In South Carolina, Newsom Tests the Presidential Waters (Without Saying So)
It is unusual for a California governor to spend time in the conservative South, especially one who rose to power by championing same-sex marriage, marijuana legalization and electric cars. But here he stood, thousands of miles from home, bowing his head for an opening prayer as light filtered through stained-glass windows in the sanctuary.
'Rejoice in hope,' Mr. Newsom, a Democrat, said later as he began to address about 300 people in the brick church.
Officially, Mr. Newsom toured small towns in South Carolina this week on a mission to embolden Democrats in the heavily Republican state. But it was obvious that Mr. Newsom was also laying groundwork that could prove beneficial if he runs for president in 2028.
Many Democrats nationwide are still trying to figure out Mr. Newsom. Some viewed him skeptically a few months ago when he challenged Democratic orthodoxy in podcast conversations with conservatives.
There have also been questions about how well Mr. Newsom's coastal California image would play in other states. He owns boutique wineries in the Napa Valley, and he became known for dining at the French Laundry, an exclusive restaurant, when he attended a party there during the Covid-19 pandemic. Satirists and late-night comedians have made his slicked-back hair a defining characteristic.
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Yahoo
17 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Resurfaced clip shows Epstein pleading the Fifth when asked if he was with Trump around underage girls
A resurfaced clip shows sex offender Jeffrey Epstein pleading the Fifth when he was asked during a deposition if he ever socialized with underage girls around Donald Trump. The video clip, unearthed by left-leaning outlet MeidasTouch, shows Epstein responding to questions during a March 2010 deposition. The disgraced financier was questioned by an attorney of an alleged victim, Vice News previously reported. In the clip, the attorney asks: 'Have you ever socialized with Donald Trump in the presence of females under the age of 18?' Epstein replied: 'Though l'd like to answer that question, at least today l'm going to have to assert my Fifth, Sixth, and 14th Amendment rights, sir.' Trump has never been accused of any crime in connection with the Epstein investigation and has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing. Pleading the Fifth refers to invoking the Fifth Amendment right to remain silent and not self-incriminate. Epstein once pleaded the Fifth over 1,000 times in a deposition, which addressed his relationships with Virginia Giuffre, Prince Andrew and Bill Clinton, along with subjects including his former girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell, and his New York mansion. It is unclear whether that deposition, details of which were published in a trove of documents in January 2024, is the same 2010 deposition in which he was questioned about Trump. In the 2010 clip, the attorney also asked: 'Have you ever had a personal relationship with Donald Trump?' Epstein asked what the attorney meant by a 'personal relationship.' The attorney rephrased, asking: 'Have you socialized with him?' 'Yes, sir,' Epstein responded. The attorney questioning Epstein is not identified in the clip. A deposition involves an individual giving sworn testimony outside of court, and can involve the names of dozens of people, but it does not mean they are implicated in any crimes. White House Communications Director Steven Cheung told The Independent that the clip is "nothing more than out-of-context frame grabs of innocuous videos and pictures of widely attended events to disgustingly infer something nefarious." "The fact is that The President kicked him out of his club for being a creep," Cheung said. "This is nothing more than a continuation of the fake news stories concocted by the Democrats and the liberal media, just like the Obama Russiagate scandal, which President Trump was right about.' Epstein and Trump were known to socialize in New York and Palm Beach. The President had called Epstein a 'terrific guy' in a 2002 interview with New York Magazine but the pair had a falling out around 2004, The New York Times reports. Trump then barred Epstein from his Mar-a-Lago club 'for being a creep,' White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said. In 2008, Epstein pleaded guilty to prostitution charges and was sentenced to 18 months in a minimum-security facility in Palm Beach County. In 2019, Epstein was arrested on federal sex trafficking charges. He died by suicide in a New York City jail cell about a month after his arrest. His associate, Ghislaine Maxwell, is the only person who has been charged in connection with the Epstein case. The disgraced British socialite is serving a 20-year sentence in a Florida federal prison for her role in helping Epstein recruit, groom, and abuse young girls. The Trump administration has come under increasing pressure, from both Democrats and MAGA allies, to release more information since the Justice Department and FBI released a joint memo on July 6 indicating there would be no further disclosures in the Epstein investigation. The memo said there was no 'client list' containing names of Epstein's alleged high-profile associates. However, U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi had insinuated that the same 'client list' was on her desk in February amid a tranche of Epstein files. The memo also confirmed Epstein died by suicide, pouring cold water on years of conspiracy theories around his death. The agencies released security footage taken from outside Epstein's cell in the hours leading up to his death to bolster their findings. But some have argued the footage was altered and has a 'missing minute.' The president has tried to quell the outrage, directing Bondi to make attempts to unseal grand jury testimony related to the Epstein investigation. Two judges in Florida and New York denied those requests this week on legal grounds. On Thursday, U.S. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche met with Maxwell. Her attorney, David Markus, told reporters she 'never declined to answer' questions and did not invoke any privileges during the meeting. 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The report alleges Trump ended the note with a birthday wish for Epstein: 'Happy Birthday — and may every day be another wonderful secret.' Trump denied the card existed, telling the WSJ: 'I never wrote a picture in my life.' The president has sued the newspaper, its parent companies and owner, Rupert Murdoch, for $10 billion. A spokesperson for Dow Jones, the paper's publisher, said the company has 'full confidence in the rigor and accuracy of our reporting.'
Los Angeles Times
19 minutes ago
- Los Angeles Times
A DACA recipient made a wrong turn at the border. Now he faces deportation
Erick Hernandez-Rodriguez said he took the wrong freeway exit and accidentally crossed over into Mexico from San Diego. Now the U.S. government says he 'self-deported' and illegally tried to re-enter the U.S. He has been detained and is slated for deportation to El Salvador, a country he has not lived in since he was 14. Hernandez-Rodriguez, 34, was in the U.S. under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival program, or DACA, which grants work permits and deportation protections to certain immigrants brought to the U.S. as children. But Hernandez-Rodriguez is currently in a detention facility in Otay Mesa, slated for expedited removal. His wife is expected to give birth in California to their second child before the end of the month. The federal government is not showing any leniency in his case, according to his attorney Valerie Sigamani. Hernandez-Rodriguez works part-time as an Uber driver and was trying to drop off a passenger near the border but missed his exit. He then drove into Mexico, but when he tried to circle back into California, he was arrested. Sigamani estimates he was out of the U.S. for less than 30 minutes. Hernandez-Rodriguez's status under DACA provided some protection to undocumented immigrants in the past, but that has changed under the Trump administration. 'DACA does not confer any form of legal status in this country,' Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement. 'Any illegal alien who is a DACA recipient may be subject to arrest and deportation.' Sigamani said her client's DACA status should show that Hernandez-Rodriguez had been working in the U.S. and not trying to sneak in. 'It seems like at this moment, there isn't that much mercy towards people who make mistakes,' she said. 'I would hope that CBP agents would still understand and know that this is an accident, that this person didn't intend to abandon their claims, but they are a good person, and they accidentally exited the U.S.' His story was first reported by NBC News. California is home to about 150,000 DACA recipients. The Hernandez-Rodriguez case is the latest example of the Trump administration's hard-line immigration policies. Ahead of his second term in office, Trump said he would 'work with Democrats on a plan' to help DACA recipients remain in the country. But once elected president, Trump quickly moved to end DACA. The program narrowly survived when the Supreme Court ruled in 2020 that his administration had done so improperly. A case that challenges DACA's legality is expected to reach the Supreme Court, where some legal experts predict the conservative majority may strike it down. In early June, Javier Diaz Santana, 32, another DACA recipient, was detained while working at a car wash. Despite explaining his situation, he was taken to a federal detention facility in Texas and granted bond by an immigration judge. In a handwritten declaration to the court and provided to The Times by his attorney, Hernandez-Rodriguez said he was working as a rideshare driver on May 31 and picked up some fares after a soccer game ended in Los Angeles. He followed his GPS directions and it told him he was approaching his exit from the freeway, but he missed it. He tried to get off at the next exit, but it was blocked by police due to a car accident. He thought he would have another chance to turn around, but then he was in line to cross the U.S./Mexico border in San Ysidro. 'I asked some Mexican officers and I explained to them what had happened,' Hernandez-Rodriguez said in his declaration. 'They told me that they would help me so I could get back in.' The officers directed him to the border, but he still was lost. He spoke to American officials at the border and showed them his DACA documentation, and they let him through one checkpoint. His attorney said he had a picture of his employment authorization document that legally allows him to work in the U.S. According to his declaration, border officials then asked him to park his car and go into an office to check in with border officials. They took his fingerprints, Sagamani said, and put Hernandez-Rodriguez in a room with three border officers. One of the officials said he could go back into the U.S. if he paid them $800, according to his declaration and his attorney. Sagamani said that the officials were asking for a bribe. Hernandez-Rodriguez said he didn't have the money. 'They told him, 'You can call somebody and ask them for the money and then they can give it to us,'' Sigamani said. When it was clear that he could not pay them, another official handcuffed him and took him into custody, Sigamani said. 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Hernandez-Rodriguez said he is worried that he will be singled out for discussing his political beliefs. The court considered testimony and evidence submitted, but Sigamani said that her client did not get to speak with the judge. 'They're not even letting him see a judge,' Sigamani said. 'I think that's intentional.'
CNN
19 minutes ago
- CNN
Legal loopholes and Senate drama: Inside Trump's battle to install US attorneys
President Donald Trump's fraught effort to install political appointees in permanent roles as US attorneys across the country gained momentum this week, as Republicans work to jumpstart a stalled confirmation process in the Senate, while the White House resorted to a novel legal maneuver to keep a political ally in place as New Jersey's top prosecutor. Alina Habba, the Trump-appointed interim US attorney for New Jersey, resigned from her post on Thursday in an effort to keep it, after district judges for the state booted her from the job. Habba, a former personal attorney for Trump and campaign spokesperson, said she will now be appointed as the 'acting' US attorney for New Jersey. Habba's time as interim US attorney was due to expire on Friday. The move, according to one source familiar with the strategy, will prevent Habba's term from expiring and nullify an effort by the state's federal judges to name her replacement, leading to a simmering standoff between the administration and New Jerseys' judges. Meanwhile in the Senate, Republicans on the Judiciary Committee have offered a broad compromise to Democrats in an effort to break a blockade on the president's slate of US attorney nominees in hopes of getting a few confirmed before the Senate leaves for its monthlong recess in August, according to a source familiar with the negotiations. A spokesperson for the Senate Judiciary Democrats declined to comment on the situation. Administration officials were initially confident they would be able to install a slate of more than 30 US attorneys Trump nominated early in the year. But only a dozen have even moved past a preliminary committee vote and not a single nominee has received a confirmation vote on the Senate floor. While every recent president has gotten off to a slow start moving US attorney nominees, Trump is in danger of falling even further behind, especially amid concerns over the quality of some of the more controversial nominees tapped by Trump, some of whom have never worked as prosecutors. The clock is also running out on the interim status for many of Trump's US attorney picks, beyond Habba. Under federal law, if the administration doesn't fill the job and the Senate doesn't confirm a nominee within 120 days, federal judges can select a temporary US attorney, further undermining the administration's goal to have their own people in place. Pressure is therefore mounting on Republicans to cut a deal with Democrats to get at least a few nominees confirmed before the Senate leaves town for a month. 'I think both sides understand that the current situation is untenable,' the source familiar with the negotiations told CNN. Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin has since May put a blanket hold on Trump's slate of US attorney nominees, leaving the administration without top law enforcement officials in permanent roles as it presses forward with an aggressive agenda that includes a heavy focus on immigration enforcement and violent crime. Durbin has justified his blanket hold in part by arguing that then-Sen. JD Vance placed a similar hold on Democratic US attorney nominees during the Biden administration. 'Sen. Durbin continues to discuss a path forward with his Democratic and Republican colleagues,' Durbin spokesperson Josh Sorbe said in a statement to CNN. There are now a dozen US attorney nominees ready for a floor vote, after seven were passed out of committee on Thursday. That includes former Fox News personality Jeanine Pirro, who is in line to be the top federal prosecutor in Washington, DC. While US attorney nominees usually receive broad bipartisan support, some of Trump's nominees have made that more difficult. In comments on Thursday, even Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, acknowledged that some of the president's nominees are 'controversial.' 'As chairman, I try to be fair to all members of the committee, even during controversial nominations. And we have plenty of them and have had plenty of them as well,' Grassley said. The drama has been particularly acute in New Jersey, where the Justice Department spent much of the week engaged in a bitter standoff with the state's federal judges over who will be the state's top prosecutor. With Habba facing an unlikely road to confirmation in the Senate, and her interim status set to expire Friday, federal judges on Tuesday tapped Desiree Leigh Grace, a top federal prosecutor, to take over the office. The Justice Department immediately said it was removing Grace, though she vowed to take over the job next week. To do so, Grace would've had to be sworn in by a federal judge just after midnight Friday after Habba's interim term expired. But Habba short-circuited all that by resigning on Thursday, trading in her interim status as New Jersey's US attorney to an 'acting' role, thus (in theory) restarting the clock on how long she can serve. 'Donald J. Trump is the 47th President,' Habba posted on Twitter on Thursday. 'Pam Bondi is the Attorney General. And I am now the Acting United States Attorney for the District of New Jersey.' Habba continued: 'I don't cower to pressure. I don't answer to politics.' Habba and the Justice Department both declined to comment when reached by CNN. Grace did not respond to CNN's request for additional comment. The White House had hoped to avoid all this. In the early days of Trump's second term, the administration worked to compile a slate of nominees to lead some of the 93 US attorneys' offices across the country. Top Justice Department officials, with input from the White House, selected dozens of nominees they believed could carry out the president's agenda – specifically on immigration and violent crime. While senior officials were initially confident they would be able to get these nominees confirmed, the process stalled earlier this year amid the disastrous attempt to force through the confirmation of Trump's nominee to lead the DC US Attorney's Office, Ed Martin. Martin's nomination was riddled with controversies. He had to repeatedly update his mandated disclosure forms to Congress and came under fire over his previous praise of a Capitol rioter who is an alleged Nazi sympathizer. In the end, Martin's nomination was pulled and Trump in his place nominated Pirro, who is not without controversy herself following her years as a Fox News personality. US attorneys are the top law enforcement officials in each of the 93 judicial districts across the country. They play an important role in prosecuting federal crimes and defending the government in civil litigation. They are also key to implementing the president's agenda at the local level. 'So much of our public focus is on the attorney general, and rightly so. However, the real engines who drive DOJ's day to day work and case making on a district-by-district basis, are the US attorneys. Each US attorney essentially runs one of those districts, and has very broad autonomy in how that office functions,' said CNN senior legal analyst Elie Honig, a former federal prosecutor in New Jersey. While nominees can serve temporarily on an interim or acting basis without getting Senate confirmation, it's less than ideal, said Honig. 'There's a big impact where you have a non-confirmed US attorney, especially if there's flux and uncertainty. If you're going from one acting to another, interim back to the other acting, it causes chaos in those offices,' Honig said. 'It causes a lack of stability, a lack of a sense of mission. It undermines morale in those offices.' Data from the Partnership for Public Service, a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization that advocates for an effective government workforce, shows that Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush were the only modern presidents able to get nominees confirmed by the six-month mark. Trump, in his first term, did not have any US attorneys confirmed after the first six months. Max Stier, PPS's president and CEO, notes that it is significant that in his second term Trump was quick to put up nominations, but that has not resulted in swift confirmations. 'Instead of being ahead of the curve, they are now behind the curve,' Stier said. Stier noted though that the pace of nominations is not what is slowing the administration from filling vacancies; it's the nature of the nominees. 'It's not just a numbers game that we're watching this administration, even unlike the first Trump administration, is putting forward extraordinarily partisan and unqualified candidates for these positions, and it's not just in the District of Columbia,' Stier said. Stier points to other examples including Habba, who has worked as Trump's personal attorney and campaign spokesman but never as a prosecutor. John Sarcone, Trump's pick for US attorney in Northern New York, has also been criticized for not having any prosecutorial experience. 'I do think the extra element that's added here of consequence is the deeply flawed nature of a consequential number of the candidates that are being put up by this administration,' Stier said. Acting US attorneys can still carry out the president's agenda without being confirmed by the Senate, but there are downsides. 'I think his real view is that acting officials are people that don't have the oversight by the United States Senate and by the public through that process, and so that allows to put in place people who either shouldn't or would exact a political cost to actually get confirmed,' Stier said. Senators have the option to personally request a confirmation that has been otherwise blocked or delayed in a process called 'blue slipping,' but a senior administration official told CNN: 'Unless there is a deal struck, in blue states we are not going to get any blue slips.' One notable example is how Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer declined to offer a blue slip for Jay Clayton, who was tapped to be US attorney in the Southern District of New York even though he is the former head of the SEC. 'It's pretty crazy,' the official said.
