Hunter Biden: Clooney threatened to pull out of LA fundraiser after fuming at White House
The claim came as part of a wide-reaching interview Hunter Biden gave to YouTube personality Andrew Callaghan's web series 'Channel 5″ where he also lashed out at Clooney and other members of the Democratic party who publicly criticized the former president after his disastrous debate against President Trump.
Hunter Biden claimed that prior to the LA fundraiser, Clooney had been lashing out at White House staff, confirming reporting from The Washington Post that the actor had expressed his displeasure to the White House about the president's remarks on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's arrest warrant.
Biden claimed that Clooney's ire was related to the work of his wife, Amal Clooney, a noted human rights attorney, who was one of the legal experts who recommended that the International Criminal Court seek action against Netanyahu over Israel's war in Gaza.
The Post had reported that George Clooney called Steve Ricchetti, one of Biden's closest advisers, to complain, and took particular issue with the president's deeming of the warrant as 'outrageous.'
'He was bitching to the White House staff … he was so angry that the president criticized the arrest warrant that was executed for Netanyahu,' Hunter Biden said.
The president's son claimed that the actor had gone a step further, threatening to pull out of the major campaign fundraiser as the 2024 campaign was beginning to heat up.
'I saw the text messages that he wrote. Reams of text messages, like, 'how dare he do that,'' Hunter Biden said. 'And he kept promising that he was gonna embarrass the president and pull out of the fundraiser.'
Representatives for George Clooney did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In the end, George Clooney did attend the fundraiser headlining the event alongside former President Obama and late-night host Jimmy Kimmel in Los Angeles.
But along with raking in $28 million for the Biden campaign, the marquee event proved fateful in a different way: George Clooney, taken aback at President Biden's seeming frailty during the event, wrote an opinion piece in The New York Times a month later calling on him to step back from the race.
The actor was among the earlier voices calling for Biden to drop out of the race. Hunter Biden's interview with Callaghan came on the one-year anniversary of Biden exiting the race.
Hunter Biden laid into George Clooney and other critics of his father during the three-plus hour interview.
'F‑‑‑ing George Clooney is not a f‑‑‑ing actor. He is a f‑‑‑ing, like … I don't know what he is. He is a brand,' Hunter Biden said in an expletive-laden broadside.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
New York Post
a few seconds ago
- New York Post
The ‘woke right' free-trade critics are only fooling themselves
Capitalism gets a lot of hate. I expect it from the left. They blame free markets for racism, 'horrifying inequality' and even, according to economist Joseph Stiglitz, 'accelerating climate change.' People on the right generally defend capitalism, but today, a growing number agree with the left. Advertisement Author James Lindsay says, 'They make the exact same arguments that we've heard for decades: 'capitalism has made everything about the dollar. Everything's about GDP . . . you lose everything that really matters, like kinship and nation and identity.' ' Tucker Carlson, who Lindsay calls 'woke right,' praises Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren's economic programs, saying they 'make obvious sense.' 'Astonishing!' says Lindsay. Advertisement 'Warren put forth something called the 'Accountable Capitalism Act,' which was going to restrain the way that corporations are able to behave under the brand name of 'accountability'.' Even Vice President JD Vance attacks free trade. 'While the government shouldn't be controlling the American economy,' Vance said, 'we should . . . put a little bit of a thumb on the scale . . . protect nascent industries from foreign competition.' That is 'just another way of saying, 'your company got too big, so we need to take some of your property and distribute it further down the chain,'' says Lindsay. Advertisement The veep is 'very against large multinational corporations and the things that they do and wants to limit them.' But why? Large companies get large mostly by doing things right. Businesses don't make profits unless they please their customers. Look at places that mostly embrace free markets — the United States, Singapore, Switzerland, New Zealand and Hong Kong (until China's government clamped down). Advertisement These are good places to live. People prosper when markets are free. 'It works!' says Lindsay. 'When you have free people who can engage freely with one another and trade . . . you actually have a rising of all ships. Because what you have is a people who are free to do with their things as they will. 'They, therefore, can implement their stuff, their money, their resources, their talents, whatever they happen to be, to solve problems for other people. And when you solve a problem for other people, even if it's a kind of silly thing, like entertaining them with a silly game on their phone, when you solve a problem for other people, they'll give you money for it in exchange.' Exactly: Trade is win-win. Otherwise, we wouldn't engage in it. So it puzzles me that as markets continue to lift more people out of poverty, capitalism faces more attacks — even from the right. 'The problem,' says Lindsay, is 'it requires people to be free . . . You can't control people who are free. 'So we need to have a government system to tell them to do the right thing in the name of the common good. That's the mentality.' Advertisement Get opinions and commentary from our columnists Subscribe to our daily Post Opinion newsletter! Thanks for signing up! Enter your email address Please provide a valid email address. By clicking above you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Never miss a story. Check out more newsletters Lindsay once hoaxed a conservative magazine, American Reformer, into publishing part of the 'Communist Manifesto,' merely by substituting Christian nationalist language for words like 'proletariat.' When the editors learned that they'd been tricked, they left the article up, saying it was 'a reasonable aggregation of some New Right ideas.' Advertisement Yikes. Government-managed trade, protection for politically connected industries, state promotion of Christianity, speech restrictions, morality laws, state-owned industry, cronyism — these are bad ideas, no matter which side sells them. John Stossel is the author of 'Give Me a Break: How I Exposed Hucksters, Cheats, and Scam Artists and Became the Scourge of the Liberal Media.'
New York Post
a few seconds ago
- New York Post
Divisive new app lets women put bad dates on blast — and men are freaking out: ‘Digital vigilantism'
There's a new app causing men to break into a cold sweat — and it's not because they forgot their wallet on a first date. Tea, a women-only app that lets users post anonymous Yelp-style reviews of men they've dated, has shot to the top of the Apple App Store — and smack into the middle of a digital war between safety and slander. The platform, launched in 2023, lets women share stories and warnings about exes, Tinder flops, and potential predators. Advertisement 3 Forget ghosting — this app has men begging to be left off the grid. Studio Romantic – Users can toss out 'green flags' or 'red flags' — or, in some cases, blast a guy's entire romantic résumé into cyberspace. The feed is full of candid commentary, catfish alerts, and more than a few 'avoid this man' declarations. Advertisement 'I see men freaking out today about this Tea app,' TikTokker @azalialexi said in a recent video. 'If you don't want things like this to exist then maybe look into advocating for women's safety and actually holding your fellow men accountable.' Tea's website claims the app was born after its founder, Sean Cook, 'witnessed his mother's terrifying experience with online dating — not only being catfished but unknowingly engaging with men who had criminal records.' It now boasts nearly 1 million users, and it's not just the safety features — like reverse image search and criminal background checks — that are turning heads. The public reviews are what really set the app ablaze. Advertisement 3 Launched in 2023, the app lets women dish on shady dates, dodgy exes and full-on predators — one swipe and horror story at a time. .tiktok/@theteapartygirls 'It's kind of like a Carfax situation,' Sabrina Henriquez, 28, who found out some of her exes had less-than-stellar ratings on Tea, told The Washington Post in a recent interview. 'It kind of saved [other women] from putting themselves in that situation.' Advertisement But not everyone's here for the gossip. 'I think the app has good intentions, it's just very messy,' Donovan James, 21, also told the outlet. 'You're always going to look bad in somebody's eyes.' Others worry it's turning into digital vigilantism. Apps like these or Facebook groups like 'Are We Dating The Same Guy' are the 'equivalent of whisper networks,' Chiara Wilkinson wrote for Dazed. Or as Dazed writer James Greig put it: 'It's digital vigilantism; the TikTok equivalent of a citizen's arrest.' Douglas Zytko, a professor at the University of Michigan at Flint, said to The Washington Post that the app is filling a void dating apps never addressed: safety. 3 Still, fears of false claims linger — and TikTok is crawling with jittery dudes doom-scrolling the damage. Mdv Edwards – 'There are multiple studies now showing that around 10 percent of overall cases of sexual assault are attributed to a dating app,' he noted. Advertisement Still, false accusations remain a fear. TikTok is now flooded with men nervously scrolling. 'Hot take: The tea app is toxic,' wrote @johnnysaysgo, who had a female friend go undercover to see what women were saying about him. 'These women were clearly just upset… I was honest with them and respectful.' User @ warned: 'Be careful.' He added that he can see the 'vision' behind the app but noted that he knows 'how vile' people who might use it could be. Advertisement And users like @kristakilduff are just enjoying the drama after getting accepted into the app. 'The men are not safe,' she said with a laugh in a recent clip. 'The Tea app has me weak — stay safe.' The backlash — and buzz — around Tea is just the latest sign that the digital dating landscape is shifting, and not necessarily for the better. As The Post previously reported, not all matches made in algorithm heaven are built to last. Advertisement A new study published in Computers in Human Behavior found that married couples who met online reported lower levels of satisfaction and stability than those who met IRL — a phenomenon dubbed the 'online dating effect.' Researchers pointed to factors like geographic distance, delayed family approval and lack of shared social circles as possible causes. So, while dating apps might be great for scoring first dates and flings, they may not always deliver happily ever after.
NBC News
2 minutes ago
- NBC News
Some Republicans push to undo gambling tax hike they passed in Trump's megabill
WASHINGTON — Some top Republicans are regretting that they inserted a tax hike on gamblers into President Donald Trump's megabill, with several lawmakers who supported the legislation now calling for rolling back that policy. Rep. Jason Smith, R-Mo., the chair of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, told NBC News that the provision was a 'mistake' and needs to be undone. 'It was definitely not something that we did in the House. I don't understand why the Senate decided to do something like that,' Smith said in a brief interview Wednesday. 'And so it is definitely a provision that — I'm interested in making sure that we fix the Senate's mistake.' The new law cuts the tax deduction on 'wagering losses' from 100% to 90% of losses starting in 2026, disrupting the current dynamic where bettors can offset losses with gains and pay taxes only on net earnings. The new policy could tax gamblers even in years where they break even or net-out losses. For instance, a bettor who wins $100,000 and loses $100,000 in the same year would be stuck with a taxable income of $10,000. 'It would be potentially catastrophic for the industry as it would disproportionately affect high volume gamblers,' said Jack Andrews, the professional sports bettor who goes by that alias. 'Those high volume players are the lifeblood of most casinos,' he added. 'If they realize they could lose, and still have taxable income to pay that they didn't make, they'll stop playing. Or find ways to play that don't generate a paper trail.' Andrews said the new law 'could result in players losing money gambling, but still owing taxes on 'income' they didn't make.' The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates the gambling tax change will raise $1.1 billion over a decade. At least a couple of senators who supported the megabill — which passed with only GOP votes — want to undo the gambling tax. Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas and Bill Hagerty of Tennessee have signed on to legislation to roll it back, alongside Nevada's two Democratic senators, Catherine Cortez Masto and Jacky Rosen. The bill is called the Facilitating Useful Loss Limitations to Help Our Unique Service Economy Act, or the FULL HOUSE Act. 'It's unfair. It makes no sense,' Cruz, who plays poker in his spare time, said in an interview of the tax provision. 'The income tax is designed to tax actual income,' he said. 'For example, playing poker for profession — not allowing them to deduct their losses means they're paying taxes not on their actual income.' 'I think we should fix it,' he added. Cruz said most Republicans voted to pass the gambling tax change without knowing about it, a damning indictment of the legislative process for the bill. 'Nobody really takes responsibility for introducing it,' Cruz said. 'None of us knew about it. It's a very big, beautiful bill, and so there are lots of provisions there that at the end, things were moving very fast. I don't know of anyone who was aware of the provision at the time it passed.' The provision was introduced in the mid-June version of the bill, with Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, overseeing the tax portion as chair of the Senate Finance Committee. And he, too, is open to revisiting it. 'Senator Crapo is open to receiving feedback from affected stakeholders and learning more about industry reporting and compliance,' a Crapo spokesperson said. 'To comply with the rules of reconciliation, every provision from the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act needed to be modified to create a budgetary effect. In order to retain the gambling loss provision, it was changed to 90 percent,' the spokesperson added. 'While the committee heard from gaming associations on other provisions after text was released on June 16th, there were no concerns raised with lowering the threshold.' The blowback from bettors has since grown since Trump signed the bill into law on July 4, and Democrats have added it to their list of grievances with the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. 'Republicans' hastily put-together bill is full of provisions that are completely counterproductive and harmful to Americans. The provision limiting the wagering loss deduction will have a negative impact on Nevada, and it's one of the many reasons I voted no,' Cortez Masto, the author of the FULL HOUSE Act. On July 10, she sought unanimous consent on the Senate floor to pass the legislation but was met with an objection from Sen. Todd Young, R-Ind., which prevented speedy passage. Her office said she will 'continue to explore all options available to restore the 100% dedication for gambling losses and protect Nevada's gaming and hospitality industries.' If the tax change isn't undone, it will come as a shock to some bettors, as 'many of them wouldn't realize this until they do their 2026 taxes, which would be early 2027,' Andrews said. But reversing it won't be so easy. Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., poured cold water on the proposals from some Republicans to roll back parts of the bill. Asked by NBC News on Tuesday whether measures offered by his colleagues to undo the Medicaid cuts and gambling tax were going to succeed, Thune said flatly, 'No.' 'There are members out there who are saying, we'd like to do this or that differently. That's always the case,' Thune said. 'This was a big piece of legislation that had a lot of moving parts. Not everybody got everything they wanted, but at the end of the day, it's historic in its breadth and the things that it addresses.' The White House didn't immediately return a message seeking comment on whether Trump is open to revisiting the provision. Other Republicans say they're unfamiliar with the industry blowback to the gamblers' tax change. 'I honestly, frankly, haven't had a chance to look at it. So I don't even know what they're talking about,' Rep. Vern Buchanan, R-Fla., the second ranking Republican on Ways and Means, said. On the other hand, Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, sounded surprised by how much attention the issue is getting. 'Why do so many people care about the gamblers tax?' he quipped. 'I'm kind of agnostic. I don't, frankly, understand why it's such a big deal. But happy to look at anything they propose.'
