While much of the political world focused on Iowa and its caucuses Monday that kick off the election season, President Donald Trump has his mind on a Democratic candidate who's skipping the early-voting state.
Trump used a Super Bowl pregame interview with Fox New Channel's Sean Hannity to make a false claim about Michael Bloomberg, the former New York City mayor who has been blanketing the airwaves with anti-Trump ads. The Republican president and Bloomberg are running dueling, multi-million dollar ads during Sunday night's game, the biggest sports event of the year.
Trump accused Bloomberg, who is 5 feet, 8 inches tall, of making a special request for a box to stand on if he qualifies for future presidential debates.
Democratic presidential candidate and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg speaks to supporters at a campaign office, Monday, Jan. 27, 2020, in Scarborough, Maine. (AP PhotoRobert F. Bukaty)
“Why he should he get a box to stand on?” Trump asked, according to an excerpt released by Fox. “Why should he be entitled to that, really? Then does that mean everyone else gets a box?”
Trump is "lying,'' Bloomberg campaign spokeswoman Julie Wood said.
“He is a pathological liar who lies about everything: his fake hair, his obesity, and his spray-on tan,” she said.
The motorcade carrying President Donald Trump arrives at Trump International Golf Club, Sunday, Feb. 2, 2020, in West Palm Beach, Fla. (AP PhotoTerry Renna)
The full interview was scheduled to air Sunday afternoon.
Trump had already fired off a series of early Sunday anti-Bloomberg tweets, calling the billionaire “part of the Fake News" and insisting he “is going nowhere” and “just wasting his money,” despite rising in the polls.
Bloomberg responded with his own aside: “Looks like our ads are keeping you up at night. We've got one in particular you should watch today." Bloomberg's 60-second spot will focus on the impact of gun violence.
Trump was spending his weekend in Palm Beach, Florida, where he has been golfing and mingling with guests at his dues-paying Mar-a-Lago club. On Saturday night, he made an appearance at an event there hosted by the “Trumpettes” fan club.
“We just had our best poll numbers that we've ever had,” Trump said in his remarks, according to video posted on social media. He also praised singer Lee Greenwood, whose song “Proud to be an American” is played every time Trump takes the stage at his rallies. Also in attendance, per photographs, were actor Stephen Baldwin and Trump's eldest son, Donald Trump Jr.
The president was expected to host his annual Super Bowl watch party in Florida before returning to Washington late Sunday.
NEW YORK (AP) — Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign was seized with worry about the potential political damage from a tape that showed Trump bragging about grabbing women sexually without their permission, longtime Trump adviser Hope Hicks testified Friday at his hush money trial.
Hicks, a former White House official, was compelled to testify by Manhattan prosecutors, who are hoping her remarks bolster their argument that the uproar over the infamous “Access Hollywood” tape hastened Trump’s then-lawyer to pay off porn actor Stormy Daniels to bury a negative story that could imperil his 2016 presidential bid.
Once one of Trump's closest confidants, Hicks provided a window into the chaotic fallout over the tape's release just days before a crucial debate with Democrat Hillary Clinton. It was recorded in 2005 but was not seen by the public until Oct. 7, 2016, about a month before Election Day. Hicks described being stunned and huddling with other Trump advisers after learning about the tape's existence from the Washington Post reporter who broke the story. Hicks forwarded the reporter's request to campaign leadership with the recommendation to “deny, deny, deny,” she said.
“I had a good sense to believe this was going to be a massive story and that it was going to dominate the news cycle for the next several days,” Hicks testified. “This was a damaging development."
She added: "This was just pulling us backwards in a way that was going to be hard to overcome.”
Prosecutors called her to the witness stand to strengthen their case alleging Trump worked to prevent damaging stories about his personal life from becoming public as part of a scheme to illegally influence the 2016 presidential election. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg has sought to establish that link not just to secure a conviction but also to persuade the public of the significance of the case, which may be the only one of four Trump prosecutions to reach trial this year.
Hicks told jurors that Trump claimed he did not know anything about his then-attorney Michael Cohen paying $130,000 to Daniels to prevent her from going public with claims of a sexual encounter with Trump. But, Hicks said, Trump eventually came to believe that burying Daniels' story was prudent, saying he thought “it would have been bad to have that story come out before the election.”
At other points, Hicks' testimony appeared to help the defense's contention that the former president was trying to protect his reputation and family — not his campaign — by shielding them from embarrassing stories about his personal life. Trump has denied any wrongdoing in the case, which he has slammed as an effort to derail his campaign to reclaim the White House in November.
Under questioning by Trump's attorney, Hicks told jurors that he was worried about the effect of the “Access Hollywood” tape on his family. And when the Wall Street Journal published a story revealing ex-Playboy Model Karen McDougal's affair allegations right before the election, Hicks said Trump was concerned about his wife seeing the story and asked Hicks to make sure newspapers weren't delivered to their residence that morning.
But when asked if Trump was also worried about the story’s impact on the campaign, Hicks responded that everything they spoke about during that time was viewed through the lens of the campaign. Trump would often asking her, “How is it playing?” as a way of gauging how his appearances, speeches and policies were landing with voters, she said.
Hicks’ proximity to Trump over the years has made her a figure of interest to congressional and criminal investigators alike, who have sought her testimony on multiple occasions on topics ranging from Russian election interference to Trump’s election loss and the subsequent Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol.
She appeared reluctant to be in the courtroom, taking a deep breath as she stepped up to the microphone and acknowledging she was “really nervous.” She later started crying on the witness stand, forcing the court to take a brief break, when Trump lawyer Emil Bove started to ask her to reflect on her time at the Trump Organization before he brought her onto his 2016 campaign.
Referring to her former boss as “Mr. Trump” and later “President Trump” when speaking about their time in the White House, she told the court she last communicated with him in the summer or fall of 2022. While no longer in Trump’s inner circle, Hicks spoke about the former president in glowing terms as the prosecutor began questioning her about her background.
She recounted how the political firestorm that ensued after the release of the tape was so intense that it knocked an actual storm out of the headlines. Before the tape became public, the news was dominated by a Category 4 hurricane that was charging toward the East Coast.
“I don’t think anybody remembers” where that hurricane hit, Hicks told jurors.
Hurricane Matthew, which hit Haiti and Cuba as a Category 4 storm, made landfall in South Carolina as a Category 1 hurricane on Oct. 8, 2016, the day after the “Access Hollywood” tape was made public.
Prosecutors have spent the week using detailed testimony about meetings, email exchanges, business transactions and bank accounts to build on the foundation of their case charging Trump with 34 counts of falsifying internal Trump Organization business records. They are setting the stage for pivotal testimony from Cohen, who paid Daniels for her silence before he went to prison for the hush money scheme.
Testimony will resume Monday. The trial could last another month or more, with important witnesses who have yet to be called, including Cohen and Daniels.
One of the most pivotal pieces of evidence disclosed to jurors this week was a recording of a meeting between Trump and Cohen before the 2016 election in which they discussed a plan to purchase the rights to McDougal’s story from the National Enquirer so that it would never come out. The tabloid had previously bought McDougal’s story to bury it on Trump’s behalf.
At one point, Trump can be heard saying: “What do we got to pay for this? One-fifty?”
In a victory for Trump just as court was ending for the week, Judge Juan M. Merchan denied a request by prosecutors to ask Trump, should he choose to testify, about being held in contempt of court for gag order violations in the case. Merchan said allowing it would be “so prejudicial it would be very, very difficult for the jury to look past that.”
Trump this week paid his $9,000 fine for violating the gag order that bars him from making public statements about witnesses, jurors and some others connected to the case.
His attorney, Todd Blanche, told the judge Friday they are appealing the finding that Trump violated the gag order. Blanche said that they took particular issue with penalties for what are known as reposts — instances where Trump shared someone else’s post with his followers.
Associated Press writers Eric Tucker and Colleen Long in Washington and Ruth Brown and Michelle Price in New York contributed to this report.
Former President Donald Trump arrives at Manhattan criminal court in New York, on Friday, May 3, 2024. (Charly Triballeau/Pool Photo via AP)
Former President Donald Trump appears at Manhattan criminal court before his trial in New York, Friday, May 3, 2024. (Curtis Means/Pool Photo via AP)
Former President Donald Trump appears at Manhattan criminal court before his trial in New York, Friday, May 3, 2024. (Mark Peterson/Pool Photo via AP)
Former President Donald Trump appears at Manhattan criminal court before his trial in New York, Friday, May 3, 2024. (Mark Peterson/Pool Photo via AP)
Former President Donald Trump appears at Manhattan criminal court before his trial in New York, Friday, May 3, 2024. (Mark Peterson/Pool Photo via AP)
Former President Donald Trump appears at Manhattan criminal court before his trial in New York, Friday, May 3, 2024. (Mark Peterson/Pool Photo via AP)
Former President Donald Trump arrives at Manhattan criminal court in New York, on Friday, May 3, 2024. (Mark Peterson/Pool Photo via AP)
Former President Donald Trump appears at Manhattan criminal court before his trial in New York, Friday, May 3, 2024. (Charly Triballeau/Pool Photo via AP)
Former President Donald Trump appears at Manhattan criminal court before his trial in New York, Friday, May 3, 2024. (Charly Triballeau/Pool Photo via AP)
Former President Donald Trump arrives at Manhattan criminal court in New York, on Friday, May 3, 2024. (Charly Triballeau/Pool Photo via AP)
Former President Donald Trump appears at Manhattan criminal court before his trial in New York, Friday, May 3, 2024. (Jeenah Moon/Pool Photo via AP)
Former President Donald Trump appears at Manhattan criminal court before his trial in New York, Friday,, May 3, 2024.(Charly Triballeau/Pool Photo via AP)
FILE - Hope Hicks, former White House Communications Director, arrives to meet with the House Intelligence Committee, at the Capitol in Washington, Feb. 27, 2018. Prosecutors say Hicks spoke with former President Donald Trump by phone during a frenzied effort to keep allegations of his marital infidelity out of the press after the infamous "Access Hollywood" tape leaked weeks before the 2016 election. In the tape, from 2005, Trump boasted about grabbing women without permission. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)
Former President Donald Trump leaves court, Thursday, May 2 2024, in New York, following the day's proceedings in his hush money trial. (Mark Peterson/New York Magazine via AP, Pool)
Republican presidential candidate, former President Donald Trump awaits the start of proceedings for his trial at the Manhattan criminal court, Thursday, May 2, 2024, in New York. (Doug Mills/The New York Times via AP, Pool)
