Rudy Giuliani made yet another outlandish claim in his latest appearance on Fox News, during which he claimed that he cancelled his previously announced oppo research trip to Ukraine because the new president of that country, who is Jewish, is “surrounded by Soros people, Democrats, and people trying to set us up.”

Speaking to Laura Ingraham, Giuliani, President Donald Trump’s personal attorney, did not provide any evidence to back up these incendiary charges, which not-so-subtly trafficked in anti-Semitic tropes that right-wing groups frequently use to smear Jewish billionaire George Soros. Notably, Giuliani’s comments came just one day after Ingraham’s show listed a virulent anti-Semite and white supremacist as among a group of “prominent conservatives” whose voices were being unfairly silenced by mainstream social media platforms.

In early May, the notoriously gaffe-prone Giuliani announced his intention to visit Ukraine to discuss the origins of the FBI investigation into Russian influence on the Trump campaign and to learn more about a criminal inquiry into former Vice President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter. During an interview with the New York Times, Giuliani openly acknowledged that his trip was aimed at “meddling in an investigation” to gain potential opposition research for his client’s 2020 presidential bid.

After a broad outcry, the Trump campaign cancelled the trip.

Ingraham seemed to repeat this previous explanation for why Giuliani didn’t go, saying: “But they called you off that, though. You were going over there.”

“I didn’t go over there because they surrounded the present president of the Ukraine with Soros people, Democrats, and people trying to set us up,” Giuliani replied. “I was going over there to make sure they investigate the Ukrainian collusion with Hillary Clinton’s people.”

“Are you going to still try to go?” Ingraham asked.

“I will go when I am sure they won’t misstate why I am going there,” Giuliani responded.

But just last week, Giuliani acknowledged he had a meeting in New York City with a former Ukrainian diplomat who has pushed a conspiracy theory that the Hillary Clinton campaign, US Embassy officials in Kiev, and the Ukrainian government worked together in 2016 to dig up dirt on the Trump campaign. All parties involved have strongly denied the diplomat’s claims.

Watch the video above, via Fox News. (The relevant portion begins at the 7:15 mark.)

Following the news about the White House wanting the USS John McCain out of sight during President Donald Trump‘s trip to Japan, Bill Maher asked what members of the military see in POTUS.

“What does the military see in Donald Trump?” he asked. “Why do they like a guy who is a draft-dodger, who denigrated the war hero John McCain, and sides with our enemies?”

He brought up Trump siding with Kim Jong Un over Joe Biden and again asked, “What do they see in him? Why the popularity?”

When Maher brought up the considered pardons for war criminals, Axios’ Jonathan Swan noted how much advocacy has come from Fox News’ Pete Hegseth alone.

Maher reviewed the “dictator checklist” he’s talked about before, and after Kirsten Powers suggested hiding the name of John McCain should go on that list too, Maher added to it the promise that people can do whatever they want and even commit war crimes and they won’t get in trouble.

Swan took issue with the idea that Trump is a dictator when people around him ignore his orders. “That’s another thing dictators can get away with,” Maher responded. “Being crazy.”

We will add video when available.

[image via screengrab]

Sean Hannity assembled a big panel of regular guests to rail against the “deep state” and the investigation into President Donald Trump, saying the “day of reckoning” is coming for the real criminals.

Hannity asked where the “media hysteria” is over “real obstruction, real crime” from Hillary Clinton, said there must be equal application of the law, and brought up the infamous Steele dossier.

“Night after night, we have literally been unpeeling the layers of this onion and ripping the mask off all of this corruption trying to get to the truth to expose what has happened here,” he said. “This was an attempt to literally fix a presidential election and destroy a duly-elected president. There is a deep state, and now their day of reckoning has come.”

Hannity then brought on his big panel, which included several familiar faces: Gregg Jarrett, Sara Carter, John Solomon, Victoria Toensing, Joe diGenova, Matt Schlapp, Pam Bondi, Geraldo Rivera, Tom Fitton, and Doug Schoen.

Hannity started by telling them, “We wouldn’t be here today––they probably would have succeeded had it not been for every single one of you, and I applaud all of you for your deep digging, your investigative reporting, the hard work, the tough analysis.”

You can watch a clip above, via Fox News.

[image via screengrab]

Pro-Trump evangelical pastor Robert Jeffress condemned Disney as “insane” and “blinded by evil” for its threat to pull production out of Georgia if that state implements a recently passed law that would effectively ban abortion after six weeks: “They want to murder and support the murder of their future audience.”

Speaking to Lou Dobbs on the Fox Business Network, Jeffress, who has a long track record of making outrageous comments and harboring extremist beliefs, was reacting to corporate threats by Disney and Netflix to leave the state over a new “fetal heartbeat” law.

Last month, Georgia’s Republican Governor Brian Kemp signed an abortion bill that would prohibit terminating a pregnancy once a fetal heartbeat can be detected, which typically happens at around the six-week mark. The new law was immediately challenged in court by the ACLU and has not yet been implemented.

Earlier in the week, Disney CEO Bob Iger told Reuters it would be “very difficult” for his company to keep producing TV shows and movies in Georgia if the law were to take effect. “I think many people who work for us will not want to work there, and we will have to heed their wishes in that regard. Right now we are watching it very carefully.”

Jeffress, however, seemed untroubled by the potential departure of millions of dollars of revenue from the state. “I would say let them go and don’t let the door hit them on the backside,” he told Dobbs. “For Disney to do this when their whole market is children. They want to murder and support the murder of their future audience.”

“That is not only not good morals, it’s not good business either,” he added, referring to Disney’s decision. “They are insane, blinded by evil in their support of abortion.”

Watch the video above, via Fox Business Network.

The Elton John biopic Rocketman is out this week, and the filmmakers are already speaking out to denounce censorship of several scenes in the movie.

Scenes depicting gay sex and making reference to John’s sexuality were edited out of the film in Russia.

John and the filmmakers put out a joint statement, obtained by The Hollywood Reporter, denouncing the “decision to pander to local laws and censor Rocketman for the Russian market, a move we were unaware of until today”:

Paramount Pictures have been brave and bold partners in allowing us to create a film which is a true representation of Elton’s extraordinary life, warts and all. That the local distributor has edited out certain scenes, denying the audience the opportunity to see the film as it was intended is a sad reflection of the divided world we still live in and how it can still be so cruelly unaccepting of the love between two people. We believe in building bridges and open dialogue, and will continue to push for the breaking down of barriers until all people are heard equally across the world.

THR’s report also notes scenes showing people taking drugs were edited out as well.

[image via screengrab]

Fox News’ Martha MacCallum tonight blasted Michael Wolff over a claim in his new book about her interview with then-Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.

At least one claim in Wolff’s book has already been rejected by the special counsel’s office, but he’s standing by it and the rest of the book.

Wolff did an interview with The New York Times in which he was questioned about his fact-checking process and said this:

It’s a distinction between journalists who are institutionally wedded and those who are not. I’m not. You make those pro forma calls to protect yourself, to protect the institution. It’s what the institution demands. I’m talking about those calls where you absolutely know what the response is going to be. They put you in the position in which you’re potentially having to negotiate what you know. In some curious way, that’s what much journalism is about. It’s about a negotiated truth.

There is a claim in his book that Kavanaugh got the questions from his Fox News interview with MacCallum ahead of time, and from Fox. Wolff told the Times he didn’t ask Fox News for comment because that’s “a difference between an institutional reporter and a non-institutional reporter. I don’t have to ask the silly questions.”

He also asked, “Can you imagine a circumstance under the sun in which Fox would come clean on that?”

Fox News told the Times in a statement the claim is “pure fiction,” and MacCallum herself responded on The Story tonight.

“Michael Wolff,” she said, “you may not care to know the facts but I do. So here they are. I wrote my questions on a legal pad the old fashioned way, on my way to D.C. in a car. No one from the White House or for that matter from Fox weighed in on my interview at all, period. This is a news show. We deal in facts. I have been doing this for 25 years and I have never given anyone my questions prior to an interview. That is the story. That is not ‘negotiated truth.'”

She also brought on Howard Kurtz and asked, “How does he get away with this?”

You can watch the segment above, via Fox News.

[image via screengrab]

Take that, dictionary.

At the 2019 Scripps National Spelling Bee, eight spellers were crowned as co-champions after all of them went through five rounds — 47 consecutive words — without a mistake, nearly exhausting the bank of competition-level words chosen for the Bee. Nothing like this had ever happened in contest’s 94-year history.

“Champion spellers, we are now in uncharted territory,” Bee official Jacques Bailly said, per the Asssociated Press, in announcing the decision to declare eight winners. “We do have plenty of words remaining on our list. But we will soon run out of words that will possibly challenge you, the most phenomenal collection of super-spellers in the history of this competition.”

Dubbed the “octo-champs,” the Bee’s winners included Rishik Gandhasri, Erin Howard, Saketh Sundar, Shruthika Padhy, Sohum Sukhatankar, Abhijay Kodali, Christopher Serrao and Rohan Raja.

The Bees between 2014–16 also ended in ties, but those competitions only had two co-champions each.

Photo credit: Alex Wong/Getty Images

CNN’s Don Lemon broke down into a laughing fit at the end of a segment that examined the latest charges of racism leveled against far right Congressman Steve King (R-IA) and his rebuttal, in which King echoed many of the same talking points of the white nationalist movement.

“He doesn’t even know he’s being racist,” Lemon said of King’s response to an angry constituent who had accused the nine-term Congressman of trafficking in racism.

“If we presume that every culture is equal and has an equal amount to contribute to our civilization,” King said. “We’re devaluing the contributions of the people who laid the foundation for America and that’s our Founding Fathers. We need to hang onto those principles and restore them and refurbish the pillars of American Exceptionalism.”

Lemon’s guest, comedian W. Kamau Bell, pulled no punches in his reply. “I appreciate Steve King giving us a working definition of white supremacy. It’s like, yep, that’s exactly what it is, being afraid of other cultures, yep, and feeling like you have to be better no matter what. That’s the working definition of white supremacy.”

“He’s saying that’s not racist when he’s saying something racist coming out of his mouth,” Lemon added, amused by the sheer irony of King’s comment.

“The thing is,” Bell pointed out, “you don’t get to determine if you’re being racist yourself, that’s for others to determine.”

To add more context to the discussion, Lemon then played a supercut of King’s long history of making remarks about “culture” that many others, including his fellow Republicans in Congress, have found racist and offensive. After the clip finished, Lemon began to ask for a comment from Bell, who instead just dropped his head onto the desk in clear frustration and refused to speak.

Lemon then lost it in a giggling fit.

When the pair finally composed themselves, Bell again did not equivocate: “Yes. All that was racist. Next question.”

Watch the video above, via CNN.

The Daily Show‘s Trevor Noah talked on Thursday night about Facebook doubling down on their position that it’s not up to them to police and remove fake videos, like the one made famous over the last week in which Speaker Nancy Pelosi is made to appear impaired by digital manipulation. Unlike many on the left and in the press, Noah softly sided with Facebook.

After playing some news clips covering the story, and the side by side comparison of the real and the fake, Noah addressed it.

“On the one hand, I can see why Nancy wants the fake videos to be pulled off of Facebook. I mean I get it, there are real videos of me on Facebook I want to come down. I understand.” On screen it showed a clip of Noah on Dancing with the Stars as he said this. “But, on the other hand, I can see why Facebook says that they can’t police fake videos online, because if you think about it, that’s all videos online.”

“Yeah. I mean, do you really think that cat was playing a keyboard? Do you? Huh? You really think that banana likes peanut butter jelly time? No!” he continued. “You can’t just take fake videos off the internet. If the Internet had no fake videos, it would be the library. ”

“I get that Nancy Pelosi and many people are saying these fake videos can affect elections, but I’m going to be honest with you: I think if a fake video of Nancy Pelosi slurring can make you vote for Trump, something tells me were always going to vote for Trump,” he said, which is an absolutely solid point.

“Here’s what I think Nancy Pelosi should do, right? Just fight fire with fire. Alright? That’s it. If all these fake videos can work against you, then just let the fake videos work for you,” he said. They began showing fake photos. “Post about that time you knocked out Sonny Liston, yeah, or tell Facebook about when you jumped a dirt bike over the Grand Canyon. Yeah?”

“And if people think that’s really you [in the fake slurring video], then just show them a video of you like this,” he said, and a fake clip of Pelosi as a Jedi played.

“Wow! I’m voting Democrat!” he said.

Couched in humor but an overall excellent argument against knee-jerk censorship on the part of Facebook.

Watch the clip above, courtesy of Comedy Central.

President Trump dropped a trade war bomb on Thursday when he announced his intent to put in place new and harsh tariffs on goods from Mexico until the “illegal Immigration problem is remedied.” And among the many worried, negative reactions was one from Senate Finance Committee Chair Chuck Grassley, in a strongly worded statement.

“Trade policy and border security are separate issues. This is a misuse of presidential tariff authority and counter to congressional intent,” the statement begins. “Following through on this threat would seriously jeopardize passage USMCA, a central campaign pledge of President Trump’s and what could be a big victory for the country.”

Putting this in the context of harming Trump’s own signature USMCA (the replacement for NAFTA) is a smart frame, an effort to show that the tariffs are in conflict with the administration’s own trade goals.

So the opening is the fullest expression of his objection, with the remainder being caveats to soften the blow with Trump and the MAGA supporters and voters by emphasizing how much he’s totally on board for everything Trump is doing with regard to immigration.

Even so it is unlikely his objection will be treated as anything other than leftist Trump hate by MAGA, and his concessions to Trump in the rest of the statement will put off Trump critics. In other words, partisan loyalties will obscure whether Grassley may actually be correct about these tariffs being a bad idea.

Here’s the full statement.

Trade policy and border security are separate issues. This is a misuse of presidential tariff authority and counter to congressional intent. Following through on this threat would seriously jeopardize passage USMCA, a central campaign pledge of President Trump’s and what could be a big victory for the country. President Trump should consider alternatives, such as imposing a fee on the billions of dollars of remittances that annually leave the United States to Mexico, which only encourage illegal immigration and don’t help the U.S. economy. It could fund border security measures and would put economic pressure on Mexico without imposing a financial burden on U.S. consumers or harming American jobs. I’ve long supported reforms to to remittance law, which haven’t become law because of opposition from big banks and other financial interests. Mexico must help get the border crisis under control and the president should use appropriate authorities to apply pressure. I’ve also called for a Safe Third Country Agreement so that Mexico cannot simply pass the buck to the United States. Mexico has a leading role to play here when asylum seekers are traversing their country without regard to the law and without consequence. Congress must also immediately fully fund border security and interior enforcement. Democrats should come to the table in a reasonable way and work to put an end to the security and humanitarian crisis on the border. I support nearly every one of President Trump’s immigration policies, but this is not one of them. I urge the president to consider other options.

Stocks, too, took a hit after Trump’s announcement.

CNN’s Chris Cuomo decried the widespread “culture of fear” that grips the White House and diagnosed its attempt to hide the USS John S. McCain from President Donald Trump during his recent visit to Japan as a “symptom of a sickness.”

On Thursday, Trump again denied any knowledge of the request — which the White House has confirmed — to to move or otherwise obscure the warship that bears the namesake of his hated political rival, the recently deceased Sen John McCain. But Trump, notably, did not condemn the request and instead called the gesture “well meaning.”

His response incensed Cuomo.

“Well-meaning? None of that is,” the CNN host said, incredulous. “The fact that someone in the White House meant well by hiding a ship’s name from the president is a symptom of a sickness. They won’t mention preparing for election interference or the problems with kids at the border or giving troubled information about foreign affairs. None of this is well-meaning. It has meaning. There is a culture of fear and catering to a POTUS who routinely chooses to lie like this.”

This institutional defensive crouch, he implied, was the driving force behind this White House’s systemic problem with spreading falsehoods, whether it’s the president himself consistently lying about Robert Mueller and Russia, his advisors lying about the real victims of China tariffs, or his spokesperson dissembling over the amount of border wall that’s being built.

“Attacking the truth is killing him politically,” Cuomo argued. “First of all, easily it’s an abuse of power and people know it. The biggest consensus about this president in this country is that he can’t tell the truth. 65%. Find another number that’s that high about him, and they happen to be 100% right.”

The CNN host urged the president to change his White House’s gross dysfunction when it comes to being honest with the American people. “Stop lying about what we know to be true,” he said. “Don’t lie about immigrants. Don’t blame Democrats for a problem that you lied about creating, you fomented, and claimed could be fixed by a fence. Push policies for more jobs and better trade, but don’t lie about our growth and the risk of tariffs. Don’t lie to farmers. I don’t accept that this president can’t do things differently.”

Watch the video above, via CNN.

The ‘Ridiculist’ is an Anderson Cooper closing segment that’s a little less serious and has a little more irreverence than the rest of the news program. And that was especially true on Thursday night as Cooper became overwhelmed with the topic at hand and broke out in downright giggling.

The segment was covering Trump making many references to there being “love” between Mueller and Comey, and the use of the words “love” and even “lover” about others as well, including Peter Strzok and Lisa Page (who were, it should be noted, lovers.)

Cooper introduced it by saying that “the greatest love story that never was continues unabated in the most disputed of Cupid’s domains: President Trump’s mind.” As he covered the various instances of Trump talking about love his mirth steadily rose. By the time he got to the montage of Trump using the word “lover” he was breaking up.

But it was when he referenced a classic Saturday Night Live skit that he really lost it.

“Lover. That word makes me so nervous. He loves that word. So much love. Like in the President’s mind the FBI has operated out of a Jacuzzi while ‘Unchained Melody’ plays on under water speakers,” he said colorfully. “Or maybe he keeps watching one of the best SNL sketches ever.”

They played the clip (see the full one below) of Will Ferrel and Rachel Dratch.

“I could watch that for hours,” said Cooper. “Oh, spiced meat. Who doesn’t love spiced lambsh—Who doesn’t love spiced lamb shanks among lovers in a hot tub?” he managed to get out through the laughing.

“Anyway, without lovers, the real ones, the ones birthed in his angry fan fiction, what would President Trump talk about?” said Cooper. “As the song goes ‘Love Will Keep us Together’ just not maybe not in Washington. The president will always think of you babe, whenever, on the Ridiculist.”

For your reference, here is the SNL skit to which he referred. You’ll find not laughing quite impossible. Lover.

—

German Chancellor Angela Merkel offered a number of not-so-subtle rebukes of President Donald Trump and his policies during her commencement address at Harvard, and earned a standing ovation from the crowd when she condemned the idea of describing “lies as truth and truth as lies.”

Merkel, who spoke to the Harvard audience through a translator, emphasized the need for honesty in public life and alluded to the university’s Latin motto, Veritas. “What better place to begin to do so than here, in this place, where so many young people from all over the world come to learn, to research, and to discuss the issues of our time under the maxim of ‘truth.'”

“That requires us not to describe lies as truth, and truth as lies,” Merkel added. This line elicited loud applause from the Harvard crowd, who then stood up in solidarity with her thinly veiled shot at a US president with which she has had a very contentious relationship.

Pivoting from that point, the German leader then built an extended metaphor around rejecting one of the president’s signature political totems, as she dismissed “walls” as a barrier to progress, peace, and democracy.

“It requires us not to accept shortcomings as our normality. Yet what, dear graduates, could stop you, could stop us, from doing that? Walls. Walls in people’s minds, walls of ignorance and narrow-mindedness,” Merkel said. “They exist between family members, as well as different groups within the society: people of different skin colors, nations, and religions. I would like to see us break down these walls.”

Watch above, via Harvard University. (The relevant portion begins at the 23:25 mark.)

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Republican Senator Martha McSally, a former US Air Force fighter pilot and combat veteran, has called for a “full investigation” into the White House’s request to move or otherwise hide the USS John S. McCain during President Donald Trump’s visit to Yokosuba Naval Base in Japan last week.

This latest turn of events comes via the Wall Street Journal, which originally broke the story that the White House sent a request to the US Navy to obscure the ship from the president’s possible sightline when he would be holding a rally on the nearby amphibious assault ship, USS Wasp. Subsequent news reports have detailed other efforts to purge the area of the namesake of the recently deceased Senator John McCain — whom Trump despises — which included not inviting and even turning away sailors from the ship, who would’ve been wearing the ship’s name on their duty caps and uniforms.

Trump has denied any knowledge of the request and the White House has confirmed he was not aware of it.

McSally, who serves on the Senate Armed Services Committee, said she wanted a “full investigation into who ordered it and what occurred.” She echoed the sentiments of the committee’s Democratic ranking member, who called the White House request “disgraceful” and “beyond petty.”

Republican scrutiny of this move comes at a critical juncture for the White House, which has just nominated acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan to permanently fill the role he has held for the past five months. Shanahan would first need Senate confirmation, however. And Shanahan ‘s role in helping the White House fulfill its request is now an issue of debate, according to the Journal.

“Acting Defense Secretary Pat Shanahan was aware of the concern about the presence of the USS John S. McCain in Japan and approved measures to avoid what officials believed might be a disruption to the president’s visit, a U.S. official said,” the Journal reported. But Shanahan disputed this in a public statement on Thursday: “What I read this morning was the first I heard about it.”

Photo credit: U.S. Navy, Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Tyra Watson.

With the United States already in the midst of a trade battle with China, President Donald Trump declared that he plans to impose tariffs on a new country.

In a pair of Thursday evening tweets, the president announced that he plans to impose a tariff on good from Mexico — effective in less than two weeks time.

“On June 10th, the United States will impose a 5% Tariff on all goods coming into our Country from Mexico, until such time as illegal migrants coming through Mexico, and into our Country, STOP,” Trump wrote. “The Tariff will gradually increase until the Illegal Immigration problem is remedied, at which time the Tariffs will be removed.”

On June 10th, the United States will impose a 5% Tariff on all goods coming into our Country from Mexico, until such time as illegal migrants coming through Mexico, and into our Country, STOP. The Tariff will gradually increase until the Illegal Immigration problem is remedied,..

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 30, 2019

….at which time the Tariffs will be removed. Details from the White House to follow.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 30, 2019

In a lengthy statement released by the White House, Trump went on to say that he plans to raise the tariffs on the first of each month until October — where they would permanently remain at 25 percent.

From the statement:

Should Mexico choose not to cooperate on reducing unlawful migration, the sustained imposition of Tariffs will produce a massive return of jobs back to American cities and towns. Remember, our great country has been the “piggy bank” from which everybody wants only to TAKE. The difference is that now we are firmly and forcefully standing up for America’s interests.

We have confidence that Mexico can and will act swiftly to help the United States stop this long-term, dangerous, and deeply unfair problem. The United States has been very good to Mexico for many years. We are now asking that Mexico immediately do its fair share to stop the use of its territory as a conduit for illegal immigration into our country.

[featured photo via Getty Images]

When talking to reporters about the story of John McCain’s name being obscured on the naval vessel named for him, President Donald Trump on Thursday treated the news as true.

To reporters, Trump said “I don’t know what happened. I wasn’t involved. I would not have done that,” and added ” somebody did it because they thought I didn’t like him.”

But late in the afternoon he tweeted with a different take.

The Navy put out a disclaimer on the McCain story. Looks like the story was an exaggeration, or even Fake News – but why not, everything else is!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 30, 2019

Presumably, the disclaimer to which he is referring is that the Navy said ultimately they did not take any action to hide the name or the ship, despite confirming the idea came up. “We didn’t do anything to obstruct the name of the ship,” a Navy official told CNN. “The Wall Street Journal piece refers to a photo of a tarp covering the ship, that photo was taken Friday, May 24, the tarp was removed the following day.”

The Navy also sent a tweet clarifying that no effort was made to block the ship or John McCain’s name.

The name of USS John S. McCain was not obscured during the POTUS visit to Yokosuka on Memorial Day. The Navy is proud of that ship, its crew, its namesake and its heritage.

— Navy Chief of Information (@chinfo) May 30, 2019

That information was already reported prior to President Trump speaking to reporters Thursday morning, but it’s not clear there were any other “disclaimers” since then.

The disclaimers, and for that matter Trump’s tweet, do not exclude that the conversations took place. Only that it was not obscured or blocked. But as a standalone tweet, it is certain to make some people think the entire story was made up and that the Navy confirmed it. Which is probably the actual intent: casting the doubt without specifying it.

A lot of that has been going around lately.

[U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Matthew R. White/Released]

On Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer, CNN White House correspondent Jim Acosta engaged in a long, painstaking fact-check of what he called President Donald Trump’s “firehose of falsehoods” about Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

“An angry President Trump gave already exhausted fact checkers quite a workout today,” Acosta said about an impromptu press gaggle Trump held at the White House before flying off to give the commencement speech at the Air Force Academy. The president, Acosta noted, was clearly upset by Robert Mueller’s comments the day before in which the former FBI director appeared to go out of his way to avoid saying Trump did not commit any crimes.

“Mr. Trump fired back,” Acosta said, “but much of what the president said wasn’t true.”

Then CNN aired several clips of Trump making a number inaccurate and insulting assertions.

“I think Mueller is a true never Trumper. He’s somebody that dislikes Donald Trump,” Trump claimed.

Acosta pointed out that Trump’s own former White House chief strategist, Steve Bannon, called that assertion “ridiculous” to Special Counsel investigators. “The president also said Mueller wanted the position of FBI director, but that’s not true either, according to White House aides who said Mueller did not come in looking for the position.”

Trump also repeated one of his favorite talking points about the Mueller probe: “Despite $40 million, 18 Trump haters, including people that worked for Hillary Clinton and some of the worst human beings on Earth, they got nothing.”

Acosta, bringing more facts: “The latest estimated cost of the Mueller report and Russia investigation is $25 million not $40 million.”

Then, attempting to clean up his own startling admission on Twitter from earlier in the day, Trump vehemently denied that Russia helped him get elected in 2016. “Russia didn’t help me at all. Russia, if anything, I think helped the other side,” Trump said angrily. “You know who got me elected? I got me elected.”

In this case, Trump on Twitter was right, while Trump on the White House lawn was not, Acosta pointed out. “Here’s the reality. A 2017 U.S. Intelligence community report stated ‘We further assess Putin and the Russian government developed a clear preference for President-Elect Trump’ and then there’s the president’s personal call for Russian assistance during the campaign.”

Watch the video above, via CNN.

The NBA Finals get underway north of the border for the first time ever on Thursday night, as the two-time defending champion Golden State Warriors take on the Toronto Raptors, playing in their first title series.

The Warriors are a solid favorite to hoist their fourth Larry O’Brien trophy in five years — thanks to the typically wonderful play of Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson, among others. Golden State comes in fresh off a sweep of Portland — this despite injuries to both Kevin Durant and DeMarcus Cousins. Cousins is expected to return to the lineup on Thursday

Toronto comes in after having taken down Milwaukee in a tight, six-game series. They’ll have the advantage of playing before a raucous crowd Thursday night, and they’ll need to take advantage. In order to convince the public they have a shot, Game 1 feels like a must-win for Toronto.

Tip-off is scheduled for shortly after 9:00 p.m. ET. ABC has the coverage, with Mike Breen, Mark Jackson, and Jeff Van Gundy on the call. The game will also be streamed online, via ESPN, free with a cable subscription. The ESPN app can be downloaded from Apple’s App Store, and the Google Play Store.

[featured photo via Getty Images]

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CNN host Brian Stelter’s show Reliable Sources has hired a producer from Lou Dobbs Tonight on Fox Business, Mediaite has learned. That hire comes despite Stelter routinely calling out Lou Dobbs for fear-mongering about migrants, airing conspiracy theories and channeling disinformation to President Donald Trump on his show.

Diane Kaye, who has been a freelance segment producer for Fox Business since November 2018, was recently brought on board at CNN as a producer for Stelter’s Sunday media show, a source familiar with the move told Mediaite. During her time at Fox Business, Kaye started on Charles Payne’s Making Money in the fall of 2018 before moving over to Dobbs’ show earlier this year.

She also previously worked on the show of former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly, as well as various programs on CNN, HLN, and Fox Business, according to her Linkedin page.

CNN did not respond to Mediaite’s requests for comment on the hire.

While networks crossing partisan lines to make hires isn’t uncommon, the Reliable Sources host bringing on a producer from Dobbs’ show is notable given Stelter’s particularly damning criticism of the Fox Business show.

“If President Trump was watching Lou Dobbs the other night, he heard that foreigners may kill millions of Americans,” said Stelter while commenting on a Dobbs segment from March 30, adding the host’s rhetoric toward immigrants is “nonsense but it’s scary” given his closeness to the president.

On April 14, Stelter criticized Dobbs’ contribution to the “Trump-Fox feedback loop,” pointing to Fox News sharing a false claim that was then re-shared by the president — thus justifying additional coverage of the lie by the network that spread the misinformation in the first place. In one example of this loop in action, Trump tweeted a false poll that showed his approval rating at 55 percent, which he had re-shared from Dobbs’ show. (Dobbs later corrected the error to note the poll had Trump at 43 percent but the president did not take down the erroneous tweet.)

“This really shows Lou Dobbs’ influence with the Trump White House. He was calling for the DHS secretary to be fired, and then lo and behold, a week and a half later, [Kirstjen] Nielsen’s out,” observed Stelter.

A textbook example of the Trump-Fox feedback loop: Dobbs gives Trump inaccurate info, Trump shares it, Dobbs walks it back, Trump leaves his inaccurate post up on Twitter… https://t.co/Vk2cNR2C6y

— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) April 12, 2019

In October of last year, Stelter called a Dobbs segment “so gross” in response to a guest spreading an antisemitic conspiracy theory about Jewish billionaire George Soros secretly funding the migrant caravans to replace white Americans. (Fox Business apologized for the segment and vowed to never invite the guest back.)

Stelter’s boss, CNN president Jeff Zucker, has outright accused all Fox News employees — even the “good journalists there” — of contributing to the network’s de facto state “propaganda machine.”

“There are a handful of good journalists there, but I think they are lost in what is a complete propaganda machine,” said Zucker in March 2018. “The idea that it’s a news channel, I think, is really not the case at all.”

More recently, Zucker doubled down on his “state-run TV” claims while speaking at SXSW in March and specifically called out Fox’s hard news staffers for opting to work there while contributing to the “propaganda” outlet.

“They chose to work at Fox and they don’t get to hide behind the fact that they’re excellent journalists or anchors,” he said. “The fact is they work at a place that has done tremendous damage to this country.”

Curiously enough, Stelter works for a division of CNN originally started by Dobbs. His media reporting falls under CNN Business, a vertical technically launched by Dobbs who, as a CNN host and executive in the 1990s, was the founding president of CNNfn — the original name for the network’s business division.

The New York Times is warning off editors and reporters from appearing on primetime MSNBC and CNN shows hosted by anchors like Rachel Maddow and Don Lemon for fear of appearing partisan, according to a new report.

Sources tell Vanity Fair’s Joe Pompeo that managers at the newspaper have been steering journalists away from appearing on certain cable news programs with a renewed vigor.

Alongside Maddow and Lemon, Lawrence O’Donnell’s show on MSNBC is also apparently a no-go, as are Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson’s programs — though Times reporters were typically never seen on those shows anyway.

Reached for comment by Vanity Fair, a Times spokeswoman pointed to the section of the newspaper’s “Ethical Journalism” handbook that covers broadcast media appearances:

“In deciding whether to make a radio, television or Internet appearance, a staff member should consider its probable tone and content to make sure they are consistent with Times standards. Staff members should avoid strident, theatrical forums that emphasize punditry and reckless opinion-mongering.”

In contrast, a spokesperson for The Washington Post told Pompeo that “We view all broadcast programs as opportunities to expose our journalism to different audiences.”

The reinforced guidelines could also reinforce something of a class separation at the Times, as a number of high-profile political reporters (like Maggie Haberman and Patrick Healy) have contracted positions as analysts on cable news, with a much more frequent presence on screen.

[Image by Don Emmert/AFP/Getty Images]

Hillary Clinton and her daughter Chelsea Clinton reportedly plan to form a production company to pursue various projects in Hollywood.

Bloomberg News reports that the Clintons have spoken with multiple studios to finance a number of film and TV projects.

Sources tell Bloomberg that the Clintons plan to focus on stories about women and by women, and hope to use their projects to influence society now that Clinton is out of political office.

Hillary Clinton has already signed on to help produce a TV show with Steven Spielberg called The Woman’s Hour.

Former President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle Obama created a production company, Higher Ground Productions, and have a deal at Netflix.

[Image via screengrab]

Former White House Senior Advisor Valerie Jarrett said her former boss, then-President Barack Obama, would have been impeached “in a nanosecond” if he had acted like President Donald Trump does.

On Thursday’s edition of SiriusXM’s Signal Boost show, hosts Zerlina Maxwell and Jess McIntosh — both former senior campaign aides to Hillary Clinton — welcomed Jarrett, and asked her to weigh in on the current dilemma that Democrats seem to think they face in impeaching Trump.

“If President Obama had done half of the things and said half of the things that President Trump is saying, even as recently as this morning, would he have been impeached, and how long do you think it would have taken?” Maxwell asked.

“About a nanosecond,” Jarrett replied, to laughter from the hosts. “Yes, I think that the standards have slipped dramatically, and there’s no earthly way President Obama could have gotten away with any of this.”

“Not just the words and the content,” she continued, “but just the policy reversals and what we’re doing to the fabric of our country. I don’t think any of that would have been acceptable to the Republicans had it come from President Obama.”

“Do you think that impeaching or not impeaching is the right question to be asking right now?” McIntosh asked.

“No, I actually don’t,” Jarrett said. “What I’m motivated by is, what are we going to do to get people engaged in improving our democracy?”

“And I’m so deeply troubled, Jess, by the fact that 43% of eligible Americans did not vote in the last election,” she continued. “So last summer, Mrs. Obama and I started a new organization called When We All Vote. It’s nonpartisan because I just think we have to change the culture in our country around voting. Right now, the energy tends to be at the extreme and special interests dominate the day, and if everybody voted, that wouldn’t be the case. We would be able to hold our elected officials accountable.”

“Right now, in my opinion, the Republicans are just kind of, they’ve lost their soul and their grounding,” Jarrett said. “I don’t even recognize this Republican party anymore. They’re willing to tolerate just about anything for the sake of getting reelected, means that we have to do something to ensure that they don’t get reelected.”

Watch the clip above, via SiriusXM.

It was a tough month in the ratings department for CNN.

According to the latest numbers from Nielsen, CNN posted 553,000 total viewers in the total day category — down 15 percent from May 2018. MSNBC put up 912,000 viewers in that category, and Fox News posted 1,342,000. CNN did squeak by over MSNBC in the advertiser-coveted 25-54 demographic with 137,000 viewers to 134,000. But those numbers paled in comparison to Fox News — which posted 231,000.

The news didn’t get much better for CNN in primetime. The network averaged 761,000 overall viewers from 8-11 p.m. in May — lagging well behind MSNBC (1,654,000) and Fox News (2,388,000). Worse yet, CNN also got thumped in the key demo. The network posted 185,000 in the 25-54 age bracket, trailing MSNBC’s 242,000 and Fox News’s 377,000.

Individually, it was a big month for Sean Hannity. The Fox News 9 p.m. host put some distance between himself and his rival, MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow, leading all of cable news with 3,138,000 overall viewers and 506,000 in the demo. (Maddow posted 2,608,000, and 410,000 in those categories respectively.) Tucker Carlson also scored — finishing No. 2 in cable news with 2,761,000 overall viewers, and 473,000 in the 25-54 bracket.

Mediaite founder and ABC News chief legal analyst Dan Abrams went off on President Donald Trump for his attacks on Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

Speaking on The Dan Abrams Show on SiriusXM’s POTUS channel, Abrams said “The president smeared an American hero today, and I’m not talking about John McCain.”

“When I hear the president of the United States smear Robert Mueller … I get upset because we need more Robert Muellers in this country,” Abrams said.

“We need people who are more law-and-order, apolitical beings,” Abrams said, praising people like Mueller and Chris Wray, the current director of the FBI

“He stuck by the finding that a sitting president cannot be indicted, he could have easily asked for a reinterpretation of that finding. … Mueller didn’t even accuse the president of the obstruction crime, because he thought it would be unfair.”

“The Russian interference in our election was real … and now the president is lying about Robert Mueller,” Abrams continued. After explaining why the “conflicts” the President alleged about Mueller were completely unsupported by the facts laid out in the Mueller report, Abrams stated:

“Hearing the president insult [Mueller] like this, should be offensive to anyone who calls themselves pro-law enforcement in this country,” Abrams said.

Listen above, via SiriusXM’s POTUS channel.

White House Deputy Communications Director Mercedes Schlapp appeared on Fox & Friends this morning and pushed back on Thursday night’s surprising Wall Street Journal report of White House staff efforts to ostensibly hide the USS John McCain from President Donald Trump during his trip to Japan for fear that the mere sight of it would set Trump off.

Brian Kilmeade brought the story up, noting to his guest that “we know the two men had a rivalry that has lasted beyond John McCain’s death, but what can you tell us about this, Mercedes?”

Schlapp replied “It’s a fake news story,” adding “the Navy came out and basically said in no way did they try to hide any of their warships in this case, this particular warship and, again, the president was not aware that this was even — the story we all read it in the Wall Street Journal. Again, it’s another one of these let’s get anonymous sources. Let’s push this narrative and it’s just unfortunate. It’s just unfortunate.”

After Kilmeade followed up with the journalistically sound question of “You are saying it did not happen?” Schlapp demurred, with no, she was not saying that. She clarified “I mean the president was not aware. The president tweeted about it late last night I believe and the Navy also sent out a tweet about this.”

The NY Times has confirmed the WSJ report which is based on Navy officer emails obtained by the reporters.

Watch above via Fox News.

By most objective measures, the press conference held by outgoing Special Counsel Robert Mueller on Wednesday was politically damaging to President Donald Trump, if only for his assertion that had he believed that the president had not committed a crime, they would have said as much. But we are not living in a time where political media outlets gain viewership by presenting objective points of view, which brings us to Fox & Friends Thursday morning.

The highest rated cable news morning show — and arguably most influential seeing as it also happens to be the commander in chief’s favorite show — appeared to be by turns confused, frustrated and at times angry with Mueller’s nine-minute presentation that appeared to only raise more questions than bring resolution.

There is a lot to unpack in the segment above, but a few highlights include co-host Ainsley Earhardt calling out the way that Mueller’s phrased his comment that he could not say that Trump did not commit a crime as “so bizarre.”

There is also Brian Kilmeade’s noting that, according to a Russian Oligarch that was interviewed by the Special Counsel’s office, Vladimir Putin himself complained that he could not get in touch with the Trump administration.

Then there was Pete Hegseth’s curious choice of describing the press event thusly: “the end of a fight when one guy takes one last kick, not because you won, just because you want to get one last in. And that feels like what Mueller tried to do yesterday. For no reason.”

Watch above via Fox News.