial slur] and I certainly don’t think that was the president’s intent.”
Warren is one of Trump’s most outspoken critics in the Senate, and for years, Trump has relished referring to her as “Pocahontas,” a reference to Warren’s claim that her family has Native American heritage.
At the White House on Monday, Trump told the veterans, who were “code talkers” in World War II, “You were here long before any of us were here. Although we have a representative in Congress who, they say, was here a long time ago. They call her Pocahontas.” As soon as Trump said it, the room fell silent.
Sanders, however, claimed that Trump’s respect for the veterans was reflected more in his actions than necessarily in his words.
“The president certainly finds an extreme amount of value and respect for these individuals. He’s constantly showing ways to honor those individuals,” she said.
Warren, however, was less forgiving. Responding to Trump’s remarks on MSNBC, the Massachusetts Democrat said it is “deeply unfortunate that the president of the United States cannot even make it through a ceremony honoring these heroes without having to throw out a racial slur.”
Later Monday, Navajo Nation President Russell Begaye said the remark was unfortunate.
“In this day and age, all tribal nations still battle insensitive references to our people. The prejudice that Native American people face is an unfortunate historical legacy,” Begaye said in a statement.
While the Navajo Nation appreciated the honor and recognition bestowed upon its “code talkers,” Begaye said, it does not want to be a part of this “ongoing feud” between the senator and the president.
President Donald Trump, during an event at the White House honoring Navajo code talkers Monday, referenced his nickname for Sen. Elizabeth Warren, “Pocahontas,” a label he has long used about the Massachusetts Democrat.
“I just want to thank you because you are very, very special people. You were here long before any of us were here,” Trump said. “Although, we have a representative in Congress who has been here a long time … longer than you — they call her Pocahontas!”
He then turned to one of the code talkers behind him, put his left hand on the man’s shoulder and said: “But you know what, I like you. You are special people.”
Trump did not name Warren.
The comment, met with silence from event attendees, revives an insult the President has long thrust upon Warren but restated during a high-profile meeting with the Native American war heroes.
“It is deeply unfortunate that the President of the United States cannot even make it through a ceremony honoring these heroes without having to throw out a racial slur. Donald Trump does this over and over thinking somehow he is going to shut me up with it. It hasn’t worked out in the past, it isn’t going to work out in the future,” Warren told MSNBC shortly after Trump’s remark.
Pocahontas was a historical figure from the 17th Century and using her name in an intentionally disparaging way insults native peoples and degrades their cultures. The largest Native American advocacy group has said that is why it has condemned the President’s usage in this manner.
White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said Monday the use of “Pocahontas” was not a racial slur and that it “certainly was not the President’s intent” to use a racial slur.
“I don’t believe that it is appropriate” to use a racial slur, Sanders said during her daily briefing, but added that she didn’t think Trump’s comment was such a slur.
Sanders then targeted Warren, saying that “the most offensive thing” was Warren claiming to be Native American.
“I think Sen. Warren was very offensive when she lied about something specifically to advance her career, and I don’t understand why no one is asking about that question and why that isn’t constantly covered,” Sanders said.
The National Congress of American Indians — the largest and oldest group representing Native Americans — has condemned Trump’s use of “Pocahontas” to deride Warren, noting that the famed Native American was a real person whose historic significance is still important to her tribe, the Pamunkey Indian Tribe in Virginia.
“We cannot and will not stand silent when our Native ancestors, cultures and histories are used in a derogatory manner for political gain,” Jacqueline Pata, the group’s executive director, said earlier this year after Trump called Warren “Pocahontas” at a speech before the National Rifle Association.
Conservatives have previously criticized Warren for claiming that she is part Native American, and the senator’s heritage became an issue during her Senate campaigns.
Trump has seized on the attacks and has regularly called Warren “Pocahontas.” The attack dates back to his 2016 campaign.
“Pocahontas is at it again,” he tweeted in June 2016. “Goofy Elizabeth Warren, one of the least productive U.S. Senators, has a nasty mouth. Hope she is V.P. choice.”
He added, “Crooked Hillary is wheeling out one of the least productive senators in the U.S. Senate, goofy Elizabeth Warren, who lied on heritage.”
And earlier this month, he added, “Pocahontas just stated that the Democrats, lead by the legendary Crooked Hillary Clinton, rigged the Primaries! Lets go FBI & Justice Dept.”
He has also used the nickname privately.
Sources told CNN earlier this year that during a meeting with senators at the White House, Trump taunted Democrats by saying “Pocahontas is now the face of your party.”
Trump has routinely given his political opponents nicknames, but the slight against Warren is one of his most culturally insensitive.
Warren says she is, in fact, part Native American, citing “family stories” passed down through generations of her family.
“I am very proud of my heritage,” Warren told NPR in 2012. “These are my family stories.
This is what my brothers and I were told by my mom and my dad, my mammaw and my pappaw. This is our lives. And I’m very proud of it.”
The legitimacy of Warren’s heritage has been widely debated and Scott Brown, her 2012 Senate campaign opponent, has even suggested Warren take a DNA test to prove her heritage.
Harvard Law School in the 1990s touted Warren, then a professor in Cambridge, as being “Native American.” They singled her out, Warren later acknowledged, because she had listed herself as a minority in an Association of American Law Schools directory.
Critics seized on the listing, saying that she received preferential treatment for questionable Native American heritage. Warren contends that her career was never furthered because of her Native American genealogy.
President Donald Trump has questioned the authenticity of the infamous “Access Hollywood” tape in which he bragged about being able to grope women, The New York Times reported over the weekend, despite the fact that Trump immediately apologized for his remarks when the video surfaced.
Trump’s decision to stick with Alabama Republican Senate candidate Roy Moore despite sexual harassment allegations against him is rooted in the President’s own sexual harassment scandal during the 2016 election.
“He sees the calls for Mr. Moore to step aside as a version of the response to the now-famous ‘Access Hollywood’ tape, in which he boasted about grabbing women’s genitalia, and the flood of groping accusations against him that followed soon after,” the Times reported. “He suggested to a senator earlier this year that it was not authentic, and repeated that claim to an adviser more recently.”
CNN has not independently confirmed the New York Times’ reporting. The White House has not responded to CNN’s request for comment.
During the election, several women accused Trump of previous instances of sexual harassment and the 2005 “Access Hollywood” tape of Trump released in October 2016 caught him saying on a hot mic: “And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything … Grab them by the p****. You can do anything.”
Trump’s reported denials mentioned in the New York Times directly contradict his apology following the tape’s release.
He said in a short video statement hours after the video surfaced: “I said it, I was wrong, and I apologize.”
President Trump took a shot at the news media on Monday ahead of a busy week that could help determine the fate of his agenda.
“We should have a contest as to which of the Networks, plus CNN and not including Fox, is the most dishonest, corrupt and/or distorted in its political coverage of your favorite President (me),” Trump tweeted. “They are all bad. Winner to receive the FAKE NEWS TROPHY!”
We should have a contest as to which of the Networks, plus CNN and not including Fox, is the most dishonest, corrupt and/or distorted in its political coverage of your favorite President (me). They are all bad. Winner to receive the FAKE NEWS TROPHY!
Trump also mocked NBC’s “Morning Joe” for airing a pre-taped segment the day after Thanksgiving.
“The good news is that their ratings are terrible, nobody cares!” he wrote.
The president’s messages come one day after he returned from South Florida, where he spent Thanksgiving with his family.
Trump made five trips to his golf courses and took repeated jabs at the media on Twitter over the holiday weekend.
His latest shots come just hours before he is set to meet with members of the Senate Finance Committee to discuss their push to pass a major tax-reform bill.
Senators are hoping to approve the legislation in the coming days in an effort to send a finished product to Trump’s desk before Christmas. But some Republicans in the upper chamber are not yet satisfied with the bill.
Congress must also race to pass a funding bill before Dec. 8 in order to avoid a government shutdown.
With a little more than two weeks until a special election for the Senate in Alabama, President Trump on Sunday doubled down on his criticism of the Democratic nominee, Doug Jones, and reiterated his support for Roy S. Moore, the Republican candidate, who has been accused of sexual misconduct by a number of women.
“The last thing we need in Alabama and the U.S. Senate is a Schumer/Pelosi puppet who is WEAK on Crime, WEAK on the Border, Bad for our Military and our great Vets, Bad for our 2nd Amendment, AND WANTS TO RAISES TAXES TO THE SKY,” Mr. Trump tweeted on Sunday morning.
“Liberal Jones would be BAD!” he tweeted less than an hour later.
In response, the Jones campaign said Mr. Jones’s record as a prosecutor “speaks for itself.”
“Roy Moore was unfit for office before nine Alabama women served as witnesses to all Alabamians of his disturbing conduct,” Sebastian Kitchen, Mr. Jones’s spokesman, wrote in an email. “Doug Jones is continuing to focus on finding common ground and getting things done for real Alabamians.”
On Sunday, the president claimed that after he had supported Mr. Strange, the candidate “shot way up in the polls” — a claim he also made in September — but “it wasn’t enough.”
It has been widely reported that Mr. Strange did not advance in the polls after Mr. Trump’s endorsement.
The latest poll numbers indicate that Mr. Moore is in a tight race. Alabama historically votes Republican but the allegations against Mr. Moore have taken a toll.
Most of the women who have accused him of sexual misconduct said it occurred when they were teenagers and Mr. Moore was in his 30s. He has denied the allegations.
“I don’t remember ever dating any girl without the permission of her mother,” Mr. Moore told the Fox News host Sean Hannity.
President Donald Trump shared an article about the website magapill.com showcasing his “accomplishment list” — though, aside from including a faulty link, the Twitter account associated with the site frequently posted content that was antisemitic or conspiratorial in nature.
“Wow, even I didn’t realize we did so much. Wish the Fake News would report! Thank you,” tweeted the president — promoting an article from a site that believes Seth Rich was “murdered” by Hillary Clinton and banking is corrupted by “certain bloodlines.”
Wow, even I didn’t realize we did so much. Wish the Fake News would report! Thank you. https://t.co/ApVbu2b0Jd
The front page of the website is titled “President Donald Trump’s Accomplishment List.” This page touts articles — in a Drudge Report style format — that supposedly reflect the president’s successes on the economy, crime, and business.
However, things get significantly stranger and disturbing when examining MAGAPill’s Twitter account, as the site obsesses over conspiracy theories — including the idea that Luciferianism, in part, controls the world, along with George Soros and the Vatican.
In the same wild flow chart, the account shares the theory that “banking families” — a seeming reference to the Jewish community — control all of the world’s financial institutions for their gain. “Banking families, Certain bloodline families have dominated global financial institutions, including: BIS, FED, IMF, World Bank, Wall Street,” states the chart.
Ironically, Trump’s tweet praising the work of MAGAPill came just after a post in which he attacked CNN as “fake news.”
President Donald Trump on Saturday blasted CNN, calling it a source of “fake” news and comparing it unfavorably to its competitor Fox News.
“@FoxNews is MUCH more important in the United States than CNN, but outside of the U.S., CNN International is still a major source of (Fake) news, and they represent our Nation to the WORLD very poorly,” he said on Twitter. “The outside world does not see the truth from them!”
.@FoxNews is MUCH more important in the United States than CNN, but outside of the U.S., CNN International is still a major source of (Fake) news, and they represent our Nation to the WORLD very poorly. The outside world does not see the truth from them!
CNN’s communications team fired back minutes later, tweeting, “It’s not CNN’s job to represent the U.S to the world. That’s yours. Our job is to report the news. #FactsFirst.”
It's not CNN's job to represent the U.S to the world. That's yours. Our job is to report the news. #FactsFirst 🍎
Trump’s remarks come at a significant time for the media outlet, whose parent company Time Warner is merging with AT&T in an $85 billion deal. The Department of Justice has sued to block the merger, and legal experts have speculated that Trump’s previous comments about CNN may be brought up during the litigation.
CNN is a frequent target of Trump’s ire, and he has labeled the network “fake news,” “dishonest,” “disgusting” and “ratings challenged” in the last several months alone.
Trump’s Saturday tweet also marked the second time in as many days that Trump lashed out at a major media outlet on Twitter. On Friday, he went after TIME Magazine, claiming he “took a pass” at being named its “Person of the Year.”
“Time Magazine called to say that I was PROBABLY going to be named ‘Man (Person) of the Year,’ like last year, but I would have to agree to an interview and a major photo shoot,” Trump tweeted. “I said probably is no good and took a pass. Thanks anyway!”
The magazine shot down at Trump’s claim shortly afterward, tweeting that “the President is incorrect about how we choose Person of the Year. TIME does not comment on our choice until publication, which is December 6.”
What Donald Trump did today was give dictators around the globe validation on their own attacks on a free and open press.
No, really. This is what dictators do.
While almost every dictator from Mao Zedong, to Joseph Stalin, to Adolf Hitler has branded some part of the population as an enemy of the people, its specific application to the free press has more recent examples.
In September 2014 the head of the military junta that rules Myanmar said the media was constantly: “condemning and providing false information again, with some truths omitted, some issues exaggerated, and some news reported without scrutiny.”
In 2007, Hugo Chavez shut down the RCTV and then made a televised address, on all channels, in which he branded the media group Globovision his next ‘enemy of the state.
In 1997 Russian state media named Noyaya Gazeta-Mir Ludei (The New Newspaper-World of People), a small 15-member of staff paper that scrutinised the actions of the regional government, was called ‘unpatriotic’ and ‘enemy of the state’.
“The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, or CFPB, has been a total disaster as run by the previous Administrations pick,” he tweeted Saturday.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, or CFPB, has been a total disaster as run by the previous Administrations pick. Financial Institutions have been devastated and unable to properly serve the public. We will bring it back to life!
“Financial Institutions have been devastated and unable to properly serve the public. We will bring it back to life!” the tweet said.
Leadership of the bureau — the brainchild of liberal Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren — was put in play Friday by the resignation of director Richard Cordray.
Before he left, Cordray named his chief of staff as his interim replacement. Cordray’s permanent replacement will be decided by Trump and the Senate.
Trump wants Office of Management and Budget director Mick Muvaney to be the agent’s interim boss. Mulvaney has called the agency “a sad, sick joke.”
Senior administration officials said Saturday that a 1998 law trumps the agency’s internal rules — and they won’t shy from a court fight over the dueling interim directors.
“We have gone out of our way to avoid an unnecessary legal battle with Director Cordray,” one official said. “But his actions indicate that he wants to provoke one.”
A “disaster”? Maybe fore Trump’s Wall Street friends. Below are several key accomplishments that have benefited consumers since the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act was enacted:
Securing Almost $12 Billion in Consumer Relief
The CFPB helped over 29 million individual consumers receive $11.8 billion dollars in due relief, while responding to over 1 million consumer complaints since openings its doors.[2]
Through enforcement action alone, the CFPB reduced $7.7 billion in consumer debts while winning $3.7 billion in compensation for consumers.[3]
Nearly 50 million households have benefited from new CFPB mortgage servicing protections that protect consumers from surprise costs and terms when repaying their mortgage, and offer additional protection if a borrower falls behind on their mortgage payment.[4]
More recently, the CFPB, partnering with the Los Angeles City Attorney’s Office and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, uncovered deceptive banking practices at Wells Fargo Bank defrauding millions of customers.[5]Enforcement action by the CFPB forced Wells Fargo to pay full refunds to consumers harmed by illegal practices and to pay a $100 million penalty for their wanton behavior.
Protecting Service Members from Predatory Practices
The CFPB’s enforcement actions provided $130 million in due compensation to service members, veterans, and their families that were harmed by illegal private sector predatory practices.[6]
In collaboration with the Department of Defense (DOD), the Office of Servicemember Affairs at the CFPB visited more than 145 military installations, handling over 71,000 consumer complaints from service members and their families,[7] and advised DOD on better rules to protect service members from financial exploitation.[8]
Saving Consumers $16 Billion in Undisclosed Credit Card Fees
The Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility and Disclosure (CARD) Act, now under CFPB jurisdiction, reined in the usurious late fees charged on credit cards, limited predatory practices targeting young consumers on college campuses, curtailed sharp interest rate hikes, increased access to consumer credit, and made credit card costs more transparent, saving consumers more than $16 billion in undisclosed fees.[9]
The number of new consumer credit cards increased steadily since implementation and enforcement of the CARD Act to 6.5 million new credit cards and $37.5 billion in available credit in July of 2016.[10]
In collaboration with private industry, the CFPB made it easier for stay-at-home spouses to gain access to credit cards by allowing them to use total household income in their applications for new accounts or higher credit limits. This has helped more than 16 million married individuals who do not work outside the home access necessary credit.
In a Friday afternoon tweet, President Donald Trump claimed that in 2016 after winning the U.S. presidency he turned down being named “Man of the Year.”
“Time Magazine called to say that I was PROBABLY going to be named ‘Man (Person) of the Year,’ like last year, but I would have to agree to an interview and a major photo shoot,” Trump tweeted. “I said probably is no good and took a pass. Thanks anyway!”
Time Magazine called to say that I was PROBABLY going to be named “Man (Person) of the Year,” like last year, but I would have to agree to an interview and a major photo shoot. I said probably is no good and took a pass. Thanks anyway!
In 2015, Trump seemed to play a game of chicken with TIME, saying he knew they’d never pick him.
“I told you @TIME Magazine would never pick me as person of the year despite being the big favorite They picked person who is ruining Germany,” Trump tweeted.
I told you @TIME Magazine would never pick me as person of the year despite being the big favorite They picked person who is ruining Germany
TIME could end up being purchased by Charles and David Koch, conservative billionaires who are looking into purchasing the parent company, Meredith Corp. The media empire publishes Family Circle and Better Homes and Gardens among other titles. They are rumored to have approached Time Inc. about a possible deal worth more than $500 million, the Los Angeles Times reported.
TIME disputed those remarks, however, writing on its own Twitter account, “The President is incorrect about how we choose Person of the Year. TIME does not comment on our choice until publication, which is December 6.”
The President is incorrect about how we choose Person of the Year. TIME does not comment on our choice until publication, which is December 6.
