Trump Corruption

CNN reports: A group of tenants filed a lawsuit Tuesday accusing Kushner Companies of illegally collecting rent and creating dangerous living conditions by failing to maintain working fire sprinkler systems in four New York City apartment buildings. The tenants in “Kushner Village” in the East Village neighborhood of Manhattan want a state judge to block Kushner Companies from collecting rent …

Salon reports: President Donald Trump, in a 2000 New York Times op-ed, cited the benefits of voting by mail and email as the principal reason why he had briefly run for president as a Reform Party candidate. “The Reform Party was my chosen vehicle because its nomination process does not involve a long string of early primaries, but instead culminates …

Politico reports: Top HHS spokesperson Michael Caputo called an emergency staff meeting on Tuesday to apologize for leveling a series of false accusations on Facebook Live over the weekend, according to three people with knowledge of the meeting. Caputo told staffers that his remarks — which included unfounded allegations the Centers for Disease Control was harboring a “resistance unit” — …

The New York Times reports: The Justice Department has opened a criminal investigation into whether President Trump’s former national security adviser John R. Bolton unlawfully disclosed classified information when he published a memoir this summer, a case that the department opened after it failed to stop the book’s publication this summer. The department has convened a grand jury, which issued …

The Daily Beast reports: Back in 2018, when Bob Woodward first reported that President Donald Trump had ordered the assassination of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Trump baulked at the mere suggestion. “No, that was never even contemplated, nor would it be contemplated and it should not have been written about in the book,” he said at the time. Well, on …

CBS News reports: Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) on Tuesday called on Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar to resign, arguing he has failed to stand up to President Trump in the response to coronavirus. The call from Schumer comes amid a series of controversies at HHS. On Monday, the New York Times reported that a top …

Bloomberg News reports: Bill Gates used to think of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration as the world’s premier public-health authority. Not anymore. And he doesn’t trust the Centers for Disease Control and Protection either. Both, in his view, are casualties of a presidency that has downplayed or dismissed science and medicine in the pursuit of political gain. “We saw …

Fox News reports: The top spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services deleted his Twitter in the aftermath of a late-night rant in which he suggested tear gassing journalists and battled with other users on the social media platform. Michael Caputo, who was using his verified Twitter account, commented “gas all of them” in response to a post …

The Guardian reports: Donald Trump has been on Fox & Friends this morning. Among the tidbits are that he said he had read Bob Woodward’s book Rage last night, and that it was “boring”. The book runs to some 400 pages. The president promised there will be a coronavirus vaccine within “weeks”. “I’m not doing it for political reasons. I …

Mediaite reports: The audio starts with President Trump admitting to Woodward, “And Bob, it’s so easily transmissible, you wouldn’t believe it,” to which the author replied, “I know.” Trump then proceeded to tell a story about an Oval Office meeting with ten people in which someone “innocently” sneezed. According to the commander-in-chief, “the entire room bailed out, including me.” After …

Business Insider reports: At least five of President Donald Trump’s top advisers urged him to limit travel from China in late January, despite the president’s repeated claims that he made the decision alone, journalist Bob Woodward reports in a new book. Woodward writes in his White House exposé “Rage” that health experts, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, Health and Human Services …

Politico reports: The White House has blocked trade adviser Peter Navarro from testifying at a House oversight hearing Wednesday about a partially canceled Defense Production Act contract to manufacture ventilators. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.), who heads the Oversight Economic and Consumer Policy Subcommittee, issued a staff report in late July that argued the administration vastly overpaid Philips Respironics, agreeing to …

Raw Story reports: On Monday’s edition of CNN’s “The Situation Room,” former National Security Adviser John Bolton agreed with the assessment of Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman that the president was a “useful idiot” for Russian President Vladimit Putin, and other foreign strongmen. “I think his behavior, almost across the board in international affairs, betrays lack of analysis, lack of consideration …

Mother Jones reports: Two months after a controversial State Department commission elevated religious freedom at the expense of LGBTQ equality and reproductive rights, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is planning to promote its findings at the United Nations, Mother Jones has learned. During the UN General Assembly, which begins on September 15 in New York, Pompeo is expected to lead …

NBC News reports: The Justice Department’s Office of the Inspector General has begun investigating the circumstances surrounding the sentencing recommendation for Roger Stone, a longtime friend of President Donald Trump, according to two sources familiar with the matter. The investigation is focused on events in February, according to the two sources who spoke on the condition of anonymity, when prosecutors …

The Daily Beast reports: A supposed FBI raid of a home of an infamous Republican dirty trickster appears to have been a ruse—one that began falling apart even as its perpetrators managed to dupe a major national newspaper. On Monday, a Virginia man who responded to a Craisglist ad seeking actors to play FBI agents for a television pilot came …

UPDATE: The story reported this morning by the Washington Post has turned out to be a hoax staged by Jacob Wohl. See the latest here. The Washington Post reports: Agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation raided the home of lobbyist, conspiracy theorist and right-wing operative Jack Burkman early Monday morning. Burkman confirmed the raid and said he was not …

The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports: President Donald Trump told the Review-Journal in an exclusive interview Sunday that he did not believe he was subject to Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak’s order limiting gatherings to 50 people when he addressed a crowd of thousands at an indoor rally in Henderson. The president blamed the Democratic governor for forcing his campaign to abandon …

Axios reports: In a new clip from an interview with Bob Woodward, President Trump said that his relationships with world leaders are better “the tougher and meaner they are,” naming Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan as an example. Trump has often faced criticism for his warm relations and praise for authoritarian leaders like Erdoğan, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Saudi …

NBC News reports: A two-decade-old audit of mail equipment transport contracts by the U.S. Postal Service’s inspector general found that a company previously run by Postmaster General Louis DeJoy was awarded multiple noncompetitive contracts by the Postal Service that may have cost consumers as much as $53 million more than if they’d been competitively bid. The 2001 audit found that …