Donald Trump and his Manhattan criminal trial were the butt of the jokes at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner on Saturday night with both host Colin Jost and President Joe Biden taking jabs.
“Donald has had a few tough days lately. You might call it Stormy weather,” Mr Biden quipped at the annual event.
He referred to his political opponent as “a six-year-old” and “Sleepy Don.”
Mr Jost joked about Mr Trump’s trial, saying: “Can we just acknowledge how refreshing it is to see a President of the United States at an event that doesn’t begin with a bailiff saying, ‘All rise?’”
Mr Trump is expected to return to court on Tuesday for the second week of testimony in the trial in which he’s accused of falsifying business records to conceal hush-money payments that were made to adult film star Stormy Daniels, just days before the 2016 presidential election.
Prosecutors allege it was part of a greater catch-and-kill scheme to influence the election.
This past week the jury heard from David Pecker, former National Enquirer publisher, who doubled down on his testimony that he bought and silenced the story of Playboy model Karen McDougal’s alleged affair with Mr Trump.
Doug Burgum moving up Trump’s VP list, report says
Doug Burgum, the governor of North Dakota and failed presidential candidate is apparently moving up the list of Donald Trump’s potential vice president pics, according to Axios.
Four people familiar with the situation told the online news outlet that Mr Trump has been speaking about Mr Burgum more often and hosted him and his wife for Easter brunch.
Mr Burgum, 67, is a staunch conservative with a background in business.
Trump attacks RFK Jr after polling shows he’s strong with potential voters
Former president Donald Trump has begun lashing out at independent presidential candidate Robert F Kennedy Jr amid recent polling indicating Mr Kennedy is attracting the support of potential Trump voters.
Over the weekend, Mr Trump made at least four Truth Social posts attacking Mr Kennedy, falsely asserting he is a “Democratic plant” installed to help President Joe Biden win, that he is more liberal than any other candidate and that his views on vaccines are “fake.”
“A Vote for Junior’ would essentially be a WASTED PROTEST VOTE, that could swing either way, but would only swing against the Democrats if Republicans knew the true story about him. ” Mr Trump wrote on Saturday.
The sudden ramp-up of attacks arrives after polling from Quinnipiac, Marist and NBC News shows that Mr Kennedy’s campaign is taking votes away from Mr Trump.
NBC News’ poll shows that in match-ups between Mr Trump and Mr Biden, the former president has at least a two-point lead. But when Mr Kennedy is thrown into the mix, Mr Biden then takes the lead. Marist polling indicates Mr Kennedy has managed to increase his support among independents from 21 per cent to 27 per cent – meanwhile, Mr Trump has gone from 38 per cent to 30 per cent.
Biden takes aim at Trump’s criminal trial: ‘Stormy weather’
President Joe Biden poked fun at his political opponent at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner on Saturday, claiming Donald Trump had faced “Stormy weather” recently.
“Donald has had a few tough days lately. You might call it Stormy weather,” Mr Biden quipped.
The joke was a reference to both the string of criminal proceedings Mr Trump has faced in multiple states and also the New York criminal trial that features adult film star, Stormy Daniels.
The president leaned into the annual event’s energy, joking that Mr Trump is “a six-year-old” and calling him “Sleepy Don” because he falls asleep in court often.
Trump’s new nickname for Robert F Kennedy Jr
Donald Trump, never short of creativity, has found a new nickname for one of his political opponents Robert F Kennedy Jr – simply: Junior.
Seemingly in an effort to downplay the independent presidential candidate’s legitimacy, Mr Trump has begun calling him “Junior”. He’s invoked the nickname in several Truth Social rants from over the weekend.
“Junior’ is far more LIBERAL than [Bill Maher] and, in fact, far more LIBERAL than anyone running as a Democrat, including West and Stein,” Mr Trump wrote on Sunday.
The former president also called Mr Kennedy “Junior” in a post on Saturday.
Trump led a ‘violent insurrection’ but I’ll still vote for him, says McConnell
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell will vote for the man he holds personally responsible for leading a “violent insurrection” at his workplace, the US Capitol, Congress’s senior Republican declared on Sunday.
It was an affirmation of both previous statements the senator has made as well as the modern state of the GOP: utterly loyal to the man who, three years ago, he and others were roundly denouncing after a violent assault on the seat of American democracy left dozens of cops wounded and several dead including members of law enforcement and rioters.
John Bowden reports:
Lindsey Graham says he will still vote for Trump even if he’s convicted
South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham said he will still support former president Donald Trump in the November election – even if he’s convicted of a crime.
Just to underscore something you said earlier, if he is convicted you will still support him and vote for him?” CNN’s Dana Bash asked Mr Graham.
Mr Graham responded: “Absolutely! I think what’s going on with Donald Trump is weaponization of the law.”
The senator claimed that “most people” have “written off” the Manhattan criminal case against Mr Trump
Trump lashes out at White House Correspondents Dinner
Donald Trump was the butt of the joke at the White House Correspondents Dinner last night – something he is not very happy about.
“The White House Correspondents’ Dinner was really bad. Colin Jost BOMBED, and Crooked Joe was an absolute disaster! Doesn’t get much worse than this!” Mr Trump wrote on Truth Social at one o’clock in the morning.
The Saturday Night Live star made multiple jokes about Mr Trump being involved in criminal cases, including the one in Manhattan that starts back up tomorrow. President Joe Biden cracked a few himself when he got up on stage too.
Watch: Biden cracks Stormy Daniels joke aimed at Trump during White House dinner
Key Takeaways from Trump’s immunity arguments at the Supreme Court
The Supreme Court spent over three hours on Thursday hearing oral arguments in the historic case involving former president Donald Trump’s claims of presidential immunity from prosecution.
On the final day of arguments for this term, the nine justices questioned lawyers for Mr Trump and the Justice Department’s special counsel and toyed with whether or not presidents should be awarded broad, some, or no immunity from criminal prosecution.
Ariana Baio reports:
Potential Trump running mate admits to shooting dog in new book
Kristi Noem, the Governor of South Dakota whom Donald Trump may be considering to be his running mate, apparently described shooting her 14-month-old dog in her new book.
According to The Guardian, Ms Noem described the incident as an example of her willingness to do anything “difficult, messy and ugly”.
Ms Noem writes that she had an aggressive wirehair pointer named Cricket who was extremely difficult to train as a hunting dog – at one point getting loose and killing a flock of chickens owned by a local family.
She said the dog was “less than worthless… as a hunting dog” and “dangerous to anyone she came in contact with” so she got her gun and led Cricket to a gravel pit – presumably to shoot her.
Later, Ms Noem described taking similar action to take care of an aggressive male goat.
The stories are from Ms Noem’s new book, No Going Back.
In response to the article from The Guardian, Ms Noem wrote on X that, “Tough decisions like this happen all the time on the farm” but that, “We love animals.”
Source: independent.co.uk