It’s Sunday.
After thirty-five days the government was reopen late Friday.
On Friday President Trump announced a deal that would fund the government through February 15th, missing from the bill was the $5.7 billion or “large down payment,” requested by President Trump and Republicans to fund the Southern border wall.
As The Washington Post while the bill lacked the funding for the border wall it did create, “a bipartisan, bicameral committee charged with negotiating an agreement on border security as part of a new spending bill for the Homeland Security Department.”
Shortly after the President made his announcement he took to Twitter to post the video of his address and to explain that he made no concession with the deal writing “it was only taking care of the millions of people getting badly hurt by the shutdown.”
On Saturday President Trump tweeted twelve times. While typically these tweets are posted in the order in which he sends them, for today they will be in order by topic and will only cover up to his last tweet for Saturday night.
1. Now we know where Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer & the Democrats stand, which is no Border Security.
2. We will build the Wall!
3. Build the Wall and Crime will Fall!
4. The President yesterday laid all that out.
5. BUILD A WALL & CRIME WILL FALL!
6. It will happen – it always does!
Government shutdown timeline.
On December 11th, 2018 President Trump told Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) that he was proud to shutdown the government over border wall funding.
TRUMP: "Yes. If we don't get what we want, one way or the other…I will shut down the government. Absolutely. I am proud to shut down the govt for border security…I will take the mantle, I will be the one to shut it down. And I'm going to shut it down for border security." pic.twitter.com/61aBwpBoDy
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) December 11, 2018
On December 19th, 2018, the Senate passed a Continuing Resolution to fund the government through February 8th, 2019.
On December 20th, 2018 the House rejected the senate plan as it did not funding for the U.S./Mexico Southern Border wall. They passed a stop gap measure that did give the $5.7 billion requested by President Trump.
On December 22nd, 2018 as the USA Today reported, the House bill that funded the border wall, failed to gain votes resulting in funding to lapse at midnight.
Over the next 34/35 days President Trump appeared in the White House press briefing room for the first time with border patrol union members, followed by his first Oval Office national prime time address, followed by a rare Saturday afternoon address where he offered the Democrats a deal involving DACA in which he agreed to extend the program for three years, the day after the Supreme Court took no action leaving the program in place for at least another ten months.
Over that same period of time the House majority switched places with the Democrats electing as Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), for the second time. She sent President Trump a letter requesting he postpone the State of the Union scheduled for January 29th, 2019, he returned the favor by grounding an undisclosed trip aboard to speak with military officials. President Trump finally responded to her request by sending another letter of his own, in which he explained he would be at the House of Representatives as planned, to which she sent another letter, explaining that she had no intention of formally inviting President Trump to hold the State of the Union. He eventually tweeted that he accepted the delay while the government shutdown continued.
While Speaker Pelosi and President Trump exchanged dueling letters over the State of the Union, the House passed several funding bills that would temporarily reopen the government while allowing both parties the ability to reach a border wall/security deal. As The Hill reported the bills were rejected by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, on four separate occasions.
While Leader McConnell refused to bring the House funding bills to the floor for consideration, the Coast Guard among other federal employees missed first one paycheck, followed by a second paycheck. New polling data revealed that the majority of American’s blamed President Trump for the shutdown while a CBS News poll showed that only 36 percent approved of his job performance while fifty-nine percent disapproved.
January 24th, as the shutdown entered the 34th day, the Senate failed to pass President Trump’s proposal that extended/phased out DACA, but included border wall funding and the Democrat backed bill that was similar to the original bill proposed on December 19th, 2018.
Shortly after the two bills failed in the Senate the Republican Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (KY) and Democrat Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (NY) met in private hoping to reach a temporary deal to reopen the government. The President through his Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders via Twitter explained that the President would not accept a bill that did not at least include a down payment toward the border wall.
January 25th, President Trump announced a deal that would fund the government through February 15th, missing from the bill was the $5.7 billion or “large down payment,” requested by President Trump and Republicans to fund the Southern border wall.
Roger Stone
On Friday the longtime friend and early President Trump political campaign adviser Roger Stone was arrested and indicted by Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Office, for witness tampering, obstruction of justice, and making false statements to Congress.
President Trump weighed-in on the arrest and indictment via Twitter on Friday morning calling the Mueller investigation, the “greatest witch hunt in the history of our country.”
After his arrest Stone spoke to the gathered crowd where he explained the charges against him were “politically motivated,” and that he would not “bare false witness,” against the President.
Roger Stone, who has a Richard Nixon tattoo on his back, appears to mimic Nixon hours after he was arrested by the FBI in a pre-dawn raid and released on a $250,000 bond.
— AJ+ (@ajplus) January 25, 2019
He denies the 7 charges that Mueller brought against him. pic.twitter.com/x9wSelwU4t
Saturday President Trump weighed-in once more via Twitter on Stone’s arrest.
7. what about…
8. a total phony conjob…
9. Fake Media coverage (collusion with Crooked H?) that I had to endure during my very successful presidential campaign.
10. WITCH HUNT!
The now infamous Steel Dossier, that was commissioned by Fusion GPS on behalf of the Hillary Clinton campaign was not publicly known or available until January 10th, 2017 when BuzzFeed News published the document online, even though the dossier had been circling the Hill and most media outlets for weeks prior.
I wasn’t able to locate the specific CBS News story that President Trump appears to be quoting from, however, according to this CBS News article, Special Counsel Robert Mueller is accusing Stone of, “giving information about WikiLeaks to the Trump campaign. According to the special counsel’s office, Stone told “senior Trump campaign officials” about hacked emails that could hurt Clinton.”
The Hill reports that Stone is expected in a D.C. federal court for arraignment on Tuesday at 11 a.m. eastern time where it’s expected Stone will plead not guilty.
11. Thank you to the Republican National Committee, (the RNC), who voted UNANIMOUSLY yesterday to support me in the upcoming 2020 Election.
The Hill reported Friday that the Republican National Committee members unanimously voted to throw the party’s “undivided support” behind President Trump ahead of his 2020 reelection bid as speculation continues to mount about potential primary challengers.” The article goes on to say while the move is unusual as historically the RNC has “refrained from expressing support for a candidate,” until they become the official party nominee, the resolution itself is mostly symbolic.
According to the article former Senator Bob Corker (R-TN) and former Senator Jeff Flake (R-AZ), have been floated as possible primary challenges, both having been critical of President Trump.
12. Fake News and bad journalism have caused a big downturn.
The Hill reported that BuzzFeed “announced this week that roughly,” fifteen percent of its staffers would be laid off, while HuffPost laid off around twenty journalists on Wednesday.
President Trump’s tweet came hours after NBC News reported that several of the employees of BuzzFeed and HuffPost that have been laid off have received death threats from the imageboard website 4Chan.
One such journalist laid off from HuffPost is Nick Wing who shared one of the threats he received via email with NBC News reporter Ben Collins, who tweeted the image.
Here's one of the images @nickpwing got emailed shortly after he announced he was fired on Twitter yesterday. He was not alone.https://t.co/Mm1EqoNCeI pic.twitter.com/gJysnsfgQj
— Ben Collins (@oneunderscore__) January 25, 2019
According to Collins, Wing received that threat shortly after he announced his layoff on Twitter.
HuffPost Editor Lydia Polgreen responded to President Trump’s tweet.
Ben Smith editor of BuzzFeed News also responded to the President’s tweet.
For what it’s worth Roger Stone becomes the sixth individual with connections to the Trump Campaign charged by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.
- Michael Cohen the onetime lawyer and fixer, sentenced to three years in prison.
- Paul Manafort former campaign chairman found guilty of tax evasion and bank fraud, pleaded guilty to conspiring to defraud the United States and conspiring to obstruct justice.
- Rick Gates former campaign co-chair, former business partner of Paul Manafort pleaded guilty to conspiracy and lying to the FBI.
- Michael Flynn former National Security Adviser pleaded guilty to lying to investigators due back in court in March for sentencing.
- George Papadopoulos former foreign policy adviser pleaded guilty to lying to investigators served thirteen days in prison.
