Tag Archives: Politics

Donald Trump Has Odd ‘Superstitions’ About His Hair, According To New Stormy Daniels Doc

Posted on by
Reply

A new documentary about porn actor Stormy Daniels includes a bizarre tidbit about Donald Trump’s hair.

“Stormy”, which was released last week on Peacock, tells Daniels’ story, including about the controversy surrounding her alleged affair with the former president. It features interviews with her friends and family, journalists and others, including comedians Seth Rogen and Jimmy Kimmel.

In one documentary excerpt flagged by Mediaite, Rogen, who worked with Daniels on the movies Knocked Up and 40-Year-Old Virgin, recalled a conversation he had with Daniels years ago about Trump’s famous hairdo.

“We were like, ‘What’s up with the hair?’ And she was like, ‘Oh, I asked him about the hair,’” Rogen said.

“He said to her that he had had a dream like, Samson and Delilah, and that he, like, felt as though his power, like, rested in his hair, and that if he lost it, he would lose his, like, power and his stature,” he continued.

“And that’s why, even though he knows it’s ridiculous and … objectively not passing all the check marks you would want a head of hair to pass, to him that is preferable than cutting it off because he has, like, superstitions about it,” he added.

In 2018, Rogen publicly corroborated Daniels’ claim she had a sexual relationship with Trump in 2006. During an appearance on The Ellen DeGeneres show, he told the host he had known Daniels a long time, and she had mentioned it a decade earlier.

“At the time, when you ask a porn star who they’ve been sleeping with, and the answer was Donald Trump, it was like the least surprising thing she could have said,” Rogen said at the time.

Trump has since been charged with falsifying business records in connection to a hush money payment to Daniels in 2016 in exchange for her silence on the alleged affair before that year’s presidential election.

Trump was in court Monday as a Manhattan judge weighed his request to delay or toss out the trial, currently scheduled to begin next month. He has denied wrongdoing, and called the case a “witch hunt and a hoax” before entering the courtroom.

The Trump campaign did not immediately return a request for comment on Rogen’s account.

Share Button

Judge Rejects Trump’s Attempt To Delay Hush Money Trial

Posted on by
Reply

NEW YORK — A New York state judge ruled on Monday that the criminal trial against former President Donald Trump stemming from a hush money payment he allegedly made to a porn actor can proceed, denying Trump’s request to have the case delayed further or altogether dismissed.

Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee for president, sat alongside his lawyers as Judge Juan Merchan announced that jury selection in the case would begin on April 15.

The trial — the first-ever criminal trial of a former president — had originally been scheduled to start on Monday but was delayed one month after prosecutors agreed to allow Trump’s defence attorneys to review some 100,000 pages of documents of potential new evidence.

Trump’s lawyers had sought to have the trial delayed for an additional 90 days or to have the charges altogether dismissed over what they argued were “violations” of the discovery process, alleging the office of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg had failed to hand over evidence to the defence team in a timely fashion. This, Trump’s lawyers alleged, was a deliberate attempt to bury potentially exculpatory evidence and amounted to “widespread misconduct”.

But prosecutors argued that the new tranche of documents contained little evidence relevant to the case and didn’t require a further postponement of the trial. Prosecutors received the documents in question earlier this month from the US Attorney’s office in Manhattan, the federal prosecutors who investigated Trump’s alleged hush money payments but decided not to charge the former president.

The documents are related to Michael Cohen, the former Trump lawyer and fixer turned state witness. Prosecutors allege Trump instructed Cohen to give porn actress Stormy Daniels $130,000 before the 2016 election to stop her from publicising a story about an extramarital sexual encounter she claims to have had with the former president a decade prior. Trump denies the tryst took place.

Trump was charged last year with 34 counts of falsifying business records in relation to the alleged hush money payments.

“This is a witch hunt, this is a hoax,” the former president told reporters before entering the courtroom Monday. During the hearing, his lawyers argued that the new batch of documents could contain evidence that would discredit Cohen as a witness, and that they needed more time to review Cohen’s emails and bank statements.

But Judge Merchan seemed unsympathetic to this argument, and appeared to grow frustrated with Trump’s lawyers when they couldn’t cite a single legal precedent to support the argument that the Manhattan DA’s could’ve forced the US Attorney’s office to fork over the documents earlier.

“The allegation you make about the people’s case is incredibly serious, unbelievably serious,” Merchan told Trump attorney Todd Blanche. “You’re literally accusing the Manhattan DA’s office of prosecutorial misconduct and trying to make me complicit in it and you don’t have a single [legal precedent to] cite.”

During a 45-minute recess in the court proceedings, news broke that a state appeals court had ruled in Trump’s favour in a separate case — the civil fraud case brought against Trump by New York Attorney General Letitia James. James had initially won a judgment against Trump, with a court finding that he’d committed fraud by falsely inflating his net worth. The appellate court decision Monday reduced his $464 million bond in the case, a potentially financially crippling sum, to $175 million.

Back inside the courtroom after the recess, Trump scowled as Merchan ruled that the Manhattan District Attorney’s office was “not at fault for the late production of documents” and the office had made a “diligent, good faith effort” during the discovery process.

Share Button

Trump Suggests He’s Like Jesus As Hearing Over Porn Star Payment Begins

Posted on by
Reply

Donald Trump on Monday embraced the idea that he’s kind of like Jesus Christ, as he attended a court hearing for his upcoming criminal trial over hush money payments made to an adult film star with whom he allegedly had an extramarital affair.

The comparison came courtesy of Truth Social, where Trump’s account shared a message purportedly sent to him by a follower.

“It’s ironic that Christ walked through His greatest persecution the very week they are trying to steal your property from you,” the message reads, suggesting that Trump’s $468 million fine for decades of financial fraud is on par with the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ.

The message then points to Psalm 109, a verse that the Christian right has embraced as a fairly ominous political rallying cry.

The stanza ends: “Let his days be few; and let another take his office.”

“Thank you again for taking the arrows intended for us. We love you,” concludes the message that may or may not have actually been sent by a fan of the former president. (It wasn’t filled with WORDS IN ALL CAPS and random uses of quotation “marks”, so it could indeed be authentic.)

Trump responded by calling the sentiment “beautiful”.

Trump’s legal team is seeking to further delay the hush money trial, originally scheduled to begin March 25, after additional evidence from an earlier federal investigation came to light.

Judge Juan Manuel Merchan already postponed the trial 30 days. Trump’s lawyers have asked for 90.

Share Button

Tory MP Says Government ‘Should Be Ashamed’ Over Treatment Of WASPIs

Posted on by
Reply

A Conservative MP has criticised the government over its handling of the group known as the WASPIs, saying it “should be ashamed”.

Backbencher Tim Loughton called for action after a major report – released last week – found the government should compensate those women impacted by changes to the state pension age.

He told Times Radio “a lot of women” in the Waspi group – Women Against State Pension Inequality – have suffered” due to this incident.

The Waspi campaign is made up of women born in the 1950s who were impacted by increases to their state pension age (from 60 to 65) so it was equal with men’s.

The change happened between 2010 and 2018. Many say they were not adequately informed about the shift, and so ended up losing out on several years of their state pension.

According to Waspi, more than a quarter of a million women have died since the campaign began.

Loughton said: “A lot of women have suffered over a long period of time, and many of them have died in quite tragic circumstances, which is why we need recognition for what they’ve gone through.”

“I think they [the Department for Work and Pensions] should be ashamed. The government has got to take note,” the Tory MP – who used to co-chair an All-Party Parliamentary group on the issue – said.

“The Ombudsman clearly found the DWP were guilty of maladministration, that they’ve not properly communicated these changes with a great number of women.”

The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman published its second report into the issue on Thursday, and found those affected were not adequately informed – and therefore need an apology and payouts.

But during Sunday morning media rounds, neither the Conservatives nor Labour committed to compensating those impacted.

Chancellor Jeremy Hunt said the issue was “genuinely more complicated” than other schemes were compensation was now being handed out, adding: “There’s no secret vault of money.”

Labour Party chair Anneliese Dodds said, “those women deserve respect, that’s the most important [thing],” but did not make any promises.

Share Button

Rishi Sunak Corrected By Community Notes On X 25 Times, Report Finds

Posted on by
Reply

Rishi Sunak has been publicly corrected on 25 different occasions for his misleading posts on social media, according to a new report.

The research, conducted by pro-EU campaign group Best for Britain and first reported by The Independent, also found that the Conservative Party is almost five times more likely to be corrected than Labour.

Best for Britain came to that conclusion by comparing the number of community notes added to posts on X (formerly Twitter) from the prime minister, cabinet ministers and the official Conservative account to their opposition counterparts.

What are community notes?

Community notes are a feature in the social media platform which were added in January 2023 to allow other X users to add context or clarifications to posts.

Users who sign up to be “contributors” can add notes to posts offering different points of view. If enough of these notes are rated as helpful by fellow contributors, it will appear below the post in question as a community note.

According to X, “community notes aim to create a better informed world by empowering people on X to collaboratively add context to potentially misleading posts”.

How many times have the Tories and Labour been corrected in this way?

Best for Britain found 73 community notes attached to government accounts in total, compared to 15 from official opposition accounts.

Twenty-six of those posts were attached to the Conservative Party’s official account, and 25 were from the PM who vowed at the start of his premiership to lead with “integrity, professionalism and accountability”.

In the first week of January, Sunak was rebuked three times for posting misleading claims about clearing the asylum backlog, suggesting tax was cut, and claiming responsibility for halving inflation.

Meanwhile, Labour leader Keir Starmer has accrued four community notes in the same period while the Labour account has seven.

David Lammy was the only shadow minister to receive more community notes than his counterpart, David Cameron – Lammy has two, while the foreign secretary has none.

The group’s CEO Naomi Smith said the findings “shouldn’t be taken lightly, especially in an election year where lack of trust can feed dangerous populism”.

“A government that the public can’t trust to act with integrity and transparency – both essential for liberal democracy – is a government that shouldn’t be in power,” Smith continued. “We need a general election and our polling shows that the public want it now.”

Share Button

Kuenssberg Skewers Chancellor Over Economy Claims: ‘Sounds Like You’re In A Parallel Universe’

Posted on by
Reply

The BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg told Jeremy Hunt “it sounds like you’re in a parallel universe” after his recent claims about the cost of living crisis and the economy.

The chancellor made headlines after he posted on X on Friday that £100,000 is not “a huge salary” after mortgage costs and childcare.

His colleague, minister Andrea Leadsom, also caused a stir this week after she claimed the cost of living crisis had ended now inflation is down.

The presenter of Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg then pointed out that private rents are up 9% since 2023, council tax for band D up 5.1% since 2023 and petrol prices up 2.3p since January 2024.

After reminding Hunt of these incidents, she asked: “Isn’t there a danger that actually you sound like you’re in a parallel universe?”

Hunt said he was talking to one of his own constituents about paying for childcare in an area where the house prices are averaging around £670,000.

But, the BBC journalist noted: “In your own area, in Surrey, the average full time wage is not even half of that. It’s £42,000.

“So, don’t you think, to many people hearing that, it just sounds completely out of touch?”

Hunt said: “Well, I was talking to one of my own constituents who was saying that, but I do accept that even those people on those higher salaries do feel under pressure.”

He said for the national average salary – those on £35,000 – he reduced their National Insurance contributions, while those on National Living Wage have seen an increase.

Actually, due to fiscal drag – where tax thresholds do not change in line with inflation and rising wages – people will be paying more in tax.

“By the end of this parliament, those people will be worse off,” Kuenssberg said, noting PM Rishi Sunak is still saying the economy is bouncing back.

The chancellor pointed out the Office for Budget Responsibility says we are going to recover to pre-pandemic living standards “two years earlier than previously thought”, saying the “plan was starting to bear fruit”.

Elsewhere, Kuenssberg also asked: “Has the cost of living crisis ended?”

Hunt admitted, “we’ve had a very very tough patch,” but blamed the invasion of Ukraine for driving up energy prices and the Covid pandemic.

He continued: “I think people will welcome the fact that inflation has fallen – but we’re not there yet.

“We need to stick to the course because we need inflation to get down to 2%.

“The thing that will make the biggest difference for families up and down the country is when interest rates falls, and the mortgage rate starts to fall.”

Share Button

Ex-Tory Chair Lord Patten Shreds Party For Becoming ‘More Right-Wing And More Unpopular’

Posted on by
Reply

The Conservative’s former chairman has launched a bruising attack on the party for becoming “more right-wing”.

In an interview on Tonight with Andrew Marr on LBC, Lord Chris Patten, a former cabinet minister, also labelled Brexit the “biggest disaster in British policy making since the Second World War”.

The Conservative grandee, who has also been an EU Commissioner and the last governor of Hong Kong, was asked about the upcoming general election, and whether there was a chance of a repeat of the 1992 vote, when Lord Patten was the Conservative Party chairman and John Major pulled off a victory despite more than a decade of Tory rule.

He said voters would not give the current government the “benefit of the doubt”.

Lord Patten said: “When asked about my experiences of being party chairman of the Conservative Party, and what the relevance is to my views on things today, I make initially the very important point that I was chairman of the Conservative Party when there was one.

“And I think what we’ve seen over the years, is the Conservative Party becoming more right-wing, as it becomes more right-wing, it becomes more populist, as it becomes more populist, it becomes more unpopular, as it becomes more unpopular, it becomes more right-wing.

“And I think what it does in the process is lose something which won John Major the election 1992.”

On Brexit, Lord Patten said: “What nobody is allowed to say is that Brexit was a bloody disaster.

“And you hear politicians, even ones I quite respect, talking about the difficulties in the economy because of the war in Ukraine, and the effect on oil prices, the effects on the economy of Covid.

“What neither of those issues are ones where to use an awful social scientist’s word, we had agency. So, you can perfectly well say that was bad luck for the government. But Brexit we did ourselves. And it was the biggest disaster in British policymaking I think since the Second World War.”

He went on: “I’m 79, I don’t think there’s a chance in hell of us re-joining European Union in my lifetime. .. but I do think there are better ways of organising our relationship with our biggest market, and we should do them, and we shouldn’t when we try to do them, be put off by tabloid headlines’.

Share Button

Who Are The ‘Waspi Women’ And Why Are They ‘Owed Compensation’?

Posted on by
Reply

A scathing report has called on the government to compensate women born in the 1950s who were affected by increases to their retirement age.

Equalising the age at which men and women receive their retirement payouts has adversely impacted thousands of women, and ministers should issue compensation up to around £3,000, which could cost the government more than £10bn, the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman has said.

Here’s everything you need to know.

Who are the Waspi women?

The so-called Waspi (Women Against State Pension Inequality) women have been campaigning for fairer retirement payouts.

A generation of women born in the 1950s have been left out of pocket by changes to the state pension age to equalise it across genders.

The issues are related to the changing of women’s state pension age, which changed from 60 to 65, to match up with men.

Both have since changed to 66, and the pension age for both men and women is set to rise again from 66 to 67 between 2026 and 2028.

They have campaigned for compensation after arguing many women weren’t adequately informed about the massive shift.

Some are struggling to pay the bills and others are working through ill health.

More than a quarter of a million women have died since the campaign began almost a decade ago, the campaign has said.

What has happened?

The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman has been investigating the issue for five years.

On Thursday, it published its second report, which concluded that those affected by the changes were not adequately informed, and should receive an apology and payouts.

The ombudsman has asked parliament to intervene and “act swiftly” to make sure a compensation scheme is established.

The watchdog said the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has not acknowledged its failings nor put things right for those affected.

The ombudsman’s report has suggested compensation at level four, ranging between £1,000 and £2,950, could be appropriate for each of those affected.

The report stated: “We recognise the very significant cost to taxpayers of compensating all women affected by DWP’s maladministration.

“Compensating all women born in the 1950s at the level four range would involve spending between around £3.5 billion and £10.5 billion of public funds, though we understand not all of them will have suffered injustice.”

What do the Waspi women say?

WASPI chairwoman Angela Madden said it is “simply unbelievable” that to date the DWP had not acknowledged its failings, nor put things right for those affected.

She said: “One of the affected women is dying every 13 minutes, and we just cannot afford to wait any longer.”

What has the government said?

The government is under no obligation to follow the recommendations.

Both the DWP and the prime minister’s official spokesman said the government will consider the ombudsman’s report and respond to their recommendations formally “in due course”.

A DWP spokesman said: “The government has always been committed to supporting all pensioners in a sustainable way that gives them a dignified retirement whilst also being fair to them and taxpayers.

“The state pension is the foundation of income in retirement and will remain so as we deliver a further 8.5% rise in April which will increase the state pension for 12 million pensioners by £900.”

Share Button

Andrea Leadsom Suggests Cost Of Living Crisis Is Over As Inflation Fall Has ‘Cheered Everyone Up’

Posted on by
Reply

Andrea Leadsom has suggested the cost of living crisis has “ended” after a fall in the rate of inflation “obviously cheered everyone up”.

On Wednesday, the Office for National Statistics revealed UK inflation has fallen from 4% in January to 3.4% last month, the lowest it’s been since 2021.

While the news is significant given that the measure of the growing cost of goods and services peaked at 11.1% in October 2022, a 41-year high, a decline only means prices are going up at a slower rate, they are not falling.

What’s more, the 3.4% figure is still short of the Bank of England’s target of 2%.

Nonetheless, Conservative minister Leadsom was keen to promote the downward trajectory against the backdrop of Tory unrest.

When asked on Sky News about whether the party was now united, Leadsom said instead: “I think what’s really important is we have seen a fantastic drop in inflation today. That’s what’s really important.

“That has obviously cheered everyone up, it’s what we have been working towards is seeing the cost of living crisis end … seeing people able to take more home in their pay packets or in their salaries every day. That’s the critical point.”

When Rishi Sunak became prime minister, he promised to halve inflation by the end of 2023 – and it ended up being the only one of his five pledges he managed to fulfil.

However, economists question whether government’s can sincerely take credit for getting inflation back under control, not least since central banks control the base interest rate that is the key tool to combat price growth, and ministers blamed global factors when inflation spiralled to record highs.

Share Button

Rwanda Bill Frustration As House Of Lords Inflicts Seven Defeats On Rishi Sunak

Posted on by
Reply

The government is facing more frustration over its controversial plan to send asylum seekers on a one-way trip to Rwanda after the House of Lords inflicted more damage on its flagship legislation.

In the latest set of parliamentary “ping-pong”, peers on Wednesday inserted seven amendments to the Safety of Rwanda Bill in an effort to water down the policy.

It comes after MPs earlier this week removed 10 changes to the bill previously made by the Lords, undermining Rishi Sunak’s hopes to get deportation flights off the ground in the spring.

The defeats mean the legislation is now not likely to pass until after Easter.

The bill, which aims to overcome the Supreme Court’s block on the Rwanda flights, is almost certain to eventually prevail because the unelected Lords can’t overrule elected MPs. But it’s unclear how long the game of “ping-pong” will continue.

Britain and Rwanda signed a deal almost two years ago that would see migrants who cross the English Channel in small boats sent to the East African country, where they would remain permanently. So far, no migrant has been sent to Rwanda under the agreement.

The plan is key to Sunak’s pledge to “stop the boats” bringing unauthorised migrants to the UK. He argues that deporting asylum seekers will deter people from making risky journeys and break the business model of people-smuggling gangs. Just under 30,000 people arrived in Britain in small boats in 2023.

Share Button