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Trump Ignores LGBT Pride Month

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Trump Promised He Would Be the Most Pro-LGBT President Ever

President Donald Trump appears to have decided to ignore LGBT Pride Month. While the President on Wednesday signed proclamations honoring June as Great Outdoors Month, National Homeownership Month, African-American Music Appreciation Month, and National Ocean Month, he has not issued a proclamation honoring LGBT Pride Month.

(Given that Trump is expected to pull the U.S. out of the Paris Climate Agreement at 3 PM today, honoring June as Great Outdoors Month and National Ocean Month seems especially hypocritical.)

Last year in June President Trump posted a surprising tweet, disconnected from anything that was actually happening:

That same week last year, during a speech on terrorism Trump falsely claimed he is the most pro-gay candidate in any major party running for office, and assailed the Obama administration’s record on LGBT civil rights, which he called “LBGT.” Days earlier he had addressed one of the most anti-LGBT crowds in America, Ralph Reed’s Faith & Freedom Coalition, promising he would “restore faith to its proper mantle in our society,” and his administration “will respect and defend Christian Americans. Christian Americans,” he repeated for emphasis.

In case there had been any confusion on Trump’s stance on same-sex marriage – he is wholly opposed – candidate Trump posted this tweet last year:

“There is no reception on Trump’s agenda, and the absence of a Pride Month proclamation is quite conspicuous,” Zack Ford at ThinkProgress writes today. He notes that Trump “could have become the first Republican president to acknowledge Pride Month with a proclamation, but he didn’t — and the silence is deafening.”

Shin Inouye‏, the former Obama administration White House Office of Communications Director of Specialty Media and USCIS Press Secretary and Acting Senior Advisor for Intergovernmental & External Affairs, made clear Trump “couldn’t be bothered” to include LGBT people in his monthly proclamations:

President Obama, by comparison, every June opened the White House up for celebrations with the LGBT community, hosting events for LGBT activists, LGBT journalists, and others. Here he is in 2012:

Of course, proclamations aren’t policy, but Trump has made clear he will not support the LGBT community. His DOJ and Education Dept. rescinded the Obama-era guidelines protecting transgender children, his “health care” plan would devastate LGBT people and people living with HIV/AIDS, his cabinet and senior staff, with very few exceptions, are anti-LGBT; the list goes on and on.

But in case President Trump wants to know what an LGBT Pride Month proclamation looks like, here is President Barack Obama’s from 2016:

 

                         THE WHITE HOUSE
                  Office of the Press Secretary

For Immediate Release                               May 31, 2016

LESBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL, AND TRANSGENDER PRIDE MONTH, 2016

——-

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

A PROCLAMATION 

     Since our founding, America has advanced on an unending
path toward becoming a more perfect Union.  This journey, led
by forward-thinking individuals who have set their sights on
reaching for a brighter tomorrow, has never been easy or smooth.
The fight for dignity and equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual,
and transgender (LGBT) people is reflected in the tireless
dedication of advocates and allies who strive to forge a more
inclusive society.  They have spurred sweeping progress by
changing hearts and minds and by demanding equal treatment --
under our laws, from our courts, and in our politics.  This
month, we recognize all they have done to bring us to this
point, and we recommit to bending the arc of our Nation toward
justice.

     Last year's landmark Supreme Court decision guaranteeing
marriage equality in all 50 States was a historic victory for
LGBT Americans, ensuring dignity for same-sex couples and
greater equality across State lines.  For every partnership
that was not previously recognized under the law and for
every American who was denied their basic civil rights, this
monumental ruling instilled newfound hope, affirming the belief
that we are all more free when we are treated as equals.

     LGBT individuals deserve to know their country stands
beside them.  That is why my Administration is striving to
better understand the needs of LGBT adults and to provide
affordable, welcoming, and supportive housing to aging LGBT
Americans.  It is also why we oppose subjecting minors to the
harmful practice of conversion therapy, and why we are
continuing to promote equality and foster safe and supportive
learning environments for all students.  We remain committed to
addressing health disparities in the LGBT community -- gay
and bisexual men and transgender women of color are at a
particularly high risk for HIV, and we have worked to strengthen
our National HIV/AIDS Strategy to reduce new infections,
increase access to care, and improve health outcomes for people
living with HIV.

     Despite the extraordinary progress of the past few years,
LGBT Americans still face discrimination simply for being who
they are.  I signed an Executive Order in 2014 that prohibits
discrimination against Federal employees and contractors on the
basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.  I urge the
Congress to enact legislation that builds upon the progress we
have made, because no one should live in fear of losing their
job simply because of who they are or who they love.  And
our commitment to combatting discrimination against the LGBT
community does not stop at our borders:  Advancing the fair

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treatment of all people has long been a cornerstone of American
diplomacy, and we have made defending and promoting the human
rights of LGBT individuals a priority in our engagement across
the globe.  In line with America's commitment to the notion that
all people should be treated fairly and with respect, champions
of this cause at home and abroad are upholding the simple truth
that LGBT rights are human rights.

     There remains much work to do to extend the promise of our
country to every American, but because of the acts of courage of
the millions who came out and spoke out to demand justice and of
those who quietly toiled and pushed for progress, our Nation has
made great strides in recognizing what these brave individuals
long knew to be true in their hearts -- that love is love and
that no person should be judged by anything but the content of
their character.  During Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender
Pride Month, as Americans wave their flags of pride high and
march boldly forward in parades and demonstrations, let us
celebrate how far we have come and reaffirm our steadfast
belief in the equal dignity of all Americans.

     NOW, THEREFORE, I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the
United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested
in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States,
do hereby proclaim June 2016 as Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and
Transgender Pride Month.  I call upon the people of the
United States to eliminate prejudice everywhere it exists,
and to celebrate the great diversity of the American people.

     IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this
thirty-first day of May, in the year of our Lord
two thousand sixteen, and of the Independence of the
United States of America the two hundred and fortieth.

BARACK OBAMA

### 

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Image: Screenshot via The White House/YouTube

 

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OPINION

President Hands Howard Stern Live Interview After NY Times Melts Down Over Biden Brush-Off

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3 hours ago

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April 26, 2024

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President Joe Biden gave an nearly-unannounced, last-minute, live exclusive interview Friday morning to Howard Stern, the SiriusXM radio host who for decades, from the mid-1990s to about 2015, was a top Trump friend, fan, and aficionado. But the impetus behind the President’s move appears to be a rare and unsigned statement from the The New York Times Company, defending the “paper of record” after months of anger from the public over what some say is its biased negative coverage of the Biden presidency and, especially, a Thursday report by Politico claiming Times Publisher A.G. Sulzberger is furious the President has refused to give the “Grey Lady” an in-person  interview.

“The Times’ desire for a sit-down interview with Biden by the newspaper’s White House team is no secret around the West Wing or within the D.C. bureau,” Politico reported. “Getting the president on the record with the paper of record is a top priority for publisher A.G. Sulzberger. So much so that last May, when Vice President Kamala Harris arrived at the newspaper’s midtown headquarters for an off-the-record meeting with around 40 Times journalists, Sulzberger devoted several minutes to asking her why Biden was still refusing to grant the paper — or any major newspaper — an interview.”

“In Sulzberger’s view,” Politico explained, “only an interview with a paper like the Times can verify that the 81-year-old Biden is still fit to hold the presidency.”

But it was this statement that made Politico’s scoop go viral.

READ MORE: Justices’ Views on Trump Immunity Stun Experts: ‘Watching the Constitution Be Rewritten’

“’All these Biden people think that the problem is Peter Baker or whatever reporter they’re mad at that day,’ one Times journalist said. ‘It’s A.G. He’s the one who is pissed [that] Biden hasn’t done any interviews and quietly encourages all the tough reporting on his age.'”

Popular Information founder Judd Legum in March documented The New York Times’ (and other top papers’) obsession with Biden’s age after the Hur Report.

Thursday evening the Times put out a “scorching” statement, as Politico later reported, not on the newspaper’s website but on the company’s corporate website, not addressing the Politico piece directly but calling it “troubling” that President Biden “has so actively and effectively avoided questions from independent journalists during his term.”

Media watchers and critics pushed back on the Times’ statement.

READ MORE: ‘To Do God Knows What’: Local Elections Official Reads Lara Trump the Riot Act

“NYT issues an unprecedented statement slamming Biden for ‘actively and effectively avoid[ing] questions from independent journalists during his term’ and claiming it’s their ‘independence’ that Biden dislikes, when it’s actually that they’re dying to trip him up,” wrote media critic Dan Froomkin, editor of Press Watch.

Froomkin also pointed to a 2017 report from Poynter, a top journalism site published by The Poynter Institute, that pointed out the poor job the Times did of interviewing then-President Trump.

Others, including former Biden Deputy Secretary of State Brian McKeon, debunked the Times’ claim President Biden hasn’t given interviews to independent journalists by pointing to Biden’s interviews with CBS News’ “60 Minutes” and a 20-minute sit-down interview with veteran journalist John Harwood for ProPublica.

Former Chicago Sun-Times editor Mark Jacob, now a media critic who publishes Stop the Presses, offered a more colorful take of Biden’s decision to go on Howard Stern.

The Times itself just last month reported on a “wide-ranging interview” President Biden gave to The New Yorker.

Watch the video and read the social media posts above or at this link.

READ MORE: ‘Doesn’t Care if Pregnant Women Live or Die’: Alito Slammed Over Emergency Abortion Remarks

 

 

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CNN Smacks Down Trump Rant Courthouse So ‘Heavily Guarded’ MAGA Cannot Attend His Trial

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6 hours ago

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April 26, 2024

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Donald Trump’s Friday morning claim Manhattan’s Criminal Courts Building is “heavily guarded” so his supporters cannot attend his trial was torched by a top CNN anchor. The ex-president, facing 34 felony charges in New York, had been urging his followers to show up and protest on the courthouse steps, but few have.

“I’m at the heavily guarded Courthouse. Security is that of Fort Knox, all so that MAGA will not be able to attend this trial, presided over by a highly conflicted pawn of the Democrat Party. It is a sight to behold! Getting ready to do my Courthouse presser. Two minutes!” Trump wrote Friday morning on his Truth Social account.

CNN’s Kaitlan Collins supplied a different view.

“Again, the courthouse is open the public. The park outside, where a handful of his supporters have gathered on trials days, is easily accessible,” she wrote minutes after his post.

READ MORE: ‘Assassination of Political Rivals as an Official Act’: AOC Warns Take Trump ‘Seriously’

Trump has tried to rile up his followers to come out and make a strong showing.

On Monday Trump urged his supporters to “rally behind MAGA” and “go out and peacefully protest” at courthouses across the country, while complaining that “people who truly LOVE our Country, and want to MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN, are not allowed to ‘Peacefully Protest,’ and are rudely and systematically shut down and ushered off to far away ‘holding areas,’ essentially denying them their Constitutional Rights.”

On Wednesday Trump claimed, “The Courthouse area in Lower Manhattan is in a COMPLETE LOCKDOWN mode, not for reasons of safety, but because they don’t want any of the thousands of MAGA supporters to be present. If they did the same thing at Columbia, and other locations, there would be no problem with the protesters!”

After detailing several of his false claims about security measures prohibiting his followers from being able to show their support and protest, CNN published a fact-check on Wednesday:

“Trump’s claims are all false. The police have not turned away ‘thousands of people’ from the courthouse during his trial; only a handful of Trump supporters have shown up to demonstrate near the building,” CNN reported.

“And while there are various security measures in place in the area, including some street closures enforced by police officers and barricades, it’s not true that ‘for blocks you can’t get near this courthouse.’ In reality, the designated protest zone for the trial is at a park directly across the street from the courthouse – and, in addition, people are permitted to drive right up to the front of the courthouse and walk into the building, which remains open to the public. If people show up early enough in the morning, they can even get into the trial courtroom itself or the overflow room that shows near-live video of the proceedings.”

READ MORE: Justices’ Views on Trump Immunity Stun Experts: ‘Watching the Constitution Be Rewritten’

 

 

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‘Assassination of Political Rivals as an Official Act’: AOC Warns Take Trump ‘Seriously’

Published

22 hours ago

on

April 25, 2024

By

Democratic U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is responding to Thursday’s U.S. Supreme Court hearing on Donald Trump’s claim he has “absolute immunity” from criminal prosecution because he was a U.S. president, and she delivered a strong warning in response.

Trump’s attorney argued before the nation’s highest court that the ex-president could have ordered the assassination of a political rival and not face criminal prosecution unless he was first impeached by the House of Representatives and then convicted by the Senate.

But even then, Trump attorney John Sauer argued, if assassinating his political rival were done as an “official act,” he would be automatically immune from all prosecution.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor, presenting the hypothetical, expressed, “there are some things that are so fundamentally evil that they have to be protected against.”

RELATED: Justices’ Views on Trump Immunity Stun Experts: ‘Watching the Constitution Be Rewritten’

“If the president decides that his rival is a corrupt person, and he orders the military, or orders someone to assassinate him, is that within his official acts for which he can get immunity?” she asked.

“It would depend on the hypothetical, but we can see that could well be an official act,” Trump attorney Sauer quickly replied.

Sauer later claimed that if a president ordered the U.S. military to wage a coup, he could also be immune from prosecution, again, if it were an “official act.”

The Atlantic’s Tom Nichols, a retired U.S. Naval War College professor and an expert on Russia, nuclear weapons, and national security affairs, was quick to poke a large hole in that hypothetical.

“If the president suspends the Senate, you can’t prosecute him because it’s not an official act until the Senate impeaches …. Uh oh,” he declared.

RELATED: Justices Slam Trump Lawyer: ‘Why Is It the President Would Not Be Required to Follow the Law?’

U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez blasted the Trump team.

“The assassination of political rivals as an official act,” the New York Democrat wrote.

“Understand what the Trump team is arguing for here. Take it seriously and at face value,” she said, issuing a warning: “This is not a game.”

Marc Elias, who has been an attorney to top Democrats and the Democratic National Committee, remarked, “I am in shock that a lawyer stood in the U.S Supreme Court and said that a president could assassinate his political opponent and it would be immune as ‘an official act.’ I am in despair that several Justices seemed to think this answer made perfect sense.”

CNN legal analyst Norm Eisen, a former U.S. Ambassador and White House Special Counsel for Ethics and Government Reform under President Barack Obama, boiled it down: “Trump is seeking dictatorial powers.”

Watch the video above or at this link.

READ MORE: ‘They Will Have Thugs?’: Lara Trump’s Claim RNC Will ‘Physically Handle the Ballots’ Stuns

 

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