Latest news with #TruthSocialandX
South China Morning Post
05-05-2025
- Business
- South China Morning Post
Trump's 100% tariff on films will have little impact on Hong Kong industry: experts
US President Donald Trump has announced a 100 per cent tariff on any films produced outside America wanting to enter its market, with experts saying the move would have little impact on the industry in Hong Kong. Advertisement President Trump posted on his social media platforms at around 7am Hong Kong time that non-US produced films constitute a 'national security threat' and that the tariff was intended to bring film production back to America. 'Other Countries are offering all sorts of incentives to draw our filmmakers and studios away from the United States. Hollywood, and many other areas within the U.S.A., are being devastated. This is a concerted effort by other Nations and, therefore, a National Security threat,' he wrote on Truth Social and X. According to Trump, the US film industry was 'dying a very fast death', and initiatives to bring film production elsewhere than the country were 'propaganda'. 'WE WANT MOVIES MADE IN AMERICA, AGAIN!' his post read. Advertisement 'I am authorising the Department of Commerce, and the United States Trade Representative, to immediately begin the process of instituting a 100 per cent Tariff on any and all Movies coming into our Country that are produced in Foreign Lands.'
The Independent
03-05-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
‘Disgusting' or ‘hilarious'? Opinions split on Trump's Pope pic
in San Francisco Donald Trump has shared an AI-generated image of himself dressed as the Pope on Truth Social and X, sparking controversy. The post, made shortly after Pope Francis 's death and funeral, drew criticism for being disrespectful to the Catholic community. Critics labelled the image "disgusting", "blasphemous", and "disrespectful", while supporters found it "hilarious". Mr Trump had previously joked about wanting to be Pope when asked about a successor to Pope Francis. Some supporters praised Mr Trump's ability to provoke the "left".
Gulf Insider
05-04-2025
- Politics
- Gulf Insider
"Oops": Trump Shares Video Boasting Of Huge Deadly Strike In Yemen
President Donald Trump on Friday evening spiked the football after over two weeks of Yemen bombings. He posted a video on Truth Social and X which purports to show a gathering of Houthi fighters. Large aerial munitions are shown falling on them and the screen erupts in a giant explosion and fireball, to which the US President responds, 'oops'. The images resembled what's typically captured from military drones or loitering aircraft observing a strike. Several dozens of people appeared on the ground in the footage, somewhat strangely standing in an oval shape. 'These Houthis gathered for instructions on an attack,' Trump wrote in his commentary. 'Oops, there will be no attack by these Houthis! They will never sink our ships again!' he added. It's impossible to actually know at this point what the people gathered in the footage were doing, or who precisely they were. Presumably President Trump is relying on carefully vetted intelligence in this instance, but as we know from the recent two+ decades of the so-called Global War on Terror that it is not always the case that the situation on the ground is carefully vetted.
Yahoo
19-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Donald Trump Declares His Leader Principle
President Donald Trump seemingly made his autocratic philosophy clear on Saturday in a social media post. 'He who saves his Country violates no Law,' Trump posted to Truth Social and X. This phrase, an apocryphal quote attributed to Napoleon, appears to be Trump's most bald assertion of autocratic intent to date. It stands as a justification for one-man rule and lawless, extraconstitutional actions. A version of it appears in the 1970 movie 'Waterloo,' where Rod Steiger, playing Napoleon, uses it to explain why he ended democracy and named himself emperor. More recently, the quote was infamously invoked by the right-wing anti-immigrant terrorist Anders Breivik in his 2011 manifesto posted before he murdered 77 people and injured hundreds more. Trump's post with the phrase stands as justification for the lawless rule he has displayed since taking office. In less than a month, he has pardoned violent criminals who tried to help him overturn the 2020 election, ended birthright citizenship, impounded funds allocated by Congress, eliminated agencies created by Congress, fired government workers in violation of statutes and in retaliation for investigating his own alleged crimes, handed power to a nebulous and opaque organization that seems to operate outside of administrative law, engaged corrupt quid pro quos to buy favor with corrupt local officials and sought to open fake criminal investigations into government spending. In this worldview, Trump is not only above the law; he makes laws by acting to save 'his Country.' It serves as a directive to his officers and followers that he is remaking the law by operating outside of it and that they should follow his lead. This is Trump's leader principle. The leader principle has another name — the Führer principle. Under Nazi propaganda, this was how the supreme leader's will was eventually transformed into law. This is the logic expressed by Nazi jurist and philosopher of fascism Carl Schmitt in his essay justifying the state murders committed on the Night of the Long Knives. '[T]he [leader's] action was true judging. It is not subject to law but is in itself the highest justice,' Schmitt wrote in The Führer Protects Justice in 1934. In the Night of the Long Knives, Adolf Hitler ordered the murder of conservative and Catholic political opponents and the purging and murder of leaders of the SA Nazi paramilitary organization, which he viewed as contesting his position of absolute power. The extrajudicial murders were provoked by paranoia of an imminent coup plot ― despite no evidence existing. Hitler justified his actions as motivated by a desire to save the country. 'In this hour I was responsible for the fate of the German nation and thereby the highest judicial authority of the German people,' Hitler said afterward. Schmitt argued that the failure of Germans to save their country at the end of World War I had 'concentrated in' Hitler and 'become in him a driving force of a political deed.' Since the leader does not want to repeat the perceived betrayals of the past, he is imbued with the authority to make laws to prevent it. Hitler, he said, 'takes seriously the teaching of German history. That gives him the right and the power to found a new state and a new order.' Schmitt wrote later, 'The real [leader] is always a judge. Out of [leadership] flows judgeship.' Trump is no Hitler. And he has committed no act as heinous as the Night of the Long Knives ― to say nothing of Hitler's far greater crimes. But the logic expressed here is the same. It is also the logic of the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Trump v. U.S., which granted the president immunity from criminal prosecution for official acts. That decision asserted a sweeping vision of executive power wherein the Constitution places the president above and beyond the law. Since 'the President is a branch of government' deriving authority 'from the Constitution itself,' his powers are 'conclusive and preclusive' and 'he may act even when the measures he takes are 'incompatible with the expressed or implied will of Congress,'' the court asserted in the opinion, written by Chief Justice John Roberts. He must be unbound from concerns about the criminal law in taking 'bold and unhesitating action' while 'Congress cannot act on, and courts cannot examine, the President's actions on subjects within his 'conclusive and preclusive' constitutional authority.' In short, the president is free from inquiry from the other two branches and can only be held accountable through an impeachment proceeding. Make no mistake that Trump and his officials view this broad reading of executive power as authorizing him to remake the law as he sees fit. Intentional or not, Roberts' opinion channeled Schmitt: The Trump administration now sees legal challenges to its policy as a means to force the judiciary to accept the logic behind Trump v. U.S. And, if they don't, Trump and his officials suggest that he will remake the law without them. But before those cases ripen, Trump's Napoleonic assertion bears another danger. It gives inspiration to his more radical followers to take the law into their own hands. If they are saving their country, they can violate no law after all. Trump has named no shortage of internal enemies that must be defeated to save the country. Journalists are the 'enemy of the people.' During the presidential campaign, he warned of the 'enemy within' and named California Democrats Sen. Adam Schiff and Rep. Nancy Pelosi as two such examples. He labeled his political opponents 'vermin' and said that immigrants are 'poisoning the blood of our country.' These provide any number of targets for supporters who take Trump's assertion to heart. And they have done just that in the past. When Trump told the far-right Proud Boys to 'stand back and stand by,' their leaders and members viewed it as a directive to await orders. They then came into action when Trump called on supporters to help him overturn the 2020 election results and led the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. After being sentenced to prison for seditious conspiracy, Trump pardoned the Proud Boys leaders who led the effort to overthrow the government. Trump's lawless assertion may then best be exemplified not by Schmitt or Hitler but by Breivik, a radical terrorist inspired to take the law into his own hands. In the interest, of course, of saving the country. MapQuest Just Handed The Internet A Perfect Tool For Trolling Trump UH-OH: Trump Just Publicly Abandoned 1 Of His Biggest 'Day 1' Promises Trump's New Executive Order Sparks Fierce Backlash: 'Full-Blown Power Grab' Trump's 'Ghastly' Ukraine Spin Blasted As 'Echoing' Russian Propaganda
The Hill
17-02-2025
- Politics
- The Hill
Trump suggests no laws violated if he ‘saves' country
President Trump said over the weekend his work to 'save' the country gives him legal leeway. 'He who saves his Country does not violate any Law,' Trump posted Saturday to Truth Social and X. The phrase is attributed to Napoleon Bonaparte, who declared himself French emperor in the early 1800s. Trump's post drew quick criticism from Democrats, who argued it was another instance of the president likening his executive authority to authoritarianism. Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) reposted Trump's comment and said it was 'spoken like a true dictator.' Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-N.Y.) also expressed concern. 'Donald Trump seems to believe he can do whatever he wishes in the name of 'saving the country,'' Torres said online. 'In our constitutional republic, the means matter more than the ends. The US Constitutions trumps the policy preferences of President Trump.' The post comes just days after the Trump administration tangled with the court system over its extensive changes. Federal judges have blocked some of Trump's sweeping executive actions, including freezing federal grants and loans, deconstructing the U.S. International Agency for Development (USAID) and birthright citizenship. Trump and his allies have pushed back on the judges' temporary holds, arguing they should respect the power of the executive branch. Still, Republican lawmakers are urging Trump to respect the rulings, worried that if he disregards them, it will send the country into a constitutional crisis. His post Saturday was not the first time he's expressed similar views. In late 2023, Trump said he would be a dictator in office only on the first day. He's also increased communication and exchanged pleasantries with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese leader Xi Jinping.
