Live Coverage: Trump Declines to Sign Illinois Agreement Prohibiting Government Overthrow

Additional notable moments from Trump’s weekend rallies included his strange criticism of… (pauses to review notes)… oh, magnets.

The Republican politician also commended the strict leadership of Xi Jinping, the authoritarian premier of China, referring to him as a “brilliant man” for effectively managing a population of 1.4 billion people through ruthless means. However, he then went on to accuse Joe Biden of accepting money from China, despite recent reports from House Democrats stating that he earned a personal profit of at least $5.5 million from Chinese customs during his time in the White House.

Below is Andrew Feinberg’s article on the scandal.

It is surprising to note that the leading candidate for the Republican party had already advised a crowd in Sioux City to “move on” from the recent shooting at Perry High School.

Kelly Rissman possesses a greater quantity.

During a series of rallies in Iowa over the weekend, Trump made several bizarre and unsettling statements. One of these was his assertion that the American Civil War, which was fought over slavery, could have been resolved through negotiation and did not need to occur.

The ex-president delivered a speech at a rally for his campaign in Newton before the state’s caucuses on January 15th.

Discussing the Civil War between the Northern and Southern states from 1861 to 1865, he addressed his followers, saying: “I find it intriguing. Perhaps there was a chance for a peaceful resolution… However, if Abraham Lincoln had chosen to negotiate, he would not have become the iconic figure we know him as today. But that would have been acceptable.”

The remarks sparked immediate anger on the internet, but Molly Jong-Fast promptly recognized it as a calculated diversion from Joe Biden’s scathing criticism of his track record on Friday.

Oliver O’Connell has an increased amount.

According to The Chicago Sun Times, Donald Trump’s campaign declined to sign a loyalty pledge while registering for the primary ballot in Illinois for the upcoming election. This pledge would have required the candidate to promise not to incite the overthrow of the US government.

Both Joe Biden and Ron DeSantis have agreed to the terms of the agreement, which requires candidates to pledge that they will not promote or support the overthrow of the government of the United States or their state, or use illegal methods to bring about a change in government.

Trump did sign the same plea when registering to run in 2016 and 2020 and his campaign spokesman Steven Cheung said of the decision to abstain this time around: “President Trump will once again take the oath of office on 20 January, 2025, and will swear ‘to faithfully execute the office of president of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States’.”

Michael Tyler, a representative for the Biden team, stated: “Donald Trump is unable to bring himself to sign a document stating that he will not try to stage a coup to overthrow our government. We can see that he is very serious about this, as three years ago on this day, he attempted and was unsuccessful in doing so.”

In response to the announcement on MSNBC, the analysts Kurt Bardella, Susan Del Percio, and David Jolly concurred that the update was consistent with the candidate’s image.

On Saturday, a judge ruled that former President Donald Trump’s legal team cannot make legal arguments to a jury during a defamation trial. This trial is based on the jury’s decision last year that Trump was not guilty of raping a columnist in the 1990s.

Judge Lewis A. Kaplan of the U.S. District Court issued a ruling before the January 16 trial to assess the amount of damages for defamation against Trump. This came after a jury found that Trump had sexually assaulted columnist E. Jean Carroll, but there was not enough evidence to prove that he had raped her.

During a campaign event in Iowa on Saturday, Trump, who is currently leading as the Republican candidate for president, spoke out against the judge and referred to them as a “radical Democrat.” He also made fun of E. Jean Carroll for not screaming during her alleged attack, stating that her story was fabricated.

In May of last year, Carroll, who is 80 years old, was awarded $5 million by a jury. They found that Trump had sexually assaulted her in a high-end department store dressing room in 1996 and had also slandered her in 2022.

Trump did not attend the Manhattan trial where Carroll testified that a chance encounter at a Bergdorf Goodman store across the street from Trump Tower was flirtatious and fun until he slammed her against a wall in a dressing room and attacked her sexually. Trump has vehemently denied it.

The story is being shared by Kelly Rissman.

According to U.S. officials, members of Congress and Pentagon leaders were not informed until Saturday that Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin had been hospitalized since Monday. This has raised concerns about his condition and the lack of transparency surrounding it.

It is still unknown when the White House and other prominent U.S. figures were notified about his time spent at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland.

The Pentagon’s delay in revealing Austin’s hospitalization for several days demonstrates a significant lack of openness regarding his illness, the severity of it, and his potential release date. This level of secrecy, especially during a time when the country is facing multiple national security challenges, goes against the usual protocol for the president and other high-ranking U.S. officials and members of the Cabinet.

Kamala Harris, the Vice President, issued a cautionary statement on Saturday regarding the threat posed by Republicans and former president Donald Trump to the freedoms and rights that have been hard-earned and hard-fought. She emphasized the significance of Black voters in the success of her and President Joe Biden’s electoral efforts.

Ms. Harris, who visited Myrtle Beach, South Carolina to speak at the African Methodist Episcopal Church’s Seventh District Women’s Missionary Society, reflected on the fact that Americans had turned out to vote during a worldwide pandemic over three years ago.

Andrew Feinberg reports:

Three years after the assault on Congress, approximately 1,230 individuals have faced federal charges related to January 6. Of these, 750 have been sentenced. However, there are still at least 80 unidentified individuals, including the individual wearing a grey hooded sweatshirt who placed pipe bombs outside the offices of the Democratic and Republican National Committees.

This is a chronology of the major events that have taken place in the three years since that notorious day.