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NBC Airs Free Trump Ad After Kamala Attempts To Skirt FCC Rule

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The White House, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

NBC aired a Donald Trump ad free of charge on Sunday to follow FCC rules after Vice President Kamala Harris appeared on Saturday Night Live.

Harris made a surprise appearance on the most recent episode of Saturday Night Live. For approximately 90 seconds, Harris performed in a sketch with Maya Rudolph — who’s played Harris in a number of previous sketches — in the show’s cold open.

In response to the sketch, Republican FCC commissioner Brendan Carr accused NBC of trying to “evade” the FCC’s Equal Time rule. The rule requires networks to offer equal screen time to presidential candidates.

“This is a clear and blatant effort to evade the FCC’s Equal Time rule. The purpose of the rule is to avoid exactly this type of biased and partisan conduct — a licensed broadcaster using the public airwaves to exert its influence for one candidate on the eve of an election. Unless the broadcaster offered Equal Time to other qualifying campaigns,” Carr pointed out.

He went on to note that the issue had arisen in 2016 when Trump appeared on the same show, and that former President Barack Obama’s FCC chair had stated that the “Equal Time” provision would be enforced.

“In the 2016 cycle, President Obama’s FCC Chair made clear that the agency would enforce the Equal Time rule when candidate Trump went on SNL. NBC stations publicly filed Equal Opportunity notices to ensure that all other qualifying candidates could obtain Equal Time if they sought it. Stations did the same thing when Clinton appeared on SNL,” he explained.

Carr then explained that, with only three days — and zero “SNL” broadcasts remaining — before the election, NBC had “effectively structured” Harris’ appearance to make it impossible for the network to offer Trump anything even remotely comparable.

“What comparable time and placement can they offer all other qualifying candidates?” he asked.

In response to Harris’s 90-second SNL appearance, the 60-second Trump ad was aired twice on Sunday — first after a NASCAR race and again after Sunday Night Football. In the unorthodox ad, Trump simply stood in front of the camera and addressed “sports fans” by urging them to vote in the upcoming election.

“Hello to our great sports fans, and I hope you’re having a fantastic time,” Trump said. “We’re two days away from the most important election in the history of our country. We’ve got to save our country, and it needs saving. It’s in very bad shape. The worst economic numbers in generations were just announced two days ago. We’re losing jobs. We’re losing everything — including viability. We’re gonna end up in a depression based on what’s been happening. We’ve never seen anything like it, at least for the last 40 years. We have to straighten out our country; we have to close our borders; we have to lower our taxes; we have to get rid of inflation; and we’re going to do it. Just remember Kamala and her friends broke it. I’ll fix it. Most important election in the history of our country. Go and vote.”

A source confirmed to The Hollywood Reporter that the ads were run to comply with FCC rules.

New York Times Pollster Warns That Shy Trump Voters Could Be Skewing Surveys — Again

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Famartin, CC BY-SA 4.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

The silent red tsunami could be on the horizon…

According to The New York Times’ chief political analyst and pollster Nate Cohn silent Trump supporters could skew poll results once again, leaving prognosticators scratching their skulls in the finals hours before Election Day.

The Times reported in Arizona, Donald Trump leads Kamala Harris by four points, and in Michigan, he has a one-point advantage. Harris, on the other hand, is beating Trump by one in Georgia, and three in Nevada, North Carolina, and Wisconsin.

On Sunday, the Times and Siena College released their final poll from the seven battleground states, and the results were inconclusive.

In his write-up of the results, Cohn submitted that they don’t “point toward a relatively clear favorite” for a few reasons, even if Harris was perhaps slightly more pleased by its finding.

“On average, Ms. Harris fared modestly better than our last round of surveys of the same states, but her gains were concentrated in states where she was previously struggling,” he wrote. “Meanwhile, the so-called Blue Wall (Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania) does not look quite as formidable of an obstacle to Mr. Trump as it once did. As a result, Ms Harris’s position in the Electoral College isn’t necessarily improved.”

Cohn also warned that nonresponse bias from Republicans may be continuing to skew the results, just as they did in 2016 and 2020:

It’s hard to measure nonresponse bias — after all, we couldn’t reach these demographically similar voters — but one measure I track from time to time is the proportion of Democrats or Republicans who respond to a survey, after considering other factors.

Across these final polls, white Democrats were 16 percent likelier to respond than white Republicans. That’s a larger disparity than our earlier polls this year, and it’s not much better than our final polls in 2020 — even with the pandemic over.

“It raises the possibility that the polls could underestimate Mr. Trump yet again,” he concluded.

Report: Less Americans Believe Trump Threatened Democracy After 2020 Election

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Gage Skidmore from Surprise, AZ, United States of America, CC BY-SA 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

New reports indicate that fewer Americans think Trump intentionally attempted to subvert the 2020 election results.

More Americans now believe that former President Donald Trump was merely “exercising his right to contest the [2020] election” than they did a few years ago, while fewer believe he “went so far that he threatened American democracy,” according to a newly-released survey.

More Americans still believe the latter over the former, but the gap between the two beliefs has closed in recent years, according to the latest New York Times/Siena National poll on the question. This same poll has asked registered voters the question since at least July 2022, and since then, voters have shifted toward the belief that Trump had every right to contest the election and away from the belief that he threatened democracy.

The Daily Wire reports:

When the question was asked in early July 2022, 39% of respondents said they thought Trump was exercising his right, while 55% said he threatened democracy. This was more than a year after the events of January 6, 2021, when Trump supporters entered the U.S. Capitol in an attempt to stop then-Vice President Mike Pence from certifying the 2020 election results as questions about the validity of the ballots remained.

Now, however, the number of people who believe Trump was just exercising his rights has risen to 46%, while the number who believe he threatened democracy has dropped to 49%. The number of people who said they were unsure or refused to answer has also dropped nearly in half, from 7% in July 2022 to just 4% now.

Trump Sues CBS News For $10B

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Gage Skidmore from Surprise, AZ, United States of America, CC BY-SA 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Former President Trump is suing CBS News for $10 billion in damages.

Trump’s attorneys said the complaint comes due to “CBS’ partisan and unlawful acts of election and voter interference through malicious, deceptive, and substantial news distortion calculated to confuse, deceive, and mislead the public.” 

Trump’s legal team also argued the edits were done in an effort to “attempt to tip the scales in favor of the Democratic Party as the heated 2024 Presidential Election — which President Trump is leading — approaches its conclusion.” 

“President Trump brings this action to redress the immense harm caused to him, to his campaign, and to tens of millions of citizens in Texas and across America by CBS’s deceptive broadcasting conduct,” the lawsuit states.

Read:

The lawsuit comes after Trump’s attorneys wrote letters to CBS News demanding the network release the full transcript of the “60 Minutes” interview with Harris after it aired two different answers to the same question. Trump attorneys asked CBS to preserve all documents and communications related to the interview pending a potential legal battle. 

The lawsuit filed Thursday specifically references the exchange Harris had with “60 Minutes” correspondent Bill Whitaker. In a preview clip that aired on “Face the Nation,” Harris was asked why it seemed like Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wasn’t listening to the U.S. 

“Well, Bill, the work that we have done has resulted in a number of movements in that region by Israel that were very much prompted by, or a result of, many things, including our advocacy for what needs to happen in the region,” Harris responded in the “Face the Nation” clip. 

“We are not going to stop pursuing what is necessary for the United States to be clear about where we stand on the need for this war to end,” Harris said in the primetime special. 

Critics have accused CBS News of editing Harris’ “word salad” answer to shield the vice president from further backlash.

Trump lawyers argue that news organizations “are responsible for accurately representing the truth of events, not distorting an interview to try and falsely make their preferred candidate appear coherent and decisive, which Kamala most certainly is not.”

“Due to CBS’ actions, the public could not distinguish which Kamala they saw in the Interview: the candidate or the actual puppet of a behind-the-scenes editor,” the lawsuit states, noting that Whitaker’s question “was of the utmost public significance — U.S. foreign policy on the matter of the Israel/Gaza war — at a time of immense importance, mere weeks before the most critical presidential election in American history.” 

Trump is demanding a jury trial and at least $10 billion in damages for CBS’ alleged “ongoing false, misleading, and deceptive acts; the attorneys’ fees and costs associated with this action; and such other relief as the court deems just and proper.” 

This is a breaking news story. Please check back for updates.

Trump Responds To Biden’s ‘Garbage’ Comments

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Photo via Gage Skidmore Flickr

Donald Trump had a surprising reaction to Biden’s shocking “garbage” comments on Tuesday.

The Republican nominee called on his supporters to forgive him during a packed rally at the PPL Center in Allentown, Pennsylvania.

“Please forgive him for not knowing what he said,” Trump said. “These people are terrible, terrible, terrible to say a thing like that. But he really doesn’t know. He really honestly, he doesn’t. And I’m convinced that he likes me more than he likes Kamala. But that’s a terrible thing.”

Watch:

Trump’s call for unity – and forgiveness – came after the president called Trump supporters’ garbage during a get-out-the-vote call for Voto Latino.

In remarks from the White House, Biden had said earlier to Latino voters:

And just the other day, a speaker at his rally called Puerto Rico a “floating island of garbage.” Well, let me tell you something. I don’t– I– I don’t know the Puerto Rican that– that I know– or a Puerto Rico, where I’m from– in my home state of Delaware, they’re good, decent, honorable people.

The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters– his– his demonization of Latinos is unconscionable, and it’s un-American. It’s totally contrary to everything we’ve done, everything we’ve been.

Biden’s comments came after Trump’s rally at Madison Square Garden on Sunday.

White House spokesperson Andrew Bates told Fox News’ Jacqui Heinrich that President Biden “referred to the hateful rhetoric at the Madison Square Garden rally as ‘garbage.’”

“The president was referencing a joke by comedian Tony Hinchcliffe in which he likened Puerto Rico to an island of floating “garbage” in the middle of the ocean,” Bates said.

Trump told Fox News host Sean Hannity Tuesday that Hinchcliffe was not vetted by the campaign but that he saw the outcry as no “big deal.”

Hannity asked, “Do you wish [Hinchcliffe] wasn’t there?”

Trump responded, “Yeah, I don’t know if it’s a big deal or not, but I don’t want anybody making nasty jokes or stupid jokes, and probably he shouldn’t have been there.”

Steve Bannon Released From Federal Prison

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Image via Pixabay

A free man!

Nearly a week from Election Day and former Trump adviser Steve Bannon has been released from Federal custody.

On Tuesday, Bannon walked out of the Federal Correctional Institution in Danbury, Connecticut with his head held high after serving his four-month sentence.

Bannon’s conviction stemmed from his refusal to cooperate with the House committee’s investigation into the January 6th Capitol riots in 2021. In 2022, a jury found Bannon guilty of two counts of contempt of Congress: one for failing to provide requested documents and another for refusing to testify before the committee.

According to his representatives, Bannon is expected to hold a press conference in Manhattan late Tuesday. He is also expected to resume his War Room podcast.

Bannon’s legal battles, however, continue. In December, he faces a New York state trial on separate charges, where he is accused of defrauding donors in a campaign to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. He has pleaded not guilty to charges of fraud, money laundering, and conspiracy.

Former Democrat Presidential Candidate Joins Republican Party

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Gage Skidmore Flickr

Big news for the GOP!

During former President Donald Trump’s Tuesday night rally in Greensboro, North Carolina, former Democrat candidate for president and independent Tulsi Gabbard formally announced she is joining the Republican Party.

Tulsi Gabbard via Gage Skidmore Flickr

Gabbard recently joined the Trump campaign as an honorary co-chair for the former president’s transition team alongside Robert F. Kennedy Jr., another former Democrat.

“I’m proud to stand here with you today, President Trump, and announce that I’m joining the Republican Party. I am joining the party of the people,” said Gabbard.

“The party of equality. The party that was founded to fight against and end slavery in this country. It is the party of common sense and the party that is led by a president who has the courage and strength to fight for peace,” added Gabbard.

“Thank you very much, Tulsi. That’s great. Wow, that was a surprise,” said Trump. “That was really, she’s been independent for a long time. That’s a great thing. A great honor. Thank you very much, Tulsi.”

Tulsi Gabbard served as a vice chair of the Democratic National Committee from 2013 through 2016 before resigning.

Gabbard left the Democrat party in 2022, declaring herself an independent. 

Gabbard represented Hawaii’s 2nd District in Congress from 2013 through 2021 as a Democrat. She serves in the U.S. Army Reserves with the rank of lieutenant colonel.

Watch a live stream from the rally HERE!

Trump Threatens To Sue CBS

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Former President Donald Trump’s legal team told CBS News he was considering litigation if the news outlet did not release the full transcript of its “60 Minutes” interview with Vice President Kamala Harris. 

CBS has come under fire in recent days after it aired two different versions of Harris’ response to a question on Israel, prompting questions over whether CBS intentionally edited Harris’ response to make her look better ahead of the presidential election.

“Such manipulative editing was aimed at causing confusion among the electorate regarding Vice President Kamala Harris’s abilities, intelligence, and appeal,” Trump lawyer Edward Andrew Paltzik wrote in a letter to CBS. “News organizations such as CBS have a responsibility to accurately represent the truth of events, not distort an interview to try and make their preferred candidate appear coherent and decisive, which Harris most certainly is not. Due to CBS’ actions, the public cannot distinguish which Kamala Harris they are seeing: the candidate or the puppet of a behind-the-scenes editor.”

“The executives and producers at CBS, and 60 Minutes in particular, are unquestionably aware that the purpose behind editing the Interview was to confuse the electorate and portray the Vice President in a better light than a full, unedited transcript would reveal. Responsible news sources must be held accountable to the highest standards,” Paltzik wrote. 

On Truth Social, Trump said that the editing of the interview could “be the Biggest Scandal in Broadcast History!”

“When will CBS release their Transcript of the fraudulent Interview with Comrade Kamala Harris? They changed her answer in order to make Kamala look intelligent, rather than ‘dumb as a rock,’” he posted. “CBS MUST GET THE TRANSCRIPT OUT NOW — Litigation has already started. Harris wasn’t able to put two sentences together, so they completely removed her answer, and put in another one.”

The edited portion in question came during a discussion on Israel when host Bill Whitaker said, “But it seems that Prime Minister Netanyahu is not listening.” 

In a promotional video posted online, Harris responded to Whitaker by saying: “The work that we have done has resulted in a number of movements in that region by Israel that were very much prompted by or a result of many things, including our advocacy for what needs to happen in the region.”

In the interview that aired, Harris responded by saying: “We are not going to stop pursuing what is necessary for the United States to be clear about where we stand on the need for this war to end.”

CBS has responded to criticism of its editing by saying it just broadcasted different parts of the “same answer.”

“60 Minutes gave an excerpt of our interview to Face the Nation that used a longer section of her answer than that on 60 Minutes,” CBS said on Sunday. “Same question. Same answer. But a different portion of the response.”

Report: Judge Unseals More Documents In Trump Investigation

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A new development…

The judge in former President Donald Trump’s federal election interference case ordered more documents to be revealed from Special Counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into the former president just weeks before the 2024 election. 

U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan ordered on Thursday night that additional documents be made public. 

The documents pertain to the appendix of exhibits in the fight over whether Trump has a level of presidential immunity that negates the charges against him. 

Much of what readers are able to review is already public, including transcripts from the now-disbanded House Jan. 6 committee, press releases from various secretaries of state, the text of  Trump’s rally speech and phone call with Georgia officials, and even real election certificates showing President Biden as the winner of the 2020 contest. One of the exhibits appears to review much of Trump’s then-Twitter activity from the period of the election.

Chutkan cited in the order Trump’s claim that the “asymmetric release of charged allegations and related documents during early voting creates a concerning appearance of election interference.” 

According to the judge, while there is a public interest for courts to avoid involving themselves in elections, “it is in fact Defendant’s requested relief that risks undermining that public interest.”

She added that the court would continue keeping political considerations out of decisions, despite the defense’s request. 

This is a breaking news story. Please check back for updates.


Fox News Host ‘Baffled’ By Kamala’s Lack Of Preparation

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Gage Skidmore Flickr

Fox News host Geraldo Rivera might be regretting his endorsement.

Days after backing the Democrat nominee the Fox News host was left stunned after her lack of preparation for her interview with anchor Bret Baier on Wednesday.

Rivera and Sean Spicer joined NewsNation’s Dan Abrams, founder of Mediaite, on Wednesday to break down Harris’s interview and despite Rivera’s public support for Harris, he was left mostly unimpressed with her appearance.

“I am baffled by the lack of preparation going into the highest profile interview she has,” Rivera said, calling the interview “a wash.”

He argued that Harris’s weak point was in terms of immigration and the southern border.

“For example, she knew, they knew, the Democrats knew that it was going to be all about immigration. Bret was going to come out smoking on immigration and he would culminate his lament over how awful the situation is with pictures of the victims. That’s the Republican playbook, it’s obvious that it was coming. How could she not be ready to answer Laken Riley and Mollie Tibbetts and so forth?” he said.

The southern border, he added, will continue to be the weak point for Harris and her campaign.

“From this moment on, I advise them to not be the doormat when it comes to this issue,” he said. “It’s their biggest Achilles heel.”

Donald Trump released a statement after Kamala’s interview:

“Kamala Harris’ interview with Bret Baier was a TRAIN WRECK. Kamala was angry, defensive, and once again abdicated any responsibility for the problems Americans are facing. She couldn’t give a straight answer to a single question because she has no answers. Kamala’s entire campaign is based on lies about President Trump. Kamala can’t handle the pressure of an interview with Fox News—she certainly can’t handle the pressure of being President of the United States.”