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President Donald Trump on Thursday raised the prospects that he could face impeachment if Republicans lose control of congress, imploring supporters at a campaign rally here to back GOP candidates in the midterm elections.
“You aren’t voting for a candidate, you’re voting for which party controls Congress. It’s a very important thing,” Mr Trump said. “They like to use the impeach word. ‘Impeach Trump!’ ... ‘But he hasn’t done anything wrong.’ ‘Doesn’t matter, we will impeach him!’”
The president’s riff came after days of mounting pressure on the White House over leaks from inside the administration that have deeply embarrassed the president over questions about his competence raised from within his own aides and political appointees.
In the wake of a critical new book from journalist Bob Woodward and an anonymous opinion essay in The New York Times , Mr Trump has grown increasingly angry and paranoid over a feeling that his own staff have betrayed him.
As he has over the past two days on several occasions, Mr Trump again attacked the Times ’ essay as “gutless” during his rally here and challenged Times ’ reporters to discover which senior official inside his administration was granted anonymity to author the essay.
“That would be a good scoop,” Mr Trump told the crowd.
President Trump's most shocking attacks on the mediaShow all 16 1 /16President Trump's most shocking attacks on the media President Trump's most shocking attacks on the media "You are fake news!" Then President-elect Trump directed this insult to CNN's Jim Acosta while refusing him a question at a press conference on January 11 2017. The President-elect's anger was due to the publishing by Buzzfeed of unverified memos that implicated Michael Cohen in Russian collusion. CNN had reported on a briefing of Obama and Trump on the memos by US intelligence chiefs, but knowing the content to be unverified had not revealed it
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President Trump's most shocking attacks on the media "They are among the most dishonest human beings on earth" President Trump said this of journalists during a visit to the CIA on the the day following his inauguration. His claim of having the largest crowd of any inauguration ceremony in history had been debunked and he clearly wasn't happy
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President Trump's most shocking attacks on the media "Failing New York Times" President Trump commonly addresses the New York Times in this way, contrary to its increasing profit margins and expanding global readership. He is pictured here in the midtown Manhattan office of the paper
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President Trump's most shocking attacks on the media "Enemy of the American People" President Trump has since repeated the claim that such news outlets are the enemy of the people, often after they break negative stories about him
President Trump's most shocking attacks on the media "They have no sources" Speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference on February 24 2017, President Trump suggested that a Washington Post article with 9 sources was "made up". The article in question exposed how then National Security Advisor Michael Flynn had misled Vice President Mike Pence over a phone call to a Russian ambassador. That the article was "made up", while highly doubtful at the time, seems even less likely since Michael Flynn pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about the same phone call
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President Trump's most shocking attacks on the media Access denied for major publications Protesters gathered outside of the New York Times office after Trump's White House barred a number of publications from attending a press briefing on February 24 2017. Just hours after the President had again denounced the media, then Press Secretary Sean Spicer denied access to news outlets such as CNN and the New York Times, while permitting Breitbart News, CBS, Fox and others
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President Trump's most shocking attacks on the media "#FNN" On July 2 2017, President Trump tweeted an edited clip from his Wrestlemania XXIII appearance in which the CNN logo had been imposed onto the face of his wrestling opponent Vince McMahon. CNN is a common target for President Trump and here he suggests that he is getting the better of the network through his repeated attacks
President Trump's most shocking attacks on the media "The most powerful TV show in America" On July 27 2017, President Trump quoted a New York Times article about Fox & Friends. The President is known to watch Fox & Friends every morning, often tweeting about matters discussed on the show, leading to speculation over its influence on his outlook and policies
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President Trump's most shocking attacks on the media "It's frankly disgusting the way the press is able to write whatever they want to write" In a meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on October 11 2017, President Trump suggested that the press ought not to be allowed their constitutionally secured freedom. He added "people should look into it", suggesting that he also doesn't respect the protection of sources. At the time, he was angry at an NBC report claiming that the President had expressed a desire to return the size of the US' nuclear arsenal to its 1960s height, a claim that he and others in his administration dismissed as fake news
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President Trump's most shocking attacks on the media "negative (Fake)" In a tweet on 9 May 2018, President Trump conflated negative reporting about him with fake news
President Trump's most shocking attacks on the media "I didn't criticise the Prime Minister" In a press conference with the Prime Minister on his visit to Britain, President Trump disputed claims published in the Sun that he had criticised Mrs May's Brexit strategy
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President Trump's most shocking attacks on the media "Horrible, horrendous people" At a Republican rally in Pennsylvania on August 3 2018, President Trump deemed all journalists in attendance "horrible, horrendous people". He later denounced the "fake, fake, disgusting news" for falsely reporting that he was late to his meeting with the Queen when visiting Britain
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President Trump's most shocking attacks on the media Trump's rhetoric "very close to inciting violence" In an interview with the Guardian on 13 August 2018, the outgoing UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra'ad al-Hussein suggested that President Trump's attacks on the press are "very close to inciting violence". Zeid singles out the President's repeated claim that the fake news (negative coverage) media is the "enemy of the people" as dangerous
Reuters
President Trump's most shocking attacks on the media "anonymous source" = fiction President Trump claimed that any report citing anonymous sources is fiction. The protection of sources is a vital matter of press freedom, without it a potential source's fear of repercussions could lead them to withhold important information
President Trump's most shocking attacks on the media "You are a rude, terrible person" At a press conference in the wake of the midterms, President Trump clashed with CNN's Jim Acosta when he asked about the President's use of language during the campaign
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President Trump's most shocking attacks on the media "I would never kill Journalists" For any journalists frightened by President Trump's attacks on the press, perhaps you can take solace in his words from a campaign rally in Grand Rapids on December 21 2015. Responding to remarks over Vladimir Putin's handling of journalists, Trump stated: "I hate some of these people, but I'd never kill them... I'll be honest - I would never kill them. Uhhh lets see.. no, I never would"
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But it was his own future that was clearly on his mind.
“I say how do you impeach somebody who is doing a great job, hasn’t done anything wrong. Our economy is good. How do you do it?” Mr Trump asked. “It’s a hell of a place in Washington.”
The rally – in support of GOP Senate candidate Matt Rosendale, Montana’s state auditor, who is challenging Democratic incumbent Jon Tester – was Mr Trump’s first campaign event after Labour Day, as he enters an active stretch run before the November midterms. White House aides have said the president will hold multiple campaign events most weeks before voters head to the polls on 6 November.
Mr Trump addressed the crowd, holding campaign signs and wearing “Make America Great Again” hats, for more than an hour and recited his usual litany of complaints over what he views as unfair press coverage.
But Mr Trump also seemed eager to defend his competence in the wake of the revelations in the book and the newspaper essay that his own aides have allegedly taken action to hide information from him and ignore his instructions in order to set guardrails against his destructive impulses.
“Is he competent?” Mr Trump said in a tone mocking a news anchor. “I think I’m pretty competent!”
Alluding obliquely to The New York Times op-ed, Mr Trump said: “Look at that thing today. Is it subversion? Is it treason? The good thing about that is that even liberals that hate me think that’s a terrible thing they did.”
Though Mr Trump rallies are typically boisterous, the crowd in Montana was restrained and the president, who tends to feed off the energy of his audience, appeared at times to be going through the motions.
He attacked Democrats, and liberal activists, over their treatment of his Supreme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh, over three days of contentious Senate confirmation hearings.
“Do you believe the anger and the meanness on the other side?” Mr Trump said. “It’s embarrassing to watch those people make fools of themselves screaming and shouting at this great gentleman.”
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Of Democrats, he said: “Their whole campaign is resist, resist.”
Ahead of the rally, Mr Trump conducted an off-stage interview with a Fox News host, with the audio piped into the arena. The president criticised the Times for publishing the op-ed, saying it was likely a “low-level” or “deep state” person.
He did not indicate that he had an idea who wrote the op-ed.
Mr Trump also said he didn’t plan to shut down the government over the border wall because Republican leaders didn’t want him to do so. It is up to him, he later added, after the crowd roared for a shutdown.
The rally was a meandering affair – maybe even more than normal. Sections of the arena were empty. The crowd was silent at times during his comments.
He gave a boost to a Florida Republican, recounted the 2016 campaign in detail, talked about his son loving to travel to Montana for hunting and even said that Abraham Lincoln faced the “fake news”.
Lincoln, he said, got poor reviews for his Gettysburg Address. But decades later, he said, the president Mr Trump has long admired was eventually given credit.
The Washington Post
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