Latest news with #Trump2024
USA Today
3 days ago
- Politics
- USA Today
Trump built GOP into a big tent. Conservatives now threaten to tear it down.
While social media feuds over Donald Trump may seem trivial, they provide an interesting view of how some of the right's most outspoken supporters view this presidency. President Donald Trump's decision to bomb Iran's nuclear sites in June didn't just risk war − it posed a grave threat to his political capital within the conservative coalition he built. Anti-war and nationalist conservatives strongly condemned the move and foreign policy hawks supported it. The clash threatened to pry apart the 'big tent' Republican Party. The same is happening again − and with even more anger and dissent − over the administration's handling of the Jeffrey Epstein controversy. There's plenty of heat rising from inside Trump's big tent. The discord alone isn't cause for concern. It's good that Trump has an array of well-meaning voices weighing in. However, many influencers seized the opportunity to devolve into tribalism. Supporters of conservative politics should try to encourage thoughtful, productive debate without resorting to these tactics. Once it became evident Trump would be the 2024 Republican candidate, conservatives rallied around him, along with Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, health-focused Robert F. Kennedy Jr. supporters and anti-war Tulsi Gabbard fans. Trump was always destined to lead a personality cult. His brash demeanor, blunt words and disdain for establishment politics carried him through prosecutions, assassination attempts and a gut-punch loss in 2020 before delivering a second presidential term. Trump 2024 was a truly remarkable example of consensus building among diverse interest groups. This alliance works only if debate is tolerated, and the Iran operation threatened to bring the house down. Those inside 'big tent' must respect each other's differences In the aftermath of the Iran bombing, hawks like Sens. Lindsey Graham and Ted Cruz praised the decision, while pundit Tucker Carlson condemned it harshly. These leaders debated the move across cable news and podcasts, each making defensible cases for or against striking the Islamist regime. Online discourse, however, was far less reasonable. Personal attacks on dissenters and pronouncements of allegiance to Trump replace thoughtful responses in the personality cult. Your Turn: Trump is unsuitable for office. But he was right to bomb Iran. | Opinion Forum Immediately, the Trump loyalists drew the lines. If you dared question whether striking a sovereign nation would lead to another disastrous Middle East war, you were labeled a 'Panican,' a disloyal Republican who dared to doubt the Trump administration. Activist Laura Loomer broadcast to her 1.7 million followers that those who questioned the strike were grifters and flip-floppers. Podcaster Luke Rudkowski responded to the 'loyalists' by compiling his own list of 'real ones,' or voices he perceived as sufficiently anti-intervention. The Hodgetwins influencer duo even contradicted themselves, posting a pro-bombing message for their 6.5 million Facebook followers while criticizing the move on X in an attempt to appease both sides. Political loyalty doesn't preclude policy disagreements While social media feuds may seem trivial, they provide an interesting view of how some of the right's most outspoken supporters view this presidency. Entire elements on the right tout their 'loyalty' to Trump as some kind of badge. Trump's big-tent party worked because of the tension between its elements. People felt there was room for discussion, and they could move the needle within their party by pleading their cases, either online or directly to the president. Opinion: Trump used Epstein files to manipulate MAGA. Now he must ask their forgiveness. The shameful gatekeeping the online conservatives engaged in recently risks mirroring the ideological rigidity of the Democratic Party: oppressive, homogenous and intolerant to the point of casting out New York City Mayor Eric Adams, Gabbard and even Kennedy. Online conservatives will squander their popularity on social media and in popular culture if we keep up the circular firing squads. Let's Make America Graceful Again by challenging people when we disagree and then welcoming them back without grudges. Reject the personality cult outright and hold our leaders accountable. Be loyal to the United States above all else, not to any one person or party. Ethan Watson is a Young Voices contributor and incoming O'Connor Fellow at the Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law at Arizona State University.
Yahoo
13-07-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
It's been 1 year since Trump was shot in Butler, Pa. Did the assassination attempt 'change' him?
Exactly a year ago today, on July 13, 2024, once and future President Trump was bundled offstage in Butler, Pa., with blood staining his cheek and his fist raised in defiance after the bullet of a would-be assassin grazed his ear, just millimeters from his brain. 'I didn't know exactly what was going on,' the president recalled last week in an interview with his daughter-in-law, Lara Trump. 'I got whacked. There's no question about that. And fortunately, I got down quickly.' A lot has changed since Trump managed to get back up that day. Tesla CEO Elon Musk endorsed him within the hour, then donated more than $250 million to a super-PAC supporting his candidacy. A week later, Trump's Democratic opponent, Joe Biden, ended his reelection campaign, becoming the only president in U.S. history to surrender his party's nomination after winning its primary. Four months later, Trump defeated Biden's replacement, Vice President Kamala Harris, by about 2 million votes. Now, in the spot where an official portrait of former President Barack Obama once hung, every visitor to the Grand Foyer of the White House passes a painting of Trump rising to his feet in Butler and imploring the crowd to 'fight, fight, fight.' A similar image adorned Trump's recent limited-edition sneaker drop ($299), and those three words double as the name of one of his new fragrances ($199). 'It was a scary time, and it changed everything for us,' White House chief of staff Susie Wiles recently told the New York Post. But has Trump himself changed since the shooting? And if so, how? In the aftermath of last year's assassination attempt, the president and his allies repeatedly promised a new Trump. 'Getting shot in the face changes a man,' conservative pundit Tucker Carlson insisted at the time. 'He's changed and we're all freaking out,' a source close to Trump told Vanity Fair. 'He was like, 'Holy shit, that was close.' He feels blessed.' At the time, GOP officials described him as 'emotional,' 'serene,' 'existential' — even 'spiritual.' With the Republican National Convention just days away, Trump 'put the word out that he [didn't] want any talk of revenge or retaliation in speeches or anywhere else,' a Republican close to the campaign told VF. Trump then went on to claim, in an interview with the New York Post, that 'I had all prepared an extremely tough speech, really good, all about the corrupt, horrible [Biden] administration. But I threw it away. 'I want to try to unite our country,' Trump continued. 'But I don't know if that's possible. People are very divided.' Yet when he took the stage in Milwaukee to accept his party's nomination, Trump couldn't help but stray from his new script to complain about 'crazy Nancy Pelosi ... destroying our country' and Democrats 'cheating on elections.' Finally — about halfway through the nearly 100-minute speech, after lengthy digressions on the border 'invasion' and Hungary's Viktor Orbán — Trump attacked his opponent by name. 'If you took the 10 worst presidents in the history of the United States and added them up, they will not have done the damage that Biden has done,' he said. 'I will only use the name once... Biden.' Trump's convention speech was an early sign that his tone, at least, wouldn't be changing. And true to form, the president has continued to blame Biden and demonize Democrats well into his second term. He has also continued to commemorate national holidays by attacking his perceived enemies on Truth Social. 'Happy Memorial Day to all, including the scum that spent the last four years trying to destroy our country through warped radical left minds,' Trump wrote in May. 'Hopefully the United States Supreme Court, and other good and compassionate judges throughout the land, will save us from the decisions of the monsters who want our country to go to hell,' he added. Revenge and retaliation still seem to be some of his favorite pastimes as well. To pick just one example, the New York Times reported last week that the Secret Service had former FBI Director James Comey followed by law enforcement officers in unmarked cars and street clothes after Trump recently accused Comey of threatening his life with an Instagram photo of seashells. Finally, and most consequentially, Trump's actual politics don't seem to have shifted either; a 'reformed Trump' has not 'replace[d] his extreme policies with a moderate agenda,' as Vanity Fair speculated he might. Before Butler, for instance, Trump confirmed in an interview with Time magazine that he was planning 'a massive deportation of people' using 'local law enforcement' and the National Guard — and 'if they weren't able to,' he added, 'then I'd use [other parts of] the military.' His inspiration, he said at the time, was the 'Eisenhower model' — a reference to President Dwight D. Eisenhower's 1954 campaign, known by the ethnic slur 'Operation Wetback,' to round up and expel Mexican immigrants in what amounted to a nationwide 'show me your papers' rule. Trump has since done just that in Los Angeles — even though far more Americans say they disapprove (50%) than approve (36%) of those actions, according to the latest Yahoo/YouGov poll. One of the only major policy areas where Trump has changed his mind since the shooting is cryptocurrency. 'I am not a fan of Bitcoin and other Cryptocurrencies, which are not money, and whose value is highly volatile and based on thin air,' he said in a series of social media posts in 2019. 'Unregulated Crypto Assets can facilitate unlawful behavior, including drug trade and other illegal activity.' Bitcoin 'just seems like a scam,' Trump added in 2021; cryptocurrencies are a 'disaster waiting to happen.' 'I think they should regulate them very, very high,' he concluded. But the fact that Trump has done the opposite since returning to office probably has less to do with last year's brush with mortality than with his family's new $1 billion crypto empire. Last summer, Vanity Fair asked whether Trump's 'chastening' was a 'short-term response to a near-death experience' or 'smart politics?' 'Would a reformed Trump replace his extreme policies with a moderate agenda?' the outlet continued. 'And would Trump, who has spoken ominously of seeking vengeance and retribution if elected, suddenly temper those dark impulses?' One year later, it seems the answer to all those questions is no. Yet there is one thing about Trump that does seem to have changed, according to those around him: He now feels empowered to follow his own instincts in a way he didn't during his first term as president. In a National Review interview published to coincide with the release of her new book, Butler: The Untold Story of the Near Assassination of Donald Trump and the Fight for America's Heartland, Washington Examiner reporter Salena Zito — who is often described as a 'Trump whisperer' of sorts — recalls how the president started attributing his survival to the 'hand of God' in their post-Butler conversations. 'He has this recognition that, in that moment and from that moment on, God was watching him, and that there was a reason that he didn't die,' Zito says. '[He's] very much the same person, but [he's changed] even in the way that he handles the urgency of what he wants to accomplish. ... He is on a mission to do as much as he can because he was saved in that moment.' If true, nothing demonstrates this dynamic like Trump's second-term tariff strategy. Import taxes aren't a new obsession for Trump. 'I believe very strongly in tariffs,' he told journalist Diane Sawyer in 1988, nearly 30 years before his first presidential run. 'America is being ripped off. We're a debtor nation, and we have to tax, we have to tariff, we have to protect this country.' Trump has long insisted (contra nearly all mainstream economists) that universal tariffs will level the proverbial playing field by incentivizing companies to retain American workers and ramp up U.S. manufacturing — all while funneling 'trillions' of dollars in new revenue to the federal government. But after fitfully pursuing these ideas during his first term — his advisers mostly objected — the president is now putting his pet theories fully into practice, launching trade wars with allies and adversaries alike. Enabled by the loyalists he's surrounded himself with — and liberated by the fact that he isn't allowed to run again in 2028 — Trump has taken a similar you-only-live-once approach on deportation, Iran, the courts and the federal government itself. Ultimately, the shooting has 'made [Trump] more aggressive,' Republican Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida told Time magazine last week. 'It actually did define him in the presidency.'
Daily Mail
09-07-2025
- Business
- Daily Mail
Trump's 'Ice Maiden' Susie Wiles reveals why Elon Musk's 'fixation' on the president spelled doom
Donald Trump 's right-hand woman has lifted the lid on Elon Musk 's contentious relationship with the president and why it was doomed from the start. Susie Wiles, the president's chief of staff nicknamed the 'Ice Maiden,' divulged new details on the tempestuous relationship between the world's richest man and the world's most powerful man. As chief of staff she is privy to high-level discussions and maintains a seat in Cabinet meetings and even in the Situation Room. Her access to the White House is practically unparalleled, meaning while Musk sometimes overnighted in the Lincoln Bedroom, she saw everything close up. Practically attached at the hip for the final stages of the Trump's 2024 campaign until Musk's departure from DOGE at the end of May, the duo's relationship has soured rapidly in their weeks apart. 'How can people be expected to have faith in Trump if he won't release the Epstein files?' Musk wrote on Tuesday putting the administration on blast for not releasing the full trove of documents on the deceased convicted pedophile. The X owner has posted on his app about Trump many times since his White House split, even skewering the Republican's domestic policy plan, the 'Big, Beautiful Bill,' claiming it would drive America into 'debt slavery.' But behind the scenes Musk and Trump had a relationship that Wiles said was akin to a father-son connection. 'The president was very, very kind to him, and Elon had so much to offer us,' Wiles said. Speaking with the New York Post's Miranda Devine, Wiles agreed with the host's assessment that Musk had a 'fatherly fixation' with Trump. 'He knew things we didn't know. He knew people and technologies that we didn't know. It was a great thing when it was a great thing, and had a very, I think, a very troublesome ending.' When pressed by Devine about why things imploded like one of the SpaceX owner's test flights the politically astute 'Ice Maiden' dodged. 'I don't know. I don't understand it.' She described the fracas as 'very troublesome,' but downplayed the spat as just a 'little hiccup' for the White House. 'I know that what has been said doesn't ring accurate to me, but I don't know, I enjoyed working with Elon,' Wiles continued while choosing her words carefully about the two trading barbs online. In June, Musk posted then deleted a statement claiming the president 'is in the Epstein files ... That is the real reason they have not been made public. Have a nice day, DJT!' The billionaire later apologized, saying he regretted some of his posts about the Republican. Musk again revitalized the attack line on Tuesday, claiming, without evidence, that former Trump advisor Steve Bannon is on the Epstein list. Trump called Musk a 'train wreck' after the billionaire's frenzied posts, often coming in the early morning hours. Though Musk's outrage goes beyond just traditional MAGA figures. After Trump's tax-and-spending bill passed last week the mega-billionaire announced the creation of a new political party, the 'America Party,' though it is not yet registered with the Federal Election Commission. The father of at least 14 children also claimed he would primary every Republican that voted for the over $3 trillion package, which is all but five, meaning 268 GOP lawmakers can expect challenges to their reelection - if Musk is to be believed. 'I think he's a fascinating person and sees the world differently. And I think that's probably what the President saw too, just a little bit different than the average Joe, but certainly came to not a good ending,' Wiles said. Though the chief of staff compared Elon Musk to an average Joe, she did laud him for being the world's richest person and 'I think the world's smartest man, honestly.' She also said the billionaire's intuition and 'insight into people' during the transition period was important to the team's success. 'He does have a quirky, my word, approach to the way he views virtually everything, but certainly business and organizations and and government and insight into people that were really important, I think, in the very early days, particularly during transition.' Wiles, 68, is a longtime political consultant and lobbyist who has been in Trump's inner orbit since February 2021. She previously worked for Ronald Reagan's administration and has gotten praise among Republicans for keeping the energetic and - at times - frenetic president on task and on message.
Yahoo
07-07-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Biden aides pushed for early debate to show off Biden's ‘strength,' expose Trump's ‘weakness,' book says
Senior advisors to then-President Joe Biden reportedly urged him to hold a debate against President Donald Trump as early as possible in an attempt to highlight Biden's "leadership" and Trump's "weakness," according to a new book. The book, "2024: How Trump Retook the White House and the Democrats Lost America," is set for release Tuesday and claims that Biden's team dismissed concerns about his age during the 2024 election cycle. The book, authored by Josh Dawsey of the Wall Street Journal, Tyler Pager of the New York Times and Isaac Arnsdorf of the Washington Post, says Biden senior advisors wrote up a memo advocating an initial spring debate, followed by a potential second one in early September after Labor Day. Biden Family Misled Public, Concealed Details On Son Beau's Cancer Diagnosis, New Book Says This strategy would allow Biden to take on Trump before early voting in battleground states kicked off, set the terms of the debate most advantageous for Biden and highlight Biden's "leadership" in contrast to Trump's, according to a memo on the matter. "By holding the first debate in the spring, YOU will be able to reach the widest audience possible, before we are deep in the summer months with the conventions, Olympics and family vacations taking precedence," Biden's senior advisors reportedly wrote in an April 15, 2024, memo, published by Politico Playbook. "In addition, the earlier YOU are able to debate the better, so that the American people can see YOU standing next to Trump and showing the strength of YOUR leadership, compared to Trump's weakness and chaos." Read On The Fox News App Biden's First Public Remarks Since Cancer Diagnosis Honor Gold Star Families Even so, the book reports that some Biden aides were hesitant about an early debate, with some even advocating that Biden shouldn't debate Trump at all. Specifically, the book cites a Biden donor who pressed the White House in May 2024 to find a reason to pull Biden from the debates, after the donor reported being "alarmed" by Biden's behavior at a Chicago fundraiser. Meanwhile, the Trump White House said the debate backfired on Biden, and instead, shed light on Biden's own weaknesses. "The only highlight from the debate was Joe Biden's inability (to) form a complete sentence," White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers said in a Monday statement to Fox News Digital. "American voters got a firsthand look at Biden's weakness, his campaign in chaos, and what it looks like when real leader is missing from the White House." "Unfortunately for the Democrats, no adviser or so-called 'strategic' move could save their incompetent candidates and terrible policies from President Trump's historic, landslide victory," Rogers said. A spokesperson for Biden did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Fox News Digital. Biden Says He Could 'Beat The Hell Out Of' Authors Of New Book Arguing His Cognitive Decline Biden and Trump ultimately did face off in a debate on June 27, 2024 – an event that prompted Biden to exit the election in July 2024 and led to Vice President Kamala Harris to take on Trump in November 2024. "2024" is one of several books that have been released in 2025 detailing Biden's mental deterioration while in office and how Trump won the election. Another example is the book "Original Sin: President Biden's Decline, Its Cover-up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again," released May article source: Biden aides pushed for early debate to show off Biden's 'strength,' expose Trump's 'weakness,' book says
Yahoo
07-07-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Biden advisors pushed early Trump debate to show 'strength,' memo shows
WASHINGTON − Joe Biden's disastrous June 2024 debate performance, when the nation witnessed a hoarse and feeble president losing his train of thought and struggling to finish sentences, ended his re-election campaign. Now, a newly surfaced campaign memo shows how aides persuaded Biden to debate Donald Trump from what they said was 'a position of strength' and before early voting began in many battleground states. 'By holding the first debate in the spring, YOU will be able to reach the widest audience possible, before we are deep in the summer months with the conventions, Olympics and family vacations taking precedence,' said the memo, which was revealed by journalists Josh Dawsey, Tyler Pager and Isaac Arnsdorf in a new book, '2024: How Trump Retook the White House and the Democrats Lost America." Throughout the memo - published July 7 by Politico - the advisers take pains to reiterate Biden's stature by addressing him as "YOU" in bold capital letters. The June 2024 debate took place months before the fall debate timeline suggested by the Commission on Presidential Debates. "In addition, the earlier YOU are able to debate the better, so that the American people can see YOU standing next to Trump and showing the strength of YOUR leadership, compared to Trump's weakness and chaos,' says the memo. It didn't turn out that way. In the aftermath of the June 27 calamity, when then 81-year-old Biden trailed off and froze at various points before a live television audience, he faced mounting pressure from influential donors and some lawmakers to drop out of the race. Less than a month later, Biden announced he was stepping aside and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris, 59, as the Democratic nominee. Harris, who ran the shortest presidential campaign in history, was trounced by Trump in November, capping a remarkable comeback. The contents of the memo stand in sharp contrast to a narrative pushed by the Trump administration, which has accused those close to Biden, including former first lady Jill Biden, of a 'cover-up' by making sure the former president had minimal public exposure and of keeping his supposed cognitive decline under wraps. House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Kentucky, sent letters to Biden's physician and former White House aides in May demanding they appear for a transcribed interview as part of an investigation into Biden's health and use of the autopen to sign presidential documents. In June, Trump's Justice Department began an investigation into pardons issued in the final days of Biden's presidency and 'whether others were taking advantage of him through use of Autopen or other means." Biden announced last month that he had been diagnosed with an 'aggressive' Stage 4 prostate cancer. Swapna Venugopal Ramaswamy is a White House correspondent for USA TODAY. You can follow her on X @SwapnaVenugopal This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Biden aides said fateful 2024 Trump debate would show 'strength'
