What's new

What effect will Donald Trump's criminal conviction have on voters for the 2024 US election?

What effect will Trump's criminal conviction have on voters for the 2024 US election?


  • Total voters
    3

FearlessRoar

T20I Star
Joined
Sep 11, 2023
Runs
30,521
Donald Trump’s criminal conviction presents a remarkable collection of historic firsts.

He’s the first former or serving US president to be found guilty of a crime. He’s the first presumptive major-party nominee to become a convicted felon as well.

While Trump plans his appeal in the hush-money case, and awaits a sentence on 11 July that could in theory include prison time and a hefty fine, it’s not too early to consider the political fallout.

That will be difficult, however, given this has never happened before.

“We often look to history to find some kind of hint of what’s going to happen,” says Jeffrey Engel, director of the Center for Presidential History at Southern Methodist University. “But there is nothing in the record that comes even close to this.”

Trump secured the Republican presidential nomination earlier this year and is scheduled to be crowned at the party's convention just days after his sentencing.

Polls indicate he is in a statistical dead heat with President Joe Biden and maintains a slight edge in many key swing states that will decide the election. But those surveys also provide evidence that this conviction might change all of that.

In exit polls conducted during the Republican primaries this winter, double-digit numbers of voters said that they would not vote for the former president if he were convicted of a felony.

An April survey by Ipsos and ABC News found that 16% of those backing Trump would reconsider their support in such a situation.

Those were hypothetical convictions, however. And at the time he was facing four criminal cases, including charges related to an alleged conspiracy to overturn the result of the 2020 election and his handling of classified documents once leaving the White House.

Now those voters can make their judgement based on a real conviction.

"The real verdict is going to be [on] 5 November, by the people," Trump said, moments after leaving the courtroom.

Doug Schoen, a pollster who worked with Democratic President Bill Clinton and independent New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, says American voters may feel less strongly about the hush-money case by then because it relates to events that took place eight years ago.

“While it’s not a great thing to be convicted of a crime, what voters will be thinking about in November is inflation, the southern border, competition with China and Russia and the money that is being spent on Israel and Ukraine,” he said.

Even a slight drop in Trump’s support, however, might be enough to matter in the kind of razor-thin race this presidential contest could become. If a few thousand voters who would have otherwise backed the former president stay home in a key state like Wisconsin or Pennsylvania, it could make all the difference.

“I do think it will have an impact and damage him as a candidate,” says Ariel Hill-Davis, co-founder of Republican Women for Progress, a group that has sought to move the party away from Trump.

She says younger voters and those who are college-educated and live in the suburbs have been concerned about Trump’s demeanour and his approach to governing.

“Those voters are really hesitant to get back in line with the Republican Party headed by Donald Trump,” she says. “The guilty verdict is going to further shore up those concerns.”

But leading Republicans, many of whom attended the trial in a show of loyalty to the party nominee, were quick to rally behind him.

House Speaker Mike Johnson called it a shameful day in American history. "This was a purely political exercise, not a legal one."

For eight years, experts and opponents have been predicting Trump’s impending political collapse, only to be proven wrong. His 2016 presidential campaign was punctuated by scandals that would have likely felled a typical politician, including Trump’s recorded Access Hollywood conversation about groping women that was referenced multiple times in this trial.

Mr Trump’s party largely stuck with him through two impeachments and the chaotic end of his presidency, during which the US Capitol was attacked by a mob of his supporters.

All this did not prevent the former president from undertaking a political revival that has put him in position to win back the White House in November.

“It’s axiomatic at this point, but Trump’s continued support, despite the kind of scandal that would have scuttled literally any other previous candidate in American history, is truly astounding,” says Mr Engel.

This historic criminal conviction may prove to be different – particularly if Trump’s appeals fail and he faces the prospect of prison.

Or it could just be the latest in a long series of seemingly disruptive events that, in hindsight, have only been bumps on Trump’s path to power.

Allan Lichtman, a professor at American University, has constructed a political model that has successfully predicted the winner of every presidential race since 1984. He concedes, however, that Trump’s criminal conviction could be the kind of “cataclysmic and unprecedented” twist that throws the model for a loop and changes the course of history.

“History books will record this as a truly extraordinary, unprecedented event, but a lot will depend on what happens afterwards,” he says.

The ultimate judgement on the importance of Trump’s conviction will come at the hands of voters in November. If the former president is defeated, his guilty verdict is likely to be viewed as one of the reasons why.

If he wins, it may become just a footnote to Trump’s tumultuous yet consequential political career.

“History is written by the winners, as we all know,” Mr Engel says.

 
To be honest, the trump supporters won't care a bit. Trump's career is littered with such controversies but still he is a popular leader in US.
 
Donald Trump has ratcheted up his unfounded claims that his New York hush-money trial was a political hit job, a day after becoming the first former president in United States history to be convicted of criminal charges

Speaking at Trump Tower in New York City on Friday morning, Trump delivered a meandering speech in which he portrayed the trial as a “scam” and “rigged”, while telling his supporters they could also be targeted.

“This is case where if they can do this to me, they can do this to anyone,” he told reporters. “These are bad people. These are in many cases, I believe, sick people.”

Trump has repeatedly attacked prosecutors and the judge involved in the case, and has said – without evidence – that the administration of US President Joe Biden was connected to the prosecution.

“This is all done by Biden and his people,” Trump said without providing any evidence. He said he plans to appeal the verdict.

Trump’s remarks – which oscillated between condemnation of the trial and his now familiar stump speeches – came less than 24 hours after New York City jurors found the former president guilty on all 34 felony counts he faced in his widely watched trial.

The Manhattan District Attorney’s office argued that Trump falsified business documents to cover up reimbursements paid to his personal fixer and former lawyer Michael Cohen, for hush-money payments made to adult film star Stormy Daniels.

Prosecutors said the payments to Daniels – in exchange for her silence over an alleged affair with Trump – were part of a wider scheme to withhold negative information that would have hurt Trump ahead of the 2016 presidential elections, which he won.

They argued that Trump sought “to defraud the voting public”, in violation of New York state law.

The upcoming US presidential election loomed large over the New York trial, and Trump’s conviction could shake up the campaign.

Trump, who is set to face off against Democratic President Joe Biden on November 5, has repeatedly said – without evidence – that the hush-money case was part of a coordinated effort to derail his re-election bid.

Reporting from outside Trump Tower on Friday, Al Jazeera’s John Hendren noted, however, that “Biden didn’t have anything to do with [the case]”.

“This was a New York jury … [Biden] is not in the chain of command of the district attorney of New York. There’s really no way Biden could have intervened in this particular case,” Hendren said.

“But Trump is going to make this a campaign issue. He says the ultimate verdict is going to come in November … and there’s no reason to believe the Republican Party will back off of him. So far the support among Republicans has been near-universal.”

Source: Al Jazeera
 
There’s no way Trump is losing the elections, especially when he’s up against sleepy joe.

Trump could deny the holocaust and he’d still win.

Trump will win the elections from Jail, and he’ll be pardoned by the Governor.
 
There’s no way Trump is losing the elections, especially when he’s up against sleepy joe.

Trump could deny the holocaust and he’d still win.

Trump will win the elections from Jail, and he’ll be pardoned by the Governor.

I don't see a great chance of him becoming the president again.
 
I don't see a great chance of him becoming the president again.
I think it is still too early. People are in summer mode. Have to wait till September for things to get serious.

I think this trial has given Trump a boost. Especially with fund raising. Also, I think it likely has helped many in the undecided catagory to make a decision.
 
Trump's White House bid goes on, lawyer tells BBC

One of Donald Trump's lawyers has told the BBC "nothing will change" his fight for the White House - despite being convicted following an historic trial in New York.

Jurors found Mr Trump guilty on Thursday of falsifying business records to conceal hush money payments made to former porn star Stormy Daniels during the 2016 presidential election campaign.

Mr Trump became the first US president to be convicted of a crime, but he has said the trial was rigged and the prosecution was politically orchestrated.

Alina Habba has told Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg the former president is a "victim of political, selective prosecution".

Following the seven-week trial at the Manhattan Criminal Courthouse, Mr Trump was found guilty of 34 counts of falsifying business records.

Mr Trump will be sentenced on 11 July. However, he confirmed he will be appealing against his criminal convictions.

Ms Habba, 40, sat alongside Mr Trump during the trial and said even if jailed, Mr Trump will still stand in the US presidential election in November.

"We have seen some corruption in this country that frankly has never seen before in our judicial system," Ms Habba told Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg.

"It is very real, it is not posturing by any means, it is 100% a problem that this country is going to have to handle and get a grapple on in November.

"He is running for president, nothing will change there.

"The people that need him in this country, because frankly it's more important than anything anybody else thinks.

"Our people are speaking loudly, they're donating, they're small donors, and they are standing up because they are afraid, because we cannot have this happen to us."

In remarks at Trump Tower in New York on Friday, Mr Trump spoke for more than 30 minutes and angrily attacked his political opponents, the jury and the judge in his case.

He called Judge Juan Merchan, who presided over his trial, a "tyrant" and claimed that he "literally crucified" witnesses.

In response, President Joe Biden's campaign described Mr Trump as unhinged and thirsting for revenge.

"That's how the American system of justice works," Mr Biden said, adding it was "reckless" and "irresponsible" for anyone to suggest the trial was rigged.

Mr Trump's unprecedented conviction has entrenched bitter divisions in the US, in the run-up to November's vote.

Prosecutors successfully laid out a case Mr Trump was afraid Ms Daniels would fatally harm his 2016 presidential campaign by going public with an alleged sexual encounter, prompting him to pay her - then illegally hide the transaction.

Mr Trump denied these allegations.

Ms Daniels herself gave evidence. In another development since the convictions, her lawyer told ABC News Ms Daniels wore a bulletproof vest when she went to the New York courthouse.

Clark Brewster said: "It's so vicious and threatening and so I think from the standpoint of just the fear of what somebody might do," he said of the atmosphere for Ms Daniels.

"It was really fear."

In exclusive comments to the Daily Mirror, Ms Daniels said Mr Trump should be jailed or used as "the volunteer punching bag at a women's shelter".

She told the paper: "It’s not over for me. It’s never going to be over for me.

"Trump may be guilty, but I still have to live with the legacy.”

Previously, Ms Daniels's husband, Barrett Blade, told CNN she felt "a little vindicated".

Mr Blade added that despite the trial ending and bringing some relief, the stress was far from over.

"It brings another weight upon her shoulders of what happens next," Mr Blade said.

"We take it day by day."

Also on Saturday, the Trump campaign sent out a text message to supporters – one of more than a dozen sent since the verdict – which read in part: “They want me behind bars. They want me DEAD.”

Some of his most fervent supporters, such as former Fox News presenter Tucker Carlson, have alleged without evidence there is a secret plot to assassinate Mr Trump.

Others have made a less conspiratorial argument – pointing out the maximum penalty Mr Trump faces, four years for each of 34 felony counts, would effectively mean he would spend the rest of his life in prison.

Mr Trump alluded to this in his most recent fundraising message, saying his enemies are “attempting to JAIL me for life as an innocent man”.

However, legal experts agree Mr Trump will not receive anywhere near the maximum, and will be sentenced to a much shorter jail sentence, if he is given any prison time at all.

BBC
 

Convicted felon Donald Trump faces Australia travel ban​

Donald Trump’s conviction for charges relating to a hush money payment to a porn star that broke election finance rules made him the first former US president to be found guilty of a felony.

While all eyes are on how the decision could impact this year’s US presidential race, the real estate mogul’s newly earned felon status also has wide-ranging implications that go beyond an attempt to avenge his 2020 election loss.

Chief among them: Trump could be banned from coming to Australia.

Donald Trump gestures to the crowd outside of Trump Tower after his conviction (Image: EPA/Peter Foley)
Trump is either finished or on the road back to the White House, and no-one has a clue which
Read More
Section 501 in Australia’s Migration Act gives the federal immigration minister the ability to refuse a visa to someone who fails the character test. The first reason that someone may fail the test listed in the legislation is if they have a “substantial criminal record” which can include being sentenced to a term of 12 months of prison or more. US whistleblower Chelsea Manning was told that then immigration minister David Coleman intended to refuse her visa to visit for a speaking tour on these grounds in 2018, after she served seven year of a 35 year sentence.

If you believe the man, Trump is going to jail for 187 years, which would definitely satisfy the substantial criminal record requirement. In reality, Trump has yet to be sentenced and faces a maximum possible sentence of 20 years imprisonment under New York state law. US legal experts think that any length of imprisonment is unlikely as the former president has no criminal record and very few people who committed the same crime received any jail time at all.

It’s doubtful that the federal government would refuse a Trump visit to Australia even if he ends up being imprisoned for a year or more. A federal immigration minister would have discretion over the decision and denying a former US president, even one with a criminal record, would likely cause a diplomatic snafu. Complicating this further is Trump’s possession of a diplomatic passport which gives holders the ability to travel to Australia without a visa but only on official government business.

While no doubt relieved that he can probably return to see our beautiful beaches and the Sydney Opera House again, Trump faces a number of other restrictions as a consequence of his convictions. These include obstacles visiting at least 36 other countries including New Zealand, as well as a ban on owning guns or sitting on a jury. Having a criminal record can also make it harder in Australia to be admitted as a lawyer or a healthcare practitioner, get home insurance, rent a house or work with children. He’s even barred from teaching English in South Korea.

Crucially, Trump can still run for and be elected president even if he’s in jail. But he may not be able to vote for himself if he was behind bars — New York allows felons to vote only after their sentence is up.

 

Trump warns of 'breaking point' for Americans if he's jailed​

WASHINGTON, June 2 (Reuters) - Donald Trump said on Sunday he would accept home confinement or jail time after his historic conviction on criminal charges by a New York jury last week but that it would be tough for the public to accept.

Trump is scheduled to be sentenced on July 11, four days before Republicans gather to formally choose their presidential nominee to face Democratic President Joe Biden in November's election.

Prison time is rare for people convicted in New York state of felony falsification of business records, the charge Trump, the Republican presidential candidate, faced at his trial. The maximum sentence for such a charge is four years imprisonment.

"I'm not sure the public would stand for it," the former president told Fox News of a potential prison sentence.

"I think it'd be tough for the public to take. You know, at a certain point, there's a breaking point."

Trump has vowed to appeal his conviction by the New York jury, which found him guilty of 34 felony counts over falsifying documents to cover up a payment to silence a porn star ahead of the 2016 election.

To succeed on appeal, Trump, 77, must demonstrate that Justice Juan Merchan made significant errors overseeing the trial.

His lawyers have said they expect to take the case to the Supreme Court. On Sunday, Trump, who tried to disqualify Merchan from the case, repeated allegations of bias by the judge and the district attorney who prosecuted the case.

"The United States Supreme Court MUST DECIDE!," Trump wrote on social media.

Trump plans to appeal after his July 11 sentencing date, his lawyers say. If an appeal in New York state courts proves unsuccessful, he could appeal to the Supreme Court. Trump's attorneys would have to persuade at least four of the court's nine justices to hear his case.

To prevail, Trump would then have to demonstrate that the state prosecution violated his federal constitutional rights and that his legal team followed proper procedures during earlier stages of his legal proceedings.

 

‘Brazen corruption’: Donald Trump is selling policies for a second term to the highest bidders​


Donald Trump is no stranger to a quid pro quo — he was impeached for one, after all. But while campaigning for a second term in the White House, he has gone further than perhaps any other candidate in recent history to shape his policies in return for cash.

Trump is not making these bargains behind closed doors or in smoky back rooms, but at fundraisers and events attended by dozens of influential and extremely wealthy people.

On several occasions he has made explicit offers to reward donors by enacting or dismantling policy on their behalf should he win in November, often reversing his own previously held positions.

Democrat Jamie Raskin, ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, accused Trump of treating the presidency “as a for-profit business enterprise and money-making venture.”

He told The Independent that Trump was “brazenly offering to sell out U.S. policy to any corporate and billionaire campaign donors ready to make a deal, including telling Big Oil he will sign their executive orders in exchange for a cool one billion dollars.”

“Donald Trump will literally sell out the future of humanity for another billion dollars,” he added.

The Campaign Legal Center, a non-profit watchdog that focuses on campaign finance laws, called Trump’s actions “brazen, quid pro quo corruption.”

"It is deeply concerning and problematic to see a presidential candidate solicit millions of dollars from wealthy donors in exchange for promised policies or actions that cater to the donors’ wishes,” said Saurav Ghosh, the group’s director of federal campaign finance reform.

Ghosh told The Independent that “years of deregulatory court decisions” have fostered a culture of big money in US elections that allow Trump “to act with impunity, pushing legal boundaries or even breaking them outright.”

Trump’s bargaining began almost the moment he left office, and has continued to this day.

Here are the policies he is selling to donors.

At a lavish dinner held at Mar-a-Lago in April, the former president gathered with around two dozen executives from the biggest oil companies in the country. His campaign was facing a sizeable cash shortfall against his opponent, President Joe Biden, and he was desperate to make up the difference.

As the executives complained about how the Biden administration’s environmental regulations were hurting their business, Trump made a starkly transactional pitch: raise $1 billion to send me back to the White House.

If he won, he said he would immediately reverse dozens of Biden’s environmental rules and policies. The $1 billion would be a “deal” for the companies, he added, because of the money they would save from deregulation.

The account of the meeting, first reported by the Washington Post, came from several people who attended. Among them were 20 executives from ExxonMobil, EQT Corporation and the American Petroleum Institute, which lobbies for the oil industry. It was reportedly organized by oil billionaire Harold Hamm.

Specifically, Trump vowed to undo a Biden administration freeze on permits for new liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports “on the first day” of entering office, one attendee told the Post.

The meeting prompted a furious response from Democrats in the House and Senate.

Representative Raskin wrote to the CEOs of nine of the oil companies that attended the meeting to demand answers about the meeting, calling it an “unvarnished quid pro quo.”

He said that reports that oil companies are currently working on potential executive orders for Trump “suggest that certain oil and gas companies, which have a track record of using deceitful tactics to undermine effective climate policy, may have already accepted or facilitated Mr Trump’s explicit corrupt bargain,” Raskin added.

Trump once called Bitcoin “a scam" and argued that it threatened the supremacy of the US dollar. A few years later, in desperate need of campaign cash, he is pitching himself to Silicon Valley as “the crypto president.”

Trump used the term to describe himself at a fundraiser hosted by tech investors David Sacks and Chamath Palihapitiya at Sacks’ home in San Francisco earlier this month.

Both Sacks and Palihapitiya have spoken publicly about their investments in crypto, and the event was attended by a number of other notable crypto investors, including executives from Coinbase and twins Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss, who own the crypto company Gemini.

Trump has not always been popular in Silicon Valley. In 2020, the tech industry spent big to make him a one-term president. But this time around, there has been a slight yet notable shift among a certain set of crypto-loving tech billionaires.

The crypto industry has spent tens of millions of dollars in an effort to influence the 2024 elections, funneling money to help elect lawmakers who will undo regulatory moves by the Biden administration. The industry hopes that deregulation will lead to huge profits for crypto investors.

Trump’s message appeared to land: He came away with $12 million in donations from that fundraiser in San Francisco, and the promise of much more.

As president, Trump spearheaded efforts to ban TikTok.

“As far as TikTok is concerned, we’re banning them from the United States,” the then-president declared to reporters aboard Air Force One in July 2020.

Indeed, he signed an executive order in his last year in office that would have effectively prohibited the video app, which is majority-owned by a Chinese company. But just this month he joined TikTok himself. And more recently he has spoken out against efforts from both the Biden administration and his own party to regulate it.

On March 7, a House committee advanced a bill that would ban the app if it didn’t divest on a rare unanimous bipartisan vote of 50-0, even as TikTok users flooded congressional lines with thousands of calls urging lawmakers to back off.

That same day, Trump wrote on Truth Social that “if you get rid of TikTok, Facebook and Zuckerschmuck will double their business,” referring to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

“I don’t want Facebook, who cheated in the last Election, doing better,” wrote Trump, echoing a baseless conspiracy theory that social media platforms rigged elections against him. “They are a true Enemy of the People!”

What prompted this dramatic change?

Some clues may be derived from the fact that his words came swiftly after a very public rapprochement with Republican mega-donor Jeff Yass. Yass has a $20 billion stake in TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, and is the largest campaign donor in the US this campaign cycle.

Trump spoke at a conference of the influential right-wing group Club for Growth, which the former president previously blasted as “Club for No Growth,” at the request of Yass.

Yass has given some $61 million to the Club for Growth since 2010, but the PAC backed Florida Ron DeSantis in the Republican primary against Trump.

At the conference, Trump told donors that he and the organization’s president, David McIntosh, are now “back in love.”

Perhaps the most brazen quid pro quo of Trump’s first term came with a giant donation from casino mogul Sheldon Adelson, the Republican Party’s biggest funder over the past decade.

According to New York Times writer Maggie Haberman in her book ‘Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America,’ Adelson made a $20 million donation to a super PAC to pressure then-president Donald Trump to adopt the highly controversial decision to move the US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

For his second term, Trump may be poised to sell another controversial policy to the Adelson family.

Sheldon Adelson died in 2021, but his wife Miriam has continued his cause and may even surpass Yass to become Trump’s biggest patron in this election cycle.

A New York Magazine profile of Miraim Adelson, published last month, suggested that Trump’s support for the Israeli annexation of the West Bank was top of her wish list for a second term.

The West Bank is considered Palestinian territory and would form the basis of a future Palestinian state. Annexing it would be against international law.

By March, Miriam Adelson had not yet opened her checkbook to fund Trump’s campaign. That month, after Trump won the Republican primary, he invited her to a Shabbat dinner at Mar-a-Lago, according to the magazine, during which his courting of the donor appears to have begun in earnest. He gave an interview to the Adelson-owned newspaper Israel Hayom in which he described himself as “a very loyal person.”

“I’ve been the best president in history to Israel by a factor of ten because of all the things I do. The embassy, Jerusalem being the capital. Then you have Golan Heights … Nobody even thought that was going to be possible. I did that,” he said.

Ten days after the publication of the New York Magazine profile, Politico reported that Adelson would fund a massive super PAC for Trump’s re-election.

During his presidency, Trump implemented sweeping tax cuts for the top 1 per cent of earners and cut the maximum corporation tax rate from 35 percent to 21 percent. His cuts were “one factor helping the fortunes of US billionaires grow by a collective $1 trillion during the pandemic, from March 18 to December 7, 2020,” according to the nonpartisan group Americans for Tax Fairness.

The group said that an analysis of donations to Trump found that he was “enabled with a total of almost a quarter billion dollars in campaign contributions from 134 of America’s billionaires during his short, violent political career.”

Trump is looking to replicate that windfall by promising even more tax cuts for the wealthy, should he win a second term. Several billionaire donors backed off following the riot on January 6, 2021 — they are now finding their way back to Trump, largely thanks to that promise.

Speaking at a donor event at the luxury Pierre Hotel in New York last month, Trump warned the wealthy attendees that taxes would go up unless he wins in November because Biden has vowed to let his tax cuts expire at the end of 2025.

“You’re going to have the biggest tax increase in history,” he said. “So whatever you guys can do, I appreciate it.”

The comments are part of a pattern of offers to wealthy donors from Trump. Donate to me, he says, and I’ll make you richer.

Speaking at Mar-a-Lago in December last year, Trump drew laughs as he described the audience as “rich as hell” before declaring: “We’re gonna give you tax cuts!”

Money has always played a role in presidential campaigns, but the scale and brazenness of Trump’s policy firesale could have a dramatic impact on future elections. If it works, the US government could become even more in thrall to the billionaire class.

 
Donald Trump becomes the official Republican presidential nominee

Donald Trump has received enough votes at the Republican National Convention (RNC) to become the party's official presidential nominee - days after surviving an assassination attempt.

At the gathering in Milwaukee, the ex-president was confirmed as the Republican candidate ahead of the 5 November election.


SKY News
 
Trump’s vice president running mate JD Vance says UK an ‘Islamist country’ in bizarre nuclear weapons comment

Donald Trump’s choice for vice president described the UK as an “Islamist country” with nuclear weapons during a speech at a right-wing conference last week.

JD Vance, the Ohio senator, was announced as Mr Trump’s running mate on Monday after the former president was shot in the ear during a rally in Pennsylvania at the weekend.

Recounting a conversation he was having with a friend, the 39-year-old said he had been wondering which “truly Islamist country” would be the first to gain access to nuclear weapons.

“I was talking about, you know, what is the first truly Islamist country that will get a nuclear weapon?” he said. “Maybe it is Iran, maybe Pakistan already kind of counts, and then we finally decided that it’s actually the UK – since Labour just took over.”

Mr Vance’s bizarre comments came as he was speaking at the National Conservatism Conference, often referred to as NatCon, in Washington DC, and were met with a chorus of laughter from the crowd.

In the speech, Mr Vance talked about how “American leaders should look out for Americans... and for the Brits, UK leaders should look out for citizens of the UK or subjects or whatever you guys call yourselves”.

He added “by the way, I have to beat up on the UK for just one additional thing”, before saying the election of a Labour government has left Britain as the “first truly Islamist country that will gain a nuclear weapon”. “To our Tory friends, I have to say, you guys have got to get a handle on this,” he said.

Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner said she “doesn’t recognise” the characterisation of the UK under a Labour government as “Islamist”.

Ms Rayner told ITV’s Good Morning Britain: “I think he said quite a lot of fruity things in the past as well.

“Look, I don’t recognise that characterisation. I’m very proud of the election success that Labour had recently. We won votes across all different communities, across the whole of the country. And we’re interested in governing on behalf of Britain and also working with our international allies.

“So I look forward to that meeting, if that is the result and it’s up to the American people to decide.”

She added: “I think political leaders across the world all have different opinions but we govern in the interests of our countries. And the US is a key ally of ours and if the American people decide who their president and vice president is, we will work with them, of course, we will.

“And I’m sure they’ll have opinions on what we do and suggest, and we’ll work together constructively and I look forward to those meetings and being able to do that. That’s grown-up politics. That’s what we do.”

And Tory veterans minister Andrew Bowie described Mr Vance’s comments as “offensive”. He told Times Radio: “I disagree with the Labour Party fundamentally on many issues, but I do not agree with that view, quite frankly.

“I think it's actually quite offensive, frankly, to my colleagues in the Labour Party.”

Meanwhile Treasury minister James Murray has said he does not know what Mr Vance was “driving at” when he described the UK as an “Islamist country”.

The exchequer secretary to the Treasury told Sky News: “I don’t really understand those comments.”

He added: “I genuinely heard that comment, and I don’t know what he was driving at in that comment, to be honest. I mean, in Britain, we’re very proud of our diversity.

“I’m very proud that we have a new Government, I’m very proud that our Labour Government is committed to national security and economic growth. I’m very clear where we are. I don’t really know how that comment fits in.”

On whether the UK has a continuing “special relationship” with the US, Mr Murray said: “I think we do, and I think we do have a special bond, irrespective of individual people or individual comments.

Among the other speakers at the National Conservatism conference was Suella Braverman, the former UK home secretary.

Last year, Ms Braverman was accused of inciting the far right when she decried the pro-Palestine demonstrations in the UK as “hate marches” and called for the protesters to be banned from action on Armistice Day. A far right mob later appeared at the fringes of the marches and, on multiple occasions, attempted to attack protesters and police officers.

A spokesperson for the Muslim Association of Britain told The Independent at the time that the then-home secretary’s comments had created “quite a lot of fear among some Muslim communities” who viewed it as a direct attack on their solidarity with Palestinians, many of whom are also Muslim.

“The home secretary needs to take a good look at herself and focus on governing the streets instead of inflaming tensions using Islamophobic tactics to embolden the far right,” the spokesperson said.

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage, who was in the US this week for the Milwaukee Republican convention, has also railed against the Muslim community in Britain, suggesting ahead of the general election that they do not share UK values.

SOURCE: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/jd-vance-vp-uk-islamist-trump-b2580398.html
 
RFK apologises over leaked call of Trump coaxing support

Robert F Kennedy Jr has apologised after a video was leaked of a private phone call in which Donald Trump is heard apparently trying to coax the independent presidential candidate to support him.

“I would love you to do something,” Trump can be heard saying in the clip. “And I think it’ll be so good for you and so big for you. And we’re going to win.”

Mr Kennedy then says: “Yeah.”

M Trump and Mr Kennedy, a longshot third-party candidate, are political rivals who have occasionally criticised each other during the campaign.

The footage is said to have been recorded on Sunday, a day before the pair met in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where the Republican convention is taking place, stoking speculation that Mr Kennedy might be about to exit the race and endorse Trump.

But Kennedy spokeswoman Stefanie Spear said on Monday that he was not dropping out.

Robert F Kennedy Jr posted on X on Tuesday: “When President Trump called me I was taping with an in-house videographer.

“I should have ordered the videographer to stop recording immediately. I am mortified that this was posted. I apologise to the president.”

It was Kennedy’s son, Robert F Kennedy III, who posted the footage online early on Tuesday.

The younger Kennedy said in the post on X, formerly Twitter, that he wanted to expose Trump’s “real opinion” on immunisations, but he swiftly deleted the clip.

Trump can also be heard in the video discussing discredited claims about the health risks of childhood vaccines, a longstanding concern for Mr Kennedy, but one which the scientific community has said is misinformation.

“I agree with you, man. Something's wrong with that whole system, and it's the doctors you find," Trump can be heard saying.

Also on Tuesday, Donald Trump Jr, the former president’s son, was asked about rumours that Mr Kennedy could join forces with the Republican presidential nominee.

Speaking at an event in Milwaukee, he said “maybe there’s a great place for him somewhere in an administration”.

Mr Trump Jr said he didn’t have any “inside scoop on that, certainly not now”, but he would “love to see that happen”.

Opinion polls suggest that Mr Kennedy could draw votes equally from Trump and the Democratic President Joe Biden, including in swing states, in this November's election.

BBC
 
Why tech bros are turning to Trump

Donald Trump, whose time in office made him a pariah to many in the business world, has found new champions among tech leaders as his path back to the White House takes shape.

Elon Musk, the world's richest person, became the biggest name yet to throw his weight behind the former president this month, endorsing him and getting involved in fundraising efforts.

The move capped weeks of mounting support from the tech world, as influential venture capitalists and tech leaders, including former Democratic donor Allison Huynh, investors Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz and the Winklevoss twins, players in the world of crypto, rallied publicly around Trump.

Support for Trump is hardly universal.

But it marks a sharp turn from just a few years ago, when companies rushed to distance themselves from Trump in the weeks after the 2021 US Capitol riot.

Coming from Silicon Valley, where backing a ban on gay marriage - a Republican cause - once cost an executive his job, the change is especially striking.

At a cryptocurrency event at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Nicholas Longo, 27, of wealth management firm Fortuna Investors, said when he voted for Trump four years ago he felt there was stigma attached.

"In 2020, it would have been inadvisable for me to express support for Donald Trump,” he said. Now, all that has changed.

The shift in the political winds has long been evident on social media, where Mr Musk and investor David Sacks are among those to regularly scorn President Joe Biden.

But their decision to open their wallets to the Trump campaign is poised to significantly expand their influence beyond their traditional circle - with major consequences for the election.

The support from tech leaders has helped Trump close the fundraising gap that he faced against Mr Biden a few months ago.

"He was pretty far behind and struggling at the end of April," said Sarah Bryner, research director at OpenSecrets. "In the last eight weeks, it's a completely different campaign."

She said the pledges sent a strong signal on how the tide is turning, noting that signs of victory at the polls often help push potential donors off the fence.

"Success begets success," she said.

Data from OpenSecrets shows Democrats claiming the larger share of venture capitalist donations in recent elections - and Mr Biden's decision to bow out of the race is expected to ignite further interest.

However, Trump's new friends remain committed.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Mr Musk has pledged $45m a month to the Trump campaign - which would make him one of the biggest donors this year.

The billionaire has denied the sum, while acknowledging his work on fundraising efforts tied to the campaign.

"I believe in an America that maximizes individual freedom and merit. That used to be the Democratic Party, but now the pendulum has swung to the Republican Party," Mr Musk wrote on X, the social media platform he owns that was formerly known as Twitter, after Mr Biden dropped out.

Analysts said the backing from key figures in the tech world suggested that Trump was widening his appeal.

"He's convinced Republicans he's not as bad as they say... and now we're seeing that's broadening out," said Sal Russo, a veteran Republican consultant based in California.

"Do I think he's going to win Santa Clara County? No, but he's going to do better," said Mr Russo.

In Trump's corner: Elon Musk

Tech leaders have said they are concerned about the Biden administration's crackdown on crypto, and cautious approach to artificial intelligence. For example, a recent executive order requires firms to comply with government AI safety standards.

"Bad government policies are now the #1 threat to Little Tech," Mr Andreessen and Mr Horowitz, whose firm invests in start-ups and is a big player in crypto and AI, wrote in a recent essay. "The time has come to stand up."

Mr Musk's decision to back Trump might appear a startling shift for a man who had historically shunned political donations.

He reportedly once waited in line for six hours to shake Barack Obama’s hand, and as recently as 2018 described himself as politically moderate.

In 2017, he was among the first members to quit a White House business council, parting ways with Trump over climate change policies.

His company, Tesla, makes electric cars, which Trump has repeatedly criticised as expensive and impractical.

However, Mr Musk has long bristled at oversight by financial regulators.

His criticism of Mr Biden ramped up two years ago, after he did not get an invite to a White House business meeting, a snub that led him to tell CNBC he felt unfairly "ignored".

On social media, he has increasingly waded into other debates over Covid lockdowns, the war in Ukraine, China policy and transgender issues.

Mr Musk, whose SpaceX rocket firm does billions of dollars of government business, has a relationship with a possible Trump administration to consider as well.

Self-interest in Silicon Valley

Democrats said the shift in the tech world has been motivated by self-interest, noting that Mr Biden has proposed new taxes on multi-millionaires and unrealised capital gains.

He has also alienated some with his embrace of organised labour, and his administration's pursuit of tech companies in anti-monopoly and other cases.

Businessman Mark Cuban, who supports Democrats, suggested that the gravitation towards Trump was a "bitcoin play" - a bet that cryptocurrency value could be boosted by high inflation and political chaos that Democrats say would result under a Trump administration.

Swing to the right

Stanford Business School professor Neil Malhotra, who has studied the political views of tech founders, said it would be a mistake to conflate the "most vocal people on Twitter" with the industry overall - or even its elites, whose views historically have straddled both parties.

A 2017 survey he and colleagues conducted found that as a group, tech leaders were aligned with Democrats on issues such as gay marriage and abortion - even taxes. However, they swung Republican in strongly opposing regulation.

He noted that since the survey, new social issues such as policing, schooling and transgender rights have come to the fore. San Francisco has been a key battleground in those debates, driving some of the tech world backlash.

"The suspicion is that most people in venture capital are still centre-left," Prof Malhotra said. But, he added: "There’s definitely a movement to the Republican Party."

Trump's shift on tech

Evan Swarztrauber, an adviser to the Foundation for American Innovation thinktank, said tech leaders were betting Trump would be more hands-off on crypto and AI.

But the gamble is not without risk.

As president, Trump won praise from the business community by cutting taxes, putting anti-labour officials in charge of labour rights and generally veering away from regulation.

But he also took a markedly more interventionist approach to the economy - and to tech - than previous administrations - starting a trade war with China, ordering a TikTok ban, and launching some of the ongoing anti-monopoly lawsuits against tech companies.

Since then, he has pushed the Republican party further in that direction - while at the same time moderating or reversing himself on issues such as the TikTok ban and crypto.

Jennifer Huddleston, a senior fellow in tech policy for the libertarian Cato Institute, said Trump may be shifting his stance on some tech issues, noting that he is now the owner of a social media platform.

JD Vance, Trump's choice for vice-president, also previously worked in venture capital and got key support from PayPal's Peter Thiel during his 2022 senate campaign.

But she warned that the effort to distinguish between the interests of "big" tech and "little" tech would prove difficult when it comes time to govern.

David Broockman, a political science professor at the University of California, Berkeley, said Trump was finding success in the business world by presenting himself as more moderate than other members of his party on social issues such as abortion.

After boasting of being "proudly the person responsible" for removing Roe v Wade protections, Trump has rejected claims he will back a national ban pushed by many conservatives, and says the matter should be left up to the states.

But Prof Broockman noted that Trump also ran a relatively moderate campaign in 2016, only to adopt more extreme policies once in office.

Those hurt his public approval and eventually frayed Republican ties to Wall Street, a traditional source of support for the party.

"Tech and other business leaders are banking on a lot of Trump's more eccentric policy ideas ... just not happening," Prof Broockman said. "But they really could happen."

Outside of tech, Trump has backed radical changes including mass deportations of undocumented immigrants, a dramatic reduction in the government workforce and a 10% tariff on all goods coming into the country.

But Garrett Johnson, co-founder of the Foundation for American Innovation and now an executive at a venture-backed tech firm, said he thought that as time had passed more tech and business elites have come around to Trump's views.

"Trump singlehandedly made the threat that China poses to our country a national topic," he said. "He was right and everyone else had to come along."

"So absolutely I think that is part of the dynamic, of the vibe shift," he said. "Was he right on everything? No, but on many big issues Trump was right."

BBC
 
Trump tells supporters they won’t have to vote in the future: ‘It’ll be fixed!’

Donald Trump has ignited alarm among his critics after telling a crowd of supporters that they won’t “have to vote again” if they return him to the presidency in November’s election.

“Christians, get out and vote! Just this time – you won’t have to do it any more,” the Republican former president said on Friday night at a rally hosted in West Palm Beach, Florida, by the far-right Christian advocacy group Turning Point Action.

“You know what? It’ll be fixed! It’ll be fine. You won’t have to vote any more, my beautiful Christians,” he said with a slight shake of his head and his right hand pressed against the left side of his chest.

He added: “I love you. Get out – you gotta get out and vote. In four years, you don’t have to vote again. We’ll have it fixed so good, you’re not gonna have to vote.”

Trump’s remarks – delivered not far from his Mar-a-Lago resort and home – were immediately met with consternation in some political quarters.

The constitutional and civil rights attorney Andrew Seidel, for instance, replied to video of Trump’s comments circulating on X by writing: “This is not subtle Christian nationalism. He’s talking about ending our democracy and installing a Christian nation.”

Actor Morgan Fairchild added in a separate X post: “But … what if I want to vote again?? I was always raised that we get to vote again! That is America.” And NBC legal commentator Katie Phang said: “In other words, Trump won’t ever leave the White House if he gets re-elected.”

Trump’s comments on Friday came months after he remarked that he would be “a dictator on day one” if given a second four-year term in the White House. He has repeatedly made known his admiration for authoritarian leaders, including Russia’s Vladimir Putin, Hungary’s Viktor Orbán and North Korea’s Kim Jong-un. And a former White House aide reported that Trump once said Adolf Hitler – whose Nazi regime murdered 6 million Jews during the Holocaust amid the second world war – “did some good things”.

Meanwhile, the conservative Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 has detailed plans to aim retribution at Trump’s actual and perceived enemies – whether politicians or bureaucrats – should he be re-elected.

Experts on authoritarianism warn the public to take Trump seriously when he speaks in that manner. And before Joe Biden halted his re-election campaign on 21 July and endorsed Kamala Harris to succeed him in the Oval Office, the Democratic president repeatedly sought to portray Trump as an existential threat to American democracy.

Trump’s supporters have tried to blame that rhetoric for the failed 13 July assassination attempt that targeted the former president at a political rally in Pennsylvania. The FBI said on Friday that a bullet – whether whole or fragmented – hit Trump in one of his ears during that day’s shooting, which also killed a rally-goer and wounded two other spectators before a Secret Service sniper shot the gunman to death.

Yet many pointed out how Trump’s remarks on Friday seemed to be an indication that the Republican nominee for president had no plans to stop making explicit threats against democratic norms, including elections themselves.

“Oh. Trump just cancelled the 2028 election,” liberal political commentator Keith Olbermann wrote on X in a post containing a video clip of the ex-president’s remarks on Friday.

Caty Payette, the communications director for Democratic US senator Martin Heinrich of New Mexico, added in a separate X post: “When we say Trump is a threat to democracy, this is exactly what we’re talking about.”

However, not everyone is turned off by the rhetoric to which Trump resorted on Friday. An Ipsos poll published in June and commissioned by the Earth4All non-profit and the Global Commons Alliance found that 41% of Americans believe “having a strong leader who does not have to bother with parliament and elections” is a very good or fairly good way to govern.

Some younger people and higher earners in particular showed support for that sentiment, according to the poll, said Owen Gaffney, co-leader of Earth4All.

Trump easily clinched the Republican nomination for November’s election despite having been convicted in May of 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in the New York state prosecution involving $130,000 paid to adult film actor Stormy Daniels after she alleged an extramarital sexual encounter with him. He has also been grappling with charges of illicitly trying to reverse the outcome of the 2020 election that he lost to Biden – efforts that were buoyed on 1 July when a US supreme court with three Trump appointees ruled that he enjoys immunity from being prosecuted for any acts deemed official.

And, among other legal issues, he has faced multimillion-dollar civil penalties for fraud and a rape allegation that a judge determined to be substantially true.

Even if Trump wins a second White House term in November, the 22nd amendment of the US constitution – which was enacted in 1951 – would prevent him from serving as president beyond early 2029.

Simply proposing to change that amendment would require approval from two-thirds of both congressional chambers. Then, three-fourths of the US states would need to approve the change.

Republican lawmakers for now have a narrow majority in the US House. The Democrat opponents have a slim majority in the Senate.

A poll released on Friday by the Republican-friendly Fox News network showed Trump in a tight race with Harris, the US vice-president, in key swing states that could decide November’s election. Before Biden’s withdrawal from the presidential election, polls generally showed Trump had built relatively comfortable leads in a number of key swing states.

THE GUARDIAN
 
At the moment Harris has the baton in the race but then Trump will have the baton and then Harris and so on. In reality it's a 50/50 election and it will be dead heat in the electoral college.
 
The election will be decided by a few thousand votes in 4 or 5 states . Thats how close it is. No swing voters left- it's pretty much get out your base to vote.
 
Back
Top