Trump swerves Putin question and lashes out when challenged over tariffs at economic policy event: Live

Donald Trump sat for rambling live interview with Bloomberg at Economic Club of Chicago as Kamala Harris set for radio sitdown with Charlamagne tha God

Trump clashes with Bloomberg moderator at economic policy event

In a combative appearance at the Economic Club of Chicago, Donald Trump clashed with Bloomberg editor John Micklethwait over his tariff plans, refused to accept basic mathematics, swerved a question on his interactions with Vladimir Putin since leaving office, offered his revisionist version of January 6, and again trash-talked Detroit.

This comes amid concerns over his health and mental acuity and the accusation by Democratic rival Kamala Harris that he is “increasingly unstable and unhinged” after a threat over the weekend to deploy the National Guard or even the military against American citizens.

The former president appeared in that state on Monday night when his town hall event in suburban Philadelphia turned into a confused, impromptu dance party when two people in the audience suffered medical emergencies.

Trump was left bizarrely bopping his head on stage for 39 minutes to a selection of pop music and show tunes leading Harris to tweet: “Hope he’s okay.”

Meanwhile, in a move to reach out to Black male voters, Harris will appear at a town hall hosted by Charlamagne Tha God, who is especially popular with the demographic. On Monday the vice president announced a series of new proposals dubbed the “Opportunity Agenda for Black Men.”

Key Points

• Trump serves question on interactions with Putin since leaving office
• Trump gets combative with moderator when challenged over flawed tariff plan at economic policy event
• ‘Hope he’s okay: Harris ridicules Trump after he spends most of swing state town hall nodding to music
• Harris campaign hits back after right-wing activist accuses VP of plagiarism
• Harris to appear with Charlamagne tha God in Detroit

[15 October 2024 11:20 · Joe Sommerlad]

Trump’s economic plans would worsen inflation, experts say

Speaking of the cost of living, economists are warning that the Republican’s nominee’s proposals would actually make matters worse for American consumers, not better.

[15 October 2024 11:00 · Joe Sommerlad]

Trump finally explains why he keeps comparing southern border migrants to Hannibal Lecter

Not much of any substance came out of the Republican’s weird failed town hall in Pennsylvania last night but he did explain why he keeps going on about Thomas Harris’s fictional cannibal gourmet.

“You know when I go Hannibal Lecter, you know what I am talking about,” Trump told his audience, having been asked about, er, inflation.

“It’s a way of demeaning, they say ‘Hannibal Lecter, why would he mention him?’ Well you know why – because he was a sick puppy, and we have sick puppies coming into our country.

“I figure that’s better than wasting a lot of words, you just say, ‘Hannibal Lecter, we don’t want him’.”

This was another excruciating moment, since we’re on the subject.

[15 October 2024 10:40 · Joe Sommerlad]

Trump-backed gubernatorial candidate promises update on probe into ‘Black Nazi’ posts on porn websites

North Carolina Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson says he will give an update today on his own investigation into last month’s CNN report alleging that he posted lewd and racist comments on a website called Nude Africa 10 years ago.

Robinson has threatened to sue the network over its reporting, which alleged, among other things, that he declared on the site that he was a “Black NAZI” and dreamed of owning slaves.

Robinson has since hired a Virginia law firm to investigate and will speak about the matter at a press conference in Raleigh at 9am today, local time.

Fireworks assured.

Here’s Rhian Lubin’s most recent report on his faltering race for the governor’s mansion against the state’s Attorney General Josh Stein.

[15 October 2024 10:20 · Joe Sommerlad]

Harris campaign hits back after right-wing activist accuses VP of plagiarism in 2009 crime book

A conservative activist has accused the Democratic presidential nominee of plagiarising passages in her 2009 book Smart on Crime, co-authored with Joan O’C Hamilton.

Christopher Rufo, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute think-tank, published a thread on X yesterday featuring analysis by Austrian “plagiarism hunter” Stefan Weber, alleging that the VP lifted “verbatim language” from uncited sources in the book 15 years ago.

The book in question focuses on policy and draws on Harris’s experience prosecuting crimes ranging from child sexual assault to murder in Alameda County and San Francisco, California.

The Harris campaign responded to the allegation by saying the candidate “clearly cited sources and statistics in footnotes and endnotes throughout”.

“Right-wing operatives are getting desperate as they see the bipartisan coalition of support Vice President Harris is building to win this election, as Trump retreats to a conservative echo chamber refusing to face questions about his lies,” said Harris campaign spokesperson James Singer.

“This is a book that’s been out for 15 years, and the Vice President clearly cited sources and statistics in footnotes and endnotes throughout.”

That hasn’t stopped the likes of JD Vance making merry with the accusation, naturally.

[15 October 2024 10:00 · Joe Sommerlad]

Trump again tries to move hush money case to federal court

The Republican nominee is still trying to move his hush money case away from Judge Juan Merchan, who has already obligingly moved his sentencing date to November 26, three weeks after the United States goes to the polls.

As you will no doubt recall, Trump was found guilty on May 30 this year by a New York jury on all 34 felony counts of falsifying documents to conceal a $130,000 payment to porn star Stormy Daniels in October 2016 to stay quiet about an affair she alleges they had a decade earlier.

Lawyers on Monday again pushed to transfer the matter to federal court, a move that would give him the ability to end the prosecution if he regains the presidency.

Trump’s attorneys renewed the request in a brief filed with the Manhattan-based 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals as they appealed US District Judge Alvin Hellerstein’s September 3 ruling rejecting the shift.

In their brief, Trump’s advocates cited the US Supreme Court’s July 1 decision that former president’s cannot be prosecuted for official actions taken in office.

In the hush money case, they said, jurors had improperly seen evidence of Trump’s official acts as president.

His lawyers said the state charges intruded on the authority of the presidency under the US Constitution.

If Trump beats Kamala Harris to the White House next month, he could seek to pardon himself for any federal crime or have his new Justice Department leadership dismiss any criminal cases pending against him in federal court.

But state criminal charges are beyond the reach of presidential pardon authority or Justice Department action.

Under American law, civil or criminal cases pursued against federal officials may be moved to federal court if they relate to do their duties in office.

Trump’s lawyers Todd Blanche and Emil Bove wrote that prosecutors’ “use of official-acts evidence in grand jury proceedings and at trial violated the Constitution and threatens the ability of all future Presidents to fulfil that role”.

Stormy Daniels and Donald Trump (Brendan McDermid/Joshua Roberts/Reuters)

[15 October 2024 09:40 · Joe Sommerlad]

‘Hope he’s okay: Harris ridicules Trump after he spends most of swing state town hall nodding to music

The former president was also in the crucial swing state of Pennsylvania last night, taking part in a town hall event in suburban Philadelphia – Oaks, Montgomery County, to be exact – hosted by puppy killer and sometime South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem.

But the event quickly turned into a confused, impromptu dance party when two people in the audience suffered medical emergencies, leaving Trump awkwardly bopping his head on stage to a selection of pop music and show tunes while the afflicted were assisted by medics, having apparently fainted in the heat of the auditorium.

The bizarre interlude was rightly ridiculed by Kamala Harris and drew some truly desperate spinning from Trump’s embattled spokesman Steven Cheung:

The playlist, since you ask, ranged from Luciano Pavarotti belting out “Ave Maria” and Andrea Bocelli and Sarah Brightman doing “Time To Say Goodbye” through “It’s a Man’s World” by James Brown, “YMCA” by The Village People, “Hallelujah” by Rufus Wainwright, “Nothing Compares 2 U” by Sinead O’Connor, “November Rain” by Guns N’ Roses and Barbara Streisand singing “Memory” from Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical Cats.

Io Dodds has this report on a weird evening, even by Trump’s standards.

[15 October 2024 09:20 · Joe Sommerlad]

Harris plays Trump’s ‘enemy within’ threats at Pennsylvania rally

The Democrat hit back at a rally in Eerie, Pennsylvania, last night by playing recordings of Trump threatening to deploy the National Guard or even the military against American citizens from a Sunday interview with Fox’s Maria Bartiromo and calling him “increasingly unstable and unhinged”.

Harris called the twice-impeached, felonious former president “someone who will stop at nothing to claim power for himself,” citing his long history of comments that express contempt for the Constitution and the recent Supreme Court decision giving presidents sweeping immunity from prosecution for any crimes committed while carrying out their official duties.

But Harris told the 6,000-strong crowd that they don’t have to take her word for it when it comes to Trump’s malign intent.

She asked staff to “roll the clip” on what she said was an example of Trump’s “worldview and intentions” – a segment from an interview he sat for with Bartiromo broadcast over the weekend.

In it, Trump tells the financial correspondent – a strong and vocal supporter of his who repeatedly broadcast lies about the conduct of the 2020 election – that “the enemy from within,” his term for Americans who do not support him or vote for Republicans, are “more dangerous” than foreign adversaries such as Russia or China.

“We have some very bad people. We have some sick people, radical left lunatics. And I think they’re the and it should be very easily handled by, if necessary, by National Guard, or if really necessary by the military,” he said, facing no pushback from the Fox personality.

Here’s Andrew Feinberg’s report.

[15 October 2024 09:00 · Joe Sommerlad]

Donald Trump raves about Kamala Harris’s medical records in late-night Truth Social rant

Donald Trump launched into a late-night Truth Social rant about election rival Kamala Harris’s medical records last night, alleging that while his own health is “flawless”, hers is “not good”, citing what he claimed were two “deeply serious conditions that clearly impact her functioning” that were mentioned in the report she released over the weekend.

The Republican also taunted his rival for pushing for a second debate and predicted her upcoming Fox News interview with Bret Baier would be “weak and soft”.

Most ridiculously of all, he claimed to “love truth”, which, I think, requires no further comment.

Perhaps this open letter from 230 doctors demanding that he come clean about his own physical and mental wellbeing is what’s got him so riled up on the subject.

Mike Bedigan reports.

[15 October 2024 08:00 · Alex Woodward]

Trump and Republicans are preparing their excuse for why they lost the election

James Stroop applied to work the polls in Alabama on Election Day. He got a letter from the state on August 23 that he hoped was a response.

Instead, he was “shocked” to discover that he was being purged from the state’s voter rolls as a “non-citizen”. The 55-year-old was born in Florida and has lived in Alabama for nearly 50 years.

James Cozzad, 49, had been a registered Republican voter and cast his ballot in 2016 and 2020 elections without any issue. He also received a letter from the state: He was being removed from the rolls, for the same reason as Stroop.

[15 October 2024 07:00 · James Liddell]

What is a sovereign citizen? The anti-government group linked to armed suspect at Trump rally

As Vem Miller was arrested outside a Donald Trump rally in California on Saturday, authorities said they noticed something peculiar about his license plate: it was “obviously fake.”

The 49-year-old Las Vegas resident was pulled over about half a mile from the Coachella Valley campaign event armed with an unregistered shotgun, a loaded handgun, and a high-capacity magazine.

Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco said at a press conference that his deputies had “probably” just thwarted a third assassination attempt on Trump in as many months, though the Secret Service has since said that Trump “was not in any danger.”