Tag: New Hampshire

Trump slurs media as ‘fake and corrupt’ for disputing his claims about Elton John

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President Donald Trump hyped his claims about selling out a New Hampshire rally in a new attack on the news media.

The president insisted Monday that he enjoyed “massive overflow crowds” at his rally last week at SNHU Arena in Manchester, and slurred journalists as “fake and corrupt” for reporting the venue wasn’t filled to capacity.

Empty seats were seen at last week’s rally, but Manchester’s deputy fire marshal confirmed more than 11,500 people had turned out to hear Trump speak — which would have broken Elton John’s record for the arena, as the president claimed.

[Raw Story]

Reality

An activist on Twitter led a campaign to purchase tickets away from Trump supporters, keeping the stadium at less than full capacity. If the Trump supporters stuck outside were allowed in it would have broken the attendance record for that stadium.

Trump praises his rally audience for not acting like ‘credible people’ after ‘CNN sucks’ chant

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President Donald Trump praised an unruly crowd at a 2020 re-election campaign rally in Manchester, New Hampshire on Tuesday.

Trump was falsely claiming that China is paying for the tariffs in his trade war when he went off on the press.

“But when you listen to the fake news — look how many there are,” he said as he gazed out to the press area.

He then stepped back from the microphone as his supporters booed the concept of a free press.

The crowd started chanting, “CNN sucks.”

“Are we sure that we are in New Hampshire?” Trump asked. “You know, you have a reputation
— I know it is not true because I know you too well. You have a reputation of being staid, very elegant, staid, and credible people. You are not acting it tonight and that’s good.

[Raw Story]

Trump praises N.H. lawmaker who called for shooting Hillary Clinton

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President Donald Trump on Thursday praised a New Hampshire Republican who previously called for former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to be shot by firing squad.

Speaking at a rally in Manchester, N.H., Trump gave a shoutout to state Rep. Al Baldasaro, who had previously served as an informal adviser during his 2016 campaign. Baldasaro had been diagnosed with cancer, Trump said during the rally, and he added that his apparent recovery and successful treatment were a testament to the changes to the Veterans Choice Program that Trump signed into law last year.

Trump also praised Baldasaro for making it to “every rally I ever gave in New Hampshire.”

“Right from the beginning. I got so tired of looking at him; he’d always be here,” Trump said.

While advising Trump in the summer of 2016, Baldasaro called Clinton a “disgrace” for her role in responding to the 2012 attacks in Benghazi, Libya, and said that she “should be put in the firing line and shot for treason.”

CNN later reported the Secret Service was investigating the remarks at the time, and the Trump campaign disavowed what Baldasaro said.

Still, Baldasaro was invited to the White House in June 2017 for a bill-signing ceremony, again prompting Trump’s team to distance itself from his remarks. Baldasaro said on Twitter at the time: “Nobody advocated shooting Hillary, just an opinion in accordance with law & CONSTITUTION on treason.”

[Politico]

‘You have no choice but to vote for me,’ Trump tells N.H. rally

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Even as markets show signs of a coming recession, President Donald Trump told New Hampshire voters Thursday that they had to support his re-election campaign or suffer the economic consequences.

“I won the election, the markets went up thousands of points, things started happening,” Trump said at a rally here. “If, for some reason, I were not to have won the election, these markets would have crashed. That will happen even more so in 2020. You have no choice but to vote for me, because your 401(k), everything is going to be down the tubes.”

“Whether you love me or hate me, you have got to vote for me,” he added.

Trump, appearing at his first campaign stop in New Hampshire this year, delivered a wide-ranging speech lasting more than 90 minutes that addressed Hillary Clinton’s emails, eradicating the AIDS epidemic and the prospects of the nearly two dozen Democrats running for president against him.

“You’ve got Pocahontas is rising. You’ve got Kamala, Kamala is falling. You’ve got Beto, Beto is like, gone. We’ll see what happens. Whoever it is, I don’t know that it matters,” Trump said, referring to Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris and former Rep. Beto O’Rourke, before turning to former Vice President Joe Biden: “I think Sleepy Joe might be able to limp across the finish line, maybe. … I sort of hope it’s him.”

The president received his largest applause of the night when he pledged his support for gun ownership, even though he has repeatedly said he is seriously considering several changes to tighten gun restrictions following a police shooting in Pennsylvania, and two deadly mass shootings in Ohio and Texas in recent weeks.

“It’s not the gun that pulls the trigger. It’s the person holding the gun,” Trump said, receiving a standing ovation from the crowd of about 10,000 in the SNHU Arena when he called gun violence a mental health problem. “We can’t make it hard for good, solid, law-abiding citizens to protect themselves.”

Trump repeated his vows to use new scientific breakthroughs to end AIDS within the next decade, though some say his administration’s policies will make that goalmore difficult.

“We will achieve new breakthroughs in science and medicine, ending in the AIDS epidemic in America, and finding new cures for childhood cancer,” he said. “And something I never thought I’d be able to say: Within one decade, the AIDS epidemic in the United States will be gone. In 10 years, the AIDS epidemic will be eradicated. So great. Who thought that was going to be happening? Who thought I would be able to get to say that?”

When Trump briefly mentioned Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), several members of the crowd began a chant of “send her back,” but it did not catch on. He has repeatedly clashed with Omar and a group of progressive, first-year lawmakers in recent weeks, after making racist statements about them. Earlier Thursday, Israeli leaders barred Omar from the country after Trump lobbied them to deny her entry.

A chant that did catch on with the crowd was “lock her up,” when Trump mentioned Clinton, the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee, and her emails, and took the crowd through the wins and losses on his 2016 electoral map.

As Trump was laying out his electoral map, he shared a story about Michigan, a state he narrowly won in 2016. Trump’s own polling has shown him falling behind in the battleground state.

“Five or six years before I even thought about running, for whatever reason, they named me man of the year in Michigan. I said how come? I didn’t even understand it myself,” Trump said. The president has previously used this anecdote in speeches, though it is unclear whether Trump ever received that award.

“I wasn’t even political,” Trump added. “But I was always complaining that our car business was being stolen. I mean it’s sort of obvious right? Mexico now has 32 percent of our car business. It all left. We are bringing it back at a level that nobody’s ever seen before.”

The Trump campaign views New Hampshire as another battleground state in the 2020 general election. Clinton won New Hampshire in 2016, and the president is making a play to turn it red in the next election.

“New Hampshire, you have a reputation. Very, very elegant state. You’re not acting it tonight, and that’s a good thing,” Trump said to the enthusiastic crowd. “New Hampshire was taken away from us [in 2016] but we did great in New Hampshire. We should’ve won in New Hampshire.”

The president also mentioned another race shaping up in New Hampshire. Corey Lewandowski, who was fired as Trump’s campaign manager but remains close to the president, may run for Senate in the Granite State. The two spoke about the race on Thursday, according to a person familiar with the conversation.

As he stood before the crowd, Trump lavished praise on Lewandowski, but he stopped short of outright endorsing him.

“I think he’d be tough to beat. I’ll tell you one thing: He’s gonna go into Washington and he’s gonna have you in mind,” Trump said, adding that Lewandowski would be “fantastic.”

But in the next breath, the president conveyed that he wasn’t yet making a declaration of support.

“People ask if I’ll support him and I say, ‘I don’t know if he’s running,’” the president said, before turning to his former aide. “Corey, let us know, please.”

Lewandowski greeted the president upon his arrival at the Manchester airport. He and his family briefly joined Trump on Air Force One. The president departed the airport with Gov. Chris Sununu, a Republican. Sununu, who faces a potentially competitive 2020 reelection bid, has relayed concerns about Lewandowski to party leadership.

During the rally, the president also gave a shout-out to Republican New Hampshire state Rep. Al Baldasaro, who has previously called for Clinton to face a firing squad.

Early on in his speech, the president briefly stopped his remarks when a protester interrupted him. “Go home, start exercising,” Trump taunted as police escorted the man out of the crowd. “That guy’s got a serious weight problem,” he said, though the protesters appeared to be thin.

In the next breath, the president said his campaign was part a movement “built on love.”

[Politico]

No evidence of Trump receiving Michigan “Man of the Year” Award

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At a campaign rally in New Hampshire on Thursday, President Donald Trump made a handful of false claims, including returning to a claim he’s made since the final days of the 2016 campaign.

He said he was once named Michigan’s “Man of the Year.”

Sounds impressive, but there is a significant problem here.

Facts First:Nobody has been able to find any evidence of Trump receiving such an award.

It is hard to definitively prove that something vague has not happened. So we’ll leave open the possibility that Trump is talking about some actual event and that he and his team are just being coy about the details.

But neither we nor anyone else has been able to find a single detail. CNN has reached out to the White House and the Trump campaign about the claim, but has not heard back.

What Trump has said

Trump first publicly uttered the claim on November 6, 2016, two days before the election, when he was making his successful last-ditch effort to win Michigan.

“I’ve been fighting for the car industry for years. I was honored five years ago. Man of the Year in Michigan. That was a great honor for me,” he said at a rally in Sterling Heights, Michigan.

He then described a supposed controversy over his supposed Man of the Year acceptance speech.

“During my speech, all I talked about is what Mexico and these other countries are doing to us. And especially what they’re doing to Michigan,” he said. “That’s all I talked about. And I was criticized. They said, ‘Donald, speak about something else.’ I said, ‘No. What’s happening is horrible.”

Trump has repeated versions of the claim at least six times since, including at a roundtable with corporate leaders in Michigan in 2017 and a rally in Wisconsin this April.

At the New Hampshire rally on Thursday, he seemed to acknowledge it sounded odd that a non-resident of Michigan would win such an award.

“In fact, five or six years before I even thought about running, for whatever reason they named me Man of the Year in Michigan. I said, ‘How come?’ I didn’t even understand it myself,'” he said. “When I was named Man of the Year, I wasn’t even political. That was years before I did this. But I was always complaining that our car business is being stolen.”

No evidence at all

Trump’s boast immediately piqued our interest. So, back in November 2016, we contacted the Trump campaign, dove into news archives and did a bunch of Googling.

The Trump campaign never responded. None of the searches brought up anything.

HuffPost went on a similar research journey and also found nothing. The website reported that the Michigan Chamber of Commerce said it didn’t give out an award like that; Trump was never on the Detroit News’s annual “Michiganians of the Year” list; then-Gov. Rick Snyder’s office was reportedly no help; Trump had never mentioned the alleged honor on his Twitter feed.

Trump has received some “Man of the Year” kinds of accolades, including Time magazine’s 2016 Person of the Year and the Statesman of the Year” award from the Republican Party of Sarasota County, Florida.

But none of the awards were for being Michigan’s top man.

Former congressman sheds some light

After the original version of this article was published on Friday, former Republican congressman Dave Trott told CNN that Trump had claimed at the 2017 roundtable that he had been given the Man of the Year award at a 2013 event where Trott had invited him to speak.

The event was a Lincoln Day dinner Trott had chaired in Oakland County, Michigan. Trott, who represented Michigan’s 11th District from 2015 to January 2019, said Trump’s speech was well-received, but there was no award.

The transcript of the 2017 roundtable shows that, after Trump spoke of the 2013 speech and thanked Trott — somewhat vaguely, but seemingly over the supposed award — Trott simply responded, “Great speech.”

Trott said Friday that, as a congressman, “I wasn’t going to correct the president in front of the automotive executives.”

“But now that I’m out of Congress, I feel comfortable correcting the story,” he said.

Trott did not seek reelection in 2018. He has said (including in an interview on Friday) that his concerns about Trump were a factor in his decision.

[CNN]

Trump mocks appearance of rally protester: ‘That guy’s got a serious weight problem’

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President Trump on Thursday mocked the weight of a protester who briefly interrupted his rally in Manchester, N.H.

“That guy’s got a serious weight problem. Go home, start exercising,” Trump said as the individual who interrupted Trump’s speech was escorted out of the arena.

“Get him out of here please. Got a bigger problem than I do,” Trump quipped. “Got a bigger problem than all of us. Now he goes home and his mom says, ‘What the hell have you just done?'”

Cameras showed multiple protesters being escorted out of the arena after the crowd began booing and chanting “U.S.A.” The interruption came as Trump slammed Democrats, accusing them of demeaning law enforcement and describing their opponents as “fascists and Nazis.” 

Moments later, Trump continued with his usual remarks, telling supporters that his movement is “built on love.”

The Associated Press reported that the president may have actually mistaken one of his supporters for a protester when he made the remark. The protesters were later identified as members of a group that supports rights for Israelis and Palestinians.

The president often mocks and belittles protesters who are removed from his rallies, but only sometimes comments on their appearance.

Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang, a former tech entrepreneur, recently took to the Iowa state fair, where he mocked Trump’s weight.

“Like, what could Donald Trump possibly be better than me at? An eating contest?” Yang asked this past weekend.

“Like, if there was a hot-air balloon that was rising and you needed to try and keep it on the ground, he would be better than me at that,” he added. “Because he is so fat.”

In May, British actress Jameela Jamil, a wellness and body positivity advocate, called on Trump’s critics to stop “fat-shaming” him and focus on his policies instead.

[The Hill]

Trump Argues He Won New Hampshire Because It Is a ‘Drug-Infested Den’

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President Donald Trump, in a conversation with Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto, labeled New Hampshire “a drug-infested den,” according to a transcript of Trump’s January 27 call that was published by The Washington Post on Thursday.

During the call, according to the Post, Trump lashed out at Peña Nieto for the quantity of illegal drugs that come into the United States from Mexico.

“We have a massive drug problem where kids are becoming addicted to drugs because the drugs are being sold for less money than candy,” Trump said.

He later bragged that he won the Granite State because of the opioid epidemic.

“I won New Hampshire because New Hampshire is a drug-infested den,” he said.

Asked by CNN to comment on the transcript, Michael Anton, a spokesman for the National Security Council, said only that he “can’t confirm or deny the authenticity of allegedly leaked classified documents.”

Trump did, in fact, win the Republican primary in New Hampshire, more than doubling the vote total received by his nearest competitor, Ohio Gov. John Kasich. Trump, however, narrowly lost the state to Democrat Hillary Clinton in the general election.

Trump seized on the opioid epidemic while campaigning in New Hampshire throughout 2015 and 2016, promising the people of the state that he would boost local clinics, help those who are already hooked on opioids and stop the flow of drugs coming into the state.

The issue was so critical to Trump that he headlined an event in New Hampshire focused strictly on opioids days before the 2016 election.

“I just want to let the people of New Hampshire know that I’m with you 1,000%, you really taught me a lot,” he said before promising to help people who “are so seriously addicted.”

And he has made similar comments in the past about how inexpensive drugs can be.

“We’re becoming a drug-infested nation,” Trump said in February. “Drugs are becoming cheaper than candy bars.”

Trump’s comments about New Hampshire drew a quick rebuke from the state’s two Democratic senators.

Sen. Jeanne Shaheen tweeted that Trump needed to apologize to the state of New Hampshire and “then should follow through on his promise to Granite Staters to help end this crisis.”

“It’s absolutely unacceptable for the President to be talking about NH in this way — a gross misrepresentation of NH & the epidemic,” she wrote.

Sen. Maggie Hassan called Trump’s comments “disgusting.”

“As he knows, NH and states across America have a substance misuse crisis,” Hassan wrote. “Instead of insulting people in the throes of addiction, [Trump] needs to work across party lines to actually stem the tide of this crisis.”

New Hampshire is one of the states most directly impacted by the opioid crisis. According to the NH Drug Monitoring Initiative, drug overdose deaths have climbed in the state since 2012 and it expected to again hit an all-time high once data from 2016 is tabulated.

A national study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that 25% of all drug overdose deaths were related to heroin in 2015. That number was just 6% in 1999.

In response to the epedemic, Trump created a White House panel tasked with looking into how the federal government should respond. The panel, which is being led by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, released its interim report earlier this week and suggested that Trump declare a state of emergency to combat opioids.

“Our citizens are dying. We must act boldly to stop it,” read its report. “The first and most urgent recommendation of this Commission is direct and completely within your control. Declare a national emergency.”

The report added: “America is enduring a death toll equal to September 11th every three weeks,” noting the fact that 142 Americans die from drug overdoses every day.

[CNN]

Trump: ‘We Should Take a Drug Test Prior to the Debate’

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Donald Trump on Saturday suggested both presidential candidates should take a drug test before the next debate, saying that Hillary Clinton is “actually getting pumped up.”

“At the beginning of her last debate, she was all pumped at the beginning, but at the end she was all ‘take me down.’ She could barely reach her car,” Trump said at a rally in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. “I think we should take a drug test. Anyway, I’m willing to do it.”

The GOP nominee compared the candidates to athletes, saying he “took down 17 senators and governors.”

“We’re like athletes, but athletes, they make them take a drug test. We should take a drug test,” he said. “I think we should take a drug test prior to the debate because I don’t know what’s going on with her.”

The final presidential debate will be held in Las Vegas, Nevada, on Wednesday.

Trump has previously attacked the Democratic nominee’s health and stamina. This past week, Trump’s campaign released an ad arguing Clinton does not have “fortitude, strength or stamina” to lead the country.

Six days ago, Trump ally Roger Stone suggested in an interview with radio host Alex Jones that Clinton was “jacked up on something, I assume some kind of methamphetamine.”

“I don’t think she has the stamina for a campaign,” Stone said. “They managed to prop her up for one debate, she can’t even keep her full schedule because her health is so bad.”

(h/t Politico)

Reality

She’s low energy, she’s high energy, what is it?

Media

Trump Ditches, Then Mocks His Press Corps

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Donald Trump on Thursday mocked his traveling press corps for being late to his rally, even though his campaign is responsible for arranging the pool’s travel.

“I have really good news for you,” the Republican nominee told supporters here, according to a livestream of the rally this and other pool reporters watched on a bus from the airport to the event location.

“I just heard the press is stuck on their airplane. They can’t get here. I love it. So they’re trying to get here now. They’re going to be about 30 minutes late. They called us and said could you wait? I said absolutely not. Let’s get going, New Hampshire.”

While television cameras continued to roll live on the rally, still photographers already at the venue opted not to shoot any images of the event out of solidarity with their pool colleagues.

“This is completely ridiculous and unacceptable. This has gone on for way to long and it’s time we take a stand,” said one member of the traveling press.

“The press corps is at a boiling point here and was more frustrated tonight than ever,” said another.

“There’s the want to do something among traveling press of course – being constantly mocked and demonized is awful – but there’s the competing feeling that news organizations have almost let too much slide to have any bargaining power at this point,” said a third member of Trump’s traveling press corps.

The reporters said they had yet to receive an explanation or response as to why they were left behind. Spokespeople for the campaign did not immediately return a request for comment.

Some members of the traveling press considered not covering the event in an attempt to boycott, but their efforts were unsuccessful as management from various networks pushed back. Plus, the event was being carried live by the network pool, meaning Trump’s image was still being broadcast on television.

Trump, who blacklisted individual reporters and several news organizations (including POLITICO) until last Thursday, has made a habit of using the media as a punching bag while still largely enjoying saturation campaign coverage from television networks.

Trump has also criticized Hillary Clinton for avoiding the press. After going more than 260 days without holding a news conference, the Democratic nominee has repeatedly taken questions from the press in the past week, including in Greensboro, North Carolina, Thursday afternoon.

Clinton also began traveling on the same plane as her press pool two weeks ago, while Trump still travels without his.

Trump is the first candidate to go so long into a campaign season without traveling with his press corps. Neither campaign has the full-on protective pool that is with the candidate from the moment they leave their home or hotel until they return, but Clinton has a quasi-protective pool, meaning she does travel with the media on the same plane. Trump’s press pool travels separately.

Members of the media pay extra to travel on the campaign-arranged press planes and buses, with the distinct purpose of making sure they arrive on time and with the candidate to events, versus arranging their own travel. But this is far from the first time Trump left his press pool behind. In late August, when Trump traveled to Mexico meet the country’s president, he left his pool behind in Arizona. Earlier that same month, when Trump went to Baton Rouge to survey flood damage, the traveling press were also not invited. Trump said that the trip would be “non-political” with no press, but the visit was still featured prominently by all of the major outlets.

Trump took off from LaGuardia Airport in Queens, New York, shortly after taping an appearance on “The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon” late Thursday afternoon.

His press plane did not leave a different airport in Teterboro, New Jersey, until after 7:30 p.m. because some reporters who pooled Trump’s appearance on “Tonight Show” were caught in traffic leaving Manhattan.

Based on the final three minutes of Trump’s remarks, all the press pool was able to hear in person, it sounded like the GOP nominee stuck to the same scripted stump speech he’s been delivering over the past week.

(h/t Politico)

Media

Trump’s Plane Joke: It’s Mexico ‘Getting Ready to Attack’

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Standing before a crowd outside the shuttered Osram Sylvania light-bulb factory in Manchester, New Hampshire, on Thursday, Donald Trump offered up the closed plant as a direct symptom of trade deals advocated by both Hillary Clinton and former President Bill Clinton.

He also joked that a plane flying overhead could be from Mexico and poised for attack.

“Mexico, and I respect Mexico, I respect their leaders, what they’ve done to us is incredible,” Trump said at the outdoor gathering, where a plane buzzed overhead. “Their leaders are so much smarter, so much sharper. And it’s incredible.”

Pointing to the sky, Trump mused, “in fact, that could be a Mexican plane up there. They’re getting ready to attack. So that’s the way it is, folks. I just want to say that this is a factory, and the legacy really of Hillary Clinton and Bill Clinton because this legacy is largely due, you could actually say entirely due, to NAFTA.”

Media

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