Have you seen it? Do you have a clip of Donald Trump’s rambling press conference last Thursday? If not, consider yourself lucky. Standing on the Mar-a-Lago podium, Trump did what he always does: equivocated, shifted topics, asked illogical counter-questions, and lied constantly. There was a dearth of challenging questions. It was a media failure. But given Trump’s inability to engage honestly, simply showing up may have been an even bigger failure.
But we have to try. It is our professional responsibility to condemn Trump. The women who questioned him on stage at the National Association of Black Journalists conference, Harris Faulkner, Kadia Goba, Rachel Scott, set a good example.
Apparently not enough Mar-a-Lago reporters got the memo.
Their questions were barely audible on the video because they didn’t have a microphone, but I turned up the volume and listened carefully and transcribed them as accurately as I could. Trump was asked about 40 questions. Most of them were softball questions without criticism. Here’s a sample.
- Does he think Kamala Harris is more talented than Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton?
- Does he think Harris is like that? Worse Than Biden?
- What does he think of Harris? ~ No Should we choose Josh Shapiro as VP?
- Is he worried about Harris’ crowd size?
- Did he know full well that Harris was dating Willie Brown?
- Has his ear fully recovered? Are there any scars?
- Can you tell us about your upcoming interview with Elon Musk?
- Is Steve Bannon’s Imprisonment Politically Motivated?
- Would he consider pardoning Hunter Biden?
There were some policy questions. They were okay, but light. Some examples (which are semi-verbal. Watch the video for Trump’s full response):
- “Harris supports re-regulating marijuana and says no one should go to jail for marijuana. Do you agree with that?” (“As we legalize it, I’m starting to agree with that even more.”)
- “Do you support extending the tax credit for EVs?” (“Everyone wants to have an electric car. We don’t have enough electricity.”)
- “What do you think about the report that Harris said he might consider an arms embargo on Israel?” (“I disagree.”)
- “Has the fact that the person who tried to assassinate you used an AR-15 gun changed your views on people having access to that weapon?” (“No.”)
- “How would you vote on the Florida amendment (which would add abortion rights to the state constitution)?” (“I don’t want to talk about it right now.”)
- “There are other things the federal government can do besides banning (abortion). For example, would you tell the FDA to take away access to mifepristone?” (“You could do something that would be a supplement, sure… but you have to be able to vote.”)
Only a few questions were hostile.
- “Kamala Harris’s father is Jamaican. She went to a historically black college. How is it that she only recently decided to become black?” (Trump said vaguely, again for emphasis.)
- “How would you respond when President Biden says he is concerned that there will be no peaceful transfer of power if he loses?”
Trump responded by claiming, in a misleading way, that “last time,” there was a peaceful transfer of power, another reporter, I recall, was Maggie Haberman. The New York TimesBack again:
- “You were last time Peaceful “Transfer of power?” (No, Trump responded on January 6 that protesters were “treated very unfairly.”)
- Also Haberman: “When you were president, you pardoned (inaudible) drug dealers and violent criminals, including one who said to a rabbi, “I’m going to make you bleed.” How is that any different from (inaudible)? (“We had a committee… that recommended certain pardons for certain people.” In fact, Mother Jones (Trump reportedly ignored standard pardon procedures)
There are 22 questions here—I could easily come up with 22 questions that journalists should be asking or at least asking this candidate. his. Sure, this could be the last time Trump will ask you a question, but it will be worth it.
Partisan divide
According to Pew analysis, voters are roughly evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans. Yet you have called the Democratic Party “traitorous,” “un-American,” “crazy,” “mad,” “angry,” and “the party of crime.” You have retweeted a video of a supporter saying, “The only good Democrat is a dead Democrat.” You regularly use “us versus them” rhetoric. Why should voters support a candidate who seeks to divide Americans?
Immigration crime
You’ve been going around claiming that countries are emptying their prisons, jails, and “mental hospitals” as you call them, and sending “millions” of criminals and the mentally ill across our southern border. That’s a pretty outrageous lie, and your claim that illegal immigrants are driving a crime wave is patently false. Why do you persist in repeating this lie?
School Immunizations
You said you would cut the budgets of all schools that have mandatory vaccines. Are you talking about just the COVID vaccine, or are you also talking about routine childhood immunizations that prevent deadly diseases like polio and measles?
Probabilistic terrorism
The FBI says there is no evidence that the man who shot you and others in Pennsylvania was politically motivated. He was in fact a registered Republican voter. But election officials, including you and your sons, keep saying that the Democrats were trying to kill you in Pennsylvania. That is an unfounded claim, experts say. Mother Jones It will incite political violence. Why do you and your representatives continue to make these false claims?
January 6th
You said you would pardon those who participated in the attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, and you used the word “patriot” to describe the rioters who beat police with hockey sticks, flagpoles, and fire extinguishers, trampled police inside doors, and sprayed them with bear spray. How can you say you support police and law and order?
Tax Tips
You’ve proposed eliminating the income tax on tips. How would that be fair to low-wage workers who don’t get tips, like grocery store clerks and delivery drivers? Would you also support raising the federal minimum wage, which has been stuck at $7.25 an hour since 2009? (Harris, who accepted Trump’s proposal on Saturday, supports raising the minimum wage.)
Dehumanization of immigrants
Your business has knowingly employed illegal workers for years in all areas, from landscaping and maintenance to modeling and hospitality services. Why should you now claim that these people you relied on are “poisoning the blood of our country”?
mass expulsion
Economists question your plan to deport 11 million illegal immigrants, including law-abiding families who have lived, worked, owned homes, and paid taxes in the United States for decades. They say mass deportations would shrink the U.S. economy by 6 percent over 20 years and cost American workers about 968,000 jobs. We would lose about $100 billion a year in taxes paid by those families. The agriculture, construction, and hotel industries depend on their labor, and immigrants commit less crime than native Americans. Why do you think uprooting established families is good policy?
border policy
Congress recently introduced a bipartisan border bill that provided most of what Republicans had long demanded. It was a huge policy win for your party, but as you admitted, you stopped it because you wanted to use the border issue against Biden. How do you justify putting your campaign ahead of your party’s hard-won goals?
Family separation
Illegal immigration has plagued presidents of both parties. But as you watched, immigrant parents were forcibly separated from their babies and young children. It was an incredibly cruel policy that had lasting effects on good families. How can showing up at the border or even crossing the border illegally justify such a callous response? And why is the architect of it, Stephen Miller, still on your advisory board?
Clean Energy
You’ve vowed to take back the Clean Energy Fund that was passed by the Biden administration. But that fund has created a domestic manufacturing boom in red states. The “battery belt” in the South is booming. Shouldn’t a Republican candidate celebrate that?
Dirty energy
You asked oil executives for $1 billion in campaign contributions, telling them that if elected, you would lower the barriers to drilling and make them a fortune. Americans are not blind. Climate change is real, and storms, fires, droughts, and floods like the one we saw in the Southeast this week are getting more severe. Home insurance prices are skyrocketing. Given the disastrous consequences of burning fossil fuels, how can encouraging more oil drilling be a wise policy?
corruption
The mantra of the 2016 campaign was “drain the swamp.” But cabinet members like EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt, who is openly hostile to environmental protection, were objectively the swamp. You and an unprecedented number of your colleagues have been investigated, charged with crimes, and in many cases convicted. How can you say you’ve drained the swamp when your administration has implemented the swamp drain?
Project 2025
You flew on a private jet with Kevin Roberts, the architect of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, and praised him and the project at a Heritage conference. About 140 people in your administration, including six Cabinet officials, were involved in Project 2025. How can you claim that you knew nothing about it and that it would not affect your presidential agenda?
legacy
By saying that abortion should be left to the states, you are in effect supporting the most severe restrictions imposed by some states. Some states do not allow exceptions for rape or incest, and even in states that do have exceptions for the health of the mother, doctors delay emergency abortions until the patient is close to death. How do you propose to protect these women?
race
Following up on the previous racial question, Kamala Harris has always identified as both black and South Asian. You asked, “Is she Indian or black?” Don’t you think that “either/or” statement is offensive to the 9% of American adults who identify as multiracial?
Flattering Christian Voters
At a recent conference, you urged Christians to get out and vote, and then you said that after that, there would be no need to vote anymore. “It’s going to be fixed,” you said. what Will it be fixed? Abortion? Election? Explain the meaning.
alias
You called her “Laughing Kamala”, but it seems like a lot of people like her joy. Do you see laughter as something negative? Separately, I would like to know why you think it is okay to call her “Kamabla”.
Military service
JD Vance and your cronies attacked Tim Walz for his military service, but Walz volunteered and served for 24 years. You were deferred from the Vietnam draft several times, and claimed bone spurs based on a diagnosis that your doctor’s daughters now say was fake. It was a favor to your father. How can you justify attacking Walz when you shied away from your duty?
economy
The Biden administration has outpaced you on many key economic indicators. He has overseen falling unemployment, stronger wage growth, more new jobs, more domestic manufacturing, rising household incomes, falling child poverty, and fewer uninsured Americans. His biggest problem has been inflation, but it has also been a global problem caused by the pandemic, supply chain disruptions, rising prices, and the surge in energy prices due to Russia’s war in Ukraine. Economic growth has been about the same for both administrations. So how can you say your economy is the “best economy” and Biden has done a “bad job.”
Foreign influence
How can voters expect you to treat Saudi Arabia fairly when the Saudis have given your son-in-law $2 billion in financial support?
lie
Voters are not naive. All politicians distort the truth, and some lie occasionally. But the nation’s fact-checkers have a hard time keeping up with you. You lied throughout this press conference. Why are we here?
