Posts tagged with "Donald Trump"

Above, Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida (R) signs copies of his new book during a stop in Davenport, Iowa, last week. (Photo source: Jordan Gale for The New York Times)

A pro-Trump PAC files an ethics complaint against DeSantis

March 17, 2023

Donald Trump spent much of the past year teasing a 2024 presidential campaign—telling New York magazine last summer that he had “already made that decision” on whether to run and promising his rally crowds for months that they would be “very happy” about his choice, reports The New York Times.

Now, Trump’s allies are accusing Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida of doing the same—but insisting that he has violated state law.

MAGA Inc., a super PAC supporting Trump, filed a complaint with Florida officials on Wednesday, March 15, alleging that DeSantis—the former president’s chief potential rival for the Republican Party’s 2024 nomination —is operating a shadow presidential campaign.

The super PAC said that DeSantis should be considered a presidential candidate because he has taken meetings with donors, raised money for a political committee, and toured the country to sell books, while allies are reaching out to potential campaign aides.

“Governor DeSantis’s failure to declare his candidacy is no mere oversight,” reads the MAGA Inc. complaint to the Florida Commission on Ethics. “It is a coordinated effort specifically designed for him to accept, as unethical gifts, illegal campaign contributions and certain personal benefits.”

The pro-Trump super PAC, which sent the complaint via certified mail on Wednesday, is asking the state commission to impose “the most severe penalties” under Florida ethics law, which include, among other things, impeachment, removal from office, public censure and ballot disqualification. NBC News earlier reported on the complaint on Wednesday.

A spokesperson in the governor’s office, Taryn Fenske, said the complaint was part of a “list of frivolous and politically motivated attacks,” adding, “It’s inappropriate to use state ethics complaints for partisan purposes.”

While DeSantis hasn’t formally declared a White House bid, he is checking all the boxes of a potential candidate, the Times said. He published a book that could double as the outline of a 2024 campaign platform and has been promoting the book on a nationwide tour—including stops in states that are hosting the first three Republican primary contests. He has also laid out foreign policy positions this week on Fox News.

The allegations from the pro-Trump group echo a similar complaint filed against Trump last year in March by a Democratic super PAC. In that complaint, the Democratic group, American Bridge, argued to the Federal Election Commission that Trump had been behaving like a 2024 presidential candidate while avoiding federal oversight by not filing a statement of candidacy.

The group filed a lawsuit in July against the federal commission, seeking to force it to take action against Trump within 30 days. The lawsuit accused Trump of trying to disguise his run for the presidency in order to leave voters “in the dark about the contributions and expenditures he has received, which is information they are entitled to.”

The FEC did not take action against Trump. He eventually announced a formal presidential campaign four months later.

Trump’s allies could face a similarly tough road in persuading the state ethics commission to act. DeSantis has appointed five of the nine members of the commission.

Research contact: @nytimes

Illustration source: Oil Change International

New York AG Letitia James: We found ‘significant evidence’ of Trump Organization fraud

January 20, 2022

New York Attorney General Letitia James asked a court late Tuesday night, January 18, to compel Donald Trump, Donald Trump Jr., and Ivanka Trump to testify under oath—saying that her office’s investigation into the Trump Organization had uncovered “significant evidence” of fraud, reports The Daily Beast.

James said in a tweet, “We have uncovered significant evidence indicating that the Trump Organization used fraudulent and misleading asset valuations on multiple properties to obtain economic benefits, including loans, insurance coverage, and tax deductions for years.”

“Donald J. Trump, Ivanka Trump, and Donald Trump Jr… assert that they may have ignored lawfully issued subpoenas for sworn testimony because of what they contend is ‘an unprecedented and unconstitutional maneuver’ by the Office of the Attorney General (OAG)” the motion states. “But subpoenas to current and former top company officials—such as those at issue here—are routine in complex financial investigations and are amply warranted here.”

The court document notes that for over a year—and since Eric Trump testified in August 2020—the AG’s office has found significant evidence indicating that the Trump Organization used intentionally wrong property valuations “to obtain a host of economic benefits, including loans, insurance coverage, and tax deductions.”

Eric Trump invoked the Fifth Amendment “repeatedly” to avoid testifying as to the valuations of multiple Trump Organization properties, according to the memo.

Prosecutors note that, while their office has not reached a final decision as to whether this evidence warrants any legal action, their grounds “for conducting the investigation are beyond reproach.”

“This game must end,” the AG’s office says in its court filing, which asks that a judge force Trump and his two adult children to testify, as well as compel the company to turn over key missing documents.

In a Wednesday statement, the Trump Organization denied the allegations, accusing James of “misleading the public” with her probe into the former president’s businesses.

“She defrauded New Yorkers by basing her entire candidacy on a promise to get Trump at all costs without having seen a shred of evidence and in violation of every conceivable ethical rule. Three years later she is now faced with the stark reality that she has no case,” the statement said.

“So, in response to Trump suing her and filing multiple ethical complaints, and on the heels of her failed governor’s race, she has no choice but to mislead the public yet again by misrepresenting the facts and ignoring her own inflammatory comments. Her allegations are baseless and will be vigorously defended.”

The filing states that the investigation into the Trump Organization began in March 2019, when Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen testified before Congress. During his testimony, Cohen said Trump’s annual financial states inflated the values of the former president’s assets in order to obtain favorable loans and insurance coverage—while also deflating the value of some of his other assets to lower real estate taxes owed.

“OAG has methodically investigated those allegations; indeed, the Trump Organization has already provided substantial documentary and testimonial discovery in response to subpoenas issued by OAG in connection with its civil investigation, without ever challenging OAG’s good faith,” the motion states.

For more than two years, the Trump Organization was aware of the attorney general’s investigation into the alleged misconduct and insisted its executives were cooperating, according to the filing. In reality, the motion states, the organization dragged its heels and only recently began to hand over many of the documents that were ordered via subpoena in December 2019.

The memo details numerous schemes to allegedly inflate the value of Trump’s assets, including one in which the former president valued his own apartment in Trump Tower at $327 million, “based on the apartment having 30,000 square feet of space multiplied by a certain price per square foot.” But in 2017, the apartment shrank for the first time to its actual size of just over 10,000 square feet and its valuation shrank commensurately to $116.8 million.

Asked about this, Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg conceded that this amounted to a $200 million overstatement, “give or take.”

The court filing offers details on the Trump Organization’s allegedly misleading and false statements about the value of at least six properties—including the Trump golf clubs in Scotland and Westchester; and several of the company’s iconic buildings, including Trump Park Avenue and 40 Wall Street.

The AG’s office argues that the Trump Organization misrepresented the value of all these properties to the IRS, lenders, and other insurers with financial statements that were “inflated as part of a pattern to suggest that Mr. Trump’s net worth was higher than it otherwise would have appeared.”

In addition to the former president’s alleged misdeeds, the filing also paints a better picture into the previously opaque roles his two adult children play in the company. For example, Ivanka Trump was renting an apartment at Trump Park Avenue as if it were valued at $8.5 million, the memo notes. In Trump’s financial statements, however, the apartment was worth $25 million.

Ivanka “was a key player” in many of the company’s transactions and “was able to ask for an access to financial summaries and projections covering properties or businesses in the Trump Organization portfolio,” according to the memo, and also was a point person in its relationship with Deutsche Bank.

Donald Trump Jr., who joined the family firm in 2001, was likewise crucial to the organization’s financial makeup.

“Moreover, evidence obtained by OAG confirms that Donald Trump, Jr. was involved with certain Trump Organization properties that are valued on Mr. Trump’s Statement of Financial Condition, including 40 Wall Street, and was consulted in connection with the matters on the Statements of Financial Condition,” the memo states.

The attorney general’s office claims it has received more than 5 million pages of evidence from the company that show Trump lied about the most banal things: the amount of cash available for a deal, the use of so-called “outside professionals” to evaluate the value of assets, and even the actual size of the Trump Tower penthouse. In some instances, investigators say, they found that the Trump Organization inflated the value of a property simply because it had his name on it—even though the financial documents explicitly indicated that wasn’t allowed.

But when investigators tried to get a hold of Trump’s handwritten documents—like Post-it Notes—that would show his involvement in the allegedly shady valuations, the AG’s office alleges that the company simply wouldn’t turn them over.

In the past, a source with direct knowledge of the company’s inner workings has told The Daily Beast that the Trump Organization had an annual ritual in which Trump and Weisselberg would review company finances in private and fill in the blanks as they saw fit. (Weisselberg and the company were indicted last summer on tax fraud charges in the parallel criminal investigation that’s being run by the Manhattan district attorney with the AG’s help.)

The filing asks a judge to compel Donald Trump and the Trump Organization to turn over all documents within 14 days, and to have Donald, Donald Jr., and Ivanka summoned to testify within 21 days.

Research contact: @thedailybeast

Above, President Joe Biden. (Photo source: ABC News)

Poll: Nearly two-thirds of Americans are optimistic after Biden’s first 100 days

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May 4, 2021

U.S. President Joe Biden completed his first 100 days in office on Thursday, April 29—and the nation now is more optimistic about the coming year, according to findings of a new ABC News/Ipsos poll.

Indeed, nearly two-thirds of Americans (64%) are optimistic about the direction of the country, the poll indicated. The research was conducted by Ipsos in partnership with ABC News, using Ipsos’ Knowledge Panel.

The last time the country came close to that level of optimism about the coming year was in December 2006 during the administration of President George W. Bush—when 61% said they were optimistic about the direction in which the country was headed, according to previous ABC News/Washington Post polls.

Shortly before the 2016 election catapulted Donald Trump into the Oval Office, only 42% of Americans were optimistic about the future; compared to 52% who were pessimistic.

But there are some warning lights flashing for the White House. Biden is betting on a lofty agenda to maintain momentum and set up Democrats for success in next year’s midterms, while the GOP is hoping that voters perceive an overreach and the president’s policies become an electoral anchor.

Only a slim majority (52%) think the federal government should spend to revitalize the economy, even if it raises taxes—including 80% of Democrats and 54% of Independents. The question of government spending and taxes largely divides Americans, with 47% saying taxes should stay at the same level, even at the expense of the economy—including 78% of Republicans.

After more than a year of the coronavirus pandemic ravaging the country, roughly one-third of Americans (36%) still remain pessimistic about the country’s future under Biden.

Only about one-quarter of Americans (23%) think the country has become more united since Biden took office. Among this group, an overwhelming 87% give Biden credit. Only 3% assigned credit to Republican leaders in Congress, and 10% said both in the poll.

Among the 28% who said the country is more divided, 6 in 10 think Biden is more responsible for the divisions, compared to 34% who say both Biden and Republicans are culpable for sowing division. Only 6% faulted Republicans.

Nearly half of the country (48%) doesn’t see movement on the question of unity since Biden took office—believing the country is neither more united nor more divided. Views on the polarization of the country during Biden’s early tenure fall along party lines—with 95% of Democrats saying the country is either more united (45%) or the same (50%), and 97% of Republicans saying the nation is more divided (65%) or the same (32%).

Biden, who developed a reputation as a moderate over decades in the Senate, has shifted his policy priorities leftward as president. In his address before a joint session of Congress this week, he outlined unprecedented investments for his core priorities, while standing undeterred by sharp Republican resistance. And the Democratic Party appears united behind him: 90% of Democrats approved of his job performance in the latest  poll.

But uncertainty looms over what will be his next legislative achievement, with Biden’s political capital split between his enormous infrastructure bill and plans for gun control, immigration, education and child care.

A slim majority of respondents (51%)to the new survey think Biden is compromising about the right amount with congressional Republican leaders on the most pressing issues. Nearly 4 in 10 Americans (39%) think Biden is doing too little, and only 9% say he is compromising too much.

Republican leaders are viewed more adversely, however. Two-thirds of Americans view GOP leaders in Congress as doing too little to compromise with Biden. Just over 1 in 5 Americans (22%) believe Republicans are doing about the right amount to compromise, and only 10% think they are doing too much.

Biden, for his part, is outperforming his predecessor on this measure. More than half of the country (56%) thought Trump was doing too little to compromise with Democrats in an ABC News/Washington Post poll from September 2017.

Meanwhile, current Republican leaders in Congress are slightly underperforming their Democratic counterparts in the Trump era, when 60% of Americans said the Democrats weren’t doing enough to compromise with Trump.

Research contact: @abcnews

Above, Representative Eric Swalwell. (Photo source: newspunch.com)

Trump sued by Swalwell over mob attack on Capitol

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March 8, 2021

On Friday, March5, former President Donald Trump, as well as his eldest son and a couple of his allies were hit with a suit brought by Representative Eric Swalwell (D-California) over their roles in the run-up to the January 6 breach of the U.S. Capitol, The Hill reports.

The 65-page complaint—filed in federal court in Washington, D.C.—accuses Trump, his son Donald Trump Jr., Representative Mo Brooks (R-Alabama),and Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani of inciting the riot and violating a number of federal and D.C. laws.

According to The Hill, each defendant was among the speakers at a pro-Trump rally that immediately preceded the deadly Capitol breach. The lawsuit depicts the incendiary rally speeches as a tipping point that culminated a months-long disinformation campaign to push the false claim that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from Trump.

“The horrific events of January 6 were a direct and foreseeable consequence of the Defendants’ unlawful actions,” the complaint states. “As such, the Defendants are responsible for the injury and destruction that followed.”

The lawsuit seeks unspecified money damages and asks for a court order requiring Trump and his allies to provide at least a week’s notice before holding any future rally in D.C. related to an election.

Among the allegations contained in the nine-count complaint is that defendants conspired to prevent lawmakers and then-Vice President Mike Pence from certifying President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris’s election win, in violation of a federal civil rights law.

Attempts by the Hill to reach Trump, Brooks and Giuliani for comment were not successful.

The lawsuit is the latest instance of potential legal exposure for the former president. Trump also faces a criminal probe in Georgia for pressuring officials to overturn President Joe Biden’s electoral win; and is under investigation in New York for possible financial crimes and civil violations related to his businesses.

The Biden Administration’s Justice Department also faces pressure from progressives and Trump critics to pursue criminal charges against the former president.

Swalwell’s lawsuit comes less than a month after Trump was acquitted in a Senate impeachment trial over his role in the Jan. 6 attack. Swalwell, a former county prosecutor in California, served as one of the House impeachment managers in the Senate trial.

Research contact: @thehill

Above, Speaker Nancy Pelosi gavels the House into recess after the chamber voted to impeach President Donald Trump. (Photo source: Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call)

House impeaches Trump for instigating mob attack on Capitol

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January 15, 2021

One more time with feeling: House Democrats in their second impeachment of President Donald Trump accomplished what they couldn’t in their first: They kept their party unified and brought some Republicans on board, Roll Call reports.

The chamber on Wednesday voted 232-197 to approve a single article of impeachment charging Trump with “incitement of insurrection” for encouraging his supporters who attacked the Capitol last week.

The article outlines Trump’s impeachable conduct, describing how for months leading up to the January 6 joint session of Congress to certify the Electoral College votes, he “repeatedly issued false statements” alleging widespread fraud and saying state and federal officials should not certify the results.

Trump reiterated those false claims in a January 6 speech at a rally for his supporters outside the White House in which he also “willfully made statements that, in context, encouraged— and foreseeably resulted in—lawless action at the Capitol, such as: ‘if you don’t fight like hell you’re not going to have a country anymore,’” the resolution says. 

“Thus incited by President Trump, members of the crowd he had addressed, in an attempt to, among other objectives, interfere with the Joint Session’s solemn constitutional duty to certify the results of the 2020 Presidential election, unlawfully breached and vandalized the Capitol, injured and killed law enforcement personnel, menaced Members of Congress, the Vice President, and Congressional personnel, and engaged in other violent, deadly, destructive, and seditious acts,” the resolution reads.

The impeachment article also cites Trump’s “prior efforts to subvert and obstruct the certification,” like his January 2 phone call threatening Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to find enough votes to overturn the state’s results, as it notes he “threatened the integrity of the democratic system, interfered with the peaceful transition of power,” Roll Call notes.

Wednesday’s vote makes Trump the first president in history to be impeached twice. The House first impeached him on December 18, 2019, on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress for pressuring Ukraine to interfere in the 2020 election. The Senate acquitted Trump of both charges on February 5, 2020.

Trump has seven days left in office, and a Senate trial won’t occur in time to remove him any earlier.

But Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Trump “must be convicted by the Senate, a constitutional remedy that will ensure that the republic will be safe from this man who is so resolutely determined to tear down the things that we hold dear and that hold us together.”

Outgoing Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell sent a note to his conference Wednesday refuting media press reports that have suggested he plans to support impeachment, but the Kentucky Republican left open the possibility he may reach that conclusion.

“I have not made a final decision on how I will vote and I intend to listen to the legal arguments when they are presented to the Senate,” McConnell saidm, according to the Roll Call report. 

Ten Republicans, including the No. 3 in House GOP leadership, Conference Chairwoman Liz Cheney, voted to impeach Trump.

All 222 Democrats supported the impeachment resolution as well.

Republicans besides Cheney who voted to impeach Trump include Jaime Herrera Beutler and Dan Newhouse of Washington, John Katko of New York, Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, Fred Upton and Peter Meijer of Michigan, Anthony Gonzalez of Ohio, Tom Rice of South Carolina and David Valadao of California.

The bipartisan support is different from the first time the House impeached Trump, when no Republican supported either article.

The impeachment vote split the GOP leadership team, with House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Minority Whip Steve Scalise voting against the article and Cheney voting for it.

McCarthy in a floor speech said Trump “bears responsibility for Wednesday’s attack on the Capitol,” but he argued against impeachment, saying it would “further fan the flames of partisan division.”


Pelosi declined Wednesday morning to tell reporters when she planned to transfer the impeachment article to the Senate, which will determine how quickly the chamber can begin a trial.

The Senate is out of session until Jan. 19. McConnell on Wednesday rejected Democratic leader Chuck Schumer’s request to use a 2004 emergency convening authority to bring the Senate back early, McConnell’s spokesman confirmed.

Whether or not the trial is held while Trump is still in office, lawmakers have said they intend to invoke Amendment 14 of the U.S. Constitution, which, under Section 3, would bar Trump from holding public office ever again.

Section 3 reads: “No Person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.”

Research contact: @rollcall

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. (Photo source: Makers)

Hillary Clinton trashes Trump over tweeted voter conspiracy theory

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August 21, 2019

Hillary Clinton recently said that she “lives rent-free” in President Donald Trump’s mind. Indeed, the POTUS continues to contest the fact that she won the popular vote in the 2016 presidential election—by nearly 2.9 million votes.

What’s more, Trump has asked the DOJ to investigate the former Secretary of State’s emails, her server, her business deals, and her husband.

But this week he returned to his familiar “ballot box” theme, according to a report by Politico—forcing Clinton yet again to rebut his conspiracy agenda.

“Wow, Report Just Out! Google manipulated from 2.6 million to 16 million votes for Hillary Clinton in 2016 Election!” Trump tweeted on Monday. “This was put out by a Clinton supporter, not a Trump Supporter! Google should be sued. My victory was even bigger than thought!”

While Trump did not cite the source of his claim, according to Politico, it came minutes after a segment on Fox Business Network referred to congressional testimony in July from behavioral psychologist Robert Epstein.

In testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee, Epstein claimed that, based on his research, “biased search results generated by Google’s search algorithm likely impacted undecided voters in a way that gave at least 2.6 million votes to Hillary Clinton.”

Epstein appears to have been citing a study based on a collection of tens of thousands of search engine results collected in the run-up to the 2016 election. The study analyzed a relatively small sample size: The results of 95 different voters, just 21 of whom he says were undecided. He based the results on a phenomenon he calls “Search Engine Manipulation Effect.”

Google has denied Epstein’s claims. Company Chief Executive Sundar Pichai said at a House Judiciary Committee hearing in December that Google had investigated Epstein’s findings and found his methodology flawed

According to the Politico report, Epstein also claimed in his congressional testimony that Big Tech, if left unchecked, could shift as many as 15 million votes toward a particular candidate in the 2020 election. Trump appeared to have nudged that number higher in his tweet Monday.

But Hillary clapped back, tweeting, “The debunked study you’re referring to was based on 21 undecided voters. For context that’s about half the number of people associated with your campaign who have been indicted.”

Research contact: @politico

Presidents Putin (left) and Trump will meet in Helsinki. (Photo source: weeklyxpose.co.za)

Alone at last! Putin and Trump to meet in Helsinki

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June 29, 2018

The Finnish are said to be the happiest people in the world, based on results of the annual World Happiness Report—but they may be rivaled in glee by the two world leaders scheduled to meet in Helsinki on July 16. Russian President Vladimir Putin will hold one-on-one talks with President Donald Trump on that date, the White House announced on June 28.

The summit is characterized by The New York Times as “politically delicate”—and the optics are sure to be controversial, as the two “alter egos” reconvene, even as Special Counsel Robert Mueller continues to investigate the Trump campaign’s possible ties to Russia.

It will be the first formal summit meeting for Mr. Trump and Mr. Putin, who have spoken together twice on the sidelines of annual gatherings of world leaders,—and often by phone, the Kremlin has claimed— and it will come at a particularly critical moment, with midterm elections looming in the United States.

“The two leaders will discuss relations between the United States and Russia, and a range of national security issues,” the White House said in a statement.

In preparation, this week, President Trump sent National Security Advisor John Bolton to Moscow, where he met on June 27 with Putin, himself. Afterward, The Times reported, an aide to Putin, Yuri Ushakov, reiterated Moscow’s denial that it had tried to influence the U.S. presidential election in 2016— comments that Trump cited in a Twitter post before the meeting was announced.:  “Russia continues to say they had nothing to do with Meddling in our Election!” the POTUS tweeted.

The meeting will come just after NATO members meeting in Brussels on July 11 and 12. They are sure to be unhappy that Trump appears closer to Putin than he does to his allies.

In fact, findings of a Monmouth University poll released on June 15 indicate that 27% of Americans think that Trump’s best relationship worldwide is with the Russian president—far more than any other leader listed in the poll.

There was a notable split among party lines with 43% of Democrats and 28% of independent voters saying Putin was likely Trump’s closest personal relationship among world leaders, while only 8% of Republicans said the same.

GOP voters were more likely to say Trump had a closer bond with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (12%) or the British Prime Minister Theresa May (11%).

When asked more broadly whether Trump has a positive relationship with Putin, 60% of voters agreed, as opposed to the 25% who said the president does not have a good relationship with Russia’s president.

Research contact: pdmurrary@monmouth.edu

U.S President Donald Trump (left) and North Korean Leader Kim Jong Un. (Photo source: Daily Express UK)

Chances look slimmer for Singapore summit

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May 23, 2018

The budding détente between North Korea and the United States hung in the balance on May 22, as the Trump administration continued pushing Pyongyang to denuclearize as a condition of the scheduled meeting in Singapore on June 12 with the hermit kingdom’s Leader Kim Jong Un.

Meanwhile, according to a report by CNN, North Korea has released three strongly worded statements—slamming Seoul and Washington for their joint military maneuvers earlier in the month and demanding that South Korea take action against defectors it claimed were sending anti-North Korea propaganda leaflets across the border.

As tempers on both continents continued to flare, South Korean President Moon Jae In flew into Washington, DC, to meet with President Trump in an effort to salvage the summit.

But should the diplomatic deliberations even be saved?

Those in the know say the White House staff is balking—both because North Korea seems to already have taken denuclearization off the table; and because Trump has not taken the time or trouble to learn about the nuclear program, something necessary to have a substantive conversation.

South Koreans, however, blame Trump’s National Security Adviser John Bolton for the problems with the summit, according to The Washington Post.

Bolton has said that his goal is for the North Korean denuclearization process to go like the one that took place in Libya in 2003, when Colonel Muammar Gaddafi agreed to give up his country’s nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief. That didn’t end well for the Libyan leader, who eventually found himself in the midst of a coup that led to his capture and execution.

While Trump continues to hold firm on the denuclearization demands, about three-quarters of Americans (77%) approve of his original decision to meet with Kim Jong Un, according to a CNN poll conducted by SSRS and released on May 10.  Trump’s approval rating for handling the situation with North Korea has jumped ten points since late March.

At press time, there were no reports coming out of the POTUS’s meeting with South Korean President Moon Jae.

Research contact: @jgriffiths

Attorney Michael Avenatti, Stormy Daniels, and Anderson Cooper on the set of 60 Minutes. (Photo source: YouTube)

Men favor Trump more after seeing Stormy Daniels on ’60 Minutes’

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April 4, 2018

President Donald Trump’s approval rating has gone up three points—from 50% to 53%—among male voters in the wake of the Stormy Daniels controversy, based on findings of a Harvard CAPS/Harris Poll of 1,340 U.S. adults released on April 2.

Among women, not so much: Their support fell from 41% to 35%, in what the poll’s co-director Mark Penn labeled as the “Stormy Effect.”

Specifically, the president’s approval rating rose following allegations by the adult film star—on 60 Minutes on March 25—that she spanked Trump and had unprotected sex with him shortly after his wife Melania gave birth to the couple’s son, Barron, in 2006.

While Trump has denied the allegations made by the adult film star, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, she insisted that the pair had an affair and that she had been silenced via a non-disclosure agreement and threatened by the billionaire’s team prior to his election.

Daniels has filed a lawsuit to get out of a non-disclosure agreement, claiming that it is not valid because the document was not signed by Trump.

According to Newsweek report, she also has offered to give back $130,000 in “hush money” that she was paid by Trump’s lawyer Michael Cohen as part of the non-disclosure agreement.

The case has now been moved to closed arbitration, although Daniel’s lawyer has opposed the move—saying that the suit should be decided “in an open court of law owned by the people.”

Research contact: @MarkPenn

Photo source: BoardingSchools.US

Americans don’t want weaponized classrooms

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March 12, 2018

A majority of Americans (56%) don’t want guns in the classroom, according to findings of an NBC News/SurveyMonkey poll of 2,857 adults nationwide released on March 8.

In the aftermath of a mass shooting that killed 17 victims at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, last month, President Donald Trump proposed that arming some of America’s teachers with concealed weapons and training them to “immediately fire back” at a “sicko” gunman would end school shootings once and for all.

However, students, school administrators, teachers, parents—and even gun violence experts—do not agree, for the most part. Across the board, 44% strongly disagree with the POTUS’s idea; 12% disagree, 17% somewhat agree, and 25% agree. Among Republicans, 50% agree; and among Democrats 75% disagree. Nearly half of self-identified Independent voters (46%) also disagree.

It also is little surprise that Republicans are more enthusiastic about how Trump has handled gun control than with how Congress has handled the issue, with 78% of Republican respondents indicating that they are enthusiastic or satisfied with how Trump has approached gun control so far. Only 43% of Republicans feel the same about Congress.

Majorities of Independents — 72 percent — say they are dissatisfied or angry about the way Trump has handled gun control, and 84 percent feel that way about Congress. A whopping 90% of Democrats are dissatisfied or downright angry at both Congress and Trump when it comes to gun control. Despite increased public pressure since the Parkland shooting, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R) has given no indication of when — or if — he would bring up any form of gun-related legislation.

A narrow bipartisan proposal that would attempt to shore up the National Instant Background Check System has at least 50 co-sponsors, but it has not been brought to the floor — and GOP lawmakers have been unable to reach a consensus on what they support.

Still, a majority of Americans ( 61%) believe that  government and society can take action that will be effective in preventing mass shootings like the one in Parkland, Florida. Thirty-six percent think school shootings like Parkland will happen again regardless of what action is taken by government and society.

Research contact: Andrew.Arenge@nbcuni.com