Trump Presser: live from 19th tee at Trump National Golf Club Bedminster (play 'Hail to the Chief')

There’s a presser from the Trump golf club, because optics matter: “Congress needs to stay in Washington and work this out. Now watch this tee shot.”

Undoubtedly pimpage of executive orders as a GOP stunt to criticize the Congressional impasse and circumvent legislation.

CNN is covering it, as is MSNBC and CSpan. Apparently by audience reaction, Trump made a sex joke to his country club buddies in today’s speech (see “middle” in the urban dictionary).

Date: August 7, 2020 at 6:18:05 PM EDT
Subject: WH Travel #3 – News conference at 7pm
The White House lifted the travel/photo lid and a 7pm news conference was added to the schedule.

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From which hole? ⛳️— Ben Cortman’s Ersatz Neighbor (@Bruh_Cortman) August 7, 2020

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YouTube Video

Trump says he plans on making insurers cover pre-existing conditions — a protection which already exists under Obamacare

Apparently, Obamacare (which was passed by Congress and signed by a President) is a huge overreach

But an executive order that does the same thing isn't?

If Trump really cares about pre-existing conditions (which he doesn't), just stop trying to repeal the ACA in court https://t.co/Af4yas2sjQ— Chris Lu (@ChrisLu44) August 8, 2020

“I don't care what anybody says” — Trump dismisses the intelligence community's announcement today that Russia is once again helping him pic.twitter.com/dCHTbJctN6

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) August 8, 2020

How long will he allow questions or will he follow the usual pattern of keeping pressers around 30 minutes. Someone should ask him about the superspreader event in Sturgis SD, among other things like how Biden is “against God”. It’s another stunt, pretending that he didn’t play golf this morning, and that he’s doing work, even in reality there are two GOP fundraisers this weekend in NY and NJ.

Trump says Joe Biden wants to “Take away your guns, take away your Second Amendment. No religion, no anything. Hurt the Bible. Hurt God. He’s against God. He’s against guns. He’s against energy, our kind of energy.”

Thousands of bikers are pouring into the small South Dakota city of Sturgis as the 80th Sturgis Motorcycle Rally rumbles to life. The rally could become one of the largest public gatherings since the coronavirus pandemic began. https://t.co/ayxAxjl8Ds

— The Associated Press (@AP) August 7, 2020

Rush Limbaugh attacks Biden’s faith: Talk about family tragedies is just “a crutch” that liberals “are allowed to lean on” https://t.co/RU9OHuhaAA pic.twitter.com/jhd8AJplEy

— Media Matters (@mmfa) August 7, 2020

Notice a pattern? pic.twitter.com/oBJ5bXjK4T

— Steve Marmel (@Marmel) August 7, 2020

It almost feels too obvious to have to point this out, but the ODNI statement does not say China is interfering in the election. pic.twitter.com/68Gf6jV8Hj

— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney) August 7, 2020

Hey, look—my new book EVIL GENIUSES: THE UNMAKING OF AMERICA isn’t out until next week but there’s a hefty excerpt in ⁦@TheAtlantic right now! https://t.co/vsNRwdopqN

— Kurt Andersen (@KBAndersen) August 7, 2020

Friday, Aug 7, 2020

Feeds are up. Country Club members are attending the presser as an audience, complete with beverages in hand. AP’s Jonathan Lemire reports that no one was temperature checked. Looks like it won’t start until 730pm, because he’s always late.

Spreader event in violation of crowd size: remember this is the same venue to which Trump invited those bikers in the rainstorm.

One of the drunks in the back needs to pipe up during this, one of whom put his hand in front of the live CSpan lens (hey, it’s Jersey fuhgeddaboudit). Trumpo starts at 732pm:

Oh my God, they’re playing “hail to the chief” in the dining room at Bedminster

— Tom Nichols (@RadioFreeTom) August 7, 2020

Comes out to “Hail to the Chief” and the “crowd” cheers. Trump reads boilerplate, uses eviction relief (ironic for a landlord) to blame “China Virus” “Democrats are holding relief hostage” proposes to defer payroll tax. Trump doesn’t understand what he’s reading.

Trump, saying his usual abject nonsense, says the pandemic “is disappearing. It's going to disappear.”

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) August 7, 2020

The legality of much of the unilateral stuff Trump is talking about doing is uncertain. https://t.co/JDb70f88iS

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) August 7, 2020

Trump says he will “enhance unemployment benefits through the end of the year,” though I think (think) he's still saying he's not doing this quite yet. He doesn't say what level the benefits would be at.

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) August 7, 2020

Trump says, if there is no deal, he'll act under his own authority to defer the payroll tax “for a period of months, til the end of the year,” “and it'll be retroactive to July 1,” and might extend it past the end of the year.

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) August 7, 2020

Mentions Lebanon and relief en route

Trump going sing-songy (child cries out in the background)

TVA “semi-public” labor kerfuffle “we’re going to do something about that” Trump tries to suck up to labor Apparently Trump hasn’t read the text before.

(Child continues to babble)

On Latin America and COVID (US Total resembles Mexico and Brazil) Trump claims “we’re doing well” more Trump nonsense about US hot spots. “heading down very rapidly” mentions AZ and FL. It’s clear this propaganda was meant to displace national news, and the only news was that relief funding stunt.

CNN and MSNBC went away, because of Trump spin, probably the “Hail to the Chief” did it.

More Trump bafflegab on testing, same blah-blah not matching reality.

Trump says, “in the not too distant future,” we'll have lots of rapid tests, as opposed to having to a three-day process of getting results from a lab.

In a lot of countries (and some places in the US), it doesn't take three days to get results from lab tests…

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) August 7, 2020

Trump pimps executive order covering all pre-existing conditions and yammers on about lowering drug prices.

Trump says drug prices went down “last year” for the first time in 51 years. By the measure he's using, they declined 0.7% in 2018, two years ago, then increased 3% in 2019.

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) August 7, 2020

Trump goes back to reading is getting bored, this has been a campaign speech. Trump doesn’t understand “favored nation” regulations (he doesn’t note that there are many exemptions in terms of domestic production)

Now trashes Biden — audience laughs

(children continue babbling) Trump tries to make joke about “middle-women” — falls flat, tries again saying he doesn’t know who those people are -which is an in-joke for the country club crowd.

Trump criticizes prescription drug middlemen. “Middlemen. I guess you'd have to say, to be politically correct, middlemen AND WOMEN. But you never heard the middlewomen before. You heard middlemen. That's the term.”

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) August 8, 2020

Trump now yaks about Portland, usual BS lawless rioters, agitators, and anarchists, trashes Portland mayor Wheeler “who surrendered his city to the mob” (he didn’t). Trump goes blah-blah “Portland is the roadmap” “Biden is a puppet” blah-blah. Trump distorts the narrative, then goes blah-blah about Minneapolis. Campaign speech.

Trump talks about Molotov cocktails in Portland, says the city's mayor is “disgraced,” talks again about the mayor's security detail, denounces “left-wing violent extremism” as “an increasing threat to our country.”

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) August 8, 2020

Trump now has put 30 minutes in on campaign speechery MSNBC and CNN are still not covering it, waiting for questions, Fox News has not cut away.

Questions

Q: negotiations with the Hill?

Trump goes blah-blah attacking Dems. Trump brags about being sued

Asked when he might sign these executive orders he talked about on coronavirus relief, Trump says “it could be by the end of the week.” He says he's not worried about the legality, though “probably we get sued.”

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) August 8, 2020

Q: Russian meddling?

“nobody’s been tougher on Russia than me” Trump goes blah-blah on deals with Iran and DPRK, does usual campaign speech tropes on China, etc… including blah-blah about employment numbers

Trump says “we have a terrific number of things and some very positive things” to talk about. He mentions the “China virus,” then boasts about the 1.8 million jobs added in July and the 9.3 million jobs added since May. (This followed a loss of 22 million jobs in March + April.)

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) August 7, 2020

Q: what do you plan to do about that interference?

“we’re going to look at it very closely” tries to deflect to China and imply that foreign powers will forge ballots

Q: why weren’t you more involved with Congressional negotiations?

attacks Schumer and Pelosi Trump says he’s “totally involved”

Trump says he will “enhance unemployment benefits through the end of the year,” though I think (think) he's still saying he's not doing this quite yet. He doesn't say what level the benefits would be at.

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) August 7, 2020

Q: why haven’t you spoken to Pelosi?

Trump punts

Q: where are you going to get the money?

“we have the money”

Asked if people will still get $600 a week under his plan, Trump says, “I won't say that yet.” But “we have the money…we have plenty of money.” No specifics.

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) August 8, 2020

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Q: you say the pandemic is disappearing, what about the people in the room

crowd boos “It looks like they’re wearing masks” Trump sucks up to crowd refers to fake news,

Trump sees it’s getting out of hand — flees

not quite an hour.

Breaking News

There’s a presser from the Trump golf club, because optics matter: “Congress needs to stay in Washington and work this out. Now watch this tee shot.”

Trump says Joe Biden wants to “Take away your guns, take away your Second Amendment. No religion, no anything. Hurt the Bible. Hurt God. He’s against God. He’s against guns. He’s against energy, our kind of energy.”

Questions