No foreign head of state has attended the inauguration of any U.S. President, at least not in modern recorded times, but this week, President-elect Donald Trump invited the President of China to Washington, D.C. for the January 20, 2025 event. His invitation has been rebuffed.

“This is a power move to intimidate the Chinese leader—if he declines, it’s disrespectful, and Trump will take it personally,” Fox News host Jesse Watters trumpeted on Wednesday, praising the President-elect (video below). “And if he accepts, he’ll be forced to observe President Trump at his most powerful moment with all the presidential pageantry America can muster. You put Xi Jinping in a subservient position, plus you can spy on him the whole time he’s in D.C.”

According to a Trump advisor, CNN reports, the President-elect “is very eager to have world leaders at the inauguration,” and “wants a global stage” for his inauguration. Trump broke 152 years of precedent by not attending the inauguration of President Joe Biden, his successor in 2021.

But President Xi appears not to be worried about appearing to be “disrespectful.”

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“Chinese President Xi Jinping is not expected to travel to Washington next month as an inauguration guest of President-elect Donald Trump, according to two sources familiar with the planning,” CBS News reported Friday. “CBS News was first to report that Trump had personally invited Xi to the swearing-in ceremony shortly after Election Day.”

CBS also reports that Trump’s “invitation to Xi, which was conveyed outside of formal diplomatic channels, took both Beijing and U.S. allies by surprise. Chinese officials who are accustomed to strict protocol and keenly aware of power dynamics in the US-China relationship were left wondering about Mr Trump’s intent.”

Calling the invitation “an exceptionally rare offer extended to the communist leader of one of America’s chief geopolitical rivals,” CNN reports that Trump has been “eager to turn his inauguration into a global event,” and “is personally extending invitations to some foreign leaders, including heads of state that have clashed with the United States in the recent past.”

Among the list of foreign leaders Trump has invited are several far-right authoritarians.

“El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and Argentinean President Javier Milei have also been invited by Trump or his team, sources confirmed to CNN. All three are close allies of Trump who have also shaken the nerves of the US and its allies at times for their embrace of strongman tactics and their far-right politics.”

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“The offers to attend his Washington fêting have been mostly informal, a person with knowledge of the conversations told CNN, and have sometimes come in passing during discussions over the phone about other matters. The person also said that some invitations have gone through back channels, not directly leader-to-leader, CNN also reports. “Trump has also dictated written invitations as well, a source familiar with the matter said, and had his team send them to foreign leaders.”

Newsweek adds that Trump is also considering inviting far-right authoritarian and Christian nationalist Viktor Orbán, the Hungarian Prime Minister, to his inauguration.

The Bulwark wants to know “what this invitation” to China’s President Xi “signifies for America’s relations with its allies in Asia. How does one think the Japanese, Koreans, Filipinos, and Taiwanese received the news about this unprecedented invitation?”

“Another pertinent question is: What does Trump think he’s doing? Is this just more evidence of his insatiable desire to be at the center of world attention? Or is it something else?”

Watch the video below or at this link.

Watters: The President-Elect has invited XI jinping to witness his inauguration. A power move to intimidate the Chinese leader. If he declines, it’s disrespectful and Trump will take it personally and if he accepts, he will be forced to observe President Trump at his most… pic.twitter.com/7UEHnTTKKl

— Acyn (@Acyn) December 12, 2024

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Image: Public domain via Wikimedia Commons 

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has charged a top financial services firm led by President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee to become Secretary of Commerce with violating federal law, according to multiple reports.

Cantor Fitzgerald, led by its CEO and chairman Howard Lutnick, was charged by the SEC with “violating laws related to disclosures by so-called blank-check companies before they raise money from the public,” CNBC reports. “The SEC said that Cantor agreed to settle the case by saying the firm would not violate the relevant securities laws again and pay a $6.75 million civil penalty.”

Lutnick, a “major Republican donor, who donated millions to Trump’s campaign,” according to NPR, also serves as the co-chair of Trump’s presidential transition team. He was awarded that honor just two weeks after hosting a fundraiser for Trump at his home in the Hamptons that raised $15 million.

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“Among the roughly 130 people who dined under an air-conditioned tent were some of Donald Trump’s wealthiest supporters, including the billionaire hedge-fund financier Bill Ackman, who sat next to the former president, and Omeed Malik, the president of another fund, 1789 Capital,” The New York Times reported in August.

Lutnick, a cryptocurrency supporter, was described as “pugnacious” by The Financial Times this week in an article titled, “The criminal’s ‘go-to cryptocurrency’ has a new friend in the White House.”

“Howard Lutnick has defended the stablecoin company which has been used by gangs and US adversaries,” FT reported, sharing how he “regaled an audience of crypto devotees in Nashville with tales of his early days exploring the world of digital currencies.”

“’I met every criminal who’s now in prison,’ the 63-year-old joked, referring to his encounters with various youthful crypto executives now serving lengthy jail sentences for fraud.”

CNBC also reports the settlement is similar to one affecting became a Trump-related business.

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“Cantor’s settlement echoes an $18 million settlement another blank-check firm, Digital World Acquisition Corp., agreed to pay to the SEC in July 2023 after being charged with fraud for failing to disclose to investors that DWAC had extensive merger discussions with Trump’s then-private social media company, Trump Media. DWAC merged with Trump Media earlier this year.”

Before Election Day, Lutnick promoted the debunked conspiracy theory that vaccines cause autism, and suggested children who are vaccinated may not be “fine,” during a CNN interview (below). He also stated that Robert F. Kennedy Jr.—who some describe as an anti-vaxxer and has said there are no vaccines that are safe and effective—would not be Trump’s nominee to head Health and Human Services (HHS), a prediction that turned out to be wrong.

Watch the video below or at this link.

Trump transition co-chair Howard Lutnick — in charge of helping staff the gov if he wins — says he had a 2.5 hour meeting with RFK Jr. who talked about pulling (safe and proven) vaccines from the market. Lutnick says RFK will not be in charge of HHS, despite what RFK said. pic.twitter.com/K6wFo6EwqP

— Kaitlan Collins (@kaitlancollins) October 31, 2024

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Image via Reuters

Saying he will be the one to decide—in consultation with anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr.—which vaccines the federal government should cut, Donald Trump on Thursday again invoked the false and widely debunked conspiracy theory that links autism to the life-saving drugs. The President-elect’s remarks were met with concern and condemnation.

“When asked in an interview for TIME’s 2024 Person of the Year whether he would approve of an end to childhood vaccination programs, Trump said he would have a ‘big discussion’ with Robert F. Kennedy Jr.,” TIME magazine reported Thursday, noting Trump has nominated RFK Jr., an attorney who has no medical training or experience leading a massive organization, to run the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).

“The autism rate is at a level that nobody ever believed possible,” Trump told TIME, which debunked his remarks in its reporting. “If you look at things that are happening, there’s something causing it.”

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Reuters also reported, “Trump says [he] could get rid of some vaccinations ‘if I think it’s dangerous.'”

“When asked if the discussion could result in his administration getting rid of some vaccinations, Trump said: ‘It could if I think it’s dangerous, if I think they are not beneficial, but I don’t think it’s going to be very controversial in the end.'”

Like RFK Jr., Trump has no medical training or background.

While “Trump did not explicitly say in the interview that vaccines cause autism,” which it classified as “a false claim that traces back to a retracted study from the 1990s,” TIME reports that when “pressed on the issue, Trump said his administration will complete ‘very serious testing,’ after which ‘we will know for sure what’s good and what’s not good.'”

Dr. Ashish Kumar Jha is a physician, the Dean of the Brown University School of Public Health, and served as the Biden White House Coronavirus Response Coordinator. He characterized Trump’s remarks that he will speak with RFK Jr. and possibly cut some vaccines, as an “extraordinarily bad idea.”

“RFK jr doesn’t seem to understand the data on vaccines,” Dr. Jha wrote. “He should have no role in deciding which vaccines should be available, recommended.”

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Dr. Priya Pal of the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Division of Infectious Diseases, commenting on Trump’s remarks, referenced creators of some of the most important vaccines in history: “Never could Pasteur, Salk, Jenner, Sabin have imagined people celebrating the return of childhood diseases that they and others worked so hard to prevent.”

Dr. Annie Andrews, a pediatrician, Clinical Professor of Pediatrics at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., a Senior Advisor to Everytown for Gun Safety and Moms Demand Action, and the CEO and founder of Their Future, Our Vote. She responded to the news by snarking, “Congratulations preventable infectious diseases!”

Infectious disease physician Apu Akkad, an Assistant Professor of Clinical Medicine wrote: “Wow. This sounds hugely problematic. RFK has no business deciding which vaccines should and shouldn’t be used — most especially without first gathering further data.”

TIME also dove in to Trump’s allegation about the perceived rise in autism.

“It’s true that autism is diagnosed much more frequently now than in the past—but not because vaccines are causing the condition. Researchers have explored possible reasons for the uptick, including rising parental ages and environmental triggers. But much of the increase, research suggests, stems from changes to diagnostic criteria, widespread awareness of the condition, and improvements in screening. Detection jumps have been particularly steep among children of color, girls, and young adults, all of whom have historically been diagnosed less frequently.”

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has stated he believes “There’s no vaccine that is, you know, safe and effective.”

Kasie Hunt: You recently said, “There’s no vaccine that’s safe and effective”. Do you still believe that?

RFK Jr: I never said that.

Hunt: Play the clip.

RFK JR (in the clip): There’s no vaccine that is safe and effective.
pic.twitter.com/GJs4KstYg8

— Republicans against Trump (@RpsAgainstTrump) November 15, 2024

Watch the video above or at this link.

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Image via Reuters