The US Justice Department’s Public Integrity Section has sent a letter to Elon Musk’s political group warning that its $1m giveaway in swing states may run afoul of federal law, a source familiar with the matter has confirmed to Sky’s US partner network NBC News.
Wednesday 23 October 2024 21:55, UK
In an exclusive interview with Sky News, the Lebanese-born father-in-law of Donald Trump’s younger daughter has defended his support for a man often accused of xenophobia, and has predicted the tide is turning for the former president with a group of unlikely voters.
“There’s a huge wave. There’s a huge shift towards the Republican Party and towards President Trump,” Massad Boulos told Sky’s Anna Botting on The World.
Dr Boulos, who immigrated to Texas as a child, has emerged as a key emissary for Donald Trump in a concerted effort to reach Arab-American voters, particularly in the swing state of Michigan where most of the diaspora in America live.
Boulos’s son, Michael, married Donald Trump’s daughter Tiffany two years ago. Since then, Boulos has risen to become the latest extended family member to enter the inner orbit of Team Trump.
Speaking to Sky News, he defended Mr Trump’s position on immigration, explained why he believed a Trump presidency would be good for the entire Middle East, and he said Arab-American voters were drawn by Trump because of an erosion of their traditional values – “the major issues with the woke ideology,” he said.
Watch the full interview here:
“Nobody’s done what I’ve done for Israel,” Donald Trump declared at a rally in Georgia when asked how he intends to support Israel if he is re-elected president.
He pointed to his administration moving the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a controversial move to recognise it fully as Israel’s capital, as well as recognising Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights, and negotiating the Abraham Accords, which normalised relations between Israel and four Arab countries for the first time.
But the biggest policy in support of Israel, Mr Trump said, was withdrawing from the nuclear agreement with Iran – a deal current Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu was ardently against.
Mr Trump went on to say that if he wins the White House again, his administration will “take care of Israel” – and then joked he’d get 97% of the vote if he ran to be prime minister there.
“We’re going to do a lot for Israel, we’re behind them. The big thing – we want to have peace in the Middle East,” he said.
He added “Bibi [Benjamin Netanyahu] called me yesterday, he called me the day before, and we have a very good relationship,” Mr Trump claimed.
The former president also said that he will also resolve the war in Ukraine after Putin’s illegal invasion.
The US Justice Department’s Public Integrity Section has sent a letter to Elon Musk’s political group warning that its $1m giveaway in swing states may run afoul of federal law, a source familiar with the matter has confirmed to Sky’s US partner network NBC News.
The Justice Department declined to comment, and the PAC’s treasurer did not immediately return a voicemail message left by NBC News.
Federal law prohibits paying people to register to vote. The America PAC contest – allowing entrants to sign a petition supporting the First and Second Amendments and enter a drawing for a $1 million prize–is only open to registered voters in certain swing states, including Pennsylvania.
Pressure has been mounting on the Justice Department to launch a probe of some kind, with 11 former government officials, including several Republican ex-prosecutors, urging it to investigate whether Mr Musk’s daily prizes violate a federal law prohibiting paying people to register to vote.
It’s unclear when the letter went out or what further action, if any, the Justice Department might take.
Some legal experts believe the contest violates federal law, while others, including NBC News election consultant and attorney Matt Sanderson, disagree. Sanderson says the contest sits in a legal gray area and probably does not violate the statute.
Donald Trump is at his first of two major campaign events today, and he is in Georgia.
This event is the “believers and ballots faith town hall” – so the audience is made up of mainly religious Americans.
The GOP nominee is expected to take questions, rather than the event being like his usual rallies.
Watch live in the stream above, at the link below – and we’ll bring you any news right here.
As we’ve reported, John Kelly, who was White House chief of staff during the Trump administration and has since become a critic of the former president, said in a series of recent interviews that Mr Trump spoke positively about Adolf Hitler when he was in office.
Mr Kelly also said that former president Trump “meets the definition of fascist” – and the Joe Biden’s press secretary has said that the White House agrees with that assertion.
Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters at the daily press briefing: “Look, you have heard from this president over and over again about the threats to democracy, and the president has spoken about that.
“You’ve heard from the former president himself saying that he is going to be a dictator on day one. This is him, not us. This is him.
“And it’s not just … us, the White House, saying this. You heard it from officials, former officials that worked for the former president say this as well.
“So you know, do we agree – I know that the vice president just spoke about this – do we agree about that determination? Yes, we do. We do.”
Ms Jean-Pierre was then asked by a reporter: “So just to be clear, when you said, ‘we do agree’ – President Biden believes that Donald Trump is a fascist?”
She replied: “I mean, yes. We have said – he’s said himself, the former president has said he is going to be a dictator on day one. We cannot ignore that.”
We are expecting to hear from Donald Trump at his first of two major campaign events today, and he is in Georgia.
This event is the “believers and ballots faith town hall” – so the audience is made up of mainly religious Americans.
He’s running around 20 minutes late so far, so we’ll let you know when he takes to the stage.
Donald Trump has outdone himself.
His rhetoric has long been extreme but, in campaign remarks as it heads towards a close, it’s more so.
Consider the direct quotes from his “enemy within” interview on Fox News on 13 October.
Asked about “bureaucrats undermining you” in a second term, he replied: “We have two enemies: we have the outside enemy, and then we have the enemy from within.
“And the enemy from within, in my opinion, is more dangerous than China, Russia, and all these countries.”
Referring to Adam Schiff, a Democratic candidate for the Senate, he says: “Adam ‘Shifty’ Schiff, who’s a total sleazebag, is going to become a senator. But I call him the enemy from within.”
Asked whether he expects chaos on election day from outside agitators, he replied: “I think the bigger problem are the people from within.
“We have some very bad people, we have some sick people, radical left lunatics.
“It should be very easily handled by, if necessary, by National Guard or, if really necessary, by the military.
Critics have interpreted the remarks as a threat to use the military against political opponents, even though he would need to be president to try.
They accuse Trump of shaping an authoritarian agenda – true, they say, because it’s laid out in his own words.
In the last hour, Vice President Kamala Harris hit out at Donald Trump after his former chief of staff claimed he repeatedly spoke positively about Adolf Hitler when he was in office.
The Trump campaign has categorically denied the allegations made by John Kelly, who has since become a Trump critic – but the Democrat nominee said in a TV statement that the comments are “deeply troubling and incredibly dangerous”.
Our US correspondent Mark Stone explains that Mr Kelly was incredibly close to Donald Trump in the White House as his chief of staff, and notes that this is not the first time such claims have been made.
But what’s different now – less than two weeks from election day – is that former Trump officials are now speaking openly and on the record.
On the other side, the Harris campaign is switching its strategy from hope and positivity about the future to the threat that a Donald Trump presidency might pose.
Watch what the vice president said below, and full analysis from Mark Stone.
US Senator and Republican vice-presidential nominee JD Vance is holding a campaign rally in Las Vegas.
It is his first of two scheduled rallies today, and Donald Trump and his son Donald Jr will be speaking later on.
Watch live below, and we’ll bring you any key updates here.
The vice president and Democrat candidate for president, Kamala Harris, has just given a statement to the media responding to some comments allegedly made by Donald Trump when he was president.
John Kelly, who was White House chief of staff during the Trump administration and has since become a critic of the former president, said in a series of recent interviews that Mr Trump spoke positively about Adolf Hitler when he was in office.
“He commented more than once that, you know, that Hitler did some good things, too,” Mr Kelly said, and he also claimed that he wanted generals like the ones Hitler had.
In response, the vice president said it is “deeply troubling and incredibly dangerous that Donald Trump would invoke Adolf Hitler, the man who is responsible for the deaths of six million Jews and hundreds of thousands of Americans”.
Ms Harris also hit out at her opponent for referring to judges, journalists, and election officials as “the enemy from within”.
She concluded: “Donald Trump is increasingly unhinged and unstable.
“And in a second term, people like John Kelly would not be there to be the guardrails against his propensities and his actions.”
Steven Cheung, a Trump campaign spokesperson, said in a statement that Mr Kelly “totally beclowned himself” by recounting “debunked stories” about the Trump administration.
“President Trump has always honoured the service and sacrifice of all of our military men and women,” Mr Cheung said.
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