Don Jr tests positive, as his father dodges media questions
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Your support makes all the difference.Donald Trump held a press conference on Friday to discuss prescription drug prices, but the moment also included him falsely claiming “he won” the 2020 election while accusing Moderna and Pfizer of working to stop his re-election efforts. The two pharmaceutical companies announced their coronavirus vaccines were 90 per cent or more effective against the novel virus following the election.
The press conference was actually not a press conference because the president took no questions. His decision not to take questions potentially came after White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany held her press briefing since 1 October on Friday.
Ms McEnany, who defended Mr Trump’s refusal to concede the election, was heckled by one reporter during the briefing over her inability to accept the election results. She also entered into a verbal spat with a CNN reporter, whom she called an “activist”, after refusing to answer more questions.
This comes after Mr Trump was told to to move aside by Republican senator Lamar Alexander, who said on Friday that the US president should allow the transition to a Biden administration to take place after more than two weeks of delay. Sources close to the president suggested that his refusal to concede was, in part, an act of revenge on Democrats who investigated Russian interference in his 2016 win over Hillary Clinton.
And later in the day it was confirmed that the president’s son, Don Jr, had tested positive for coronavirus and was quarantining.
‘It’s hard to fathom’ how Trump thinks, says Biden
‘It’s hard to fathom’ how Trump thinks, says Biden
Outgoing president’s actions send ‘damaging’ messages to rest of world
Romney condemns Trump
Republican senator Mitt Romney has spoken out against Donald Trump – and while it’s not the first time that has happened in recent months, his criticism this time is particularly pointed.
Romney accuses Trump of trying to “subvert the will of the people and overturn the election” by pressuring state officials, knowing that legal attempts to prove widespread voting irregularities will fail.
“It is difficult to imagine a worse, more undemocratic action by a sitting American president," he writes.
‘Rudy’s hair dye dripping down his face’
A heavily-sweating Rudy Giuliani appeared to have hair dye dripping down his face as he addressed a press conference on Thursday to claim election fraud - something noted with surprise by other members of the Trump team.
Mr Giuliani, 76, was visibly affected by the bright camera lights in the small room, within the RNC headquarters.
Sweating profusely, he repeatedly wiped his brow. Dark brown streaks started running down his cheeks.
Two voices could be heard on the Trump Team video feed broadcast on Twitter. One can be heard saying they were on a Zoom call and assuming they can't be heard by people watching the feed, while another can be heard referring to "Rudy's hair dye running down his face" while laughing.
He went on to allege that Venezuela was responsible for plotting with Democrats to ensure Donald Trump lost the election to Joe Biden, among other bizarre claims.
Here’s Harriet Alexander with a read-up:
Trump’s team caught on hot mic discussing Giuliani’s hair dye ‘dripping down his face’
The 76-year-old had brown streaks running down his face
Wisconsin recount due to begin
Wisconsin on Friday will begin recounting ballots in its presidential race in the state's two biggest and most Democratic counties.
It's a long shot bid by president Donald Trump — who paid a required $3 million fee to challenge Joe Biden's victory in two liberal, mostly diverse, urban areas of the Rust Belt state.
Mr Trump, who lost by more than 20,600 votes in Wisconsin, has alleged "mistakes and fraud" in the two counties, though he has produced no evidence to back up his claims, and had earlier indicated that their was statewide fraud, also without evidence.
On Thursday, Mr Biden’s team said the president had “cherry picked” the two counties as an example to others, with very little expectation that Mr Trump is able to reverse his loss in the state, through the recount.
Obama says he ‘didn't enjoy’ phoning Trump to concede
Former president of the United States and an emergent Donald Trump critic, Barack Obama, has again hit out at his successor’s failure to follow precedent, having so far refused to accepet defeat and condede the 2020 presidential contest to Joe Biden.
Mr Obama, speaking to MSBNC News on Thursday, said he “didn't enjoy having to call Donald Trump and congratulate him for having won the night of his election four years ago, but I did it because that's part of my job”.
The remarks came close to labelling Mr Trump as undemocratic, with the 45th president saying concessions were the "continuity of our democracy."
Obama says GOP support for Trump ‘troubles’ him
….the former president went on to deride Republicans who have failed to challenge Mr Trump’s false assertions of election fraud, telling MSNBC on Thursday that he was “troubled” by events.
"These are just bald assertions, they have been repeatedly rejected by the courts, and I think I’m, I’m less surprised by Donald Trump doing this, he has shown, you know, only a flimsy relationship with the truth," Mr Obama told MSNBC contributor Jonathan Capehart.
"I’m more troubled that you’re seeing a lot of Republican officials go along with it, not because they actually believe it, but because they feel intimidated by it."
"Joe Biden is going to be the next president of the United States. Kamala Harris is going to be the next vice president," Mr Obama continued.
"I have been troubled, like every American, whether you’re a Republican or a Democrat or independent should be troubled, when you start having attempts to block, negate, overturn the people’s vote when there’s no actual evidence that there was anything illegal or fraudulent taking place."
Biden says Trump ‘totally irresponsible’
Joe Biden called Donald Trump's attempt to reverse election results as “totally irresponsible” on Thursday, following a call with ten state governors, and warned that it set '"damaging" messages about democracy to the rest of the world.
“I think they’re witnessing an incredible irresponsibility, incredibly damaging messages being sent to the rest of the world about how democracy functions,” said the president-elect. “It sends a horrible message about who we are as a country”.
Trump’s press conference, fact checked
Donald Trump’s legal team - or more accurately, what remains left of it - once again presented false claims about ”fraud" in swing states such as Arizona, Nevada, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Georgia, which Joe Biden all carried against the president on 3 November, during a bizarre ‘path to victory’ press conference on Thursday.
The team, which had been billed as an “elite strike force” ahead of time, singled-out Democratic cities including Detroit and Philadelphia, for almost no reason than to challenge the votes of more liberal populations with higher Black American voters, again without any basis.
Presented no evidence for their claims or conspiracies, Mr Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, sweated profusely as he wildly alleged that Venezuelans with ties to president Nicolás Maduro and the late president Hugo Chávez, as well as those connected to billionaire George Soros, had somehow tampered with US election results.
Fortunately, the Associated Press have debunked those claims in the Fact Check, you can read here:
AP FACT CHECK: Trump legal team's batch of false vote claims
President Donald Trump's legal team is repeating debunked claims about election technology firm Dominion Voting Systems and other vote-tabulating software
Biden wins Georgia following recount
Following the largest recount by hand in American history, election officials confirmed on Thursday that Joe Biden has won the Peach State and its 16 electoral votes, in an extraordinary victory for Democrats.
Mr Biden and his party had pushed to expand their electoral map through the Sun Belt in the run-up to the 3 November vote, which had not voted Democrat since 1992.
The win also extends Mr Biden’s lead in the Electoral College over president Donald Trump, who has still failed to concede the election and claimed without basis that the process was “rigged” against him, despite evidence.
Mr Biden was declared the winner of the presidential election on 7 November after flipping Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin to the Democrats’, and how has 306 electoral votes to Mr Trump’s 232.
Joe Biden wins Georgia, flipping the state for Democrats
Joe Biden has won Georgia and its 16 electoral votes
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