Fox News made drastic edits to Donald Trump’s recent Bronx barbershop interview, cutting many of the Republican candidate’s lies and rambling rants.
According to a CNN investigation published Thursday, Fox News cleaned up several of Trump’s weaves and most politically extreme comments during his barbershop talk in New York City over the weekend. An unedited video uploaded to Instagram shows a much less polished performance from the former president, filled with meandering tangents and outright lies that never made it to air.
The Fox News broadcast of the event cut Trump’s comments about “gang members and drug lords” in Aurora, Colorado, and his lies about Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio. “They just dumped 50,000 people—32,000 migrants from another country—in Springfield, Ohio. They don’t know what to do,” said Trump, greatly exaggerating things. The city estimates somewhere between 12,000 and 15,000 immigrants live in the entire county, not all of whom are Haitian. Those who are Haitian are there through temporary protected status, which means they are in the country legally. But Trump doesn’t care about the facts.
Fox additionally drastically edited Trump’s response to an audience member in the barbershop asking about federal taxes. In the unedited video, Trump can be heard rambling for seven minutes about the Keystone pipeline, tariffs, The Wall Street Journal, and transgender sports, with the audience member generously trying to keep him on track but eventually saying, “I wasn’t able to finish my question.”
The Fox News video just shows what happens in a brief moment after Trump gets shepherded into answering about eliminating federal taxes, cutting out the rest.
Ironically, the Trump team has spent the past month threatening that they’d sue CBS News over Kamala Harris’s 60 Minutes interview if the network doesn’t release the full unedited transcript. This week, Trump’s team threatened to sue the network if it doesn’t comply, despite having little legal basis to do so.
In his critique of Harris’s CBS appearance, Trump wants to blame it on the edit. However, with this new revelation about Fox, he just looks like a hypocrite.
Right-wing activist Charlie Kirk went full fake fanatic during a campaign event for Donald Trump, attacking Democrats and urging U.S. pastors to break the law.
During the event Wednesday night in Duluth, Georgia, meme-loving fascist Kirk gave the audience a taste of the wildly divisive, incendiary, pseudo-religious rhetoric he’s been trotting out on Trump’s behalf.
“The Democrat Party supports everything that God hates,” Kirk said to cheers. “The Democrat Party is espousing the death of the unborn, the mutilation of our teenage kids, open borders, the destruction of our sovereignty, the elimination of our currency status.
“I believe there is a spiritual battle happening around all of us, but don’t expect a spiritual–uh” he said, appearing to choke on the words. “A spiritual victory, if our own pastors do not engage.
“Right now, this state is a Christian state, I want to see that to continue. But we need the faithful, we need those of you that have influence over your congregation to put pressure on your pastors,” Kirk said, making a call to action.
Kirk then addressed any pastors that might be watching. “I hope you give a Sunday sermon, and you talk about how the Democrat Party believes everything that God hates,” he said.
Charlie Kirk: “The Democrat Party supports everything that god hates … I hope you give a Sunday sermon and you talk about how the Democrat Party believes everything that god hates.”
So much for turning down the rhetoric! pic.twitter.com/af0IV398XF
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 23, 2024 Kirk’s conservative youth organization, Turning Point USA, has become the centerpiece of an effort by pro-Trump Christian nationalists hoping to motivate religious leaders to violate U.S. tax law by preaching the gospel of Trump. As tax-exempt entities, such as charities and churches, are strictly barred from partaking in political campaign activity, Kirk has previously offered resources to pastors seeking to “challenge the IRS.”
Last month, JD Vance attended a town hall hosted by a virulently misogynist Christian nationalist, who also urges churches to be “courageous” in supporting Trump.
Kirk has previously made similar claims about the Democratic Party, as recently as during the Monday episode of The Charlie Kirk Show.
“Kamala Harris is wired to be repulsed by the name of God. They—she mocks God. Again, everything Democrats love, God hates,” the far-right activist said.
Kirk claimed, “If you’re a Christian that votes to the Democrat Party, you are voting for things that God hates. That’s between you and God.”
The Trump campaign is explicitly working with religious extremists like Kirk to drum up support among Christian voters, who might want to notice that none of the things Kirk listed are things “God hates.” According to the Bible, the only things God doesn’t care for are haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and a man who stirs up dissension among his brothers. I’ll let you decide which presidential ticket that sounds like.
Read more about Christian nationalism:
Donald Trump made up a fictional war with France Wednesday, and then claimed to have stopped it.
During a speech in Duluth, Georgia, Trump—who previously touted himself a “wartime president” but now lies about how peaceful and safe his time in office was—was bragging about his record when he falsely claimed he really had prevented an international conflict.
“You have no idea what I did in the White House. I stopped wars … with France!” Trump said.
“France, you know the France story? They were gonna charge us, think of this, 25 percent to all Ameri—I have to protect American companies, whether we like ’em or not. Some of ’em I didn’t even like. You know Google is treating us much better, did you notice that? What happened to Google? They’re treating us much better.
“They say McDonald’s was one of the most viewed things that they’ve ever had,” Trump cheered.
Trump: “You have no idea what I did in the White House. I stopped wars with France.”
His brain then flits to Google and McDonald’s. All of this in about 30 seconds. pic.twitter.com/yxgYlycUCM
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 24, 2024 While there was obviously no threat of war with France, it’s possible that Trump was referring to a trade skirmish with France from his time in office. Paris passed a digital services tax on large tech companies, including Google, Facebook, and Amazon, in 2019. In response, Trump threatened to place tariffs of up to 100 percent on French goods, such as champagne and luxury bags.
Undeterred, France ordered the tech companies to pay up in 2020. After Joe Biden entered the White House in 2021, he suspended Trump’s plan for retaliatory tariffs against France.
So the “war” Trump stopped wasn’t a war, it was a trade fight. And he didn’t even stop it. If anything, he escalated it.
But this might explain his incoherent weave from France to Google and back to his favorite subject: himself.
Kentucky Representative Thomas Massie has called for the United States to stop funding Israel, as it targets civilian infrastructure in Lebanon.
Massie posted a video on X Wednesday that showed an Israeli missile strike leveling an apartment building in Beirut, Lebanon.
“If Israel insists on destroying civilian targets in Lebanon, let them buy and build their own weapons. American taxpayers should not be funding this,” the Republican lawmaker wrote.
ScreenshotThe U.S. has spent at least $17.9 billion on military aid to Israel since it began its catastrophic military campaign in Gaza after the massacre on October 7.
Massie, a far-right Republican, has been outspoken against America’s unwavering support of Israel’s unchecked military activity in the Middle East, challenging the notion that opposing to pro-Israel policies is a position held solely by those on the far left.
Massie boycotted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s address to Congress in July, calling it a “war rally.” He openly criticized the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on attack ads trying to unseat him. He also voted against censuring Democratic Representative Rashida Tlaib over her comments criticizing Israel’s ongoing genocide of Palestinians.
Israel carried out a series of air strikes Sunday that targeted branches of the Al Qard Al Hassan association, a financial association that Israel claims is helping Hezbollah fund its activities, according to the BBC. The strikes against nonmilitary targets hit civilian areas in Beirut, as well as south and east Lebanon.
Israel has killed at least 1,800 people in Lebanon in the past five weeks, since expanding military operations there.
In the year since launching its military campaign in Gaza, Israel has killed more than 41,000 people and injured more than 96,700, according to ABC News. This week, the Israeli government began a campaign to empty out (ethnically cleanse) northern Gaza, reportedly cutting off supplies and targeting homes, shelters, schools, and hospitals with airstrikes, displacing thousands of civilians.
In just a handful of hours, Donald Trump’s MAGA allies have gone from arguing that his recent comments about Hitler were misconstrued to just outright claiming that the whole story was completely made up.
During an interview with CNN on Wednesday, Florida Representative Mike Waltz completely rejected the evidence of his eyes and ears, claiming that the Republican presidential nominee’s comments praising Hitler and expecting undying loyalty from his top commanders were phony.
“It doesn’t make sense to me. I find the timing suspicious,” Waltz said.
“And it just completely is divorced from the man that I’ve come to know in Donald Trump, and how he’s dealt with Gold Star families, how he has been caring, how he’s been compassionate,” Waltz continued, referring to the military status given to families who have lost a loved one during their military service.
Rep. Mike Waltz on CNN suggests John Kelly is lying about Trump praising Hitler pic.twitter.com/jotsK0PhCC
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 23, 2024 The far-right revision comes after Trump’s longest-serving chief of staff, retired military General John Kelly, told The Atlantic that his ex-boss fit the description of a fascist. Kelly recalled a disturbing exchange he had with the former president while he was still in office, in which Trump expressed frustration over a perceived lack of loyalty from the military.
“I need the kind of generals that Hitler had,” Trump said in a private conversation in the White House, according to two sources that spoke anonymously with The Atlantic. “People who were totally loyal to him, that follow orders.”
Another time, while in a frustrated discussion with Kelly, Trump reportedly asked, “Why can’t you be like the German generals?” forgetting that Hitler’s top generals had themselves defied him and made several attempts toward the end of World War II to kill him. Kelly, trying to correct the president, informed him that German generals “tried to kill Hitler three times and almost pulled it off.”
Kelly recounted that when Trump had raised the matter of “German generals,” he responded by asking, “Do you mean Bismarck’s generals?”
“I mean, I knew he didn’t know who Bismarck was, or about the Franco-Prussian War. I said, ‘Do you mean the kaiser’s generals? Surely you can’t mean Hitler’s generals?’” Kelly told The Atlantic. “And he said, ‘Yeah, yeah, Hitler’s generals.’ I explained to him that Rommel had to commit suicide after taking part in a plot against Hitler.”
But Trump did not know who Rommel was, either.
It’s at least the second time this month that Waltz has rejected the reality of Trump’s rhetoric. Last week, Waltz refused to acknowledge that direct quotes from Trump’s “enemy from within” comments were actually what he said.
“I don’t think that’s what he said, John,” Waltz told CNN host John Berman, before pointing to civil unrest and mass protests during 2020. “I think that’s completely appropriate, the National Guard was rolled out then.… We cannot have, nor should we have, riots in the streets, business owners threatened, and Americans feeling unsafe.”
Read more about Trump’s comments:
Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s running mate, Nicole Shanahan, tried to pay a Washington Post reporter a hefty $500,000 to kill a profile she was writing on the Silicon Valley billionaire.
The reporter didn’t respond to the offer, and the Post published its profile of Shanahan Wednesday morning, where the attempted bribe was revealed. Shanahan made the offer in June, texting one of her associates who was contacted by the Post that she would “pay your friend,” referring to the reporter, “half a million dollars to be a whistleblower” and name the sources for the story.
In making the offer, Shanahan claimed that the sources were spreading false information about her. Shanahan would not respond to multiple requests from the Post beginning in April to sit for an interview, and ultimately the newspaper sent her a list of questions. Shanahan answered that she didn’t agree with some of the Post’s reporting but didn’t provide answers to any of the questions. The Post’s story details Shanahan’s evolution from a Democrat to a MAGA star praised by the likes of Tucker Carlson.
“I’m so sorry you feel it is appropriate to do this for political motivations,” Shanahan told the Post. “It’s a very sad state our country is in.”
Kennedy drew headlines when he announced Shanahan as his running mate in March. Many suspected that he chose her due to her wealth and the fact that she was Google co-founder Sergey Brin’s ex-wife. Later revelations showed that she has extreme views on in vitro fertilization and that she shares Kennedy’s opposition to vaccines, using the example of her autistic daughter as proof of their danger.
In August, she and Kennedy dropped their independent presidential campaign and endorsed Donald Trump, spearheading a “Make America Healthy Again” initiative to back the former president. Such a wealthy benefactor supporting Trump signals that she might be involved in his administration if he wins the election, and doesn’t bode well for public health in America, either. The fact that she tried to bribe a reporter means she shares the former president’s lack of ethics.
Source : New Republic