Trump: The Con-Artist in Chief

Discussion in 'Politics' started by JoeNation, May 31, 2016.

  1. JoeNation
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    JoeNation The ReichWing Abuser

    The original grifter.


    Big Trump checks to vets groups sent on day of media report
    By MICHAEL BIESECKER, JILL COLVIN and STEVE PEOPLES
    May. 31, 2016 6:49 PM EDT

    Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump answers questions during a news conference in New... Read more


    NEW YORK (AP) — More than a dozen big checks flowed out of New York last week, bound for veterans' charities from Donald Trump. On Tuesday, he announced he had made good on his promise of last January to give the groups millions of dollars from a highly publicized fundraiser.

    The announcement by the presumptive Republican presidential candidate came in the midst of a 40-minute rant against "dishonest" and "sleazy" reporters who have been pressing the issue.

    The largest donation, a $1 million check dated May 24 and drawn from Donald J. Trump's personal account, was addressed to a small Tuckahoe, New York, group that provides scholarships to the children of fallen Marines.


    Trump had been interviewed that same day by The Washington Post, which for weeks had been raising questions about where the promised money was, urging him to disclose recipients of the millions raised during a splashy telethon-style fundraiser he held in Iowa in January in place of a Fox debate he was boycotting.

    At a news conference Tuesday, Trump released a list of 41 groups he said had received $5.6 million.

    "Most of the money went out quite a while ago," Trump said. "Some of it went out more recently. But all of this has gone out."

    Throughout Tuesday's confrontational event, Trump repeatedly slammed the media as "unbelievably dishonest" for its treatment of the issue and dismissed an ABC reporter as "a sleaze." He said many times that he didn't want credit for the fundraising but seemed peeved that he wasn't thanked for it.

    "Instead of being like, 'Thank you very much, Mr. Trump,' or 'Trump did a good job,' everyone's saying, 'Who got it? Who got it? Who got it?' And you make me look very bad," Trump complained, taking on reporters in the room. "I have never received such bad publicity for doing such a good job."

    The Associated Press spoke or left messages with each of the organizations Trump named. Of the 30 groups that responded by Tuesday, about half said they had received checks from Trump just last week.

    Several said the checks were dated May 24 — the same date as Trump's interview with The Post, and shipped out overnight express.

    Among them was the big check from Trump himself, written to the Marine Corps-Law Enforcement Foundation. Trump's campaign had previously told the newspaper that his promised $1 million personal donation had already been distributed.

    Though the foundation had received a $100,000 check from Trump's charity in March, last week's $1 million donation came as something of a surprise.

    "It is obviously a wonderful donation," said Sue Boulhosa, the group's executive director and sole employee. She said the group had "an inkling" that more might come but the amount was a happy surprise.

    Trump has a longstanding relationship with the group, which Boulhosa said typically raises a total of between $2 million and $3 million a year. The foundation had presented Trump with an award at its 2015 gala held at a New York hotel.

    Appearing on CNN Tuesday, Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Clinton said she was glad that Trump had given out the promised money.

    "The problem here is the difference between what Donald Trump says and what Donald Trump does," Clinton said. "He's bragged for months about raising $6 million for vets and donating $1 million himself, but it took a reporter to shame him into actually making the contribution."

    Trump's campaign manager Corey Lewandowski had originally told the Post that the event had raised about $4.5 million — less than the $6 million originally announced by Trump — because some who'd pledged had backed out. Lewandowski also said all the money had been given out.

    Trump had claimed during the fundraiser that he'd raised $6 million through a combination of pledges from wealthy friends, the public and $1 million from himself.

    But the campaign refused for months to disclose which charities had received the money, leading to questions about whether the money raised was less than he had said.

    "It was very unfair that the press treated us so badly," Trump complained Tuesday.

    He suggested he had hoped to keep the donations private. However, Trump hadn't appeared shy about giving away poster-sized checks at campaign events in the weeks after the fundraiser.

    On Jan. 30, just before the campaign's leadoff caucuses in Iowa, he gave a $100,000 check to the Puppy Jake Foundation, which provides service dogs to wounded veterans. Representatives from the foundation, accompanies by several service dogs, accepted the check at the Adler Theater in Davenport, Iowa, where Trump was being interviewed on stage by Jerry Falwell Jr.

    The next day, in Council Bluffs, Trump presented another check, also for $100,000, to Partners for Patriots, which also provides service dogs to disabled veterans.

    The public presentations trickled off within days, though some of the groups contacted by AP did report receiving checks in February, March and April.

    But the biggest batch appeared to have gone out May 24, with several of the groups saying they had no contact with the Trump organization before that.

    Trump spokeswoman Hope Hicks denied Tuesday that timing had anything to do with questions from the media.

    "Mr. Trump's team worked very hard to complete this lengthy process prior to Memorial Day Weekend," she said. The campaign also said it had taken months to carefully vet each of the groups receiving money.

    ___

    Associated Press writer Jonathan Lemire contributed from New York.
     
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  2. JoeNation
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    JoeNation The ReichWing Abuser

    It just goes on and on...

    Inside The Trump University ‘Playbook’
    Salespeople were instructed to deliberately mislead potential customers and manipulate their emotions.
    05/31/2016 06:19 pm ET
    Christina Wilkie National Political Reporter, The Huffington Post
    Igor Bobic Associate Politics Editor, The Huffington Post
    [​IMG]
    LUCAS JACKSON / REUTERS
    A federal judge has unsealed hundreds of documents related to a lawsuit over Trump University, detailing how its salespeople were instructed to mislead customers.

    WASHINGTON — A federal judge on Tuesday unsealed nearly 400 pages of documents related to a lawsuit over the for-profit Trump University, revealing the aggressive and predatory practices that Trump U. salespeople were encouraged to use on potential participants of the real estate seminar, which has been accused of being a scam.

    The documents detail the internal “playbook” of Trump University, including information about how its salespeople were told to deliberately mislead potential customers, manipulate their emotions and ignore their concerns. Taken together, they represent a damning new window into the company that Trump closed in 2011 amid multiple investigations but has promised to revive.

    At a Tuesday press conference at Trump Tower in New York, the presumptive GOP nominee continued his recent streak of bashing Gonzalo Curiel, the federal judge who unsealed the documents. Trump called Curiel a “hater” who is “very unfair.” Asked why he continued to antagonize the judge and bring up his Latino heritage, Trump said, “Because I don’t care.”

    Curiel is the judge in Art Cohen v. Donald J. Trump, a case alleging that Trump University committed fraud by promising people they were buying a top real estate education, when in reality the goal of Trump University was to sell people the most expensive version of an ineffective course.

    Since he launched his presidential bid last year, Trump has offered conflicting accounts of his involvement with Trump University. In March, Trump defended the company during a debate, saying that its salespeople “did a good job” and that the program had an “A” rating from the Better Business Bureau. (The truth is a little more complicated.) Trump has also claimed in promotional videos that he hand-picked the instructors at Trump U.

    The playbooks instruct salespeople to mention Trump by name in order to intimidate potential customers who are hesitant to spend thousands of dollars on a Trump University product. “Mr. Trump will not listen to excuses,” the playbook tells salespeople to say, “and neither will we.”

    In another scenario, salespeople are instructed to berate potential customers, telling them, “You’ve had your entire adult life to accomplish your financial goals... and you’re not even close to where you need to be.”

    [​IMG]
    TRUMP UNIVERSITY
    But according to more than 5,000 former Trump University customers, it wasn’t their plans that were flawed — it was the Trump U. business model itself. Many of the former students now suing Trump say they were pressured into spending money they didn’t have on Trump University products.

    The playbook instructed Trump University employees on how to target potential customers with bad credit. “What most people do,” reads one prompt, “is handle the tuition by putting it on their credit cards because it gives them the ability to make very small monthly payments and maintain a low overhead to run their real estate project.” Later on, it says, they can “use their success in real estate to pay off the banks in a couple of months or so.”

    “However, you don’t seem to have the advantage of having that kind of leveraging power,” the pitch continues. “Do you have any other seed capital or savings set aside to further invest into your real estate projects?”

    [​IMG]
    TRUMP UNIVERSITY
    The playbook also emphasizes the need to collect key financial information from potential customers. Salespeople were instructed to find out if clients were single parents who “had three children that may need money for food,” for example, or if they were a “middle-aged commuter.”

    [​IMG]
    TRUMP UNIVERSITY
    A section of the books called the “Creative Financing Retreat” includes lessons on how to use credit cards and retirement accounts to pay for “real estate investments” — chiefly, the Trump University course.

    “If a seller will take $10,000 down on a fixer-upper that you expect to make $20,000 on, why not use credit cards?” reads one prompt.

    “Check with a tax attorney to see how you might borrow from your own retirement account to finance real estate investments,” reads another.

    Another section, on the “Multi-Family & Commercial Real Estate Investment Retreat,” promises that students will learn how to “take full advantage of tax breaks and other financial shelters, allowing you to maximize your profits.”

    According to the documents, it seems the only kind of person Trump University didn’t want attending its sales pitches were journalists.

    “Reporters are rarely on your side and they are not sympathetic,” reads a section on how to deal with the media. “No matter how much confidence you have in Trump University, you should not say anything” to a journalist.

    [​IMG]
    TRUMP UNIVERSITY
    Trump did not immediately comment on the new documents Tuesday, and a spokeswoman for the campaign did not respond to an inquiry from The Huffington Post.

    Editor’s note: Donald Trump regularly incites political violence and is a serial liar, rampant xenophobe, racist, misogynist and birther who has repeatedly pledged to ban all Muslims — 1.6 billion members of an entire religion — from entering the U.S.
     
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  3. JoeNation
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    JoeNation The ReichWing Abuser

    I used to think Mitt Romney was a joke, and he was, but Trump is so far beyond a joke that Mitt actually looks relatively OK at this point.
     
  4. JoeNation
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    JoeNation The ReichWing Abuser

     
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  5. JoeNation
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    JoeNation The ReichWing Abuser

    Now for the easiest con in America....the Republican base.
     
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  6. IQless1
    Blah

    IQless1 trump supporters are scum

    What he's really doing is describing himself, yet attributing it to someone else. It's a con artist's trick, a distraction. Instead of admitting fault, he lays the blame on others for the very thing he is guilty of. A tactic common among republicans.
     
    JoeNation likes this.
  7. IQless1
    Blah

    IQless1 trump supporters are scum

    They both lied.
     
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  8. rlm's cents
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    rlm's cents Well-Known Member

    Yeah, just look at Hillary. She is being investigated by an Obama IG, the FBI, and an Obama judge. Yet she is blaming the Republicans. And then there was the video. There is Obama. Everything is/was Bush's fault. For Holder, it was just his and Obama's skin color. Reid blamed the Republicans for blocking the Congress while he was sitting on umpteen hundreds of bills.

    OOPS! You were trying to blame the Republicans, weren't you?
     
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  9. JoeNation
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    JoeNation The ReichWing Abuser

    It's OK for them to lie. They are Republicans. Their base is too damn stupid to care if their guy lies through his teeth because he is their guy. But if they rail against the person on the other side, I'm supposed to give a damn what they think.
     
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  10. arizonaJack

    arizonaJack Well-Known Member

    A werk ago you started this garbage and I mentioned the final accounting was not complete. You said he only raised $3 million and was lying.
    There ya go...$5.6 million disbursed and it's still rolling in. You are pathetic as is the media.
    Trump owned their sleazy asses today and you cant stand it can you. lol how pathetic.
    I look forward to your thread on Clinton Foundation bilking billions from Haiti earthquake relief fund.
    Also, can you please link to Hillarys donations from her own pocket to veterans? All she has done for vets is get them dead

    TRUMP!!!!!
     
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  11. JoeNation
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    JoeNation The ReichWing Abuser

    He lied his ass off and only started writing checks the day the WaPo article came out. You idiots will believe anything.
     
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  12. arizonaJack

    arizonaJack Well-Known Member

    LMAO!
    Says the idiot who believed the $3 million dollar lie, ran right here and posted it, was called out and proven wrong and now digging his hole even deeper!!!!
    Now, how about that Haiti earthquake money?
    Your a fools fool Joe. Either that or a paid shill in Hillars troll army.

    TRUMP!!!!
     
  13. CoinOKC
    Yeehaw

    CoinOKC T R U M P 2 0 2 4

    I can guarantee you will never see that thread started by Joe.
    Yet another thread you'll never see. Hillary doesn't give a damn about veterans.
     
  14. JoeNation
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    JoeNation The ReichWing Abuser

    Fools believe Trump lies. Don't worry, you're not alone.


    Trump’s veterans controversy goes from bad to worse
    06/01/16 08:00 AM—UPDATED 06/01/16 08:43 AM
    By Steve Benen

    It no doubt seemed like a good idea at the time. In January, Donald Trump was in the middle of a spat with Fox News, so the Republican presidential hopeful boycotted a debate ahead of the Iowa caucuses, instead holding a fundraiser in the Hawkeye State for veterans. The GOP candidate boastedthat he’d raised $6 million for vets, and he’d contributed $1 million out of his own pocket.
    The trouble, however, started two weeks ago, when the Washington Post started asking what happened to the money. The newspaper found that Trump did not raise $6 million as he’d claimed, and making matters worse, though his campaign said Trump had already made a $1 million contribution, that turned out not to be true, either.
    Yesterday, the presumptive Republican nominee held a press conference to set the record straight, though as the Washington Post reported, it didn’t go well.
    Donald Trump announced Tuesday that he had given away all the money he had raised four months earlier for veterans – and at the same time bitterly attacked the news media for pressing him to explain what he had done with the money.
    “Instead of being like, ‘Thank you very much, Mr. Trump,’ or ‘Trump did a good job,’ everyone’s saying, ‘Who got it, who got it, who got it?‘ “Trump said during a news conference here at Trump Tower. “And you make me look very bad. I have never received such bad publicity for doing such a good job.”
    Yes, it appears that in Trump’s mind, journalists are supposed to thank Donald Trump when he thinks he’s done something worthwhile.
    But even putting that aside, whether the Republican presidential hopeful realizes it or not, yesterday’s explanation for the controversy arguably made matters worse, not better.
    The AP reported yesterday, for example, “Phone calls to all 41 of the groups by The Associated Press brought more than two-dozen responses Tuesday. About half reported checks from Trump within the past week, typically dated May 24, the day The Washington Post published a story questioning whether he had distributed all of the money.”
    In other words, four months after his big fundraiser, where Trump touted a tally that turned out to be untrue, Trump only started cutting checks to a variety of groups after the Washington Post published a story that made the candidate look awful.
    the irony of Trump demanding tax materials from groups while he insists on keeping his own tax returns hidden from the public, and even if we overlook the fact that his operation doesn’t appear to have done an especially good job in vetting, there’s also the inconvenient fact that, according to the Trump campaign, the groups were chosen in advance in January – suggesting the organizations had already been vetted.
    So where does that leave us? Trump said he’d raised $6 million for veterans, but that wasn’t true. He later claimed he never used the $6 million figure, but that wasn’t true. His campaign insisted Trump had contributed $1 million himself, but that wasn’t true. Trump said he “didn’t want to have credit” for the fundraising efforts, but that wasn’t true. He said he and his team were vetting groups they’d never heard of four months after the fact, but that wasn’t true.
    And as of yesterday, all of this, the Republican candidate insisted, is the media’s fault. Indeed, Trump thinks journalists should be “ashamed” of themselves for scrutinizing his claims that turned out to be wrong.
    Not to put too fine a point on this, but in a normal year, in a normal party, with a normal candidate, this is the sort of controversy that could end a campaign. Legitimate presidential hopefuls can get away with some dissembling and the occasional whopper, but Trump was caught telling obvious falsehoods about support for veterans’ charities.
    If this happened to Hillary Clinton, is there any doubt it would be the #1 issue in the presidential race between now and Election Day? That every pundit in America would use this as Exhibit A in their takes on why Americans just can’t trust the Democrat?
     
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  15. rlm's cents
    Hot

    rlm's cents Well-Known Member

    So you think ;
    Benghazi was due to the video?
    Hillary came under sniper fire?
    Hillary turned over all her email?
    Hillary had no classified email on her server?
    Hillary cooperated with the FBI investigation?
    etc.?
     
  16. IQless1
    Blah

    IQless1 trump supporters are scum

    Trump's the Teflon Con, but his coating is starting to wear thin. ;)
     
  17. arizonaJack

    arizonaJack Well-Known Member

    So Crooked Hillary sells 20% of US Uranium to Putins Russia for $145,000,000 and you call Trump teflon?
    LOL thats a good one :)
     
  18. JoeNation
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    JoeNation The ReichWing Abuser

    BREAKING: NY Attorney General Announces Fraud Lawsuit Against Donald Trump To Begin (VIDEO)
    JUNE 1ST, 2016

    The Attorney General of the State of New York is determined to follow through with his lawsuit against the man who could become the next president of the United States, presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump.

    The civil suit is over the fraud that the attorney general, Eric Schneiderman, and others allege was the basis for Trump’s seminar program called Trump University. A similar suit is currently underway in the state of California.

    The fraud allegations claim that those who participated in Trump University courses were defrauded out of their money, and that the exploitation was intentional. Internal Trump University documents reveal that recruiters targeted low income populations, including veterans, to scam them out of, in some cases, tens of thousands of dollars for which they received no tangible return.

    Trump has flatly denied allegations of fraud, even in the face of evidence to the contrary.

    Now, of course, part of the big problem is that the voters who are going all in for Trump don’t seem to be turned off from the candidate’s steam roller campaign by anything like this, or rather these, lawsuits. And in addition to Trump’s maintenance of his base, poll numbers which have Trump coming neck and neck with Clinton indicate that much of the Republican Party is slowly but surely uniting behind him. Trump is the candidate of the GOP’s ideology, so at the base few Republican voters have much to say against him.

    Trump presents Republican voters with a unique dilemma that is slowly but surely being resolved in their minds. If people were still willing to vote for him after he called Mexicans rapists and criminals, made obscenely sexist comments over and over again, and mocked a disabled reporter, those voters are still going to back him in the face of a civil suit brought by a Democratic State Attorney General.

    Although Schneiderman is resolved, his suit is likely going to have little effect on the outcome of the election. But, maybe he never meant it to, having told ABC News that this “isn’t a political case, just a straight up fraud case.”
     
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  19. JoeNation
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    JoeNation The ReichWing Abuser

    I'd be very careful calling anyone else "crooked" if I were you. Trump seems to be less honest than a used car salesman these days. He wouldn't last 2 days as president before he was caught breaking into Fort Knox.
     
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  20. arizonaJack

    arizonaJack Well-Known Member

    Trump raising all that cash for vets really grinds you , doesn't it. Not suprised .
     
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