Tag Archives: 2024 election

Trump’s Ugly Calls For Violence Laid Out In Chilling New Video

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The supercut also shows him urging supporters to “fight like hell” on Jan. 6, 2021, just before some of those in the crowd near the White House marched to the U.S. Capitol to attack Congress at it met to certify the electoral vote that gave the presidency to Joe Biden:

One of the four criminal cases against Trump is centered on his role in the events of the Jan. 6 insurrection.

In his personal account, Biden also accused Trump of hypocrisy for holding events for law enforcement and claiming to “back the blue” while also embracing those who attacked police in the U.S. Capitol riot.

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‘Scare Tactic Much?’: Critics Pounce On Trump Over Bonkers Pennsylvania Claim

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Donald Trump warned National Rifle Association members Friday that Democrats would change the name of Pennsylvania if they win in November.

The former president, during an hour-plus-long speech in Harrisburg, reflected on his election win in the state back in 2016 before declaring that his campaign has to be victorious this year.

“Or we’re not gonna have Pennsylvania, they’ll change the name, they’re gonna change the name of Pennsylvania,” Trump said.

Trump went on to note efforts to reexamine naming things after historical figures, claiming that George Washington’s name has been stripped from high schools.

“That’s one even I thought was safe. Abraham Lincoln and George Washington, their names are now in danger,” he said.

It’s unclear what Trump was referring to but his Pennsylvania claim comes roughly one month after Fox News reported on the National Park Service’s proposal to remove a statue of William Penn, who the state is named after, from a park in Philadelphia.

The statue, local news site Billy Penn noted, is a small version of one atop City Hall that is arguably “the highest profile statue” in Philadelphia that “limited the height of development throughout the city.”

NPS later reversed the decision following criticism including from Pennsylvania state Representative Bryan Cutler, who claimed that President Joe Biden and his administration were trying to “cancel” Penn.

Pennsylvania Goveernor Josh Shapiro wrote that he had been in contact with the administration “to correct this decision” over the statue.

“I’m pleased Welcome Park will remain the rightful home of this William Penn statue — right here in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Penn founded,” he wrote on X.

Critics mocked the former president over the Pennsylvania name claim including conservative attorney and Trump critic George Conway, who jokingly wrote that the remarks were “perfectly normal.”

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The US Right’s Newest Conspiracy Is The Super Bowl-Taylor Swift-Joe Biden ‘Psyop’

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It’s a conspiracy involving the deepest of deep states: The world’s most popular entertainer, America’s most popular sporting event and the president of the United States. Its goal, according to theories circulating in the outskirts of MAGA world, is to covertly compel fans to throw the 2024 election to the Democrats.

Right-wing speculation reached a fever pitch this week around pop mega-star Taylor Swift and boyfriend Travis Kelce after Kelce’s team, the Kansas City Chiefs, qualified for Super Bowl LVIII on Sunday, a victory the two celebrated with much-photographed postgame smooch. A day later, The New York Times ran a piece noting President Joe Biden’s re-election campaign is hoping for Swift’s endorsement.

Those two seemingly unrelated events — and the possibility that Swift would use her massive star power and huge online reach to help Biden beat Donald Trump — are driving right-wing media into a meltdown. And that one of the country’s biggest celebrities will use her fanbase to help Biden is already being treated as inevitable by some of the right’s biggest influencers.

“That will be a tsunami that will be very difficult to thwart,” Turning Point USA Founder Charlie Kirk reportedly said to a group of young conservatives at a conference on Monday night, of the possibility of Swift and her massive army of supporters wading into the election. “We better be prepared. It seems as though things are aligning for that.”

But there’s more to this than the possibility of a Swift nod swinging a close election. For years, right-wing conspiracists have pushed the notion that Swift, who began her career in the conservative world of country music and was once referred to as “Aryan goddess” by white supremacists, is somehow a Democratic “agent” because she endorsed Democrats in the 2018 midterms and Biden in the 2020 presidential election. (Swift has admitted she regrets not getting involved in 2016.)

The Biden campaign did not immediately respond to HuffPost’s request for comment on alleged collusion with Swift and the NFL.

Kelce, for his part, appeared in a Pfizer commercial promoting the Covid vaccine. Covid shots have long been the subject of right-wing conspiracies, with adherents falsely believing the government is covering up adverse reactions or that the vaccines harbor microchips.

Now, high-profile conservative figures are promoting the unfounded idea that Swift, the NFL and the Democratic Party are together involved in a “psyop” campaign to deliver the election to Biden. Fox News host Jesse Watters recently suggested that Swift was a “front for a covert political agenda” and bizarrely called her a “Pentagon asset” — which, of course, the Pentagon denied.

“As for this conspiracy theory, we are going to shake it off,” a Pentagon spokesperson told the Daily Beast.

By that logic, Swift’s appearances at Chiefs games isn’t to cheer on her boyfriend or even to promote her tour — it’s really to get the country to vote blue in November.

“I wonder who’s going to win the Super Bowl next month. And I wonder if there’s a major presidential endorsement coming from an artificially culturally propped-up couple this fall. Just some wild speculation over here, let’s see how it ages over the next 8 months,” former GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, who has embraced far more dangerous conspiracy theories than this one, tweeted Monday.

“You don’t have to take my word for it. The New York Times already said it’s working on what the Biden administration calls the ′Taylor strategy,’” Jack Posobiec, a conspiracy theorist known for promoting “Pizzagate”, said at Turning Point Action’s Restoring National Confidence Summit on Tuesday, the same event where Kirk mentioned Swift. (The Times article referenced no such strategy.)

“It’s not about her, it’s about the machine that’s around her,” Posobiec said, suggesting Swift is somehow in cahoots with Democrats.

The theory has some truth behind it: Biden has struggled with young voters, who are a major part of Swift’s fanbase and a reason Biden aides are hopeful an endorsement will arrive before the election. Swift’s endorsement could help encourage some of her 279 million Instagram followers to register to vote, or even to raise cash for Biden.

But just ask former Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen, who earned Swift’s endorsement in a 2018 Senate race, if the pop megastar can guarantee a victory. (Bredesen lost to GOP Senator Marsha Blackburn by 11 points.)

Though even as the conservative podcasting and media spheres hype the dangers of a Swift endorsement to Trump, some of the most right-wing members of Congress aren’t convinced there’s anything political to the Swift-Kelce coupling.

“I’m a sports fan and if I’m watching a game, I’m watching the game,” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) told HuffPost. Greene herself has been involved in online conspiracism, and said she’s seen some of the speculation about Swift, but didn’t care to comment.

“Taylor Swift, she’s an entertainer,” Greene said. “Apparently, she’s dating a football player.”

Other House Republicans said they hadn’t heard of what’s going on. Rep. Eric Burlison (R-Mo.) said he only wanted the Chiefs to win the Super Bowl. “She’s not adding to anything to help them be more successful,” Burlison said.

Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) joked that maybe Swift is a “double deep plant” who will actually help Republicans.

“I remember when she was country — she was in Nashville, and I like country music,” he said. “I’m not a pop person.”

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Nikki Haley Explains Why ‘Insecure’ Trump Is His ‘Own Worst Enemy’

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Nikki Haley called Donald Trump his “own worst enemy” while appearing on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday.

With the Republican presidential primary down to two candidates, Haley has been enduring a majority of Trump’s rage in recent weeks.

But the former South Carolina governor told “Meet the Press” moderator Kristen Welker that she thinks the former president’s outbursts only prove how he’s unfit for a second term as president.

“I laugh every time I see one of his tweets, every time I see him throw a temper tantrum, because I know Donald Trump very well,” said Haley, who served as his U.N. ambassador for two years.

“When he feels insecure, he starts to rail, he starts to rant, he starts to flail his arms and he starts to get upset.”

“When he feels threatened, he starts to throw all kinds of things out there,” she continued. “I would always tell him he was his own worst enemy. He’s proving that right now.”

Recently, Trump’s attacks on Haley have gotten increasingly racist. He has resorted to mocking Haley by her given name, Nimarata, and suggesting she is ineligible for office as the daughter of Indian immigrants. (Haley was born in South Carolina, making her eligible for the presidency.)

Haley, seen here hosting a rally in North Charleston, South Carolina, on Jan. 24, slammed Trump as "insecure" on "Meet the Press" this weekend.
Haley, seen here hosting a rally in North Charleston, South Carolina, on Jan. 24, slammed Trump as “insecure” on “Meet the Press” this weekend.

Anadolu via Getty Images

Elsewhere in the interview, Haley also said she thinks that Trump’s lack of composure in the courtroom is a cause for concern.

After Trump lashed out at a New York jury’s $83.3 million defamation judgment last week, Haley said Americans can “see that he’s completely distracted; they see that he’s going on these rants about how he’s the victim, and I think that’s exactly what we don’t need a strong leader to be.”

“These court cases are going to keep happening. One by one, we’re going to keep seeing him in a courtroom and we’re going to see him come out and do a press conference,” she said. “That’s not what you want a president to be, but more than that, that’s not what we want Russia to see, that’s not what we want China to see and that’s not what we want Iran to see.”

In addition to his personal attacks on Haley, Trump has also tried to strong-arm her potential donors.

On Wednesday in a Truth Social post, he said anyone who donates money to his opponent would be “barred from the MAGA camp.”

Haley called his warning “totally unhinged” during an interview on Fox News on Friday and her campaign later announced it had received $1 million in donations after Trump’s threat.

Watch Haley’s full interview on “Meet the Press” below:

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