Tag: Trump

New charges could put Manafort away for 25 years

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Carlo Allegri/Reuters

❝ On Wednesday morning in a D.C. courtroom, former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort engaged in what we assume was, for him, a deeply humiliating act: he expressed remorse, presumably for the first time in his 69 years on earth. Or, at least, he tried to. “I am sorry for what I’ve done and all the activities that have gotten us here today,” he told Judge Amy Berman Jackson, claiming that he shouldn’t get more jail time for the copious federal crimes he committed because he is his adult wife’s “primary caretaker,” and the two of them need each other…

While that reasoning might have worked on Judge T.S. Ellis, who strangely argued last week that Manafort had led a “blameless life” outside of all the crime, Jackson wasn’t having it, sentencing him to an additional 43 months on federal conspiracy charges, and letting him know she saw right through his act: “Saying I’m sorry I got caught is not an inspiring plea for leniency…”

❝ And, somehow, it’s unlikely that that was the worst part of Manafort’s day! Because literal minutes later, this happened:

New York prosecutors Wednesday announced criminal charges against President Donald Trump’s former campaign chief, Paul Manafort, only minutes after his sentencing in a federal case. The indictment, unveiled by Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance, charges Manafort with 16 counts related to mortgage fraud, conspiracy, and falsifying business records. . . . Crucially, Trump does not have pardon power for state charges.

❝ …Last week, a grand jury moved to charge the guy who ran the president’s campaign with residential mortgage fraud, conspiracy, falsifying business records, and a handful of other crimes. If he’s convicted of the most serious charges, he could spend up to a quarter of a century in prison…

Nice start to another piece of potential justice for one of Trump’s assistant creeps. If we’re lucky, we’ll live long enough to see Manafort and, eventually, the creep-in-chief spend some well-deserved time in the slammer.

Mexico closes 5 immigrant detention centers — “lacking…shelter and services”

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mintpressnews.com

❝ Mexico’s federal immigration agency shuttered five of its detention centers late last month, as the agency’s new chief says he wants to improve the treatment of undocumented migrants.

The closings included the detention center in Reynosa, across the border from McAllen, Texas, just days after the director of that office was fired. A report from TV network Telemundo had found officials at that office had extorted migrants being held there, and officials have said they’re investigating the complaints.

The remaining closures were in Nogales, across the border from Nogales, Arizona, on the coasts in Acapulco, Guerrero, and Tuxpan, Veracruz; and toward southern Mexico in Morelia, Michoacan…

❝ Top immigration officials, appointed by the newly elected President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, appear to be making an effort to reform the agency, said Gretchen Kuhner, director of the Institute for Women in Migration, a Mexico City-based nonprofit.

Mexico now working to improve the lot of undocumentados while the home of the brave and the land of the free couldn’t care less. At least the Executive branch and a chunk of Congress.

Trump belief in failed economic analyses results in more failure

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The Commerce Department said Wednesday that the United States last year posted an $891.2 billion trade deficit in merchandise, the largest in the nation’s 243-year history despite more than two years of President Trump’s “America First” policies.

The results were a sobering reminder that the laws of economics still apply to a president who had promised to supercharge economic growth while simultaneously shrinking the chronic U.S. trade deficit.

Those twin promises proved incompatible, as economists had predicted…

“Macroeconomics end up ruling. You can’t wish it away. You can’t tariff it away,” said William Reinsch, a former Commerce Department official now at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

The same supply-side foolishness Republicans seem to love were trotted out by Trump advisors like Navarro and Kudlow offering up the same economic bible that failed – most recently – Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush. There are masochistic terms for fools who continue to repeat useless acts in hope of a different result. They describe politicians who really don’t give a damn about decent jobs, good wages, good education and good health for the working families of this nation..

“…Rupert wants Donald Trump to win. So just let it go.”

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Rupert and his wife and Trumpo — Daily Mail, UK

❝ An editor at Fox News killed a report prior to the 2016 presidential election revealing that President Trump engaged in an affair with adult-film actress Stormy Daniels years ago, The New Yorker reported on Monday.

According to the magazine, former FoxNews.com reporter Diana Falzone “had obtained proof” of the affair and confirmed it with several key sources, including Daniels and her ex-husband.

Falzone had also reportedly obtained emails between Daniels’s attorney and Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen that showed that Cohen had proposed to pay cash to Daniels in exchange for a nondisclosure agreement.

❝ …former Fox News executive Ken LaCorte ultimately told Falzone to “let it go.”

“Good reporting, kiddo. But Rupert [Murdoch] wants Donald Trump to win. So just let it go,” LaCorte reportedly said.

If you’re surprised to learn this, I know folks with a couple of bridges in NYC ready to sell them to you.