Trump awards next year's G7 summit to his failing Doral resort

President Obama has awarded the 2012 Group of Seven summit of world leaders to his private company...

Can you fucking imagine the outrage?

This is just stunning- hopefully he will be in the midst of a trial in the Senate by this time. Has there even been a more obvious con man as POTUS?

He won't be president by then.

[quote]Mulvaney said it was Trump’s idea to pursue the idea of hosting the event at his resort.

No kidding.

Why is no one stopping this? It's a conflict of interest. A President should never be allowed to profit from being in office!

You think Trump cares, R5?

This is who he is.

Frank Bruni:

This Doral madness is a gesture of such perverse defiance, such profound contempt, that it takes the breath away. What next? Trump won’t stop here.

“If ever a time should come, when vain and aspiring men shall possess the highest seats in Government, our country will stand in need of its experienced patriots to prevent its ruin.”

- Samuel Adams, 1776

From r7 -

Trump has a guarantee by Mitch he won't be removed.

*

Trump is ruling through blackmail &/or promise of ill gotten gain; Mitch is most likely the target of both

*

No one in MSM is looking for the WHY on GOP Trump support; it's not court picks, tax cuts or the base

*

It's nefarious

[quote]Mulvaney quoted an anonymous site selection official who he said told him, “It’s almost like they built this facility to host this type of event.” Mulvaney did not say what other sites were vetted.

Holiday Inn, Embassy Suites, Motel 6, Days Inn, Red Roof Inn, Super 8, EconoLodge, DoubleTree, Comfort inn, Quality Inn.

I PRAY the other six leaders get on the phone with one another and just opt to meet in a different country, excluding the US altogether.

It's disgraceful, R11.

I wonder what the other leaders like Merkel, Trudeau, Macron, etc. are saying to each other about Trump right now.

It would be great if the other leaders opted to stay elsewhere, and just had a G6 Summit. Fuck that grifter

Damn, Doral is low rent. Rooms go for under $200. I've spent more on a hotel in Vegas.

We're nit sending our best and brightest hotel rooms in Florida!

They could have just stayed at Camp David, as Obama did when he hosted the event.

Rooms available on Expedia for $134.00 each. Not joking.

R14 Each room comes with its own bed bugs, no additional charge.

Doral is in the western most area of Miami-Dade County, and about as far from the Miami Beach as you could get. That's why those room rates are at bargain prices, tourists dont have shit to do out there but golf and sit in horrible Miami traffic. That and Trump is trash.

Even the 'Signature Suites' aren't nice. Full of cheap furniture, horrible curtains and tacky gold paint.

The windows don't exactly look bullet (or wind) proof either.

I doubt any world leaders will actually sleep there.

Well, presumably the facility will be required to do some security upgrades, R19.

But it's certainly not somewhere most of would want to stay.

R20 “Security Upgrades” aka taxpayer funded remodel

Ahhhhh, security upgrades = Trump getting the country to pay for renovations!

Bingo, r21.

They'd have to close it and start the refurb now to get it close to being ready in terms of security upgrades.

Yeah, R24 -- someone should ask Trump the genius how this will be managed.

This should make his existing Emolument cases explode.

The summit is not going to help the resort, since everything will be provided at cost with no profit. If anything, it will make the resort worse off since it will have to turn away paying guests.

R27

He’s absolutely shameless.

Gurl I remember the Doral resort being featured heavily on Celebrity Apprentice, the conference rooms look like your average neighbor community center up the block!

I guess Trump wants to be impeached.

Impeach-remove-convict-imprison.

Why am I not surprised that Trump wants to put the G7 up in one of his low-rent hovels that's probably hurting for business. Every situation is just another opportunity to scam people.

We really need President Graft to get stuck in a bathtub.

He's got a lot of vacancy in his cranium. Why doesn't he rent that out too? Oh, I forgot, Putin already owns that.

This is just another distraction from the other crimes he's been doing

It's well known as a dump.

[quote] He's got a lot of vacancy in his cranium. Why doesn't he rent that out too? Oh, I forgot, Putin already owns that.

Hillary and Obama occupy a LOT of real estate up there.

It's named Doral after the cigarettes the maids have on their smoke breaks.

Don't forget it's filled with bed bugs

As much as I would love for Merkel and the rest of them to tell tRump to go fuck himself, I doubt they’d risk all the upheaval that would result from such a move.

Fuck if I'd stay there. ISIS is no doubt regrouping and selecting targets.

Taste me, taste me...

r27 are you kidding? None of the taxpayer-funded stays at his resorts have been done "at cost". What are you smoking?

Not only is it a bad resort, the summit is going to take place during the part of the season where Doral has the lowest occupancy because it's so fucking hot and humid.

This choice was clearly made to line Trump's pockets, as well as his 15-minute long advertisements he's given to it during campaign and presidential speeches. It's one of the few Trump properties that HE owns directly. There couldn't BE a bigger conflict of interest.

Not exactly The Hotel du Palais in Biarritz where the last G7 was held is it?

He was gouging the secret service so badly for protecting Trump Tower in NYC that they said they were going to erect a temporary shed outside the building and work from there instead. And that was "at cost". So, yes, the Doral will be "at cost", but costs will be hylerinflated.

This violates so many ethics in procurement laws. But, he's gotten away with everything else why should this be any different.

R13 Exactly. I've been waiting for the international community to stand up to Orange Cancer in ANY way. If they can't even make this small gesture, then they're a pack of Neville Chamberlains. We need some Churchills.

Uh, excuse me, Americans, as an European I perhaps have no idea - aren't the US a Rule of Law country? If yes, why such an obviously illegal move isn't immediately blocked and punished?

“Doral is low rent. Rooms go for under $200”

Don’t let the bedbugs bite.

At least the international leaders will be able to see illegal workers first hand

[quote]This choice was clearly made to line Trump's pockets

Yes. There were a couple of investigative reporters on Don Lemon's show last night and they told Don that the Doral resort has been losing money. Down 18% over the past few years.

Report on WP from May:

Late last year, in a Miami conference room, a consultant for President Trump’s company said business at his prized 643-room Doral resort was in sharp decline.

At Doral, which Trump has listed in federal disclosures as his biggest moneymaker hotel, room rates, banquets, golf and overall revenue were all down since 2015. In two years, the resort’s net operating income — a key figure, representing the amount left over after expenses are paid — had fallen by 69 percent.

Even in a vigorous economy, the property was missing the Trump Organization’s internal business targets; for instance, the club expected to take in $85 million in revenue in 2017 but took in just $75 million.

“They are severely underperforming” other resorts in the area, tax consultant Jessica Vachiratevanurak told a Miami-Dade County official in a bid to lower the property’s tax bill. The reason, she said: “There is some negative connotation that is associated with the brand.”

The troubles at Trump Doral — detailed here for the first time, based on documents and video obtained under Florida’s public-records law — suggest the Trump Organization’s problems are bigger than previously known. This is also the first known case in which a Trump Organization representative has publicly acknowledged the president’s name has hurt business.

The decline at Doral is especially significant because the resort had seemed better insulated from political backlash than other Trump properties, protected by its place in golf’s history, by its recent renovations, and by its location in a booming state that Trump won in 2016.

It wasn’t.

“Profitability is down across the board,” Michael Bellisario, an analyst with Robert W. Baird & Co., said after reviewing at the request of The Washington Post the data that Trump provided Miami-Dade County.

The documents included detailed breakdowns of the Trump resort’s income streams, expenses and projections, as well as comparisons between Trump Doral and its competitors in the area.

“It’s clearly underperforming their expectations,” Bellisario said, though it remains profitable, in part because it has reduced expenses at the same time.

Eric Trump — the president’s son who runs the business day-to-day — rejected the idea that the Trump brand is damaged. “This story is completely senseless,” he said in a statement. “Our iconic properties are the best in the world and our portfolio is unrivaled by anyone.”

This Dump is the last Resort.

So cute his administration wants to believe he’ll still be President come next June.

Forcing Trudeau, Merkel, and Macron to sleep in a Trump hotel is fucking hilarious. You can hate Trump but this is genius trolling.

Maybe someone can hire whores to pee on the beds

Forget Trump's "Where is my Roy Cohn?"; where is OUR Lorraine Motel?

[quote] This Doral madness is a gesture of such perverse defiance, such profound contempt, that it takes the breath away. What next? Trump won’t stop here.

Well what the fuck is the government doing about it? Nothing.

Congress? Nothing.

The courts? Nothing.

The public? Nothing.

The media? Nothing.

NOBODY is doing a goddamned motherfucking thing to stop him. That's the real reason he keeps doing what he's doing. Because he CAN.

[quote] I wonder what the other leaders like Merkel, Trudeau, Macron, etc. are saying to each other about Trump right now.

Nothing. They're as impotent as American leaders are.

Nobody will EVER do anything to stop him.

European leaders are even more FEEBLE and WEAK than the American leaders, because they're even more scared of DUMP than the Americans are.

"Our iconic properties are the best in the world and our portfolio is unrivaled by anyone.”

They're not your properties, dumb ass. They belong to your Russian masters, Putin and his oligarch buddies, the same people who own your bitch ass.

And it wouldn't surprise me in the least if these con artists dumb 20 million of taxpayer money into renovation costs and refuse to pay it back, since after all, Trump isn't drawing any salary as President and it's the least Americans can do for their great leader.

r59 = "WILL THERE EVER BE A RAINBOW?" troll

The G6 should contact Havana and make a deal. They all arrive in Miami, pose briefly on the tarmac, and without explantion helicopter to a Cuban resort and hold the meetings there. Or Puerto Rico if they REALLY want to piss off Trump.

You seem.....concerned, r59.

And you seem like a russian troll-bot, R63.

How's the weather in Moscow?

r65 excellent example of "accuse others of doing what you're actually doing"

I don't think you're a troll, but you are .. rather fatalistic. And misinformed, there are lots of people working to hold Trump and his regime accountable.

R65 is talking to itself.

Looks like the bot-feature malfunctioned.

r66 I started this thread, retard.

[quote] I started this thread, retard

rofl... perhaps you should re-read your post at R65, Einstein.

I saw the typo, I assumed anyone with half a brain could figure out who was being referenced.

[quote] I assumed anyone with half a brain could figure out who was being referenced.

Put that half brain together with YOUR half brain, and you'll have a full brain.

Congrats!

Trump is demonstrating how gossamer thin the vaunted US checks and balances system is. All that talk about American exceptionalism and looking down our noses at banana republics. Well, we've been pegged down a couple of notches during this administration.

Any other president wouldn't even dare to nominate any property remotely associated with them. Just the appearance of corruption would be enough of a stick to beat back their most craven nature. Not this president.

r70 you're so witty and clever! Don't ever change.

Lovely, r64. Sunny and balmy. It's giving me a chance to wear the Ship 'n Shore wardrobe I won when I was a contestant on цена правильная!

R5 there's a House bill in the works to ban this.

[quote][R14] Each room comes with its own bed bugs, no additional charge.

Well yes but it's all in the language -- we come at no ADDITIONAL charge, but there's a bedbug fee folded right into the contract as part of the basic package. Roy Cohn added that after reviewing the initial draft of the agreement. I was actually there to see that -- it was a real privilege watching a fellow professional at work.

House needs to take a vote on this, get the Republicans on record for corruption.

I don't know why. Of all the shit he has pulled - this repels me most of all. I guess 'cause I was thinking he'd never get away with something like this.

No wonder he thinks he's King Shit and can do anything he wants. Because he can.

I remember when I was so proud of my Country. It was only a few years ago too. Now I'm perpetually disheartened and disgusted.

It's only corruption, R76 when Democrats or blacks or Latinos or Libtards or Muslims do it.

Along long as white, Republican Xtians do it, everything is hunky dory.

The interesting thing is seeing Republican pundits and sites like The Federalist twisting themselves in knots trying to say it isn't corrupt.

Interesting? Dismal

Washington Post:

Trump says he’ll host G7 summit at cost at his resort — but provides few details

How can it not be corrupt!!?? Trump awards a government contract to a Trump business. WTF? Does he have to go to Fort Knox and forklift out a ton of gold before anyone calls him out for grifting our government?

This is so fucking obvious and people are rationalizing it. Unbelievable. There are hundreds, if not, thousands of venues which could host the G7 Summit--how about we pick one of them and bypass a Trump property altogether? Is that so difficult? I can't believe how far this country has gone down the crapper. It's mind-boggling.

R73 Is the model on the right a young Tippi Hedren?

R59, you've forgotten that Pelosi & the Democrats are beginning an impeachment inquiry into Trump, so he is finally being held accountable.

There are times I wish I didn't live in a democracy. This is one of them. Jerk his ass out the WH and....

I have a feeling that this won't happen. Trump will blame the Democrats, of course, or stage some kind of fire so he won't lose (hideous) face.

Sure looks like her, r83, doesn't it?

Even if Trump hosts at cost, whatever that really means - and which he wouldn't have if there wasn't an outcry when he's on the ropes - he's still promoting his brand and having the country underwrite it.

That is still corruption. This needs to be hauled up by Congress, the equal partner of the executive.

Trump claims he won’t make a profit from the summit. That’s too ambiguous.

In movie making, if you want to negotiate for money, you never ask to be paid on the back-end. Instead, you get it up front. The reason being is that studios use accounting tricks to avoid ever making a profit. even the most successful movies.

Likewise, Trump will manipulate the numbers in similar manner. Maybe he’ll get kick backs from vendors, or charge lobbiests for parties that they all attend. Something like that. Endless possibilities.

Oh, here’s another one: politicians will occasionally get caught when they commander aircraft for personal use. They then will pledge to reimburse the government for their seat.

The problem is, they pay the cost of a first class ticket (or maybe even a coach ticket). But they aren’t obligated to reimburse the government for the entire cost of the trip, when they might be the only passenger. That’s a common dodge.

This says what we ALREADY know about Republicans. Party over politics. No morality. They should be ashamed for letting this monster run unchecked for that last three and a half years. This would make me jump party.

[quote]Trump claims he won’t make a profit from the summit. That’s too ambiguous.

Well, that is horseshit coming from a pathological liar and he will get millions of taxpayers money to renovate everything from the rooms to carpet and curtains. There are 2 "presidential suites" and 7 heads of state.

"Party over politics"

How about we make that : "party over country"?

When The Don said the club is near the airport, he wasn’t exaggerating. It’s practically next door. What a terrible location. The noise levels alone. At least the world leaders can buy souvenirs at the strip mall next door.

When they had the G7 in Biarritz they had 13,000 police officers on duty and closed the airport after they'd emptied the whole town of tourists.

Should be fun to see how the locals in Doral react.

They should meet at Trump's Doral resort but stay at the Marriott.

That's the Miami Springs Golf Club and not the Doral in r94. Miami Springs is literally right next to the airport runway. The Doral is close and is very noisy because of the planes, but it is 3 miles away from the edge of the runway.

What is Trump's strategy for this stunt booking. Everyone knows it's cause for direct impeachment. Also Congress will pass a "no approval" and Trump will cancel? Then he puts the cancellation into his standup routine at Rallies? Trump has fixed it with Pence for pardon and wants to be impeached ASAP?

Sen. KevinCramer (R-ND) on Trump’s decision to award G7 summit to his own Miami property: “It may seem careless politically, but on the other hand there's tremendous integrity in his boldness and his transparency.,”

Perhaps criminals should alert law enforcement in advance of their crimes -- such "boldness and transparency" is apparently to be commended.

Lock.Him.Up.

[quote] “It may seem careless politically, but on the other hand there's tremendous integrity in his boldness and his transparency.,”

Spin worthy of this year's Goebbels award.

He's been daring Republicans to remove him from office for quite some time. They're too afraid of losing their own comfortable seats.

Do you think there was ever an American President or leading politician who was as reviled as Trump?

I don’t know much about Huey Long, except that he was re-elected governor while in jail, IIRC. Andrew Jackson was a hot mess but he won a second term. (Tangentially, Mayor Buddy Cianci was re-elected after he got out of prison for corruption. More recently, Joey Ganim was re-elected mayor of Bridgeport after serving 6 years for corruption. (I knew Joey in college.)

Maybe Roy Cohn? Or Joe McCarthy? People learned to distrust Nixon, but the general public didn’t talk about his mental instability or question his love of country. Remember that speech when he used his wife’s “Republican cloth coat” to exemplify that he was not getting rich on political deals, or his wife would have a nice fur coat. (Poor Pat.)

I just can’t think of any post WWII President who’s been cause a “fucking idiot” buy his own staff, more than once. Who’s sanity is routinely questioned. Who is openly called a habitual liar by so many people. Who is suspected to be a Russian asset. Who is willfully incompetent and corrupt to his core. And who has had such a large number of influential Republican party members resign their party so as to disassociate themselves from him.

Any examples?

I guess Mussolini. Things did not end well for him.

[quote]People learned to distrust Nixon, but the general public didn’t talk about his mental instability or question his love of country.

Indeed.

Carl Bernstein said on CNN recently that even Nixon was never questioned on his loyalty to the United States or suspected of being a Russian asset.

Or his reading skills.

True.

Nixon may have been a scumbag in many ways, but he was intellectually brilliant, unlike Trump.

Alan Greenspan said the 2 smartest Presidents during his lifetime were Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton.

Pretty sure that there weren't any pre WWII presidents who have been so reviled either. The worst you can say about George W Bush is that he was an incompetent puppet.

I can’t recall a time when Trump gave an address from the Oval Office which explained a policy or immediate challenge. I mean, in coherent sentences with complete thoughts that follow each other.

I did here him speak this week claiming that the Kurds were happy with the US withdrawal (no, they are not). That Erdogan, who is a “Friend” of his (He is not), was happy with it. That somehow the US is in a stronger position (we are not). He just says anything, despite all evidence to the contrary. Oh, but my point being, his comments were just a series of platitudes and non sequiturs which lacked any continuity or explained his strategy.

Admiral Mcraven made this comment today:

“His letter to Erdogan was 6th grade stuff, impulsive decisions, bad decisions. This whole notion that the Kurds are ”happy”, the President tells us, sounds like some kind of a cruel Monty Python skit going on. We’re in real serious difficulty now with the national security process disintegrating.”

He added that he thinks “our democracy is under attack” by President Trump.

This Syrian debacle his costing him a lot of support in the military and with politicians. The military would never stage a coup, but I have to wonder if they might have some influence, somehow.

I would assume the Top Brass are on their phones or having drinks with Senators on both sides of the aisle, telling them to shut this shit storm up. The cabinet isn't going to do it.

[bold]Democrats introduce 'THUG Act' to block funding for G-7 at Trump resort[/bold]

Democrats introduced legislation Friday that would block federal funding for next year’s Group of Seven (G-7) summit at Trump National Doral Miami.

Democratic Reps. Lois Frankel (Fla.), Bennie Thompson (Miss.) and Steve Cohen (Tenn.) introduced the Trump’s Heist Undermines the G-7 (THUG) Act after acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney told reporters Thursday that the Trump resort near Miami will host the annual summit of world leaders June 10-12.

A companion bill is being introduced in the Senate by Democratic Sens. Richard Blumenthal (Conn.) and Sheldon Whitehouse (R.I.).

“Mr. Trump is unashamed of his corruption,” Frankel said in a statement. “He is abusing the office of the Presidency and violating law by directing millions of dollars of American and foreign money to his family enterprises by holding an important meeting of world leaders at his Doral resort.”

“His contempt for the Constitution and American people seems boundless in profiting from his office through payments from foreign governments," Blumenthal added. "Our Founding Fathers are rolling over in their graves. Congress must act to stop this plain craven abuse of power and corruption."

The legislation also would require Trump to provide Congress with any documents related to his decision to host the event at his property. The measure is unlikely to be taken up in the GOP-controlled Senate.

Mulvaney said the Doral property was one of 12 that was under consideration and that it was ultimately chosen in part because of its proximity to airports, landing zones and hospitals. The acting chief of staff dismissed criticism that the property’s selection violates the Emoluments Clause of the Constitution, which prohibits presidents from accepting payments from foreign countries, U.S. states or the federal government.

"I get the criticisms. So does [Trump]… but no, there’s no issue here on him profiting from this in any way, shape or form," Mulvaney said. "If you think it's going to help his brand, that's great, but I would suggest that he doesn't need much help promoting his brand."

I think I heard that Trump is trying to revive the idea of a joint US-Russian cyber task force to fight cyber crimes. When he first proposed it, in a presser after his private conversation with Putin, the intelligence community squashed the idea, since we already have a talented team and such a task force would only serve to give away our skills to the Russians and make us more vulnerable. That, plus the fact that it is the Russians that we need to most defend against, at this moment. It’s not Jina, or some 400 lb. guy in a bed somewhere. 🇷🇺

After an earlier Putin summit, he also proposed a joint military exercise with the Russians. The military squashed that idea too, for the same reason.

What the frick does this have to involve before the people in power do something?

r114 What the fuck do you think they're doing?

[quote]What is Trump's strategy for this stunt booking.

Gather around little ones ..... president does not want to be in the G7. He wants to be a strongman dictator. He has never been anything but his own boss (except now he works for his lenders ... russian oligarchs ) so he has no interest in conforming to the peer pressure of the G7. He would love nothing more than this Doral setup of his to go up in smoke and the meeting be cancelled. He's begging to have the whole affair thrown in to chaos.

r116 speculation and condescending as well, nice.

R115, they are acting too slowly.

First, his cabinet should have Amendment 25’d him a year ago. Or earlier. And especially after the Helsinki debacle.

The Congress should have issued an advisory opinion that a sitting President can be indicted. If Clinton could be subject to a civil suit while in office, only pretzel logic says that criminal activity is ok.

Congress should be routinely subpoenaing witnesses, not “requesting” appearances. And they should have locked up Corey Lewandowski up for Contempt of Congress and held him in the congressional jail.

For starters.

He’s going to invite Putin, and the other members probably won’t like that. Maybe, if they don’t boycott the event entirely, they’ll send a subordinate, like their equivalent of the Secretary of Agriculture, or such. I understand in diplomatic circles, that a passive aggressive, but obvious insult.

Remember when President Clinton made Newt Gingrich enter/exit Air Force One via the cargo hold or service entrance? Newt had a public meltdown afterwards and lost a lot of credibility and power as a result. The World ought to do the same with Turnip.

Nixon was pissed that Clinton didn’t send a representative to his wife’s funeral. (“Not even the wife of a cabinet secretary!”)

r118 you're assuming that the Republicans in power would do anything like that.

r119 to clarify:

The then Speaker of the House of Representatives felt "insulted" and "appalled" that Mr Clinton did not invite him and his Senate counterpart Bob Dole to the front of the plane for budget crisis talks during a 25 hour flight for the funeral of Yitzhak Rabin, the Israeli prime minister.

Mr Gingrich's sense of injustice was compounded when he and Mr Dole were directed off the back of the plane when they landed at Washington, while Mr Clinton emerged down the front steps in front of the cameras.

A few days later, the two Republican-controlled chambers passed a tough stopgap funding bill that Mr Clinton vetoed because he said it contained unacceptable cuts to health programmes for the elderly.

"I think that's part of why you ended up with us sending down a tougher ... resolution," Mr Gingrich said, referring to his perceived shabby treatment aboard Air Force One. "This is petty, but I think it's human."

Mr Gingrich was famously depicted as a crying baby in a damning front page cartoon in the New York Daily News and later admitted that his words were a mistake.

I wonder if Speaker Pelosi can somehow work the THUG Act (R113) into one of the appropriation bills and try to force Moscow Mitch to approve it and tRump to sign it.

Does this Thug Act has to pass the House and Senate? Does anyone know? MoscowMitch will just block it in the Senate and nothing will happen....as usual.

The bed bugs is not a joke, this guy with the bed bug bites sued Trump Doral and Doral settled.

Is it simply too expensive for cheap Trump to remove the bedbugs?

Quite frankly I think it would assume the hell out of Trump for his bed bugs to bite the leaders of France, Germany and the UK.

Well, bedbugs don’t discriminate. If they’re biting Merkel and Trudeau, they’ll be biting tRump’s fat ass.

I try to remember when I rent a hotel room. First, immediately put your luggage in the bathtub. They, with camera ready, strip the corner of the fitted sheet off the mattress. I’ve never he seen a bedbug, but God willing, I never will.

Bedbugs are sneaky bastards. Look for black stains on the mattress or the sheets - it looks like ink, but …. it's not ink.

The interiors are soulless and not very "lux" - pretty tamped down. How is the golfing?

Hot and humid and unpleasant at the time of the year the G7 will be occurring.

YAY!!! He gave in. He just tweeted that the event won’t be at the Doral!!!

The bedbugs are disappointed. They were looking forward to international cuisine.

Not linking to his tweet.

HAHAHAHAHAHa

This was apparently too blatant even for Trump.

Although - he got his distraction, which was the entire point of it. And the Republicans looked like asshats for defending him the past week.

[quote]Heath Mayo @HeathMayo 9m Let’s recap: Congressional GOP spent an entire week defending the president for something that was clearly unethical & very probably unconstitutional all for no reason b/c Trump realized he had to fold.

[quote]...Therefore, based on both Media & Democrat Crazed and Irrational Hostility, we will no longer consider Trump National Doral, Miami, as the Host Site for the G-7 in 2020. We will begin the search for another site, including the possibility of Camp David, immediately. Thank you!

[quote]And the Republicans looked like asshats for defending him the past week.

That's the good part of this. Let the Republicans drive their numbers down over the next year by defending stuff like this.

“I was just joking!”

Trump’s go-to excuse when reversing himself. Either that, or he’ll say it was his staff’s idea and he decided to “overrule my staff”.

The bedbugs are disappointed they won't get to feast on Trudeau's hot ass:

Who knew Kristy Swanson sucked at both acting AND politics?

[quote]Pretty sure that there weren't any pre WWII presidents who have been so reviled either. The worst you can say about George W Bush is that he was an incompetent puppet.

Even Nixon gets credit for doing things beneficial to the country. I can’t imagine what accolades could be attributed to Trump besides ostracizing the country from the rest of the world.

Poor bed bugs. They were preparing for exotic European flavored meals.

If, as some upthread have said, Trump wants to be impeached, why doesn't he just resign? He could cite ill health ( even if it's a lie) or unrestrained hostility of the media and Democrats. He clearly wants to hold on.

"In interviews with more than 20 GOP lawmakers and ...aides...many said they were repulsed by Trump’s decision to host an international summit at his own resort" WaPo

Let's not forget that these are the same cretins who were up in arms because Obama wore a tan suit. Meanwhile, they twist themselves into pretzels coming up with ways to excuse the animated Cheeto's assaults on democracy and the Constitution.

If Trump resigns it looks like losing. There are ways that it could be framed to look like winning - he says that he can do more to help America if he's not the President, it's all the Democrats fault, etc... - but there are apparently no grown-ups left in the White House to lay the appropriate framework. So Trump keeps floundering, digs the hole deeper, etc....

I could about believe that this always was the plan, to create a distraction.

I am r86 and I called it. I knew the idiot would blame the Dems when his fucking legal team made him realize that hosting G7 at the Doral would be a conflict of interest that would end up piling more firewood for the impeachment inquiry. I can't wait for him to go.

He’s moved the conference to NYC. Trump Tower, actually.

/s

R145 the building with no fire sprinklers?

R146, are you kidding me? How did he get away with that?

"Remember when President Clinton made Newt Gingrich enter/exit Air Force One via the cargo hold or service entrance?"

Given that Newt Gingrich is the biggest shithead in the history of US politics, Clinton should have made him enter through the same pipe/hole where blue ice comes out of.

I think R145 is joking.

r148 not only that, but it never happened. Gingrich was annoyed because Clinton didn't want to talk with him on Air Force One during Gingrich's government shutdown.

R147 Nope

Most buildings in NYC don't have sprinklers. It didn't become law until sometime in the 1990s, so it's inky the newer buildings that have them, which aren't the majority of buildings.

[quote]If, as some upthread have said, Trump wants to be impeached, why doesn't he just resign? He could cite ill health ( even if it's a lie) or unrestrained hostility of the media and Democrats. He clearly wants to hold on.

He's a professional victim, everything is someone's fault and he has no trouble pointing it out (even though it's not true) So if he's impeached, it was a coup.

He's just a run of the mill dishonest real estate goon. He can't think any other way.

The scary part is even if he is impeached and removed from office he can still run and win in 2020

Not if he's thrown in jail. Which he should be.

The Senate can bar him from future office or any future “position of public trust”, which sounds like it can be pretty expansive. That means no public office. No phony charities. Perhaps no public corporate boards. No NRA board, for example. If the Senate has the will.

The country learned about McCarthy and changed their minds about him. Ditto for Nixon. This shithead will always have his cult followers, but he’ll lose his majority, and it’s just a question of how badly it gets, as to whether or not Republican Senators start to see their future threatened in the big blue tsunami of 2020.

And yes, R145 was joking. Though, perhaps we should just wait and see.

He probably will be tied up in court cases if the district courts decide to litigate his crimes in their district. SDNY, DNJ DCVA, DCDC, there are probably more than these.

In his press conference a little while ago Cheetolini decried the "phony emoluments clause."

That's disgraceful, R159.

I hope they not only jail him, but remove his and his family's Secret Service protection.

America does not lock up presidents or first ladys. It's just not done here.

I'd be surprised if anything ever happens to Trump as far as legal reprimanding or jail time.

I just don't see it happening.

R162. It shouldn't be that way. I always thought that the USA was at least better than corrupt hellholes like Mexico or Colombia. But this administration has proven that we are no better than them, and in some ways, worse. Colombia is at least opening its doors to the millions of Venezuelan refugees and giving them work permits, despite them barely having enough for themselves. Yet the deplorables approve the indefinite detention of refugees under squalid conditions and the separation of children from their families, with no knowledge or accountability as to where the children have gone. And they have the nerve to calm themselves Christian!

Once the President leaves office, he is no longer President, and as such can be prosecuted, even executed, for crimes.

R162, Trump is unique. He is certainly a Russian asset. Unwittingly or otherwise. He is as corrupt as they come. Dirty, dirty, dirty. He is also so neurotic or mentally ill that he can’t be trusted not to sell secrets to adversaries after his term in office.

He needs to be prosecute, convicted, and sent to Colorado’s Supermax prison where he can be put in solitary where he can’t divulge secrets to our adversaries.

Even Russia was “de-Stalinized”. His support will continue dropping as we hear more of the evidence. He’ll always have a core of followers, but they will become insignificant In number.