Quid pro quo and Putin praise: Trump’s contentious history with Ukraine

The Biden administration is pushing through major support for Ukraine before Donald Trump takes office. 

From billions of dollars in security assistance to a nearly $5 billion debt-relief package, Biden is attempting to stockpile support before the wells are expected to dry up under Trump’s presidency. 

Trump has claimed he will end the war in just one day, with no explanation of how he would do that. However, Trump’s previous statements regarding the war—including his refusal to pick a side—suggest the felon-elect would lean in favor of Russia to swiftly dissolve conflict. 

The nonstop news cycle makes it easy to lose track of the why’s and who’s in this issue, so Daily Kos has compiled a quick walk-through history on Trump’s relationships with Ukraine and Russia.

Here’s what you need to know.

The “perfect phone call” scandal

The way the world views Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has changed quite a lot since he first took office in 2019. Since Russia’s invasion of his country in 2022, Zelenskyy has been a praised wartime leader—a huge jump from his time as a comedian who played the piano with his penis—but in 2019, Zelenskyy found himself as a pawn in Trump’s political maneuvers. 

That July, Trump swept Zelenskyy up into an international scandal, threatening in a phone call to withhold aid from the Ukrainian president unless he provided dirt on Joe Biden, who had not even won the Democratic nomination yet.

Later in 2019, officials testified before Congress that Trump withheld $400 million in security aid as a means to coerce Zelenskyy to announce Ukraine would investigate Biden for corruption.

Ultimately, this—and plenty more—led to Trump’s impeachment in the House. He was later acquitted by the Senate.

“I’m the only one to get impeached on a perfect phone call, like a perfect phone call,” Trump said laughably in an August 2020 interview with Fox Business.

Historically, the U.S. has provided aid to Ukraine as an incentive for pushing out corruption and promoting democracy. However, Trump’s request positioned Zelenskyy to play the same games of corruption the Ukrainian president was fighting, in exchange for much-needed aid.

The praise-fest

Trump has a laundry list of kind words for Russian dictator Vladimir Putin. Here are some of the (many) receipts of their love exchange over the years. 

In 2014, Trump praised Putin for the takeover of Crimea, saying the move was “smart” and predicting that Ukraine would fall “fairly quickly” because of it. 

In 2022, Trump called the Russian dictator a “genius” and “very savvy” for his invasion of Ukraine.

“I went in yesterday and there was a television screen, and I said, ‘This is genius,’” Trump said following the invasion. “Putin declares a big portion of the Ukraine—of Ukraine—Putin declares it as independent. Oh, that’s wonderful.”

According to CNN, Trump talked about Putin over 80 times, often heaping praise on him, between June 2013 and February 2017. 

Putin is now returning some of the sentiment. In November, Putin said he is willing to reopen the line of communication about ending the war once “courageous” Trump takes office next year. 

However, critics have argued that Trump and Putin’s idea of ending the war leans more in favor of the dictatorship claiming Ukrainian land and less in line with the U.S. 's history of supporting Ukraine’s independence.

Trump smears Ukraine

While the U.S. has a long track record of providing support to Ukraine to promote the country’s independence and anti-corruption efforts, Trump has turned his back on the idea of Ukrainian independence from Russia, painting the country as broken and helpless. 

In September, Trump dismissed Ukraine as "demolished” and called its people “dead” as he raved about how the country should have given into Russia’s demands sooner. 

“If they made a bad deal it would’ve been much better,” he continued. “They would’ve given up a little bit and everybody would be living and every building would be built and every tower would be aging for another 2,000 years.”

The incoming president further speculated that Ukraine shouldn’t have fought Putin, saying that “the worst deal would’ve been better than what we have now.”

Trump has seemingly taken up a personal vendetta with Zelenskyy as well, making jabs to delegitimize the Ukrainian president. 

“Every time Zelenskyy comes to the United States he walks away with $100 billion, I think he’s the greatest salesman on Earth,” Trump said in September, on the campaign trail. 

The U.S. has supplied $175 billion of aid to Ukraine since Russia’s invasion, with $106 billion of that going directly to Ukraine’s government. 

Notably, Trump has pointed fingers at Ukraine and Zelenskyy for the war while staying mum about any fault Russia might have. 

At the end of the day, Trump made his stance clear last month when he said Zelenskyy “should never have let that war start.”

 

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How Trump plans to seize the power of the purse From Congress

The second-term president likely will seek to cut off spending that lawmakers have already appropriated, setting off a constitutional struggle within the branches. If successful, he could wield the power to punish perceived foes.

By Molly Redden, for ProPublica

ProPublica is a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative newsroom. Sign up for The Big Story newsletter to receive stories like this one in your inbox.

Donald Trump is entering his second term with vows to cut a vast array of government services and a radical plan to do so. Rather than relying on his party’s control of Congress to trim the budget, Trump and his advisers intend to test an obscure legal theory holding that presidents have sweeping power to withhold funding from programs they dislike.

“We can simply choke off the money,” Trump said in a 2023 campaign video. “For 200 years under our system of government, it was undisputed that the president had the constitutional power to stop unnecessary spending.”

His plan, known as “impoundment,” threatens to provoke a major clash over the limits of the president’s control over the budget. The Constitution gives Congress the sole authority to appropriate the federal budget, while the role of the executive branch is to dole out the money effectively. But Trump and his advisers are asserting that a president can unilaterally ignore Congress’ spending decisions and “impound” funds if he opposes them or deems them wasteful.

Trump’s designs on the budget are part of his administration’s larger plan to consolidate as much power in the executive branch as possible. This month, he pressured the Senate to go into recess so he could appoint his cabinet without any oversight. (So far, Republicans who control the chamber have not agreed to do so.) His key advisers have spelled out plans to bring independent agencies, such as the Department of Justice, under political control.

If Trump were to assert a power to kill congressionally approved programs, it would almost certainly tee up a fight in the federal courts and Congress and, experts say, could fundamentally alter Congress’ bedrock power.

“It’s an effort to wrest the entire power of the purse away from Congress, and that is just not the constitutional design,” said Eloise Pasachoff, a Georgetown Law professor who has written about the federal budget and appropriations process. “The president doesn’t have the authority to go into the budget bit by bit and pull out the stuff he doesn’t like.”

Trump’s claim to have impoundment power contravenes a Nixon-era law that forbids presidents from blocking spending over policy disagreements as well as a string of federal court rulings that prevent presidents from refusing to spend money unless Congress grants them the flexibility.

Elon Musk and Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump during a campaign rally on Saturday, Oct. 5, 2024, in Butler, Pennsylvania.

In an op-ed published Wednesday, tech billionaire Elon Musk and former Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, who are overseeing the newly created, nongovernmental Department of Government Efficiency, wrote that they planned to slash federal spending and fire civil servants. Some of their efforts could offer Trump his first Supreme Court test of the post-Watergate Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974, which requires the president to spend the money Congress approves. The law allows exceptions, such as when the executive branch can achieve Congress’ goals by spending less, but not as a means for the president to kill programs he opposes.

Trump and his aides have been telegraphing his plans for a hostile takeover of the budgeting process for months. Trump has decried the 1974 law as “not a very good act” in his campaign video and said, “Bringing back impoundment will give us a crucial tool with which to obliterate the Deep State.”

Musk and Ramaswamy have seized that mantle, writing, “We believe the current Supreme Court would likely side with him on this question.”

The once-obscure debate over impoundment has come into vogue in MAGA circles thanks to veterans of Trump’s first administration who remain his close allies. Russell Vought, Trump’s former budget director, and Mark Paoletta, who served under Vought as the Office of Management and Budget general counsel, have worked to popularize the idea from the Trump-aligned think tank Vought founded, the Center for Renewing America.

On Friday, Trump announced he had picked Vought to lead OMB again. “Russ knows exactly how to dismantle the Deep State and end Weaponized Government, and he will help us return Self Governance to the People,” Trump said in a statement.

Vought was also a top architect of the controversial Project 2025. In private remarks to a gathering of MAGA luminaries uncovered by ProPublica, Vought boasted that he was assembling a “shadow” Office of Legal Counsel so that Trump is armed on day one with the legal rationalizations to realize his agenda.

“I don’t want President Trump having to lose a moment of time having fights in the Oval Office about whether something is legal or doable or moral,” Vought said.

Trump spokespeople and Vought did not respond to requests for comment.

The prospect of Trump seizing vast control over federal spending is not merely about reducing the size of the federal government, a long-standing conservative goal. It is also fueling new fears about his promises of vengeance.

A similar power grab led to his first impeachment. During his first term, Trump held up nearly $400 million in military aid to Ukraine while he pressured President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to open a corruption investigation into Joe Biden and his family. The U.S. Government Accountability Office later ruled his actions violated the Impoundment Control Act.

Pasachoff predicted that, when advantageous, the incoming Trump administration will attempt to achieve the goals of impoundment without picking such a high-profile fight.

Trump tested piecemeal ways beyond the Ukrainian arms imbroglio to withhold federal funding as a means to punish his perceived enemies, said Bobby Kogan, a former OMB adviser under Biden and the senior director of federal budget policy at the left-leaning think tank American Progress. After devastating wildfires in California and Washington, Trump delayed or refused to sign disaster declarations that would have unlocked federal relief aid because neither state had voted for him. He targeted so-called sanctuary cities by conditioning federal grants on local law enforcement’s willingness to cooperate with mass deportation efforts. The Biden administration eventually withdrew the policy.

Trump and his aides claim there is a long presidential history of impoundment dating back to Thomas Jefferson.

Most historical examples involve the military and cases where Congress had explicitly given presidents permission to use discretion, said Zachary Price, a professor at the University of California College of the Law, San Francisco. Jefferson, for example, decided not to spend money Congress had appropriated for gun boats — a decision the law, which appropriated money for “a number not exceeding fifteen gun boats” using “a sum not exceeding fifty thousand dollars,” authorized him to make.

President Donald Trump listens while acting OMB Director Russell Vought speaks in the Roosevelt Room of the White House on Oct. 9, 2019.

President Richard Nixon took impoundment to a new extreme, wielding the concept to gut billions of dollars from programs he simply opposed, such as highway improvements, water treatment, drug rehabilitation and disaster relief for farmers. He faced overwhelming pushback both from Congress and in the courts. More than a half dozen federal judges and the Supreme Court ultimately ruled that the appropriations bills at issue did not give Nixon the flexibility to cut individual programs.

Vought and his allies argue the limits Congress placed in 1974 are unconstitutional, saying a clause in the Constitution obligating the president to “faithfully execute” the law also implies his power to forbid its enforcement. (Trump is fond of describing Article II, where this clause lives, as giving him “the right to do whatever I want as president.”)

The Supreme Court has never directly weighed in on whether impoundment is constitutional. But it threw water on that reasoning in an 1838 case, Kendall v. U.S., about a federal debt payment.

“To contend that the obligation imposed on the President to see the laws faithfully executed, implies a power to forbid their execution, is a novel construction of the constitution, and entirely inadmissible,” the justices wrote.

During his cutting spree, Nixon’s own Justice Department argued roughly the same.

“With respect to the suggestion that the President has a constitutional power to decline to spend appropriated funds,” William Rehnquist, the head of the Office of Legal Counsel whom Nixon later appointed to the Supreme Court, warned in a 1969 legal memo, “we must conclude that existence of such a broad power is supported by neither reason nor precedent.”

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Marjorie Taylor Greene’s new gig will make your eyes roll

All-star conspiracy theorist Marjorie Taylor Greene has been given her own subcommittee to chair. The representative from Georgia will work under the House Oversight Committee and alongside Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy’s toothless Department of Government Efficiency—yes, named after the DOGE meme and crypto scheme that Musk is so fond of.

Fox News reports that Greene will chair yet another DOGE—the Delivering on Government Efficiency Committee, which will purportedly “focus on rooting out waste, fraud and abuse in the federal government.”

A longtime Donald Trump loyalist, Greene tried and failed to oust Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson earlier this year. She subsequently threatened to try it again. The prospect of chairing her own subcommittee seems to have mollified the congresswoman, as reports indicate she is now expected to support Johnson’s upcoming bid to re-up as speaker.

Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez had a perfect response to Greene’s new gig. 

“​​This is good, actually,” AOC posted on X. “She barely shows up and doesn’t do the reading. To borrow a phrase I saw elsewhere, it’s like giving someone an unplugged controller.“

“Absolutely dying at those two now getting assigned the ‘privilege’ of ‘working” with MTG,” she continued. “That is actually hilarious. Enjoy, fellas! Very prestigious post you have there.”

Absolutely dying at those two now getting assigned the “privilege” of “working” with MTG. That is actually hilarious. Enjoy, fellas! Very prestigious post you have there 💀

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) November 22, 2024

Carpetbagger Greene has a rich history of unproductive antics in the House and on committees. Way back in 2021, 11 Republicans voted with Democrats to remove Greene from her committee assignments. At the time, Greene’s history of making threatening statements against fellow lawmakers and spewing antisemitic conspiracy theories was considered a detriment to the American public.

In 2023, after the GOP retook control of the House, Greene got a chance to embarrass America as a committee member again. And since her very first day back, she has spewed hate, disseminated misinformation, and even had to be muzzled by her own party’s committee chair for being such a crap-tabulous person.

She is now tasked with having to actually work with someone. Sure, she will parade in government agency officials and then misinform the public about excessive spending while turning a blind eye to actual waste and the private sector’s gouging of American taxpayers. But will her ego coexist with Musk’s, a guy known to relish in destroying things because he’s in a tyrannical position of power? 

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Thought Gaetz was a bad attorney general pick? Get a load of Pam Bondi

Donald Trump has chosen to nominate former Florida Attorney General and Fox News guest host Pam Bondi to serve as his attorney general. Trump made the decision after his first choice, sex trafficking investigation subject Matt Gaetz, decided to drop out.

Bondi fits right in with Trump ideologically. During her time serving in Florida, Bondi focused on attacking the Affordable Care Act, which Trump has long pushed to repeal.

In 2012, she worked with other Republican attorneys general on a lawsuit meant to undo the law, which has extended health care coverage to millions of Americans. Bondi clearly relished her role as the public face of the suit and a 2012 Tampa Bay Times story quoted Bondi asking her team to take photos of her in front of the Supreme Court following a news conference there.

The case failed and the law has remained in place—with coverage expanded by the Biden/Harris administration.

Bondi was also part of a 2018 lawsuit that sought to strike down provisions in the law that require insurance companies to cover people with preexisting conditions. That effort also ultimately failed.

Like so many others in the Trump orbit, Bondi is a frequent part of the rotation of guests and guest hosts on Fox News.

In her appearances on the network the lawyer distinguished herself by referring to Kenosha shooter Kyle Rittenhouse as merely a “little boy out there trying to protect his community,” and by calling for schools to follow the post-9/11 airport security model in response to school shootings, as opposed to gun regulation.

Trump enlisted Bondi to argue his case on the Senate floor when he was impeached for using the presidency to solicit political favors from Ukraine, and she was one of the public faces of Trump’s efforts to promote election lies following his loss to President Joe Biden in the 2020 election.

“We’ve won Pennsylvania,” Bondi claimed at the time—and in a Fox News appearance came up with a story about “fake ballots” purportedly being counted in the state. Trump lost Pennsylvania to Biden by over 80,000 votes.

Trump has frequently said that loyalty is extremely important to him, and Bondi has been an advocate for him for years.

Those ties have also led to the appearance of corruption. In 2016, Trump was forced to pay a penalty to the IRS after it was determined that he had broken tax laws by giving a political contribution to a Bondi-connected nonprofit.

Following that 2013 donation of $25,000 from Trump, Bondi decided not to investigate fraud claims against Trump University in her role as Florida attorney general. Years later, Trump paid out $25 million in settlements to students who said the organization had duped them with promises to impart the “secrets of success” in real estate.

Unlike Gaetz, Bondi may not have any ongoing sex trafficking investigations (that are publicly known at least) but she has proven herself a Trump diehard, which is his top qualification for the most important positions.

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Trump taps Pam Bondi for attorney general after Gaetz withdraws

President-elect Donald Trump on Thursday named Pam Bondi, the former attorney general of Florida, to be U.S. attorney general just hours after his other choice, Matt Gaetz, withdrew his name from consideration.

Bondi is a longtime Trump ally and was one of his lawyers during his first impeachment trial, when he was accused — but not convicted — of abusing his power as he tried to condition U.S. military assistance to Ukraine on that country investigating then-former Vice President Joe Biden.

Bondi was among a group of Republicans who showed up to support Trump at his hush money criminal trial in New York that ended in May with a conviction on 34 felony counts. She's been a chair at the America First Policy Institute, a think tank set up by former Trump administration staffers.

“For too long, the partisan Department of Justice has been weaponized against me and other Republicans - Not anymore,” Trump said in a social media post. “Pam will refocus the DOJ to its intended purpose of fighting Crime, and Making America Safe Again.”

Trump’s son Donald Trump Jr. told Fox Business on Sunday that the transition team had backups in mind for his controversial nominees should they fail to get confirmed. The swift selection of Bondi came about six hours after Gaetz withdrew.

Matt Gaetz speaks to media outside the U.S. Capitol on June 11.

Gaetz stepped aside amid continued fallout over a federal sex trafficking investigation that cast doubt on his ability to be confirmed as the nation's chief federal law enforcement officer.

That announcement capped a turbulent eight-day period in which Trump sought to capitalize on his decisive election win to force Senate Republicans to accept provocative selections like Gaetz, who had been investigated by the Justice Department before being tapped last week to lead it. The decision could heighten scrutiny on other controversial Trump nominees, including Pentagon pick Pete Hegseth, who faces sexual assault allegations that he denies.

“While the momentum was strong, it is clear that my confirmation was unfairly becoming a distraction to the critical work of the Trump/Vance Transition,” Gaetz, a Florida Republican who one day earlier met with senators in an effort to win their support, said in a statement.

“There is no time to waste on a needlessly protracted Washington scuffle, thus I’ll be withdrawing my name from consideration to serve as Attorney General. Trump’s DOJ must be in place and ready on Day 1," he added. Hours later, Gaetz posted on social media that he looks “forward to continuing the fight to save our country,” adding, “Just maybe from a different post.”

Trump, in a social media post, said: “I greatly appreciate the recent efforts of Matt Gaetz in seeking approval to be Attorney General. He was doing very well but, at the same time, did not want to be a distraction for the Administration, for which he has much respect. Matt has a wonderful future, and I look forward to watching all of the great things he will do!”

Screenshot of Donald Trump’s Truth Social post on Nov. 21 announcing Pam Bondi as his new attorney general nominee.

Last week, Trump named personal lawyers Todd Blanche, Emil Bove and D. John Sauer to senior roles in the department. Another possible attorney general contender, Matt Whitaker, was announced Wednesday as the U.S. ambassador to NATO.

Trump picks his former director of national intelligence to head CIA

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — President-elect Donald Trump announced that he is nominating former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe to lead the Central Intelligence Agency.

A former Republican congressman from Texas, Ratcliffe served as director of national intelligence for the final year and a half of Trump’s first term, leading the U.S. government’s spy agencies during the coronavirus pandemic. He is a more traditional pick for the role, which requires Senate confirmation, than some rumored loyalists pushed by some of Trump's supporters.

As intelligence director, he was criticized by Democrats for declassifying in the final days of the 2020 presidential election Russian intelligence alleging damaging information about Democrats during the 2016 race even though he acknowledged it might not be true.

Ratcliffe's visibility rose as he emerged in 2019 as an ardent defender of Trump during the House’s first impeachment proceedings against him. He was a member of Trump’s impeachment advisory team and strenuously questioned witnesses during the impeachment hearings.

After the Democratic-controlled House voted to impeach Trump, Ratcliffe said: “This is the thinnest, fastest and weakest impeachment our country has ever seen.” He also forcefully questioned former special counsel Robert Mueller when he testified before the House Judiciary Committee about his investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.

“I look forward to John being the first person ever to serve in both of our Nation’s highest Intelligence positions,” Trump said in a statement. “He will be a fearless fighter for the Constitutional Rights of all Americans, while ensuring the Highest Levels of National Security, and PEACE THROUGH STRENGTH.”

Forget how corrupt Trump’s first presidency was? Watch this

The corruption of Donald Trump’s first administration was so constant that it’s easy to forget every scandal. Thankfully, on Monday night, MSNBC host Rachel Maddow is here to remind us as Trump begins to stock his incoming White House with bigots, sycophants, and even a puppy killer.

"The first Donald Trump presidential term had so many cabinet officials forced out of office in disgrace and referred to the Justice Department to face criminal charges,” Maddow recalled. “It's actually hard to remember them all."

Maddow ran down some of Trump's original Cabinet secretaries:

  • Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke left his position after more than a dozen investigations into dubious dealings and potential ethical violations. (Zinke is now the representative for Montana’s 1st Congressional District.)

  • Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao’s tenure as the ineffective mouthpiece for Trump’s nonexistent infrastructure bill was filled with reports that she used her position to enrich her family. 

  • Energy Secretary Rick Perry was one of the Trump officials who resigned after Trump’s Ukraine scandal, which led to Trump’s first impeachment.

  • Labor Secretary Alexander Acosta resigned after having given sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein a sweetheart deal. (Trump then dragged his heels in replacing Acosta.)

  • Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price joined Trump’s administration as an ethically challenged secretary, then left office after multiple federal inquiries into his use of taxpayer money to fund extravagant travel.

  • EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt, whose ethical integrity matched that of a wet piece of rice paper, left his position because he couldn’t manage the multiple ethics investigations into his activities.

And these were simply Trump’s first round of picks. One of Trump’s last scandal-laden cabinet members, Secretary of Veterans Affairs Robert Wilkie, is leading Trump's Defense Department transition team. Wilkie’s time in the first Trump administration was marred by claims he orchestrated a smear campaign against a female veteran who alleged she was sexually assaulted at a V.A. facility.

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Trump chooses New York Rep. Elise Stefanik as ambassador to UN

President-elect Donald Trump has chosen Rep. Elise Stefanik to serve as his ambassador to the United Nations.

“Elise is an incredibly strong, tough, and smart America First fighter,” Trump said in a statement Monday announcing his pick.

Nikki Haley, who challenged Trump for the GOP nomination, was among those who previously held the role in his first term.

Stefanik, 40, who serves as House Republican Conference Chair, has long been one of Trump's most loyal allies in the House, and was among those discussed as a potential vice presidential choice.

Born and raised in upstate New York, Stefanik graduated from Harvard and worked in former President George W. Bush’s White House on the domestic policy council and in the chief of staff’s office.

In 2014, at 30, she became the youngest woman ever elected to Congress, representing upstate New York. She later became the youngest woman to serve in House leadership.

Stefanik was known early in her tenure as a more moderate conservative voice. But she soon attached herself to the former president, quietly remaking her image into that of a staunch MAGA ally — and seeing her power ascend.

She became the House Republican Conference Chair in 2021.

Stefanik spent years positioning herself as one of Trump’s most trusted allies and confidants on the Hill. She endorsed him in the 2024 race before he had even launched his bid, and aggressively campaigned on his behalf during the GOP primary.

She saw her profile rise after her aggressive questioning of a trio of university presidents over anti-Semitism on campus led to two of their resignations — a performance Trump repeatedly praised.

She also defended him vigorously in both of his impeachment trials and railed against his four criminal indictments, including filing an ethics complaint in New York against the judge who heard his civil fraud case.

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Fox News hosts suggest ‘death penalty’ for Trump legal foes

On Thursday, Fox News host Dana Perino suggested the “death penalty” as a course of action for lawyers who have gone after Donald Trump on legal grounds in the past few years.

The remark occurred during a discussion on the network’s panel show, “The Five.”

Co-host Greg Gutfeld asked her if the lawyers involved in these cases require therapy following Trump’s successful campaign.

“Yes, they definitely need therapy, and maybe also the death penalty,” Perino responded. 

Gutfeld agreed, adding, “Yes, I think the death penalty.”

Perino went on to argue that she believes Trump won the race because of the cases filed against him, rejecting the notion that they were a negative to many voters.

Both pundits made their remarks using a light tone—odd for speaking about an execution—but the rhetoric reflects the fascist tone of Trump and the conservative movement. Fox frequently reflects and amplifies this world view in their consistent role throughout the years as a promoter and amplifier of Trump’s outlook.

The outcome of the legal cases that Fox derided proved in the court of law the extent of Trump’s corruption.

A New York court fined Trump $355 million after it agreed that he lied about his finances while securing loans and business deals in the state. A jury of his peers in New York found him guilty on 34 felony counts for payments made related to silencing adult film star Stormy Daniels.

While the federal cases against Trump on mishandling classified documents and attempting to subvert the 2020 election are now being wound down, he was nonetheless impeached—for a second time—for inciting the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Going forward, the feedback loop between Trump and Fox News is sure to continue—he feeds them rhetoric and attacks, they amplify those attacks and give him fodder for more fury—and casual talk about death for legal officials doing their jobs will further be normalized.

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Democratic leaders show how to lose with grace—unlike, well, you know

Democratic leaders are taking the high road in the wake of Vice President Kamala Harris’ defeat at the polls, but reminding Americans that the fight is far from over. 

President Joe Biden addressed a grieving nation from the White House Rose Garden on Thursday, and stayed true to America’s democratic values. 

“I’ll fulfill my oath. I will honor the Constitution. On Jan. 20th, we’ll have a peaceful transfer of power here in America”, Biden said

This is the first presidential election since the Jan. 6th insurrection that then-President Donald Trump encouraged as he tried to overturn the results of the 2020 election while claiming voter fraud. Millions of Americans are once again mourning the possibility of America’s first woman president—along with the daunting reality of Trump’s second term in the White House. 

“You’re hurting. I hear you, and I see you,” Biden said. 

But he had a pep talk for the disillusioned.

“Setbacks are unavoidable, but giving up is unforgivable,” he said. “We all get knocked down. But the measure of our character, as my dad would say, is how quickly we get back up. Remember, defeat does not mean we are defeated. We lost this battle. The America of your dreams is calling for you to get back up.”

During her 12-minute concession speech at Howard University on Wednesday, Harris also encouraged a peaceful transfer of power in the wake of her loss to Trump.

“We must accept the results of this election,” she said.

She also had a message of resilience.

“Don’t you ever listen when anyone tells you something is impossible because it has never been done before,” said Harris, the first woman of color to ascend as a nominee for president. “You have the capacity to do extraordinary good in the world. And so to everyone who is watching, do not despair. This is not a time to throw up our hands. This is a time to roll up our sleeves.”

Former President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama posted a joint statement on X on Wednesday that exuded grace. 

"This is obviously not the outcome we had hoped for, given our profound disagreements with the Republican ticket on a whole host of issues," they wrote. "But living in a democracy is about recognizing that our point of view won't always win out, and being willing to accept the peaceful transfer of power." 

They praised Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, as “two extraordinary public servants who ran a remarkable campaign.”

Here's our statement on the results of the 2024 presidential election: pic.twitter.com/lDkNVQDvMn

— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) November 6, 2024

Former Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, also released a joint statement on X Wednesday. 

“We wish them well and hope they will govern for all of us,” they said about Trump and Vice President-elect JD Vance. “We must remember that America is bigger than the results of any one election, and what we as citizens do now will make the difference between a nation that moves forward and one that falls back.”

Our statement on the result of the 2024 election. pic.twitter.com/1YYdGElPMP

— Bill Clinton (@BillClinton) November 6, 2024

“The Daily Show” host Jon Stewart gave a hopeful, rousing speech to his audience on election night when it became clear that Trump was going to win. 

“We have to continue to fight and continue to work, day in and day out, to create the better society for our children, for this world, for this country, that we know is possible,” Stewart said. “It's possible.”

As painful as this election was for many, this moment calls not for despair, but determination. And while leaders called for strength and patience, some Democratic voters felt compelled to express their understandable anger and frustration.

“Americans chose a known, obvious fascist and now America will get whatever this wannabe dictator wants to enact from here on in,” The White Stripes musician Jack White posted on Instagram. “We all know what he is capable of: Project 2025, deportations, nationwide abortion ban, ending his own 2 term limit, backing Putin and his war, shutting down the Board of Education, adding to climate change, limiting LGBTQ rights, controlling the DOJ, keeping the minimum wage down, etc. etc. etc.”

Singer-songwriter Ethel Cain sounded an equally furious note on her Tumblr page.

“If you voted for Trump, I hope that peace never finds you,” she wrote. “Instead, I hope clarity strikes you someday like a clap of lightning and you have to live the rest of your life with the knowledge and guilt of what you’ve done and who you are as a person.”

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