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  • America as Donald Trump (II), By Patience Turtoe-Sanders

    America as Donald Trump (II), By Patience Turtoe-Sanders

    By Dr. Patience Turtoe-Sanders

    Continue first part here

    President Trump is a very smart man, yet he is not being given credit for his smartness. American bourgeoisies say, “He is not presidential.” But the bourgeoisies forgot that the founding fathers of America were not presidential. History reveals that some of the founding fathers of this great country call America, were hooligans, that the prison gates of England were let loose to release the hoodlums of England to set sail to America, and sail they set. The early settlers of America were fearless and bold, ruthless and daring men who fought the waves of the high seas, suffered diseases, conquered, and came to America, and still they fought harsh and brutal weathers, fought and killed wild beasts, again survived, and fought relentlessly with their colonial masters, the British, to gain independence. The early settlers of America were not presidential, neither were they class conscious. All they wanted was a country where people could be FREE to express their thoughts, where the ambitious would dare to carry out their imagination, a country where anyone with a skill could achieve greatness. But present day Americans dislike immigrants: they have forgotten that their founding fathers and mothers were immigrants. Many Americans get intimidated when an immigrant exhales. Unless being entertained, an immigrant who shows academic excellence most times gets ignored, if not, he or she gets harshly criticized. Corporate America would prefer not to give a qualified immigrant a job because of their accents, and because corporate America do not want to “offend.” Many ordinary Americans would not patronize certain places because, “It is full of immigrants.” Some Americans have become so self-conscious that many have lost compassion, moral character and decorum, and like the bourgeoisies, these have joined in calling their own elect, a man who represent their own country, all sorts of names saying, “Donald trump is not presidential?”

    If being presidential is deceiving people, lying, cheating, conniving, saying one thing to the public and doing another, then President Trump is truly not presidential. But if expressing one’s thought, showing sympathy as President Trump did by pardoning a sick, repented, and dying 85-year-old man, and expressing humility as President Trump demonstrated by bending down to pick a flying hat from a guard’s head at an airport, and putting the hat back on the “common” guard’s head is not being presidential, then all those who accuse President Trump of such should have a change of heart and learn from the President. 1 Corinthians 9:19 says, “Though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all.…” President Trump had recognized that his position was to serve, not to show off, he didn’t need to. He already made a name for himself. President Trump wanted to help the public. The bourgeoisies of America seek devices to distract the President and the public every day. If it is not Russia, (which by the way did not influence American public to vote for Trump,) the President is distracted by his extended family members as in writing a book about him, or, his pardon, or, by award he gives, and his responses to hurricanes, which is, by the way, God’s call to America to repent and return to God.

    President Donald Trump is disliked, criticized and hated. Why? Is it because he is a black man in a white body? The culture of white skinned America is to subtly make a person being hurt feel good about it, but the Africa-American culture is to tell the way it is straight up. This is President Donald Trump, an extrovert, who does not hesitate to tell you the way he feels; he is bold and fearless to take an action that may not be supported. President Trump has deviated from his culture, he is showing the world the real American’s heart, and the bourgeoisies of America feel very uncomfortable with his behavior, so they want to stop him, but can the President be stopped? God Almighty, who sees the heart, searched the hearts of all who could turn gay-country America back to Him, and one who could make Jerusalem the Capital of Israel again. God found none other than President Trump, who was criticized for daring to voice a ban of transvestite from the military.

    The early founders of America founded America based on Christian principles, they prayed and sought God, as demonstrated in their coin, which reads, “In God we trust.” African-Americans also love God as demonstrated in the action of Floyd May Weather, when after whooping boxer, McGregor, looked up to the heavens in reverence of God. Yet, America became a gay country years before Donald Trump became President. Most Americans love God, but some have demonstrated a lack of respect for God and some Americans think they are themselves, gods. America is a gay country. But there is one who has shown a reverence for God, President Donald Trump. He recognizes that unborn babies are human beings, and that marriage is between a man and a woman as demonstrated in Genesis 2:24.

    The bourgeoisies of America and the President’s adversaries attempted to stop President Trump from achieving God’s plan for Americans, but they failed. They judged him, they went after his children, his son-in-law, and they even impeached him, but God was with President Trump. They criticized the President’s relationship with Russia, and some even accused Russia of putting President Trump in power. If previous regimes had done their homework, no country would have been able to hike into America’s computers to alter results of the 2016 election. I liken the matter of Russia’s interference to that of a student and a teacher, who left the answer sheet to an examination open and walked away from the test center. The student taking the test spied and copied, got one hundred percent, and then the teacher got angry that the student spied, yet the teacher was the one who exposed the answers.

    Oh, how God loved President Trump! How God demonstrated His powerful Hands on the President and his family members!! But no!!! President Trump has angered the Spirits. He has deviated from the original purpose that God has for him. President Trump is stopping himself from fulfilling the purpose of God for him and America. The President has demonstrated bad intentions for both immigrants and the American public. President Trump has refused to recognize that immigrants are the strength of America as demonstrated in farms and the medical field whose population have the highest workers of immigrants. The President’s administration has not protected immigrants. His administration appeared to totally dislike immigrants from Africa. The President even called an African nation “Shithole.” President Trump, himself, an employer till this day, has refused to acknowledge that corporate America and other money-hungry American employers have not only taken advantage of immigrants, that these sneak migrant workers through American borders into America every day, enslave these unsuspecting immigrants, and hold them hostage, and rather than protecting these immigrants, President Trump’s administration scattered immigrants and their children all over America. Through his insistence on building a wall, his handling of COVID 19, his insistence on scrapping “Obama Care,” through his unguarded pronouncements and contempt for other nations, and through the demonstration of his character that he prefers pleasing a certain group of American people to honoring God Almighty, Who crowned the President, who, in 2016, had not suspected that he, Donald Trump, would be elected President, President Trump has betrayed his own spiritual privilege. Billy Graham once said, “When wealth is lost, nothing is lost. When health is lost, something is lost. But when character is lost, everything is lost.” It grieves my heart that President Trump is going to lose the 2020 election. I truly love the President. I really do.

    Dr. Patience Turtoe-Sanders is an author, a preacher, a nurse, a professor, a mother and a wife. She lives in the United States of America.

  • America as Donald Trump (I), By Patience Turtoe-Sanders

    America as Donald Trump (I), By Patience Turtoe-Sanders

     

    By Dr. Patience Turtoe-Sanders

    Donald Trump was derided and laughed at when he announced his intention of running for the position of the presidency of the great United States of America in 2016. The bourgeoisies of America said, “He is kidding.” Many assumed Donald Trump, the entertainer, the one whose fame shot through the television program, “The Apprentice,” would quit. “He is going to quit in the middle of the race,” they said and waited, but Donald Trump beat seventeen candidates from his Republican party and won the nomination to run for the highest office in the world, with one goal in mind, which is, “To make America great again.” And to do this, Donald Trump would build a wall to keep foreigners from coming into the United States of America, and for this, the bourgeoisies got angry and accused Donald Trump of hate. The then President of America, Barack Obama, said, “America has too much sense to vote for Donald Trump,” but America did. Facts don’t lie. Deep investigations revealed that America overwhelmingly voted for Donald Trump to be President of the United States of America. Why?

    This is because Americans love their country so much so, that many Americans have never traveled outside the states where they were born, nor have they read about other nations. Americans are so content with their country that most Americans never leave America. Some Americans rely on the media and personal contact to learn about other countries. Many base their judgment of immigrants (foreigners) on perception and not on facts, so that if their experience with an immigrant is negative, they will perceive all foreigners to be bad. Americans perceive immigrants as invaders. Why?

    Immigrants come to America with one goal in mind, which is, to create a better life for members of their community. America is individualized by culture. They are taught to first think of themselves before they think of other people. “YOU come first,” an American is told from cradle. But immigrants are communal by culture, so they think, act and perceive differently. Where Americans perceive discrimination, many immigrants perceive goals: “I came to this country to better the lives of my people,” and so most immigrants do not support a call against discrimination. Immigrants focus on their goals, and many work beneath their credentials. Immigrants do jobs that Americans would not do. Some immigrants who were medical doctors in their country, work as nursing assistants in America and then give an assessment of a patient better than the nurse they are assisting, to the annoyance of their bosses. Foreign Administrators, upon arrival in America may work as receptionist, professors as teachers’ aides, lawyers as messengers, yet they soon resume working in their rightful profession, and again to the annoyance of Americans who perhaps have been on the same blue-collar jobs for years. “How come you, who just came to America, have achieved so much?” Americans may ask of immigrants who were once their colleagues but have soared. Most Americans assume that their government provides financial aid for immigrant to excel, not knowing that the immigrant already had a profession before coming to America, and for exhaling, immigrants get disliked. Why?

    Many Americans are of the impression that immigrants do not pay taxes, and again, immigrants are disliked for this, yet Americans perception is wrong. Immigrants do pay taxes. Americans perceive immigrants as threat to their existence, so they want to keep immigrants away as demonstrated by President Trump, who at one time threatened to shut down the government if congress does not give him the opportunity to build a wall that will keep immigrants away, and for this some have called the President a bigot, a divider a hater, but building a wall was a major theme of the President’s campaign. President Trump did not hide his intention of keeping immigrants away from America, no. He was very clear about what he would do if voted into power, and the American people voted for him. So what’s the matter now? Why are the bourgeoisies of America criticizing President Trump? Why are they doing everything possible to discredit him? Why do they want his presidency terminated? Why do they hate the President so?

    The bourgeoisies of America hate President Donald Trump because he dared to reveal their hearts to the world. The bourgeoisies of American, regardless of party, whether Republicans or, Democrats think just like Donald Trump: they do not appreciate immigrants in America, but they keep their thoughts hidden, and President Trump has come to reveal their secrets thought to the world. In America, accent is bad. Once corporate America hears one’s accent, suddenly, the job the immigrant is interviewing for is no longer needed, or, the job description has changed, and, or, the pay has become smaller, or, the work load has increased. These pseudo job descriptions are given by corporate America in order to discourage the immigrants, yet, most immigrants will refuse to be discouraged and accept the job, again, to the annoyance of his or her American colleague, who screams, “You are being discriminated against. I don’t do that much, yet I get paid more.” Immigrants are focused. They come to America to achieve, and achieve they will. So many immigrants work hard.

    American employers seeing how hard immigrants work, soon device means of maximizing profit. A job that pays overtime after eight hours soon begins to pay overtime after forty hours, and while American workers protest, immigrants work happily, and again to the annoyance of Americans, who accuse immigrants of, “Taking our jobs away from us.” Still when employers advocate for pay cut, Americans would protest, but immigrants would take the pay cut and work even harder. “What kind of people are these?” Americans would ask.

    Corporate America thrives on the desperation of immigrants who are eager, not only to survive but to provide for members of their extended families in their home countries. Desperate immigrants would do anything (but they will not steal) just to make members of their communities comfortable. They will volunteer to work without being paid over time… cut down their own pay… work as fishermen in Alaska, where they are kept for months without going home to visit their family members… drive trucks…. Where many American workers want to change a work culture they perceive degrading, desperate immigrant workers would not part take at such a change. Why? To some immigrants, whatever they earn in America is better than what they would earn in their home countries where they work but sometimes don’t get paid at all.

    The American dream is a car, a house, a dog and two children. The immigrant dream is several of everything: houses, cars, children and no dog. So many immigrants give birth to many children running all over American neighborhoods to the annoyance of Americans who appreciate quietness, and who secretly ask themselves, “What are immigrants doing with so many children?” Americans are honest people. When the average American finds a lost thing, the culture is to return it, but when some immigrants find something lost, they call it, “An act of fate,” and keep it. Americans are monogamous by judicial, but some immigrant’s have a polygamous culture, and even though married, many encourage their girlfriends to come and see them at work to the horror of Americans. The average American is very trusting and does not keep a secret, but many foreign cultures encourage secrecy, craftiness, and deceit. Some immigrants marry Americans, become legal immigrants, and then disappear without a trace, with some taking their children along with them. Do Americans have reasons to dislike immigrants?

    Americans are taught to tell the truth regardless of relationship, but some foreign cultures have selective truth, to these, parents, blood ties, close friends do not “lie,” so even when it is obvious that a relative is lying, many immigrants ignore the truth. Americans love perfection; they would not buy a defective product, but the average immigrant thinks, “As no one is perfect so is a product.” Therefore immigrants pay dearly for products that Americans would discard. At auction, immigrants would bid the highest even for flooded vehicles, they pay dearly for damaged and expired goods, and again, to the annoyance of Americans. President Donald Trump was an ordinary American who, in his youth, walked the streets, socialized with hooligans, employed both immigrants and Americans alike and worked with international business men and women, and though this might sound strange, President Trump appeared to love immigrants. He married one.

     

  • Win or Lose, Trump Is A Danger To Africa, By Azu Ishiekwene

    Azu Ishiekwene

    If Donald J. Trump were president of Wakanda on the eve of an election, that country would have received several warnings from the US State Department on the need for free and fair polls, and the necessity for all parties to play by the rules.

    But what is playing by the rules if parties will not accept an orderly transfer of power?

    During two recent off-cycle state elections in the south of Nigeria, for example, the US Embassy threatened to invoke visa restrictions on candidates, agents or security officials who impede the electoral process. It was not an empty threat and the junket-obsessed political elite knew it.

    Yet, as this welcome US fore-finger was wagging at Nigerian politicians, four other fingers of the same hand were pointing back at the US, where its own President, Trump, has threatened that he would not accept the result of the November 3 election, if he loses.

     

    He made the same threat in 2016, saying he would not accept the outcome in the race against Hilary Clinton because the system was “rigged”. We may never know what would have happened since he won.

    As of the time of writing, Facebook was planning to implement stringent standards to prevent the shambles of 2016 or the likelihood of a repeat of Cambodia 2018 where the prime minister was accused of buying fake fans to boost his electoral chances – a clear indication of how low the US that prides itself on sterling democratic values has fallen.

    By this time next week, the US presidential election would be over. But there are a number of reasons why even days after the election, voters may still not be able to say for sure whether Trump or former Vice President Joe Biden won.

    One reason why is because aspects of the labyrinthine voting and counting process in US elections which gives states and counties considerable latitude in the conduct of elections are being challenged in court. While some states may still be counting mail-in ballots (and they would be significantly more in this COVID-19 year), others, especially Republican states, want mail-in ballot counting to end before or on voting day.

    The main reason why this election is fraught, however, is because Trump has hinted darkly that he would not accept the result, if he loses. He said he could not guarantee an orderly transfer of power, if the outcome does not favour him. Trump’s base is listening and the violent elements among them are waiting. The US faces a dark winter of post-election chaos.

    Trump’s threat not to accept defeat is the main fuel stoking the flames. Yet, what he is doing and what is being done in his name are much worse. In a number of states across the US, especially in the battleground states, Republican governors are still desperately trying to use the courts to block counting of mail-in votes beyond election day, even where the law allows it.

    The Supreme Court weighed in with a precarious 4-4 ruling but the matter is not settled yet. The inauguration on Monday of the conservative-leaning Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court could tip over the final decision on mail-in votes – a consequential matter in a COVID-19 year and beyond.

    In other states, various voter suppression methods, including stringent voter ID requirements and last-minute gerrymandering have become a part of the kitchen sink.

    It doesn’t end there. Concerns about Trump’s race baiting, suspicion that he may yet again deploy the National Guard as he did after George Floyd’s murder, and the rush to confirm Judge Barrett on the eve of election, all look like ingredients from a dictator’s cookbook.

    But he does not care. Trump has said over and over again that “the system is rigged”, that he suspects serious fraud with mail-in ballots, that China is helping the Democratic Party compromise the system, that he is a victim of an Obama spy ring, all with barely a shred of proof. Yet, he seems determined to use self-help, if the results don’t go his way.

    At first, it was like a joke. But since he makes no distinction between opinions and facts, Trump has taught the world to take him by his jokes. He indulges in fiction, which he invents with a single-minded talent that beggars belief.

    Insisting – up till last week – that he would not accept an orderly transfer of power if he loses the election, is frightening. He makes Guinea where President Alpha Conde has just foisted a third term on the country look like a beacon of democracy.

    Conde can, at least, argue that the Guinean parliament extended his mandate, even though he obtained the extension by fraud. But for a sitting US president to repudiate the prospects of an orderly transfer of power if he loses, is not just a dangerous precedent for that country, it increases the chances of more Condes rising in Africa and elsewhere. Has anyone noticed that the AU has been resoundingly silent about Conde’s travesty?

    If Trump does not believe senior government officials across party lines and even independent think tanks that have insisted that his claim of mail-in fraud or a “rigged system” is false, why should incumbents in Africa or elsewhere not undermine the electoral system in their own countries on the excuse that every ballot must match their testosterone specimen?

    In the last two decades, a significant number of African countries have come under representative governments largely because of external pressure from the West, led by the European Union and the US. Even though more money has poured in from China – often with few questions or scruples – pressure from the west and improvements in technology have put more governments on the continent on the spot.

    Politicians may not have been altogether pleased with the outcome of the elections, but because they have seen the consequences of chaos elsewhere, because they have seen the US live up to its pledge to punish persons responsible for deadly election violence whether in Kenya, Liberia or Cote d’Ivoire, they have yielded to orderly transfer of power.

    Nigeria provided a spectacular example of orderly transition five years ago, when former President Goodluck Jonathan called Muhammadu Buhari and conceded defeat even before the final results were announced in an election that could have descended into chaos.

    Despite deep misgivings in the ruling People’s Democratic Party (PDP) at the time that Jonathan was being wangled out of office by a conspiracy of the Northern elite, the former president endured his misery and walked away.

    Kenya and Zimbabwe followed suit. When Yahya Jammeh of The Gambia refused to accept the outcome of elections in that country the regional body, ECOWAS, shooed the yam-head out of office. Until recent events in Mali, Cote d’Ivoire and Guinea threatened to spoil the broth, Africa has been looking like the fireside where the world could at last light its candle.

    A US president threatening to impede an orderly transition of power, is a danger not just to his own country but also to politicians elsewhere who might copy his bad example. This year, out of five African countries holding major elections, the presidents of two of them – Alassane Quattara of Cote d’Ivoire and Conde of Guinea – have maneuvered themselves into positions for a controversial third term.

    Which Trump would stand up to Quattara, Conde or any other political outlaw on the continent? The Trump begging China to help him win election at home or the one hiding his tax records in plain sight? The Trump crying wolf over a “rigged system” even before the first ballot was cast or the one that unleashed the National Guard on unarmed protesters? The Trump who bullies women and indulges in race-baiting or the one who pledged not to accept an orderly transfer of power, if he loses at the poll?

    Which Trump is the world modelling on the eve of November 3?

    After four years of “America First”, the world is learning to find its own path even in matters where the US used to provide leadership and direction. Yet, if this is the new face of American exceptionalism – a US presidential candidate who undermines the electoral system for the heck of it and refuses to accept an orderly transfer of power if he loses, then we must brace up for a bitter winter in global politics.

    Not even in shit-hole countries is it fashionable anymore to insist on victory as precondition for elections. Who needs elections if they must win before the contest, anyway?

    But that is what Trump insists on. It’s apparent that America’s problems are worse than shambolic race relations and COVID-19. Trump-mylitis or the new epidemic of electoral-victory-at-all-costs is also a new contagion the world must guard against.

     

    Ishiekwene is MD/Editor-In-Chief of The Interview

     

  • Trump reduces number of refugee admissions into U.S to 15,000

    Trump reduces number of refugee admissions into U.S to 15,000

    President Donald Trump has cut the number of refugees allowed into the U.S. to historic low of 15,000 in the current fiscal year.

    The figure includes 6,000 unused places from the previous financial year due to the coronavirus pandemic, Trump said in a statement distributed by the White House in the early hours of Wednesday.

    The policy caps the number of refugees who can be admitted from Iraq at 4,000 and the number admitted from El Salvador, Guatemala or Honduras at 1,000.

    The remaining 10,000 spots are for people who fear persecution for their religious beliefs or political activities or who are referred to the U.S. Refugee Admissions Programme.

    The statement additionally specifies that “persons from certain high-risk areas of terrorist presence or control, including Somalia, Syria, and Yemen, shall not be admitted as refugees, except those refugees of special humanitarian concern.”

    The U.S. State Department had announced the cut would happen earlier in the month, saying it was necessary to “prioritise the safety and well-being of Americans, especially in light of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.’’

    The number is the lowest level since the introduction of the U.S. refugee programme in 1980. The previous limit for the last fiscal year was 18,000.

    In 2016, then-President Barack Obama’s last full year in office, about 85,000 refugees were allowed into the US.

    Trump lowered the limit in 2017, his first in office, and about 53,000 refugees were let in, according to a report issued last year by the Department of Homeland Security.

  • US Election 2020: Key highlights from Trump, Biden final debate

    US Election 2020: Key highlights from Trump, Biden final debate

    Here are some key quotes from the final debate between Donald Trump and Joe Biden as they tried to sway undecided American voters.

    NBC News correspondent Kristen Welker moderated the debate, which was held in Nashville, Tennessee, on Thursday evening, with less than two weeks to go before the Nov. 3 presidential election.

    COVID-19 PANDEMIC
    Welker asked how each candidate would lead the country out of the pandemic crisis.

    Trump: “We’re fighting it and we’re fighting it hard… We’re rounding the corner. It’s going away.”

    Trump: “I caught it. I learned a lot … We have to recover. We can’t close up our nation.”

    Biden: “If you hear nothing else I say tonight hear this … Anyone who’s responsible for that many deaths should not remain as president of United States of America.”

    Biden: “This is the same fellow told you this is going to end by Easter last time. This is the same fellow who told you that, don’t worry, we’re going to end this by the summer. We’re about to go into a dark winter, a dark winter, and he has no clear plan.”

    Trump: “I don’t know if we’re going to have a dark winter, and at all. We’re opening up our country. We’ve learned and studied and understand the disease.”

    Biden: “He says, we’re, you know, we’re learning to live with it. People are learning to die with it.”

    FOREIGN POLICY
    Biden: “He’s legitimized North Korea. He’s talked about his good buddy (leader Kim Jong Un), who’s a thug, a thug. And he talks about how we’re better off when North Korea is much more capable of firing a missile that is able to reach U.S. territory. “

    Trump: “You know what? North Korea – we’re not in a war. We have a good relationship.”

    Biden: “We had a good relationship with Hitler before he in fact invaded Europe. Come on.”

    “The reason he (Kim) would not meet with President Obama is because President Obama said, ‘We’re going to talk about denuclearization. We’re not going to legitimize you. We’re going to continue to push stronger and stronger sanctions on you.’ That’s why he wouldn’t meet with us.”

    HEALTHCARE

    Trump: “No matter how well you run (the Affordable Care Act), it’s no good. What we’d like to do is terminate it. We have the individual mandate done. I don’t know that it’s going to work. If we don’t win (in court) … we’ll have Obamacare but it will be better run.”

    Biden: “People deserve to have affordable health care, period. Period. Period. Period.”

    IMMIGRATION
    Biden on children separated at the border: “It makes us a laughingstock and it violates every notion of who we are.”

    Trump: “Children are brought here by coyotes and lots of bad people, cartels … We let people in but they have to come in legally.”

  • US Presidential Poll: Trump, Biden clash sharply over pandemic in less chaotic final debate

    US Presidential Poll: Trump, Biden clash sharply over pandemic in less chaotic final debate

    U.S. President Donald Trump and Democratic challenger Joe Biden offered sharply contrasting views on the still-raging coronavirus pandemic at Thursday’s final presidential debate, seeking to persuade the few remaining undecided voters 12 days before the Nov. 3 election.

    Trump, a Republican, adopted a more restrained tone than he did during the chaotic first presidential debate in September, when he repeatedly interrupted Biden.

    But Thursday’s clash still featured plenty of personal attacks between two men who evince little respect for each other, and Trump kept fact-checkers busy by leveling unfounded corruption accusations at Biden and his family.

    The televised encounter in Nashville, Tennessee, represented one of Trump’s last remaining opportunities to reshape a campaign dominated by a pandemic that has killed more than 221,000 people in the United States.

    Trump has trailed Biden in opinion polls for months, though the contest is tighter in some battleground states likely to decide the election.

    “Anyone who’s responsible for that many deaths should not remain president of the United States of America,” Biden said.

    Trump defended his approach to the outbreak and said the country could not afford to close businesses again, even amid fresh surges.

    “We’re learning to live with it,” said Trump, who has played down the virus for months. “We have no choice.”

    “Learning to live with it?” Biden retorted. “Come on. We’re dying with it.”

    Trump asserted that a vaccine was potentially “weeks” away. Most experts, including administration officials, have said a vaccine is unlikely to be widely available until mid-2021.

    Several U.S. states, including the election swing state of Ohio, reported record single-day increases in COVID-19 infections on Thursday, evidence the pandemic is accelerating anew.

    Trump, whose instinct remains to run as an outsider, portrayed Biden as a career politician whose nearly 50-year record was insubstantial.

    But Biden returned again and again to Trump’s nearly four years as president, pointing to the economic damage the virus has done to people’s lives.

    After an opening segment on the pandemic, Thursday’s clash pivoted to rapid-fire exchanges over whether either candidate had improper foreign entanglements.

    Trump repeated his accusations that Biden and his son Hunter engaged in unethical practices in China and Ukraine.

    No evidence has been verified to support the allegations, and Biden called them false and discredited.

    Trump’s effort to uncover dirt on Hunter Biden’s Ukraine business ties led to the president’s impeachment.

    The president and his children have been accused of conflicts of interest of their own since he entered the White House in 2017, most involving the family’s international real estate and hotel businesses.

    Biden defended his family and said unequivocally that he had never made “a single penny” from a foreign country, before pivoting to accuse Trump of trying to distract Americans.

    “There’s a reason why he’s bringing up all this malarkey,” Biden said, looking directly into the camera.

    “It’s not about his family and my family. It’s about your family, and your family’s hurting badly.”

    He accused Trump of avoiding paying taxes, citing a New York Times investigation that reported Trump’s tax returns show he paid almost no federal income tax over more than 20 years.

    “Release your tax returns or stop talking about corruption,” Biden said.

    Trump, who has broken with decades of precedent in refusing to release his tax returns, said he had paid “millions.” He again said he would release his returns only once a longstanding audit was completed.

    The candidates clashed over healthcare, China policy and – after months of anti-racism protests – race relations, with Biden saying Trump was “one of the most racist presidents” in history.

    “He pours fuel on every single racist fire,” Biden said. “This guy has a dog whistle as big as a foghorn.”

    Trump responded by criticising Biden’s authorship of a 1994 crime bill that increased incarceration of minority defendants while asserting that he had done more for Black Americans than any president with the “possible” exception of Abraham Lincoln in the 1860s.

    Biden criticised Trump’s effort to persuade the U.S. Supreme Court to invalidate the 2010 Affordable Care Act, the sweeping healthcare reform passed when Biden was vice president in President Barack Obama’s administration.

    “People deserve to have affordable healthcare, period,” Biden said, noting that the law prevented insurance companies from denying coverage to people with pre-existing conditions.

    Trump said he wanted to replace the ACA with something “much better” that would offer the same protections, even though the administration has yet to propose a comprehensive healthcare plan in spite of a promise to do so for years.

    During a segment on climate change, Biden said his environmental plan would “transition from the oil industry” in favour of renewable energy sources, prompting Trump to go on the attack.

    “He is going to destroy the oil industry,” Trump said. “Will you remember that, Texas? Will you remember that, Pennsylvania?”

    Relatively few voters have yet to make up their minds, and Trump’s window to influence the outcome may be closing.

    A record 47 million Americans already have cast ballots, eclipsing total early voting from the 2016 election.

    The contentious first debate, when the two men traded insults, was watched by at least 73 million viewers.

    Trump passed up another planned debate last week after it was switched to a virtual format following his COVID-19 diagnosis.

  • Donald Trump tests negative for COVID-19

    Donald Trump tests negative for COVID-19

    President Donald Trump has reportedly tested negative for the deadly Coronavirus (COVID-19) on consecutive days.

    This was confirmed by White House physician Sean Conley as the President is heading for a campaign rally in Florida.

    “In response to your inquiry regarding the President’s most recent COVID-19 tests, I can share with you that he has tested NEGATIVE, on consecutive days, using the Abbott BinaxNOW antigen card” CNN reported.

    Conley wrote in a memo, noting that those tests were taken “in context with additional clinical and laboratory data.”
    Trump is “not infectious to others”.

    His memo comes moments after the President was seen boarding Air Force One without a mask on his way to Sanford, Florida, where he will rally a large group of supporters, many of whom are not wearing masks.

  • US presidential election:Trump, Biden second debate cancelled

    US presidential election:Trump, Biden second debate cancelled

    The U.S. Commission on Presidential Debates has decided to cancel the second debate between President Trump and his challenger Joe Biden.

    The debate was to hold on 15 October in a virtual format, but Trump said he preferred a person-to-person debate.

    His COVID-19 infection was the main reason the non-partisan debate body suggested the virtual format, so as not to endanger the Biden camp.

    But matters became more complicated when the Biden campaign rejected the suggestion by the Trump campaign that the debate be moved to 22 October and the 22 October debate shifted to 29 October.

    On Friday, the Commission on Presidential Debates said it will now focus on preparations for the October 22 debate, which will be the final debate between the two candidates.

    Mr. Trump is still recovering from COVID-19, and a number of his top aides have also become infected.

    The first debate that held in Cleveland Ohio was chaotic, with Trump notably and rudely interjecting Biden, whenever he took the floor.

  • US Poll: Trump tackles organisers, rejects virtual debate with Biden

    US Poll: Trump tackles organisers, rejects virtual debate with Biden

    President Donald Trump said on Thursday that he would not participate in a virtual debate with 2020 Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden after organizers plan to stage the rivals’ next face-off virtually to protect the health and safety of those involved.

    “I’m not going to do a virtual debate,” Trump, who’s recovering from COVID-19 at the White House, said in an interview with Fox Business.

    “I’m not going to waste my time with a virtual debate. That’s not what debating is all about. You sit behind a computer and do a debate, that is ridiculous,” Trump said.

    The Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD) announced on Thursday morning that the second Trump-Biden encounter, scheduled for Oct. 15, “will take the form of a town meeting, in which the candidates would participate from separate remote locations.”

    The town meeting participants and the moderator, it added, would be located at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts in Miami, Florida.

    Bill Stepien, Trump’s campaign manager, said in a statement that “there is no need for this unilateral declaration,” referring to the change to the debate format.

    “The safety of all involved can easily be achieved without canceling a chance for voters to see both candidates go head to head,” said Stepien, who also recently tested positive for COVID-19.

    “We’ll pass on this sad excuse to bail out Joe Biden and do a rally instead,” Stepien said.

    The presidential candidates met for their first debate in the race in Cleveland, Ohio on Sept. 29, two days before the incumbent tested positive for COVID-19. Biden has undergone multiple tests since Trump’s diagnosis, with each one returning negative.

    The former vice president has said the second debate should not be held if his Republican opponent still has the virus.

    Kate Bedingfield, Biden’s deputy campaign manager, said on Thursday that the Democrat intended to take part in the virtual debate next week.

    “Vice President Biden looks forward to speaking directly to the American people and comparing his plan for bringing the country together and building back better with Donald Trump’s failed leadership on the coronavirus that has thrown the strong economy he inherited into the worst downturn since the Great Depression,” the spokesperson said in a statement.

    Frank Fahrenkopf, head of the CPD, told CNN that the panel spoke with both campaigns “just before” it announced the decision to hold the Miami debate virtually, but did not consult with them about the decision.

    Fahrenkopf said that the decision had the support of the Cleveland Clinic, the commission’s health advisers, while also acknowledging that it was fully within Trump’s right to decline to debate.

    “There is no law requiring any presidential candidate to debate,” he explained, adding: “So it is up to every candidate to decide whether they want to debate or not.”

    Trump returned to the White House on Monday, where he continues to receive COVID-19 treatment after a three-day hospitalisation.

    Speaking to Fox Business on Thursday, the president said he was feeling “perfect,” while appearing eager to hit the campaign trail as Biden’s lead over him in national polls continues widening.

    “I think I’m better … to a point where I’d love to do a rally tonight. I wanted to do one last night.

    “I feel perfect. There’s nothing wrong,” Trump said.

    The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that individuals self-isolate for at least 10 days after the onset of symptoms from COVID-19, which has infected more than 7.55 million people and killed nearly 212,000 in the U.S.

  • COVID-19: Trump declared ‘symptom-free,’ makes return to Oval Office

    COVID-19: Trump declared ‘symptom-free,’ makes return to Oval Office

    U.S. President Donald Trump has been symptom-free for 24 hours and his vital signs are in the normal range, his physician said on Wednesday.

    Trump was hospitalised for coronavirus complications over the weekend.

    The president subsequently made his first return to the Oval Office.

    The ceremonial Marine guard was stationed outside the building, a sign that the head of state was inside.

    In a video posted to Twitter later, Trump appeared outside the Oval Office to tout the cutting-edge medicine he was treated with.

    He said he “wasn’t feeling so hot” when he went to hospital, but “they gave me Regeneron … It was, like, unbelievable, I felt good immediately.”

    Trump, who was given an experimental antibody cocktail produced by drug-maker Regeneron, said he wanted to approve the treatment through an emergency use authorization.

    “I want to get for you what I got and I’m gonna make it free,” he said, adding there were “hundreds of thousands of doses that are just about ready.”

    “That’s much more important to me than the vaccine,” Trump asserted, appearing energetic.

    It is unclear to what extent the approval process for new medicines can be speeded up.

    “I think this was a blessing from God that I caught” the coronavirus, he said, calling the therapeutic a “cure.”

    Trump earlier tweeted that he had been briefed on a Hurricane Delta and had spoken with the governors of Louisiana and Texas, two states that might get hit.

    The president is likely still infectious, having first reported symptoms on Thursday.

    Chief of Staff Mark Meadows told reporters that there are “safety protocols” in place for the Oval Office.

    “The president continues to work. He’s in very good health; we are pleased with his progress,” Meadows said several hours before Trump went to his desk.

    The timeline of the president’s infection with coronavirus remains a mystery, in part as the White House refuses to disclose what it knows.

    Trump tested positive on Thursday, after a busy week in which he hosted a massive Rose Garden ceremony to announce his Supreme Court pick, held campaign events and participated in the first presidential debate.

    In addition to Trump, a number of White House staff, campaign aides and Republican lawmakers have tested positive for the new coronavirus since the end of last week – including people who were at the Rose Garden and on his debate preparation team.

    Speaking to reporters, Brian Morgenstern, the deputy communications director for Trump, declined to reveal when the president last had a negative coronavirus test.

    “We’re not asking to go back through a bunch of records and look backwards,” Morgenstern said.

    His boss, Kayleigh McEneny, is currently in quarantine after having tested positive.

    Trump appeared without a mask on the White House’s Truman Balcony on Monday evening, after he left the hospital following a three-night stay.

    The president has kept up a steady deluge of tweets on a wide range of topics, including retweeting a number of random accounts which had posted flattering comments on him.

    Trump wants to participate in next week’s debate with Democratic nominee Joe Biden, the second face-to-face leading up to the November election.

    Biden has insisted that Trump be virus-free.

    Since being discharged from hospital, Trump has returned to comparing the coronavirus with the seasonal flu as he continued to downplay the pandemic and push for economic reopenings.

    More than 211,000 people have died from the coronavirus since March in the U.S., by far dwarfing annual figures on flu deaths.