As a candidate, Donald Trump campaigned—and won—this year on the promise he would lower prices for Americans angry after the COVID pandemic’s inflation brought steep price increases, but now he’s backtracking, saying he’s not sure he will actually be able to fulfill those vows. Outrage at Trump, and the people who voted for him based on that pledge, was palpable on Thursday.

As recently as Sunday, MSNBC reports, Trump insisted, “We’re going to bring those prices way down.”

On Monday, Fox News reported: “Pointing to high grocery prices, Trump says, ‘I won an election based on that'”

But in his TIME magazine “Person of the Year” interview, Trump suggested he might not be able to lower prices as he promised to do. Appearing to remove himself from the equation, he declared: “It’s hard to bring things down once they’re up. You know, it’s very hard.”

Sam Stein of The Bulwark and MSNBC noted via social media, “’Prices will come down,’ Trump told voters during a speech last week laying out his vision for a return to the White House. ‘You just watch: They’ll come down, and they’ll come down fast, not only with insurance, with everything.'”

READ MORE: ‘Marxist’ Agenda: Hegseth Says Gay Troops ‘Erode Standards’ in ‘Social Engineering’ Push

The President-elect told TIME he would “like to bring them down” when asked, “If the prices of groceries don’t come down, will your presidency be a failure?” but insisted if prices do not drop he doesn’t think that will make his second term a failure.

On the campaign trail Trump repeatedly promised he would lower prices and inflation, as HuffPost reported Thursday:

“’We will end inflation and make America affordable again, and we’re going to get the prices down, we have to get them down,’ Trump said at a rally in September. ‘It’s too much. Groceries, cars, everything. We’re going to get the prices down.'”

“’We will cut your taxes and inflation, slash your prices, raise your wages and bring thousands of factories back to America,’ Trump said at a Georgia rally in October, reciting a line he used in speeches at several other events.”

“Trump also specifically promised to get gas prices down: ‘I will cut your energy prices in half within 12 months.'”

Stein’s post earlier Thursday morning quoting Trump saying “You know, it’s very hard” to bring prices down set of an explosion of anger at the incoming occupant of the White House.

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“Trump has already folded on prices. He has no plans to make life more affordable for the majority of Americans,” declared Lindsay Owens, Ph.D., Executive Director of the Groundwork Collaborative.

Donald Trump, Nov. 4, 2024: “A vote for Trump means your groceries will be cheaper.” https://t.co/ZKnbJkVT17 pic.twitter.com/wmHn2f84J8

— Republican Voters Against Trump (@AccountableGOP) December 12, 2024

“All of you idiots who voted for Trump over food prices should feel pretty stupid,” journalist Roland Martin remarked in response.

Politico White House reporter Adam Cancryn responded to Stein: “Trump in Asheville in August: ‘From the day I take the oath of office, we will rapidly drive prices down, and make America affordable again’ ‘Prices will come down. You just watch. They’ll come down and they’ll come down fast. Not only with insurance, with everything.'”

The Washington Post’s Aaron Blake added: “Trump on Sept. 23: ‘Vote Trump, and your incomes will soar. Your net worth will skyrocket. Your energy costs and grocery prices will come tumbling down.'”

“Oh, Trump doesn’t have a plan to bring down costs for Americans? I’m shocked,” snarked Democratic U.S. Rep. Pramila Jayapal.

Tom Bonier, a veteran Democratic political strategist noted, “He’s likely right, which is why the Biden record of increasing wages while slowing inflation has put our country on the right track, but of course no one could admit that until Trump won by running against inflation.”

Ron Fournier, a business executive and former journalist asked, “Wait. He promised to bring them down. Did he …

… lie?”

READ MORE: ‘You Have to’: Trump Confirms Plan to Deport US Citizens With Undocumented Parents

Image via Reuters

Pete Hegseth, President-elect Donald Trump’s controversial pick to oversee the Department of Defense and its 3.4 million military and civilian personnel, has a long history of anti-LGBTQ statements. According to multiple reports, Hegseth has opposed gay service members, labeling them a threat to military standards and a part of a “Marxist” agenda promoting “social engineering.”

“At least when it was an ‘Army of One,’ they were, you know, tough looking, go get ‘em army – but you’re right, that was the subtle shifting toward an individual ad campaign,” Hegseth told far-right podcaster Ben Shapiro, CNN reports. “Now you just have the absurdity of ‘I have two mommies and I’m so proud to show them that I can wear the uniform too.’ So they, it’s just like everything else the Marxists and the leftists have done. At first it was camouflaged nicely and now they’re just, they’re just open about it.”

Hegseth, now a former Fox News weekend co-host under fire for alleged sexual assault, alcohol abuse, an affinity for Christian nationalism, and mismanagement of two veterans’ charities, has repeatedly denigrated gays and lesbians, and expressed opposition to LGBTQ Americans serving in the U.S. Armed Forces, and women serving in the military — especially in combat roles.

RELATED: House Republican Says They Were Told ‘In Conference’ Hegseth Accusations ‘Were Anonymous’

“In his 2024 book ‘The War on Warriors’ and in subsequent media promotions this year. Hegseth described both the original ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ (DADT) policy and its repeal in 2011 as a ‘gateway’ and a ‘camouflage’ for broader cultural changes that he claims have undermined military cohesion and effectiveness,” CNN reports.

Studies before and after the repeal of DADT have proven LGBTQ service members serving openly do not diminish unit cohesion or impair military readiness. “The repeal of DADT has had no overall negative impact on military readiness or its component dimensions, including cohesion, recruitment, retention, assaults, harassment or morale,” a Palm Center report found one year after DADT repeal.

As MeidasTouch News reported Wednesday, Hegseth has “argued that allowing women and openly gay and lesbian individuals to serve undermines the readiness and effectiveness of the armed forces. He dismissed these inclusivity efforts as ‘social engineering’ aimed at satisfying political agendas rather than improving national security. In his words, the changes were about achieving symbolic milestones, such as having a female Navy SEAL, rather than maintaining operational excellence.”

Hegseth lamented on Fox News’ “Red Eye” in 2015 that America has a “military right now that is more interested in social engineering led by this president than they are in war fighting, So, as a result, through Don’t Ask Don’t Tell and women in the military and these standards, they’re going to inevitably start to erode standards because they want that one female special operator, that one female Green Beret, that one female Army Ranger, that one female Navy Seal, so they can put them on a recruiting poster and feel good about themselves and has nothing to do with national security.”

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“So it started, you know, we saw it under Clinton with the tinkering of ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ and the reasons for those changes,” Hegseth said in November on a podcast promoting his book, also according to CNN. “And I talked to some of the people involved in when that was changed, but it really happened, started to accelerate under Obama.”

And yet, when asked on Wednesday by CNN if he still holds that repealing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” was a mistake, Hegseth grew silent and did not answer, ignoring the reporter (video below).

Hegseth has a long, documented history of anti-LGBTQ and anti-women statements and positions.

“The dumbest phrase on planet Earth in the military is our diversity is our strength,” Hegseth said on a podcast this year, ABC News reported last month.

“There aren’t enough lesbians in San Francisco to staff the 82nd Airborne like you need, you need the boys in Kentucky and Texas and North Carolina and Wisconsin,” Hegseth also said earlier this year, ABC noted. On a separate podcast, he “said that transgender soldiers are ‘not deployable’ because they are ‘reliant on chemicals’ and suggested that women should not serve in certain combat roles.”

“Everything about men and women serving together makes the situation more complicated, and complication in combat means casualties are worse,” Hegseth also said, ABC added. He also argued “that men are ‘more capable’ in combat roles because of biological factors.”

Hegseth, under fire, this week claimed he supports women in the military, but did not specifically state he supports women in combat roles.

“I strive to defend the pillars of Western civilization against the distractions of diversity,” Hegseth wrote in 2002 as publisher of The Princeton Tory, the university’s conservative student magazine, The New Yorker reported last month.

“In the same year that Hegseth was defending the West against diversity, he and the other editors of the Tory opined that the New York Times’ decision to publish announcements of same-sex marriages had opened the floodgates to incest and bestiality: ‘At what point does the paper deem a ‘relationship’ unfit for publication? What if we ‘loved’ our sister and wanted to marry her? Or maybe two women at the same time? A 13-year-old? The family dog?’”

And in a 2002 publisher’s note at The Tory, Talking Points Memo reported, Hegseth “declared that he was ‘not encouraged’ by the ‘educational principles … guiding our generation.’ Among other things, he cited the ‘encouragement and support’ for ‘homosexuality.'”

“In pieces for the Tory,” TPM continued, “Hegseth and the team he oversaw railed against efforts to promote diversity on campus and what they described as the immoral ‘homosexual lifestyle.'”

The New Yorker also reports that during Hegseth’s tenure, The Tory wrote: “boys can wear bras and girls can wear ties until we’re blue in the face, but it won’t change the reality that the homosexual lifestyle is abnormal and immoral.”

“Hegseth and The Tory’s editor also wrote: “Overwhelming majorities of Americans agree with the notion that homosexuality and heterosexuality are not moral equivalents.”

Watch the video below or at this link.

Trump’s Defense Secretary pick, Pete Hegseth, has called allowing openly gay troops a “Marxist” push for social justice and said it “erodes” military standards.

He declined to clarify his comments when asked Wednesday by CNN.

Watch: www.cnn.com/2024/12/12/p…

[image or embed]

— Andrew Kaczynski (@kfile.bsky.social) December 12, 2024 at 9:48 AM

RELATED: ‘Swarm of MAGA Attacks’ Making Hegseth Confirmation Seem More Likely: Report

Image via Reuters

Despite public opinion polls that find the majority of Americans support a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, the incoming Trump administration is forging ahead with President-elect Donald Trump’s vow to begin his mass deportations of millions of people “on day one.” That will now include the green lighting of arrests of undocumented immigrants who happen to be sick in the hospital, worshipping or marrying in a church, synagogue, or mosque, or studying — or even teaching — in a school classroom, according to an NBC News exclusive report.

Since 2011, under the Obama administration, ICE, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, has been banned from, as NBC reported, “arresting undocumented people at or near so-called sensitive locations, including houses of worship, schools and hospitals or events such as funerals, weddings and public demonstrations without approval from supervisors.”

That ban has been described as a “fundamental” principle by the U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas. “Adherence to this principle is one bedrock of our stature as public servants,” he noted.

As Trump positions himself to achieve his promised goal of enacting the “largest deportation operation in American history,” that ban will be rescinded to remove as many barriers as possible that stand in his way.

READ MORE: House Republican Says They Were Told ‘In Conference’ Hegseth Accusations ‘Were Anonymous’

The Biden administration had expanded the ICE policy to include “colleges or mental health institutions, and even places where religious studies were happening,” according to NBC News’ Julia Ainsley in her on-air report Wednesday. She noted that the ban will also be lifted on arrests at events, including rallies.

“So that means if you have a protest against mass deportations where you would expect undocumented immigrants to show up, that could be a place that ICE could target for arrest,” Ainsley explained.

Immigration experts oppose allowing arrests at sensitive places, believing that access to them, including by undocumented immigrants, benefits society as a whole.

“Immigration enforcement has always required a balance. In the past, Presidents of both parties have recognized that merely because it may be lawful to make arrests at hospitals and schools doesn’t mean it’s humane or wise public policy,” Lee Gelernt, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), told NBC News. “We don’t want people with contagious diseases too scared to go to the hospital or children going uneducated because of poorly considered deportation policies.”

“There are churches that have historically served as sanctuaries, knowing that ICE can’t come in and arrest them there, and they do that in communities to offer a safe space for migrants,” Ainsley reported, noting that now, faith leaders and others are “worried not only because of policies like these, but because what they see as a change, a shift to the right, in the American public where people are more in favor of deportations than they were previously, and they’re worried about threats to them or to backlash if they continue to give migrant sanctuary within their spaces.”

But as Vox reported in October, Americans are more supportive of deportations only when there are no other legal avenues open to the undocumented, like a path to citizenship.

READ MORE: Trump’s Guilfoyle Nomination Surfaces Allegations Old and New

A Pew Research poll in August, Vox reported, found “that about 6 in 10 registered voters say that undocumented immigrants should be allowed to ‘stay in the country legally, if certain requirements are met.’ And a similar share, 58 percent, favored ‘allowing undocumented immigrants to legally work and stay in the country if they are married to a US citizen.'”

Trump, in an NBC News “Meet the Press” interview on Sunday said he supports deporting legal U.S. citizens who are children of undocumented immigrants, in what he called an effort to not break families apart.

In September of 2021, DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas issued a memo explaining the ban on arrests in sensitive areas.

“In our pursuit of justice, including in the execution of our enforcement responsibilities, we impact people’s lives and advance our country’s well-being in the most fundamental ways. It is because of the profound impact of our work that we must consider so many different factors before we decide to act. This can make our work very difficult. It is also one of the reasons why our work is noble,” Secretary Mayorkas wrote. “When we conduct an enforcement action – whether it is an arrest, search, service of a subpoena, or other action – we need to consider many factors, including the location in which we are conducting the action and its impact on other people and broader societal interests. For example, if we take an action at an emergency shelter, it is possible that noncitizens, including children, will be hesitant to visit the shelter and receive needed food and water, urgent medical attention, or other humanitarian care.”

“To the fullest extent possible, we should not take an enforcement action in or near a location that would restrain people’s access to essential services or engagement in essential activities. Such a location is referred to as a ‘protected area.’ This principle is fundamental. We can accomplish our enforcement mission without denying or limiting individuals’ access to needed medical care, children access to their schools, the displaced access to food and shelter, people of faith access to their places of worship, and more. Adherence to this principle is one bedrock of our stature as public servants.”

Mayorkas offered some examples of sensitive areas where arrests should not be made. Presumably, under the Trump administration, arrests will be allowed in some or all of these locations.

They include:

“A school, such as a pre-school, primary or secondary school, vocational or trade school, or college or university.”

“A medical or mental healthcare facility, such as a hospital, doctor’s office, health clinic, vaccination or testing site, urgent care center, site that serves pregnant individuals, or community health center.”

“A place of worship or religious study, whether in a structure dedicated to activities of faith (such as a church or religious school) or a temporary facility or location where such activities are taking place.”

“A place where children gather, such as a playground, recreation center, childcare center, before- or after-school care center, foster care facility, group home for children, or school bus stop.”

“A social services establishment, such as a crisis center, domestic violence shelter, victims services center, child advocacy center, supervised visitation center, family justice center, community-based organization, facility that serves disabled persons, homeless shelter, drug or alcohol counseling and treatment facility, or food bank or pantry or other establishment distributing food or other essentials of life to people in need.”

“A place where disaster or emergency response and relief is being provided, such as along evacuation routes, where shelter or emergency supplies, food, or water are being distributed, or registration for disaster-related assistance or family reunification is underway.”

“A place where a funeral, graveside ceremony, rosary, wedding, or other religious or civil ceremonies or observances occur.”

Image via Reuters