Category: Bullying

Donald Trump’s rhetorical style is straight out of middle school. He’s like an eighth-grade girl.

Trump Attacks Tom ‘The Chin’ Friedman For Calling Him Racist: We Just Spoke and He ‘Kissed My A**’

President Donald Trump unleashed a tirade against Thomas Friedman on Twitter Friday morning, claiming the New York Times columnist had been friendly in a private call before deeming him a racist in print.

Trump kicked off his Twitter meltdown with an unflattering nickname for Friedman:

Thomas “the Chin” Friedman, a weak and pathetic sort of guy, writes columns for The New York Times in between rounds of his favorite game, golf. Two weeks ago, while speaking to a friend on his cell phone, I unfortunately ended up speaking to Friedman … he could not have been nicer or more respectful to your favorite President, me. Then I saw the column he wrote, “Trump Will Be Re-elected, Won’t He?” He called me a Racist, which I am not, and said Rhode Island went from economically bad to great in 5 years because the … Governor of the State did a good job. That may be true but she could not have done it without the tremendous economic success of our Country & the turnaround that my Administration has caused. Really Nasty to me in his average I.Q. Columns, kissed my a.. on the call. Phony!

While it’s difficult to know what transpired on their call — Trump tends to be an unreliable narrator and has claimed many a time that his critics kiss his ass in private — the president is correct about Friedman’s brutal column, which warned Democrats that Trump could win in 2020.

The searing line that likely piqued Trump’s ire: “I wasn’t surprised to hear so many people expressing fear that the racist, divisive, climate-change-denying, woman-abusing jerk who is our president was going to get re-elected, and was even seeing his poll numbers rise.”

[Mediaite]

Trump Twitter-rages over media’s coverage of the racist ‘send her back’ chant he incited

President Donald Trump on Thursday said he did not like the racist “send her back” chant directed at Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) that erupted during his campaign rally this week.

On Friday, however, the president attacked the media for criticizing the chant even as he boasted about the large number of people at the rally who were conducting the racist chant.

“It is amazing how the Fake News Media became ‘crazed’ over the chant ‘send her back’ by a packed Arena (a record) crowd in the Great State of North Carolina, but is totally calm & accepting of the most vile and disgusting statements made by the three Radical Left Congresswomen,” the president wrote. “Mainstream Media, which has lost all credibility, has either officially or unofficially become a part of the Radical Left Democrat Party. It is a sick partnership, so pathetic to watch!”

Trump then bashed the media for covering the adoring crowd that welcomed Omar home when she arrived back in her home state of Minnesota.

“They even covered a tiny staged crowd as they greeted Foul Mouthed Omar in Minnesota, a State which I will win in 2020 because they can’t stand her and her hatred of our Country,” he wrote.

[Raw Story]

Trump claims he tried to quell “send her back!” chants. The video says otherwise.

During an Oval Office media session with the US Special Olympics team on Thursday, President Donald Trump made a desperate attempt to distance himself from one of the ugliest moments of his presidency — one his words directly incited, despite what he’d now have people believe.

ABC’s Jonathan Karl asked why he didn’t do something to try to stop the “send her back!” chants that were directed toward Somali refugee-turned-Rep. Ilhan Omar during his rally the night before in North Carolina. Trump defended himself by simply lying.

“Well, number one, I think I did. I started speaking very quickly,” Trump said. “I disagree with [the chants], by the way. But it was quite a chant, and I felt a little bit badly about it. But I will say — I did, and I started speaking very quickly. But it started up rather fast.”

Trump went on to try to draw a contrast between what he said and what his supporters chanted.

“I didn’t say that, they did,” Trump said, prompting Karl to point out that the chant seemed to be directly inspired not only by his misleading attacks on Omar during the rally, but also by tweets he posted on Sunday urging Omar and other Democratic women of color in Congress who are critical of him to leave the country.

“If you examine that, I don’t think you’ll find that,” Trump said, unconvincingly. He then moved on to taking questions from other reporters.

Trump isn’t shy about gaslighting — during a speech last summer, he advised his supporters to “just remember, what you’re seeing and what you’re reading is not what’s happening.” But his claim that he “started speaking very quickly” is directly contradicted by video footage of Wednesday’s event.

Here’s what really happened

After Trump spent about two minutes lambasting Omar during his rally in North Carolina — going as far as to falsely accuse her of sympathizing with al-Qaeda — the “send her back!” chants broke out. But instead of trying to stop them, Trump briefly basked in the chants before moving on with his speech.

He gave no indication that he disagreed with the sentiments expressed by his supporters. In fact, given that he admonished Omar and other congresswomen of color “to go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came” in the aforementioned tweet, the idea that he’s opposed to such sentiments is a huge stretch.

Here’s the full clip of the chants and what led up to them:

The chants quickly became the major headline from the speech, in a week when Trump has continued his racist attacks on Democratic women of color. Journalists and politicians compared the outburst to scenes from fascist rallies, including Nazi Germany.

Even Trump and his supporters seem to realize that this is a bad look. But instead of apologizing, they’re lying. For instance, during his weekly press conference on Thursday, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) tried to portray the fact that Trump continued with his speech after the chants as though it constituted a bold stand against bigotry.

White House spokesperson Hogan Gidley echoed McCarthy during a Fox News interview later that day. “He didn’t let the chant go on very long,” Gidley said, adding that “it’s tough to hear what they were chanting.” (It was not tough to hear what people were chanting.)

While the White House and McCarthy try to rewrite history, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said the quiet part loud. Asked about the anti-Omar chants during a press gaggle on Thursday, Graham suggested that Trump and his supporters are only interested in deporting refugees who don’t support the president politically.

“If you’re a Somali refugee wearing a MAGA cap, [Trump] doesn’t want to send you back,” Graham said. “What does that tell me? That it’s about the criticism, not the critic.”

Refugees, however, have just as much of a right to criticize the president as anybody else — no matter how much Trump and his supporters may dislike it.

[Vox]

Trump supporters chant ‘send her back’ as president hurls racially-charged accusations at Rep. Omar

President Donald Trump went through a series of things he said Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) had said that he deemed anti-American. He said that she belittled 9/11 and a slew of other accusations that were racially charged.

His crowd booed each thing he checked off of the box things he hated about her. But then the crowd began chanting “send her back! Send her back!”

Omar is an immigrant from Somalia who emigrated along with her parents when she was just 12 years old. Her family claimed asylum from their war-torn country.

Trump said on Twitter that he believed she along with three other Congresswomen of color should be sent back to the countries they’re from. Trump’s campaign and Republicans proceeded to spend the days that followed, saying that Trump simply wanted them to leave the U.S. if they didn’t like it so much. Today’s chant from his supporters proved once again, that the “love it or leave it” spin isn’t working.

[Raw Story]

Media

Trump Continues Attacks on Democratic Congresswomen – Calls Them the ‘Four Horsewomen of the Apocalypse’

President Donald Trump is not letting go of his latest obsession: the four progressive Democratic freshmen Congresswomen who are also women of color.

In an early Wednesday morning rant Trump quoted Louisiana Republican Senator John Kennedy, a chameleon who likes to appear as a moderate on MSNBC, then take off his mask and reveal himself as strongly conservative.

Trump, quoting Kennedy, called the four Congresswomen, “wack jobs” and “the four horsewomen of the apocalypse,” a phrase white nationalist Fox News host Laura Ingraham coined to attack the progressive Democrats when they were first elected in November.

“In America, if you hate our Country, you are free to leave. The simple fact of the matter is, the four Congresswomen think that America is wicked in its origins, they think that America is even more wicked now, that we are all racist and evil. They’re entitled to their opinion, they’re Americans. Now I’m entitled to my opinion, & I just think they’re left wing cranks. They’re the reason there are directions on a shampoo bottle, & we should ignore them. The ‘squad’ has moved the Democrat Party substantially LEFT, and they are destroying the Democrat Party. I’m appalled that so many of our Presidential candidates are falling all over themselves to try to agree with the four horsewomen of the apocalypse. I’m entitled to say that they’re Wack Jobs.”

Here’s Sen. Kennedy last night talking to Fox News’ host Tucker Carlson, who has been accused of being a white supremacist.

Trump finished his rant by claiming – falsely – House Democrats are getting nothing done. Meanwhile, the truth is the House has passed 325 bills but “grim reaper” Mitch McConnell is refusing to allow almost any to come to the floor.

[The New Civil Rights Movement]

Kellyanne Conway Snaps Back at Reporter: ‘What’s Your Ethnicity?’

When White House reporter Andrew Feinberg posed a question to Kellyanne Conway on Tuesday about the president’s racist tweets against the four congresswomen known as the “Squad,” he found himself taken aback by her response. 

Feinberg, a reporter for the website BeltwayBreakfast.com, asked the White House counselor which countries President Donald Trump was referring to when he suggested Ayanna Pressley, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar—all U.S. citizens—should “go back” to where they came from. 

Instead of answering that question, Conway asked him, “What’s your ethnicity?” 

“Uh… why is that relevant?” Feinberg asked before Conway interrupted him to say, “Because I’m asking you a question.”

After Conway shares that her ancestors are from Ireland and Italy, the reporter said, “My ethnicity is not relevant to the question I’m asking you.” 

Conway still would not answer Feinberg’s question, instead insisting that he question was relevant because Trump said “originally” from—he didn’t—and going on a rant about how “a lot of us are sick and tired in this country of America coming last,” echoing comments she made on Fox News earlier in the day about the “Squad” representing a “dark underbelly in this country.” 

In that same Fox interview, Conway distanced herself from her husband George Conway, whose latest Washington Post column is headlined: “Trump is a racist president.” 

Reached for comment, Feinberg told The Daily Beast, “It’s not the first time she’s responded to one of my questions with an irrelevant question, but this time was particularly bizarre.”

“I just wanted to get back to what I was asking her about,” he added, “so I was glad she was able to confirm the president’s thinking on the matter.”

[The Daily Beast]

Media

Trump Attacks Congresswomen in Unhinged Presser: ‘They Hate Our Country’ With a Passion, ‘They Hate Jews’

In his first public comments since he leveled attacks on Democratic congresswomen that many saw as racist, President Donald Trump defended his tweets in a press conference on the south lawn of the White House.

Trump took questions in a contentious back-and-forth from the press and continued to hit Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) for “hating Israel” and three other freshman congresswomen, namely Rep. Ayanna Pressley, Rep. Rashida Tlaiband Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the last of which he blamed for Amazon not building a East Coast headquarters in Queens, New York.

“Why don’t they go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came,” Trump wrote of the congresswomen in a Twitter thread Sunday morning.

“They are very unhappy,” Trump told reporters on Monday. “I’m watching them, all they do is complain. All I’m saying, if they want to leave, they can leave.”

He then turned his focus of derision on Rep. Omar, referring to her as “somebody that comes from Somalia.” He continued that Omar is “never happy, says horrible things about Israel, hates Israel, hates Jews.”

“I look at the one, I look at Omar,” Trump said. “I don’t know, I never met her. I hear the way she talks about Al Qaeda. Al Qaeda has killed many Americans.”

He finished, “They can leave, and you know what? I’m sure there will be many people that want to miss them.”

Trump spoke at length, ultimately claiming that these four congresswomen, “hate our country … with a passion” before oddly lamenting how the “Democrat party” would be making a big political mistake by getting behind these four individuals.

[Mediaite]

Reality

Trump lied about Omar’s Al Qaeda comments.

Trump says he’s not concerned about being racist because “many people agree” with him

President Donald Trump said on Monday that he’s not concerned about coming across as racist in tweets he posted on Sunday admonishing Democratic women of color in Congress to “go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came,” because many people agree with him. No, really.

While Trump was taking questions from reporters during an event that was ostensibly supposed to be a “Made in America Product Showcase,” Fox News reporter John Roberts asked him if it concerns him that “many people saw that tweet as racist and that white nationalist groups are finding common cause with you on that point?”

Trump said that he is not, in fact, worried about it.

“It doesn’t concern me because many people agree with me,” he said. “And all I’m saying — they want to leave, they can leave. Now, it doesn’t say, ‘Leave forever.’ It says, ‘Leave if you want.’”

Trump quickly pivoted to talking about the stock market hitting all-time highs — as though the existence of a relatively strong economy stands on its own as a refutation of anyone who would criticize the American government. His comments were applauded.

Watch:

Trump also escalated his attacks on Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) — who, along with Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), is one of the first Muslim women to serve in Congress — by baselessly accusing her of being an al-Qaeda sympathizer.

“I mean, I look at the one, I look at Omar — I don’t know, I never met her — I hear the way she talks about al-Qaeda. Al-Qaeda has killed many Americans. She said, ‘You can hold your chest out. When I think of America — uhh. When I think of al-Qaeda, I can hold my chest out,’” Trump said. “These are people that in my opinion hate our country … they can leave … they have to love our country.”

Trump went on to accuse Omar of “speaking about how wonderful al-Qaeda is” and said she “hates Jews.”

Trump’s latest attack on Omar represents a grotesque distortion of what she said during a 2013 interview with a public television station. Referring to her experiences as a college student Omar said, “When I was in college, I took a terrorism class … every time the professor said ‘al-Qaeda,’ his shoulders went up. … But you know … you don’t say ‘America’ with an intensity, you don’t say ‘England’ with the intensity. You don’t say ‘the army’ with the intensity … But you say these names [of terrorist groups] because you want that word to carry weight. You want it to be something.”

At no point did Omar say anything even close to praising al-Qaeda. And while she has criticized Israel in a manner that some thought invoked anti-Semitic tropes, Trump’s claim that she “hates Jews” is also a dangerous exaggeration. (Omar was inundated with death threatsearlier this year after Trump posted a video suggesting she sympathized with 9/11 attackers.)

In short, the president isn’t concerned about being racist because other people out there are racist too. He also doesn’t seem particularly concerned about the safety of a duly elected Congress member, given that his obscene lies about her are likely to result in her receiving threats.

Meanwhile, the Republican Party — which holds a majority in the Senate and thus has the power to prevent Trump from being removed from office — barely seems capable at this point of criticizing the president’s explicit bigotry. Such is the state of play in American politics.

[Vox]

Trump admin dramatically limits asylum claims by Central Americans

The Trump administration on Monday moved to dramatically limit the ability of Central American migrants to claim asylum if they enter the United States by land through Mexico, the latest attempt by the White House to limit immigration and toughen the US asylum process amid overcrowded conditionsat border facilities.The rule from the departments of Justice and Homeland Security would prohibit migrants who have resided or “transited en route” in a third country from seeking asylum in the US, therefore barring migrants traveling through Mexico from being able to claim asylum and as a result, drastically limit who’s eligible for asylum. Over recent months, there’s been a dramatic spike in apprehensions at the US-Mexico border. The majority of migrants are from the Northern Triangle countries of Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. They’ve had to travel through Mexico to reach the border and upon arriving in the US, some have turned themselves into the US Border Patrol and claimed asylum.The regulation addresses that group of migrants.

“Until Congress can act, this interim rule will help reduce a major ‘pull’ factor driving irregular migration to the United States,” acting Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan in a statement. It will allow the departments of Justice and Homeland Security to “more quickly and efficiently process cases originating from the southern border, leading to fewer individuals transiting through Mexico on a dangerous journey.”There are some exceptions: an asylum seeker whose claim was denied after applying for protection in a country, if someone has been trafficked, and if someone transited through a country that did not sign one of the major international treaties on refugees. The rule would take effect immediately but is certain to face legal challenges. Under US law, migrants are allowed to claim asylum once on US soil. There’s a caveat, however, for those who come through safe third countries, meaning countries that the US has entered into an agreement with. The United Nations’ refugee agency defines “safe country,” in part, as “being countries in which refugees can enjoy asylum without any danger.”But Trump’s own statements on Mexico could undercut that definition. In tweets, the President has called Mexico “one of the most dangerous country’s in the world” and claimed that the murder rate in the country has increased.”The Coyotes and Drug Cartels are in total control of the Mexico side of the Southern Border. They have labs nearby where they make drugs to sell into the U.S. Mexico, one of the most dangerous country’s in the world, must eradicate this problem now. Also, stop the MARCH to U.S.” Trump tweeted in April.

[CNN]

Trump Doubles Down on Attacking Democratic Congresswomen Who He Said Should ‘Go Back’

President Donald Trump stuck to his attack on freshmen Democratic congresswomen from earlier Sunday, arguing his opponents are defending “people who speak so badly of our Country.”

Trump has been widely condemned for his tweets attacking freshmen Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Rashida Tlaib(D-MI) and Ayanna Pressley (D-MA).

He doubled down on his stance Sunday night:

“If the Democrat Party wants to continue to condone such disgraceful behavior, then we look even more forward to seeing you at the ballot box in 2020!” Trump said.

A new poll from NBC News and The Wall Street Journal shows Trump trailing Democratic rivals Joe Biden, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) by at least five points.

[Mediaite]

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