“Really guys, with jobs numbers like these what’s there to complain about?”
Mark Wilson/Getty Images
As you’ve probably heard by now, former White House staffer Omarosa Manigault Newman claims in a book out today that there are tapes of Donald Trump using the n-word repeatedly on the set of The Apprentice, the show where the two first crossed paths. Do these tapes exists? The former senior adviser to the president has already released a recording in which Chief of Staff John Kelly can be heard firing her, but so far, she’s yet to reveal the ones involving the racial slur in question. Which doesn’t mean they aren’t out there, or that it would be impossible to imagine the former real-estate developer saying such a thing, given that he:
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Refused to condemn white supremacists, neo-Nazis, and members of the K.K.K.;
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Once claimed that 15,000 Haitians who had obtained visas to live in the U.S. “all have AIDS” and that 40,000 Nigerian visa-holders would never “go back to their huts”;
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Allegedly questioned why America should admit immigrants from “s–thole” countries in Africa over ones from Norway;
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Asked black reporter April Ryan to set up a meeting with a Congressional Black Caucus because he seemingly believes all black people are friends;
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Described minority communities as “ghettos” where “gangs [roam] the streets”;
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Spent five years spreading the conspiracy theory that America’s first black president wasn’t born in the U.S.;
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Was twice sued by the federal government for “discouraging the renting of apartments to African-Americans” (the suits were later settled);
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Has insisted, in the face of DNA evidence and an official exoneration, that the Central Park Five—a group of four African Americans and one Hispanic teen—are guilty of rape and should be executed; and
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Spends a large portion of “executive time” attacking black people, including athletes, Representative Maxine Waters, newscaster Don Lemon, and one of the few African-Americans to have been employed by his White House, who he recently called a “crazed, crying lowlife” and a “dog.”
One person who clearly believes there’s a possibility such tapes exist? White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who on Tuesday refused to go on the record saying otherwise. In response to a question about whether she had asked Trump directly whether he’d used the slur, Sanders initially deployed her characteristic line of bulls–t, responding that she “didn‘t have to because he addressed it to the American people all at one time,” referring to his denial on Twitter. And yet, when pressed whether she could “guarantee that the American people will never hear Donald Trump utter the n-word,” the woman who’s had zero issue lying on behalf of the president in the past admitted that she couldn’t. “I can’t guarantee anything,” Sanders told reporter Kristen Welker. “I can tell you that I’ve never heard it.”
Why couldn’t Sanders guarantee it? Likely because, deep down inside, she knows there’s more than a slight possibility that Trump has uttered the n-word, and doesn’t want to be on the record claiming otherwise. But she’s still a good little solider, which is why after admitting there’s a chance the American people will hear the president use a term that’s beyond the pale, she rolled out the argument that it’s highly unlikely, seeing as Trump is apparently all about black people. “This is a president who is fighting for all Americans, who is putting policies in place that help all Americans, particularly African-American,” Sanders claimed before trotting out some statistics about black employment numbers being on the rise, and falsely claiming that Trump has done more for black people than Barack Obama:
No further questions!
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Hmm, where have we seen this tactic before?
Oh right, on Fox News, where the staff of the state-run network has a habit of yelling “Hey, look over there!” whenever a damning Trump scandal arises:
Fox routinely finds ways to spin bad, unrelated news about the economy into good, related news about the economy, often blaming the media for its focus on Trump’s scandals and ethics probes.
When former F.B.I. director James B. Comey testified in June 2017, Fox Business’s Stuart Varney called the media’s coverage a “disgrace” for not focusing more on the economy.
After a February poll showed that most Americans think Trump is a racist, Fox News’s Laura Ingraham pivoted to the economy and asked her panelists, “What’s not to love?” . . . One Fox guest even alluded to shooting his television out of frustration for Speaker Paul D. Ryan’s lack of support for Trump’s economy.
Really, who cares that the president is a corrupt, unhinged, extremely dumb megalomaniac who kowtows to the Kremlin, locks kids in cages, takes glee in destroying the environment, lets his Mar-a-Lago buddies secretly run the V.A., tries to make asbestos great again, and wages a trade war that hurts American businesses and consumers when the economy is expected to accelerate this year (and then slow down in 2019)?
Is the Treasury stonewalling the Senate Intelligence Committee’s attempts to follow the money in the Russia probe?
Sure sounds like it!
Treasury has at times been reluctant to cooperate with the committee’s requests for sensitive financial documents that are significant to the Russia probe, at one point going at least four months without responding to one of the committee’s requests.
Last year, Treasury rejected the committee’s request for help from one of its experts, even as Treasury officials have speculated—behind closed doors—that the Senate committee would not be able to follow the twisting financial trail laid out in the documents they had turned over, a path that often passes through offshore shell companies or untraceable cash transactions.
In e-mails reviewed by BuzzFeed News, personnel within Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, or FinCEN, discussed in 2017 whether Treasury was trying to thwart the committee’s investigation.
A spokesperson for FinCEN would only say that the division is “in regular contact with congressional committees to provide documents responsive to their requests” and that it does not “discuss the specifics of requests related to committee investigations.”
Hedge-fund wife pulls the ole “I’m a farmer” line to erect view-blocking Hamptons fence
The wife of noted hedge-fund tycoon Greg Lippmann—the shrewd investor played by Ryan Gosling in The Big Short—wants to build a fence around the couple’s 34-acre estate, claiming that she’s starting an organic farm. . . . Only farmers are allowed to erect fences higher than six feet in Sagaponack to protect the vistas that look out to the ocean and across the farmland here.
Neighbors claim that the Lippmanns—who made their fortune by shorting subprime mortgages prior to the 2008 financial crisis—are saying that they’re farmers in order to keep people from looking onto their property.
“I don’t think she qualifies as a farmer, per se,” neighbor Paul Brennan, who is against the eight-foot fence, told the Post. “They’re more weekend farmers.” Others claim that Lippman, whose lawyers did not respond to a request for comment, has “threatened them in recent weeks, telling them that she will plant towering fir trees around her property if she doesn’t get what she wants,” a practice that, amazingly, has a name: “Christmas-treeing in.”
Elsewhere!
Sinking Turkish Lira, Indian Rupee Fuel Fears of Contagion (W.S.J.)
Goldman Sachs Had No Mandate When Musk Tweeted (Bloomberg)
Tinder founders sue IAC for billions claiming company “robbed” them of stock options (CNBC)
Cryptocurrency Market Plumbs New Depths in 2018 (W.S.J.)
Kudlow: Economy will help G.O.P. keep its grip on House (Politico)
Inside chat app Symphony’s battle to break into a $28 billion Wall Street market—and avoid becoming Bloomberg roadkill (Business Insider)
Royal Bank of Scotland pays $4.9 billion for financial crisis-era misconduct: U.S. Justice Department (Reuters)
For the Ultra-Rich, Peace of Mind Is a $263,800 Safe (Bloomberg)
The Les Moonves Nightmare Enters a New Phase (The Hive)
Hot Dog Honcho to Host Trump Fund-raiser in the Hamptons (Bloomberg)
