‘I’m a more honest man than you’: Trump ends Piers Morgan interview
A new congressional report has detailed how senior officials in the Trump administration – including chief of staff Mark Meadows and treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin – intervened to send $700m in Covid-19 relief funds to a struggling trucking firm despite objections from the Department of Defence.
Meanwhile, the 6 January select committee is reportedly considering how to try and obtain testimony from House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy after further leaked audio showed him discussing Mr Trump’s responsibility for the 6 January riot – and calling for extremist members of his caucus to be banned from Twitter.
New audio released last night included Mr McCarthy worrying aloud that some House Republicans were inciting violence, particularly singling out Florida’s Matt Gaetz, whom he said was “putting people in jeopardy”.
Mainstream Republican House members have so far declined to turn on their leader publicly, but Mr Gaetz has already come out swinging against Mr McCarthy, complaining that he and his deputy Steve Scalise “held views about President Trump and me that they shared on sniveling calls with Liz Cheney, not us.”
Report: Grand jury in Trump probe to be dissolved
Among the many legal probes into Donald Trump and his affairs, the Manhattan District Attorney’s investigation into fraud allegations is among the more troubled, with current officeholder Alvin Bragg apparently unconvinced of the case’s strength despite years of work.
Now, reports are saying that the grand jury empanelled to hear evidence in the case is to be dissolved. According to ABC News, it hasn’t even heard any evidence since January.
Read more below from John Bowden.
Andrew Naughtie28 April 2022 09:52
Elon Musk has a suggestion for Truth Social
Despite pleas from the right to Elon Musk to let Donald Trump back on Twitter, the ex-president has so far insisted he will remain on his own bespoke social network platform, Truth Social, despite its disastrous decline in engagement and the fact that he has only posted on it once.
Now, Mr Musk has a suggestion for a Truth Social rebrand: “Truth Social (terrible name) exists because Twitter censored free speech,” he tweeted. “Should be called Trumpet instead!”
The same name was also suggested by Georgia Congressman Andrew Clyde in 2021 after Mr Trump was first kicked off Twitter.
Andrew Naughtie28 April 2022 09:19
Trump says he feared being attacked with ‘dangerous fruit’
Former president Donald Trump said he feared irate protesters would hit him with “very dangerous” fruits at his campaign rallies.
“I wanted to have people be ready because we were put on alert that they were going to do fruit,” Mr Trump said in the October 2021 deposition, according to a transcript of the proceedings filed in the court on Tuesday.
The 45th US president said that “tomatoes are bad” and that “some fruit is a lot worse”, The Washington Post reported.
“But it’s very dangerous. … I remember that specific event, because everybody was on alert. They were going to hit — they were going to hit hard,” he said.
Mr Trump was testifying in a civil lawsuit filed by a group of protesters alleging they were assaulted by his security guards in 2015.
Andrew Naughtie28 April 2022 08:45
Here’s what Republican candidates spent currying favour at Trump’s properties
The Independent has compiled data from Federal Election Commission filings since the beginning of 2021 to the end of March 2022, which shows that Republican candidates spent $1.28m at Mr Trump’s properties in Florida, New York, California, Washington DC and Las Vegas.
One of the biggest sources of revenue was Mr Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club, where the former president has de-camped.
Since 2021, candidates have spent more than $700,000 at the Palm Beach club – some of them after receiving his endorsement, as was the case with Representative Ted Budd, who is running for Senate in North Carolina.
Alisha Rahaman Sarkar28 April 2022 06:46
Piers Morgan Uncensored with Trump suffers 100,000-viewer drop-off
The second episode of Piers Morgan’s Uncensored TV series featuring former president Donald Trump was viewed by around 100,000 fewer people than the debut.
The special, which aired on 26 April on the newly launched talkTV channel, featured the concluding part of Morgan’s interview with Mr Trump.
According to Deadline, the episode was viewed by an average of 200,000 people across the hour. This was still more than the viewing figures for BBC News and Sky News, but substantially less than Monday’s premiere, which averaged 317,000 viewers.
In a one-star review of the first episode of Uncensored, The Independent’s Nick Hilton described it as “a truly tortured piece of broadcasting”.
Alisha Rahaman Sarkar28 April 2022 06:10
McCarthy assures colleagues he never asked Trump to resign
House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy, defending his private conversations, has assured his colleagues that he never asked former president Donald Trump to resign over the 6 January Capitol riots.
It was Mr McCarthy’s first face-to-face meeting with House Republicans amid the fallout from his criticisms of the former president and the party’s most far-right members.
One Republican in the room said the meeting was “cathartic” for lawmakers, while another voiced confidence that McCarthy would be the “next speaker”, according to the Associated Press.
“He’s got the support of the conference and then some,” Rep Dan Meuser said as he left the private session at GOP headquarters.“You guys obsess over 6 January. Nobody cares,” Rep Glenn Grothman told reporters, adding that “it is history”.
Alisha Rahaman Sarkar28 April 2022 05:39
Republicans fear a Trump return to an Elon Musk-owned Twitter
While some Republicans took to publicly cheering Elon Musk’s $44bn purchase of Twitter as a major victory for free speech, there were some who viewed it with trepidation, according to reports.
For a series of top GOP insiders told Politico Playbook of their grave concerns about the new Musk-led Twitter becoming a haven to welcome back previously banned accounts, namely Donald Trump.
“If I’m a Democrat, I’d pray that Elon Musk puts Trump right back on Twitter,” an anonymous House GOP leadership aide told Politico, who asked to remain unidentified in order to speak freely.
Justin Vallejo28 April 2022 05:00
Whistleblower in Deutsche Bank and Donald Trump case found dead
A whitsleblower who reportedly worked with authorities to investigate the activities of Deutsche Bank and its ties with former president Donald Trump was found dead at a Los Angeles high school.
Valentin Broeksmit, 46, was found dead on Monday at about 7am local time, more than a year after he went missing, Los Angeles County coroner’s office said. He was last seen on 6 April 2021 driving a red Mini Cooper in Griffith Park.
Broeksmit had offered hundreds of bank documents to the federal investigators and journalists looking into ties between the bank and Mr Trump, ABC10News reported.
Journalist Scott Stedman said he doesn’t suspect foul play in his friend’s death as he struggled with drugs on and off.
Alisha Rahaman Sarkar28 April 2022 04:53
Republicans cheer as GOP candidate says Fauci should be executed by firing squad
John Bennett, who is also running for Congress, said Dr Fauci should be tried and executed without offering any explanation what for at a campaign stop ahead of his June primary.
Dr Fauci has been subjected to repeated death threats and harassment since becoming the public face of the White House’s Covid pandemic fight, and in 2020 revealed he and his family needed a permanent security detail.
Justin Vallejo28 April 2022 04:00
New York says it’s wrapping up probe into Trump’s ‘Russian nesting doll’ finances
The New York State Attorney General’s Office is close to unravelling the Trump Organization’s “Russian nesting doll” finances, according to reports.
Attorneys said they still waiting to search two cell phones belonging to Donald Trump, plus the laptop of a long time executive assistant, after they were pressed on why the three-year investigation was taking so long.
“The process is near the end,” Kevin Wallace, senior enforcement counsel at the New York State Attorney General’s Office, told a judge, according to CNN.
Justin Vallejo28 April 2022 03:00