Defense Rests in Trump Hush-Money Trial
without Ex-President Taking Stand
Posted By: Dreadnought, 5/21/2024 11:21:15 AM
Former president Donald Trump’s defense rested on Tuesday morning in his “hush-money” criminal trial, without Trump taking the stand. Trump’s defense attorney Todd Blanche rested his case after testimony from Robert Costello, a former legal adviser to star witness and disbarred former Trump attorney Michael Cohen. Closing statements are scheduled to take place next Tuesday and a charging conference will take place this afternoon. On his way out of the courtroom, Trump did not answer questions about his decision not to testify.
people like this.
people like this.
people like this.
people like this.
people like this.
people like this.
people like this.
people like this.
Below, you will find ...
Most Recent Articles posted by "Dreadnought"
and
Most Active Articles (last 48 hours)
Most Recent Articles posted by
Dreadnought"
Norway, Ireland and Spain say they will
recognize a Palestinian state, deepening
Israel’s isolation 4 replies
recognize a Palestinian state, deepening
Israel’s isolation 4 replies
TEL AVIV, Israel — Norway, Ireland and Spain said Wednesday they would recognize a Palestinian state, a historic but largely symbolic move that further deepens Israel’s isolation more than seven months into its grinding war against Hamas in Gaza. Israel denounced the decisions and recalled its ambassadors to the three countries.
Palestinian officials welcomed the announcements as an affirmation of their decades-long quest for statehood in east Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip — territories Israel seized in the 1967 Mideast war and still controls.
While some 140 countries — more than two-thirds of the United Nations — recognize a Palestinian state, Wednesday’s cascade
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration is canceling student loans for another 160,000 borrowers through a combination of existing programs. The Education Department announced the latest round of cancellation on Wednesday, saying it will erase $7.7 billion in federal student loans. With the latest action, the administration said it has canceled $167 billion in student debt for nearly 5 million Americans through several programs.
“From day one of my administration, I promised to fight to ensure higher education is a ticket to the middle class, not a barrier to opportunity,” President Joe Biden said in a statement. “I will never stop working to cancel student debt
WASHINGTON — Former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley said Wednesday that she's planning to vote for former President Donald Trump in November, despite her criticism of him during the campaign for the GOP presidential nomination.
Haley made her first public appearance since dropping out of the presidential race at the Hudson Institute in Washington, where she gave a speech on national security and foreign policy. After those remarks, she took a question from a moderator on whether Trump or President Joe Biden would do a better job handling the issues.
"Trump has not been perfect on these policies. I’ve made that clear many, many times," Haley replied. "But Biden
Israel has released footage taken by members of Hamas showing them taunting and abusing five teenagers taken during the October 7th attack. Several of the victims are visibly injured and bleeding. Hamas fighters and others (at one point, a Palestinian woman interjects) can be heard shouting and suggesting they intend to rape the women.
WARNING: The footage below is disgusting and disturbing. As necessary as I believe it is for people to see who Hamas is with their own eyes, viewer discretion is advised. It shows one terrorist pointing at Karina, still in her Snoopy pyjamas having been snatched from her bed, and saying: 'Here are the girls, women,
Key details from Hunter Biden’s congressional testimony earlier this year are now in doubt thanks to documents provided to congressional investigators by two IRS agents who came forward last year with allegations of misconduct in the first son’s tax case.
IRS whistleblowers Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler turned over documents to the House Ways and Means Committee on Wednesday that appear to show that Hunter Biden downplayed the extent of the foreign-influence peddling schemes he participated in while his father was vice president and in the years after his father left office.
London — UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced a snap general election for July 4 in a statement outside Downing Street on Wednesday evening, as his Conservative Party faces an uphill struggle to extend its 14 years in power.
Sunak said outside Downing Street that he had informed King Charles III of the rare summer poll, firing the starting gun on a six-week campaign that is almost universally expected to conclude in the demise of his Conservative government.
Soaked by a downpour as he spoke, Sunak said: “Now is the moment for Britain to choose its future.” He also attacked his opponents, saying that by voting for the Labour
Confronted with a surge in crime and homelessness, Portland voters have chosen a onetime Republican to be their next district attorney, ousting incumbent Mike Schmidt and the progressive agenda he was elected to implement following the riots of 2020.
The contest between incumbent Multnomah County district attorney Schmidt and moderate opponent Nathan Vasquez, one of Schmidt’s former deputies, has drawn national attention as a bellwether for the fate of the progressive prosecutor movement that gained steam after the murder of George Floyd four years ago.
I'm not even going to bother to report on the results of the Harvard/Harris poll regarding the presidential race. If the results hold up Joe Biden is going to be spending a lot more time in Delaware.
The cake is not fully baked, of course, but if the election were held today a lot of dead voters would have to be recruited to overcome Trump's apparent lead. And, while I understand the concern about ballot boxes being stuffed and vote harvesting tipping the balance, there is a margin beyond which you can't cheat, and we are likely approaching, at, or even beyond it.
The New York Times admits that mass immigration is “a core tenet of neoliberalism,” deeply opposed by the nation’s working class, who are most impacted by the continuous inflow of millions of foreign workers willing to work for lower wages.
In a lengthy piece detailing the rise of “neopopulism,” used to describe the growing number of Americans and lawmakers who distrust free market ideology at all costs regardless of its impact on household wealth and domestic industry, the New York Times notes that mass immigration is an unpopular policy among the working class.
Former President Donald Trump’s allies are reportedly working to make inroads with Arab American activists and donors as polling shows he is crushing President Joe Biden with Arab American and Muslim voters in crucial swing states.
Washington Post columnist Josh Rogin reported Monday that “Arab-American donors and activists from around the country plan to convene in Oakland Hills, Mich., for a private dinner initiated by” Trump’s former Acting Director of National Intelligence Ric Grenell. Among those in attendance will be Michael Boulos, who is married to Tiffany Trump, and his father, Dr. Massad Boulos.
The faculty of Harvard University voted overwhelmingly Monday to reinstate 13 seniors who had been denied permission to graduate by Harvard’s administrative board due to their actions in the pro-Palestinian “encampment.”
The Harvard Crimson reported:
Members of the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences overwhelmingly voted to add 13 students back to the list of degrees recommended for conferral in May after the students were initially barred from graduating at Commencement over their participation in the pro-Palestine encampment.
The Fed released a report today showing that a majority of Americans said they were still being impacted by inflation last year. In some cases that meant not being able to pay bills or buy food.
Inflation may have slowed last year, but it continued to deal heavy blows — some devastating — on Americans’ livelihoods: Nearly two-thirds of US adults were worse off because of it, and roughly 1 in 6 couldn’t pay all their monthly bills, new Federal Reserve data shows...
Inflation made the financial lives “worse” for 65% of US households, according to the report. Among those, 19% said it was “much worse.”...
Most Active Articles (last 48 hours)
Meghan Markle could be on her way to the White House, with a slew of experts tipping her for a potential run at the presidency.(Snip)Following her and Prince Harry's high-profile visit to Nigeria, buzz around Meghan's possible political ambitions has intensified.(Snip)The couple's recent trip to Nigeria, which mirrored a Royal tour, was deemed so successful that a political insider from California hinted that Meghan might aim to "queue jump" into a prominent position within US politics, emulating Trump's leap from business to the presidency without prior political experience. A source revealed: "She [Meghan] has her eyes on the prize."
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has made a campaign promise to black farmers that will give them $5 billion in reparations should he win the 2024 presidential election.
Kennedy, a one-time Democrat turned third-party insurgent, was speaking on a recent episode of his podcast with John Boyd Jr., founder of the National Black Farmers Association.
Boyd Jr. is behind an effort to sue the Biden administration for watering down a proposed debt relief program aimed at helping people of color and 'socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers' in the agriculture industry.
Judge Cannon on Tuesday unsealed numerous motions related to Jack Smith’s classified documents case against Trump. One filing revealed Biden’s FBI authorized the use of deadly force during their raid on Mar-a-Lago in August 2022. Tons of new unsealed filings on classified docs case--I will try to post as much as I can (there goes the workout) but this is mind-blowing. FBI authorized the use of deadly force at Mar-a-Lago pic.twitter.com/f0lR6UifAH — Julie Kelly (@julie_kelly2) May 21, 2024 Armed FBI agents were prepared to confront Trump!!
It is with a heavy heart that we must report who Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi's real killer is: The United States of America.
At least, that's the implication from Iran, which needed a couple of days to get its story straight and blame "Western sanctions" on the poor quality of its helicopters, which led to Raisi's untimely demise. That talking point is now floating around, thanks to friendly media outlets willing to overlook (if not actually cheer on) Iran being a country run by very bad people.
“One of the culprits behind yesterday’s tragedy is the United States, because of its sanctions that bar Iran from procuring essential aviation parts,”
Biden to sell off 1M barrels of gasoline
held in reserve to keep prices low before election 25 replies
held in reserve to keep prices low before election 25 replies
The Biden administration announced Tuesday that it will sell off 1 million barrels of gasoline held in case of emergencies — with the Energy Department explicitly citing an interest in keeping gas prices low over the summer driving season ahead of the November election.
The fuel will be released from the Northeast Gasoline Supply Reserve, a component of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve that was established in 2014 after Superstorm Sandy disrupted gasoline supplies in the New York City area.
Many families are struggling with rising monthly expenses. For families with children in diapers, extra costs are really hard to manage.
According to the National Diaper Bank Network, 92% of families receiving diapers in Tennessee are working and still are unable to afford an adequate supply of diapers.
Fortunately, a new benefit for families with TennCare could be coming at the perfect time.
It was just announced that the state's Medicaid program will start covering 100 diapers a month for newborns, infants and 1-year-olds.
"They're expensive, so this is going to be a huge, huge break," said Doug Adair, president of Nashville Diaper Connection.
Given what we know about what has been going on in Justice Juan Merchan’s Manhattan courtroom, including the preposterous, over-the-top bias of this judge for the prosecution and his overt antipathy for the defendant, Donald Trump, what explains his willing destruction of his own reputation as a judge?
Each and every legal scholar who has weighed in on the course of the trial, from Alan Dershowitz to Jonathan Turley and countless others, (with the exception of those paid by CNN and MSNBC) is gobsmacked by Merchan’s thoroughly unconstitutional rulings, gag orders, contempt charges, exclusion of practically every witness with relevant testimony for the defense, and his allowance of non-relevant
Microsoft has announced a new line of AI-enhanced Windows PCs, aiming to revolutionize the way users interact with their devices by integrating the Copilot AI assistant into the Windows operating system. The creepy system will take constant screenshots of your activity to track your every move.
Fortune reports that at an event held at the company’s headquarters in Redmond, Washington, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella introduced the new class of AI-imbued personal computers, emphasizing their potential to anticipate users’ needs and intentions. “We’re entering this new era where computers not only understand us, but can actually anticipate what we want and our intent,” Nadella stated.
Amal Clooney played a key role in arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar.
If her name sounds familiar it is because she is the wife of actor George Clooney. She advised the International Criminal Court (ICC) in favor of issuing the warrants.
The fact that Israel is accused of crimes against humanity when it is fighting for its survival against the internationally recognized terror organization that massacred Israelis and others on October 7, 2023, is unbelievable. Equating Israel and Hamas is unacceptable. How would any reasonable person argue that Israel is the same as Hamas unless that person was an anti-Israel, anti-Jew antisemitic?
(The Center Square) – Illinois legislators are working to change the term "offender" to "justice impacted individual" in state law, a move Republicans say disrespects victims of violent crime.
House Bill 4409 would add Illinois Department of Corrections representation to the Adult Redeploy Illinois oversight board, but it also changes the word "offender" to "justice-impacted individuals." Republicans on the Senate floor said the name change could cost taxpayers thousands of dollars. (Snip) Republicans said the focus shouldn’t be on what they called the "poor offender," but rather the victims of violent crimes.
The faculty of Harvard University voted overwhelmingly Monday to reinstate 13 seniors who had been denied permission to graduate by Harvard’s administrative board due to their actions in the pro-Palestinian “encampment.”
The Harvard Crimson reported:
Members of the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences overwhelmingly voted to add 13 students back to the list of degrees recommended for conferral in May after the students were initially barred from graduating at Commencement over their participation in the pro-Palestine encampment.
We know that the FBI and DOJ made a point of conducting the Mar-a-Lago raid when they knew Trump would not be there. However, newly released documents associated with the raid empowered the FBI and DOJ agents present on the scene to shoot Donald Trump and his Secret Service detail if necessary. We don’t know if this was standard operating procedure or not, but it’s certainly concerning on its face. [Snip] Assuming that the use of deadly force statement is not the FBI’s standard operating procedure, its inclusion in the raid plan is disturbing. And even if it is SOP,