Gunnar wrote:I wonder how much he had to be bribed to change from a "never Trumper" to just another Trump sycophant.
Kevin Graham wrote:Trump is hugely popular in S.Carolina now, so Graham really has no choice but to start licking his arse.
Joesley Batista, the meat tycoon at the center of a scandal that almost toppled the Brazilian government last year, was detained by police amid a probe linked to the sprawling Carwash investigation.
Police were serving 18 arrest warrants and another 56 search and seizures on an illegal campaign financing scheme and corruption of high-ranking members of the Agriculture Ministry between 2014 and 2015, according to a statement from Brazil’s tax agency. The probe is centered in Brazil’s Minas Gerais state, but warrants are also being carried out in Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Paraiba and Mato Grosso states.
J&F Investimentos Former President And CEO Joesley Batista Testifies At A Congressional Inquiry Committee Hearing
Joesley BatistaPhotographer: Andre Coelho/Bloomberg
Joesley Batista was released from jail in March, weeks after his older brother Wesley Batista, the former chief executive officer of JBS SA. The brothers, who control the meatpacking giant, had been in jail for about six months as they battled insider-trading accusations and, in Joesley’s case, allegedly concealing information during plea bargain negotiations. The brothers became the center of a scandal that rocked Brazil in 2017 after they reached an agreement with authorities to testify about a long-running scheme to bribe politicians including President Michel Temer. Prosecutors later asked for the plea deals signed by both brothers to be revoked.
Joesley has cooperated with the judiciary and the order for his temporary arrest is “strange,” his lawyer Andre Callegari said in a message sent by a press official for the family’s holding company, J&F Investimentos. He added that Joesley has testified and given several documents in the case, and said he will give “all the clarifications needed.”
JBS fell as much as 5.2 percent in early trading in Sao Paulo, erasing this month’s gains. It was down 0.9 percent as of 10:38 a.m. local time.
The news of the brothers’ plea deal and later arrest sent markets plunging, and caused JBS to temporarily abandon plans to sell shares in New York. The company appointed their father, 84-year-old Jose Batista Sobrinho, as CEO. The meatpacker’s shares and bonds eventually rebounded as it renegotiated its debt with banks and quickly sold assets. Meat operations in the U.S., which account for more than two-thirds of JBS’s revenues, have benefited from rising demand both at home and abroad.
President Trump abruptly ended a meeting with Democratic leaders on Wednesday, saying he was unable to work with them on legislation following comments by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) that he was “engaged in a coverup.”
Trump made an unscheduled appearance in the Rose Garden shortly afterward and in a meandering 10-minute address said he had left the meeting with Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) at which they were supposed to talk about working together on a $2 billion infrastructure plan.
“Instead of walking in happily to a meeting, I walk in to look at people who said I was doing a coverup,” Trump said, adding that he can’t work on infrastructure “under these circumstances.”
Pelosi made her comments earlier Wednesday morning after a closed-door meeting with House Democrats called to discuss ongoing investigations of Trump and his administration. Despite her accusation of a coverup, Pelosi and all but one of her six committee chairmen with investigative powers tamped down talk of impeachment proceedings during the meeting.
Speaking to reporters shortly after Trump’s appearance in the Rose Garden, Pelosi and Schumer said they were taken aback by Trump’s behavior.
“To watch what happened in the White House would make your jaw drop,” Schumer said.
Pelosi said Democrats had been prepared to deliver a signature accomplishment to Trump at a time when the nation’s roads, bridges, airports and other infrastructure are ailing.
“He just took a pass, and it just makes me wonder why he did,” Pelosi said. “In any event, I pray for the president of the United States, and I pray for the United States of America.”
canpakes wrote:Another temper tantrum. Trump can’t do what is needed for the nation if he’s angry about something.
Jersey Girl wrote:canpakes wrote:Another temper tantrum. Trump can’t do what is needed for the nation if he’s angry about something.
Yes. Like go to work. He's now refusing to do his job.
Trump promised never to golf. Instead, he’s spent more than twice as many days golfing as Obama at the same point, costing taxpayers over three times as much.
Donald Trump’s golf habit has already cost taxpayers at least $102 million in extra travel and security expenses, and next month will achieve a new milestone: a seven-figure presidential visit to another country so he can play at his own course.
U.S. taxpayers have spent $81 million for the president’s two dozen trips to Florida, according to a HuffPost analysis. They spent $17 million for his 15 trips to New Jersey, another $1 million so he could visit his resort in Los Angeles and at least $3 million for his two days in Scotland last summer ― $1.3 million of which went just for rental cars for the massive entourage that accompanies a president abroad.
And, notwithstanding Trump’s campaign promise that if elected he would not play golf at all, the White House has done preliminary work for Trump’s visit to his resort on the west coast of Ireland next month, according to Irish media and government sources, even though no official meeting with Irish leaders is planned in the capital, Dublin.
Late Tuesday afternoon, the White House announced that Trump would meet with Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar in Shannon, just 30 miles by air from Trump’s golf resort in Doonbeg. It will be the first time Trump will visit a foreign country — with the staggering footprint of personnel and equipment that entails — for the main purpose of playing golf, though an official purpose was layered on after the fact.
“It’s obviously an incredible waste of money,” said Robert Weissman, president of the group Public Citizen. He then quipped: “Of course, the more time he spends golfing, the less time he spends governing, the better.”
The $102 million total to date spent on Trump’s presidential golfing represents 255 times the annual presidential salary he volunteered not to take. It is more than three times the cost of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation that Trump continually complains about. It would fund for six years the Special Olympics program that Trump’s proposed budget had originally cut to save money.
President Donald Trump has "aggressively" pushed for the Army Corps of Engineers to award a contract to a North Dakota-based construction company to build sections of his proposed wall along the southern US border, The Washington Post reported Thursday.
Citing conversations with multiple unnamed administration officials, the paper said the President has been pushing Department of Homeland Security leaders and Lt. Gen. Todd Semonite, the commanding general of the Army Corps of Engineers, to award a contract potentially worth billions of dollars to Fisher Industries, "whose top executive is a GOP donor and frequent guest on Fox News."
The Post said Trump's push for the contract with Fisher, which is suing the federal government over its solicitation process for border wall contracts, "has alarmed military commanders and DHS officials."
The President, who has "repeatedly" lobbied on behalf of the company to officials, again brought it up on Thursday during an Oval Office meeting about the border wall that included Gen. Mark Milley, the commander of the Army, and other Pentagon officials, the paper said. Trump, according to officials the Post spoke to, "immediately brought up Fisher" during the meeting.