Trump impeachment news: President claims no president has ever done as much as him 'for religion' as he escalates Christian magazine attacks
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As Donald Trump reels from Wednesday’s House vote making him only the third American president to be impeached, a Washington Post reporter has claimed he overheard a White House staffer wishing colleagues a “Merry Impeachmas”, suggesting the president’s inner circle is not as united as he likes to insist.
Mr Trump has meanwhile taken to Twitter to denounce the influential religious periodical Christianity Today, founded by legendary evangelist Billy Graham, after it called for his ousting and criticised his “profoundly immoral” conduct. “I won’t be reading ET again!” he frothed, offering a memorable typo.
The president has also been attracting criticism from his fellow Republicans after attacking Democratic congresswoman Debbie Dingell and suggesting her late husband is looking on from hell during his midweek rally in Battle Creek, Michigan, with Oklahoma’s Tom Cole branding his remarks “extraordinarily inappropriate”.
As Mr Trump prepared to sign a series of spending bills to avoid a government shutdown and to approve 2020 defence budgets, among other budgetary concerns, reports revealed that the White House had threatened a presidential veto for the measures if they included language that mandated any aid earmarked for Ukraine be "released quickly" to that country.
The president is accused of withholding aid to Ukraine in a bid to pressure Kiev to investigate his political opponents, an abuse of power at the heart of his impeachment on Wednesday.
Democrats intended to prevent that aid freeze from happening again by including the language in the proposal, but administration officials threatened a veto for the $1.4 trillion spending bill.
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Cory Booker says he hopes to revive the Obama coalition that brought the first African American into the Oval Office.
Impeachment aside, Nancy Pelosi has invited Donald Trump to deliver the annual State of the Union address next month.
Some questions: Will the Senate be conducting a trial following impeachment then? Will it be over? Will it yet to have started?
Mr Trump is continuing his war with Christian media (sort of)
Take a look!
The Late Show has some fun with the festivity of impeachment.
Take a look at Stephen Colbert's latest animated classic:
Steve Bannon has some thoughts on impeachment
The anti-globalist former Trump adviser has told Fox News he thinks that Mr Trump should want to have a "real" impeachment trial with witnesses, in order to deter accusations of a rigged system.
“It's important for the history, the country ... it's important for the people that voted for President Trump, they believe in him," Mr Bannon said on Thursday during an interview with the conservative network. "He didn't do anything wrong.”
He added: "He'll be exonerated by the Senate in front of the American people and the world. And then in November, he'll be vindicated at the ballot box.”
Donald Trump has reportedly accepted the invitation to deliver the State of the Union next month, after Ms Pelosi extended the offer earlier today.
Donald Trump has just retweeted this video, in what appears to be a clear trolling of the whole impeachment affair:
Former Kentucky governor defends last-minute child rapist pardon
Republican Matt Bevin lost re-election earlier this year, and delivered a last minute pardon of a man convicted of raping a 9-year-old.
He has now defended that action amid the furor, telling the talk radio host Terry Meiners that his pardon came after he reviewed the evidence of the case (or lack thereof, according to Mr Bevin).
"There was zero evidence," he said.
"Both their hymens were intact," he added. "This is perhaps more specific than people would want, but trust me. If you have been repeatedly sexually violated as a small child by an adult, there are going to be repercussions of that physically and medically."
Who had the best of the debate last night, time wise?
Bernie Sanders won the night on this front, with 20 minutes and 30 seconds of speaking time during last night's 2 1/2 hour debate.
Behind him? Amy Klobuchar, with 19 minutes and 53 seconds of speaking time. That's a great showing for Ms Klobuchar, who has so far shown little ability to shine in early polls.
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