This afternoon President Trump is holding a roundtable with governors on the reopening of America’s small businesses. The anticipated start time is 3:00pm ET.
UPDATE: Video Added
WH Livestream Link – Fox News Livestream Link – Fox Business Livestream
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President Donald Trump calls-in to the Sean Hannity television show to discuss current events including police reform, the coronavirus pandemic, and his re-election campaign.
Earlier today White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany held a press briefing with the press pool. [Video and Transcript Below]
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[Transcript] – MS. MCENANY: Good afternoon, everyone. Great to join you today. So, five years ago today, nine innocent parishioners of a historically black church were killed during an evening Bible study in Charleston, South Carolina. We all remember that tragedy, and this was a despicable act of evil that happened five years ago today. So we remember that somber day at that Charleston church, as our hearts still break for the victims and our prayers go out to the families.
Yesterday, President Trump led and brought our nation together behind real, meaningful, substantial change to ensure that we have safe streets and safe policing. Part of that was having an incentive structure to implement the highest professional standards in our police departments through an accreditation process.
This accreditation entails making sure you have de-escalation practices in place, use of force tactics in place. Part of that is prohibiting chokehold, except in the event where lethal force is used. It also incentivizes information sharing and makes sure that if they have an officer who’s had multiple uses of excessive force, that that information is sent to a national database.
And then, finally, another prong of this was having co-responders, who are experts in mental health, going alongside law enforcement, because we know law enforcement officials often have to deal with mental health, homelessness, and addiction. And having a co-responder, who is an expert in this process, will go a long way.
This is project — progress. It’s tangible action. And it’s solutions.
And today, Senator Tim Scott said this is “not a binary choice” between supporting police officers and between supporting victims of grave injustices, like George Floyd. It’s not a binary choice. There are not sides here. This is about America coming together. This is about human decency. And this is about justice. And when we see injustices, we recognize them.
As President Trump said yesterday, all children deserve equal opportunity because we are all made equal by God. That is so true.
First, let me point out that I have sat across from a police officer family that lost their loved one. I saw a little girl named Charlie, who will forever grow up without a father; who will forever grow up without a father for prom, for the father-daughter dance. And it was heartbreaking to know that she lost her father, who was a valiant hero.
But yesterday, I sat across from families who lost their loved ones in mass instances of injustice. And it was heartbreaking to hear their stories. It was a real tragedy. It was a tearful moment. It was an emotional moment. And it’s one that the President, when I asked him in the Oval Office about it afterwards, he said this: “I love those families. I want to help those families.” And President Trump means that. Because this is about humanity. That is ultimately what this is about.
And Senator Scott shared a very beautiful Bible verse with those families yesterday, and I just want to read it here, to close. Romans 8:28: “And we know that in all things, God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to his purpose.” He shared that Bible verse with those families, and it was particularly meaningful to me and, I think, to the families, as well.
And, with that, I’ll take questions. Yes.
Q First of all, you did a great job dealing with that feedback. I know that’s not — that’s not —
MS. MCENANY: Mix-minus.
Q Mix-minus — it’s the worst.
MS. MCENANY: Yes. Thank you.
Q All right. So the Trump administration — the Trump Justice Department has appointment six U.S. attorneys to examine the actions of the President’s political adversaries, but they’ve only opened one federal investigation into systemic bias in policing. So my question to you is: Why are so many resources being allocated to make sure the President and his allies were treated fairly by law enforcement and not the same for millions of black Americans?
MS. MCENANY: So I think you’re comparing two things that it’s not accurate to compare on the level of the number of —
Q They’re Justice Department investigations.
MS. MCENANY: — attorneys looking into.
First, we all know that this administration was dragged four years through a bogus investigation founded upon a dossier full of lies, funded by Hillary Clinton and the Democrats. It was an injustice to the American people who elected President Trump as President of the United States, who was then bogged down by an investigation, which ended up with two words: no collusion.
That’s one —
Q But there were convictions. There were guilty pleas.
MS. MCENANY: That’s the first part of your question.
But as to the second part, this President has taken real, tangible, concrete action on the issue of policing. We saw that yesterday. Guess who hasn’t led? Democrats. They’ve engaged in meaningless symbolism as we saw them, you know, kneeling for minutes on end. But this President isn’t about gestures. It’s not about symbolism. It’s about action. It’s about making sure someone like George Floyd never dies in that manner ever again in this country.
Q He did not mention racial bias yesterday, nor does that executive order.
MS. MCENANY: This — first of all, this executive order addresses the issue at hand. And I thought my colleague Ja’Ron Smith handled this really well yesterday when he said this about the executive order on this very question from you. He said, “A lot of people want to make it about race, but it’s about communities and individuals. You’re trying to fix something that — you can’t really fix the heart of people, but you can fix individual pieces that deal with the real problem, which is access [to] opportunity.”
You can fix schools and remedy the disparities we see in schooling. You can fix policing to the degree we can, at the federal level, to incentivize good behavior and fair practices. You can fix the economy, as President Trump has done. He brought about the lowest economic unemployment rate for African American individuals, and paychecks going up prior to this pandemic when we had to artificially shut down the economy. You can fix the individual pieces, but it’s up to our country to change hearts.
Yeah.
Q Does the President — the President talked about chokeholds yesterday. The bill that’s been unveiled by the Republican Senator Scott and other Republicans does not ban chokeholds. Does he think it should?
MS. MCENANY: The President is fully in support of the Scott bill. They are working closely on that. And our EO puts an end to that, or incentivizes through the accreditation process to put an end to chokeholds in the — unless there’s lethal force used. We fully support the Scott bill and every element of it.
And one thing I would note about the Scott bill is: For years, we’ve tried to make lynching a federal crime in this country, and the Scott bill does it. It’s a great bill. It’s more great action from Republicans, and we hope we can have bipartisan support on that.
Q But to be clear, the executive order does not ban chokeholds. I mean, you can’t actually do that, I don’t believe, through an executive order. And this bill does not ban chokeholds. Do you think, does the President think that chokeholds simply should be banned?
MS. MCENANY: So what I have from the Justice Act here is that this will also end the practice of utilizing chokeholds. And I would underscore the executive order does that through an incentivizing process. So we’ve done what we can, and we’ll continue to do more and we’ll continue to work with the Scott bill. And there might be amendments to it, there might not. But we want to see this come to fruition.
Yes.
Q Because it does incentives; it doesn’t actually ban the practice? It encourages, but it doesn’t not actually ban the practice?
MS. MCENANY: Yes. Well, that is —
Q (Inaudible) Democrats (inaudible).
MS. MCENANY: We’re incentivizing to ban chokeholds and lessen the case of where lethal force is used. That’s the process that we’re using, and I’ll tell you this: It’s a much better process than the Democrats who, so far, have offered zero — nothing — except a lot of bad ideas about this that would ultimately, I would note, defund the police department.
Yes.
Q Kayleigh, in the last day, 96 people in Tulsa have contracted the coronavirus. I’m wondering about this rally coming up on Saturday. Will the President or the White House take responsibility if people get sick and catch the coronavirus at this rally on Saturday?
MS. MCENANY: So the campaign has taken certain measures to make sure this is a safe rally: temperature checks, hand sanitizers, and masks. So we are taking precautions.
Q But you’re not requiring people to wear masks.
MS. MCENANY: They will be given a mask. It’s up to them whether to make that decision. CDC guidelines are recommended but not required.
Q And the CDC guidelines suggest that people practice social distancing. You’re not going to be able to practice social distancing in a rally with thousands of people. So aren’t you, in essence, bringing people to a rally where they won’t be abiding by those guidelines, adhering to those guidelines?
MS. MCENANY: It’s the personal choice of individuals as to what to do. But if we want to talk about internal coherence, I believe that the media needs to work on internal coherence.
This wonderful New York Post story — I don’t think Steven Nelson is here, but good job to the New York Post — highlights the hypocrisy of the media where this is okay: protesting; this is not okay: Trump rallies.
It’s really remarkable, and I think the American people have taken notice when, for instance, NBC tweets at 4:05 p.m. on June 14th: “Rally for Black trans lives draws [packed] crowds,” in Brooklyn Museum Plaza, seeming to be lauding the protests. And then, less than an hour and a half later, they say, “President Trump plans to rally…but health experts are questioning that decision.” CBS had a similar logically inconsistent tweet.
Q Kayleigh, these are protesters protesting against injustice, against racism and police brutality. This is a rally — a political rally. They’re — they’re not going to be demonstrating for any kind of cause other than supporting the President. And I go back to my original question: Will the White House, will the President take responsibility if there are people who catch the coronavirus and get sick? As you know, you’ve been to these rallies.
MS. MCENANY: So have you, by the way.
Q Many of the people who go to the rallies — I’ve been to them too —
MS. MCENANY: Yes.
Q — are elderly. Probably half, preexisting conditions that put them at risk for serious complications if they catch this virus.
MS. MCENANY: So, first, let me note, you’ve been to rallies — these Trump rallies. We do rally in support of something. We rally in support of the President who got us the lowest number of black unemployment in the history of our country and paychecks going up. We rally that HBCU funding for historically black colleges and universities is permanent because of President Trump.
Q Right. But you’re not answering my question.
MS. MCENANY: We rally — but to say —
Q Will the President, will the White House take responsibility if people get sick?
MS. MCENANY: No, because you — Jim, you suggested —
Q Can you answer that question?
MS. MCENANY: You suggested that we don’t rally on behalf of anything. So let me note one more thing: We rally on behalf of —
Q I said you rally on behalf of the President. That’s why you’re going.
MS. MCENANY: We rally on behalf of criminal justice reform and the FIRST STEP Act, which President Obama and Vice President Biden talked about, but we did.
And I would note this: If we want to talk about the efficacy of what we’re doing, 1,300 health experts signed a letter about the protest, saying, “We do not condemn these gatherings. We support them as vital.” So you have the health experts on one side saying this, and then, all of a sudden, a Trump rally is different.
Q Okay. You’re dancing around — you’re dancing around the question. You’re holding up a newspaper headline. That’s very nice.
MS. MCENANY: And I’ve taken five of your questions. Work on your internal cohesion, and get back to me, Jim.
Yes, please.
Q Ms. McEnany, you have not answered the question. Will the President, will the White House —
MS. MCENANY: I answered five of your questions. And last —
Q But my first question has not been answered. Will the President, will the White House take responsibility —
MS. MCENANY: I said to you we are taking precautions.
Q — if people get sick?
MS. MCENANY: I said to you we are taking precautions: masks, hand sanitizer.
Q So you’re not going to take responsibility?
MS. MCENANY: Zeke.
Q Kayleigh, so for attendees at this rally, the campaign is requiring them to sign a waiver to waive them of liability, acknowledging that there’s an assumed risk with going to that rally. Does not the President have some responsibility himself to ensure — to set an example of for the nation to stop — you know, to prevent these larger gatherings or ensuring social distancing so that the American people — and people around the world, for that matter — follow his example and (inaudible) the most safe environment? Why is the President not following CDC guidance in doing that?
MS. MCENANY: We are doing temperature checks, hand sanitizers, masks. When you come to the rally, as with any event, you assume a personal risk. That is just what you do. When you go to a baseball game, you assume a risk. That’s part of life. It’s the personal decision of Americans as to whether to go to the rally or whether or not to go to the rally.
But I would note that this concern for the rallies has been largely absent when it came to the protesters. People really note when CBS says, “Thousands participate in a rally in a silent march for black trans lives,” and then less than — this more than an hour and a half later, “President Trump moving ahead with the rally. Serious risk of spreading coronavirus.” It’s really inconsistent. The media seems to not be interested in health so much as the ideology behind certain events.
So, you know, for instance, you go and the lockdown protesters were widely condemned by the media — who were protesting the lockdown — but then, all of a sudden, this protest for Black Lives Matter is lauded. It makes no sense. Ideology is driving the line of questioning in many of these cases, when it should be — if you’re focused on science, you should be out there asking these same questions about the protests.
Q Well, Kayleigh, public health officials here, local officials, mayors in large — many of the cities where there have been protests have encouraged those who attended those large gatherings and others to get tested four or five days after their attendance at the event. Does the President want attendees at his own rally on Saturday to get tested four or five days later to make sure that they didn’t get the virus there? And who should they inform if they do come down with the virus after the rally?
MS. MCENANY: It’s their personal decision as to whether they want to get tested after, but I’d note testing capability is, thanks to President Trump, 23.7 million people tested in this country so far. That’s an extraordinary number.
So, testing is out there and available if someone chooses to do that.
Jen.
Q Sorry, Kayleigh, just one more. Excuse me — sorry. Has the White House been monitoring this outbreak of violence between Indian and Chinese troops? And does the White House have any reaction? Is the President getting on the phone and talking to the relevant countries there?
MS. MCENANY: So the President is aware of it. We’re monitoring the situation between Indian and Chinese forces along the Line of Actual Control in eastern Ladakh.
So we’ve seen that the Indian Army statement that 20 Indian soldiers died as a result of the confrontation today, and we extend our deepest condolences on that.
Jen.
Q To follow up on Zeke, has the Coronavirus Task Force been consulted? Have they done any modeling on how many people could get sick at the Tulsa rally or die from the Tulsa rally? Have they even been consulted about the rally?
MS. MCENANY: The Coronavirus Task Force — they’re meeting today. I would first point that out. They meet regularly, and they monitor the whole country. So they don’t zone in on a Trump rally; they zone in on the whole country and analyze it through a database lens.
Q So they haven’t specifically done modeling on the rally?
MS. MCENANY: They look at the entirety of the country. That would include the state of Oklahoma, but they look at all 50 states in close consultation with governors.
Q And on Jay Powell — this morning, the Fed chairman, Jay Powell, this morning said that he thinks it would be appropriate for there to be more federal stimulus. Does the White House have any comment on his comments?
MS. MCENANY: You know, it’s something that’s being looked at, of course — a phase four. And no announcements on what those elements be, and wouldn’t want to get out ahead of the President. But I would note that this economy is robust and growing and coming back stronger than anyone could think from this because of the President.
I mean, you look at retail sales surging, 17.7 percent; unemployment insurance weekly claims falling. We have the fastest growth rate in American history in the third quarter.
So we artificially shut down the economy, but we have a robust recovery happening and taking place, and that’s thanks to President Trump. And there are a lot of good metrics, like new business applications skyrocketing, small businesses now opening at about 80 percent, Apple mobility index that’s practically pre-pandemic levels.
So there’s more work to be done, and phase four will address that, should it take place.
But we are encouraged by what we’re seeing, that the Donald Trump economy is coming back, because ultimately, investors and business owners have faith in this President.
Yes, Jeff.
Q Thank you, Kayleigh. You mentioned testing just now. The President has also both been tweeting and saying publicly, on Monday, that if the country just stopped testing, that there would be no — or virtually no cases left. That doesn’t make sense. Can you explain what he means by that?
MS. MCENANY: Yeah, it’s entirely logical. When you do more testing, you identify more cases. Countries that don’t do as much testing don’t identify the same number of cases. I mean, it’s pretty logical exactly what he said.
Q Okay, so it’s about identifying them. Because he seemed to suggest that if we weren’t testing, then those cases wouldn’t exist. Is that — is that just a misunderstanding?
MS. MCENANY: No, that — that wasn’t — that was not at all what he was saying. He was saying, when you test, you end up identifying more cases. And we’ve tested 23.7 million people; positivity rate of 5.9 percent. So we are in a good place when it comes to testing.
Yes.
Q And just along those same lines, the Vice President today wrote an op-ed — I believe in the Wall Street Journal — playing down the prospects of a second wave. Does the White House — is the White House just confident that there’s not going to be a second wave of the coronavirus?
MS. MCENANY: The White House is confident that we have enough testing to identify asymptomatic individuals; that we have therapeutics that are promising; that we are working on a vaccine with Project Warp Speed that we hope will be there by the end of the year and we think will be. And we have a robust public-private partnership that has shored up America’s supply chain.
So we are in a good place, and that’s what the Vice President was noting.
Jon.
Q Thanks a lot, Kayleigh. Two subjects. The first question has to do with the lawsuit that was filed against John Bolton, the former National Security Advisor, by the Department of Justice yesterday. The DOJ did not file a lawsuit against Simon & Schuster, nor did it file an injunction against the publisher. Why not? Do you still expect this book to hit bookstores, to be on Amazon, to be available for people to read on the 23rd of this month?
MS. MCENANY: So that — as to why they went down that particular path, that’s a question for DOJ. But what I would note is this book is full of classified information, which is inexcusable. Former National Security Advisor John Bolton should know all too well that it’s unacceptable to have highly classified information from the government of the United States in a book that will be published. It’s unacceptable. It has not gone through the review process, and that’s where we currently stand.
And I’d refer you back to Barr’s comment on this, which is, “We don’t believe that Bolton went through that process.” It hasn’t been completed, the process, and therefore he “is in violation of that agreement.” That was part of his quote from Monday.
Q Then, on the other subject, the executive order the President signed yesterday. During that event, in his comments, he acknowledged that there are, indeed, bad police officers. Is the President opposed to the idea of removing qualified immunity for police officers, even bad police officers?
MS. MCENANY: Yeah, so qualified immunity, let me note, is a total and complete non-starter. What qualified immunity would do is it would really enable the police in this country to do their job. That’s in the Democrat bill.
And I’d argue this: You know, Democrats, they say, “Defund the police, defund the police.” We hear that from Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez and Congresswoman Omar and others. Well, what does the Democrat bill do? By removing qualified immunity, what you’re essentially doing is not allowing police to do their job. There would be a decrease in policing in this country. Our streets would not be safe.
What President Trump has done is worked with the law enforcement to improve law enforcement, to ensure that the bad cops that exist are pushed out of the system. The overwhelming majority of cops are good, so we’ve got to address the handful that are bad, and that’s what the President’s order has done.
But taking away qualified immunity would make the streets of this country a whole lot less secure. Just look at what happened when we didn’t have ample law enforcement out on Lafayette Square: A church burned and multiple officers injured.
Q So how do you handle the situation, Kayleigh, of a bad police officer hiding behind the shield of qualified immunity?
MS. MCENANY: Look, I would note that also the court has litigated this pretty strongly. It’s been adjudicated. The Harlow court — in that decision, Harlow, the Supreme Court talked about achieving a balance between allowing victims to hold officials accountable while also minimizing the social cost to the whole — the cost of police officers, for example, pulling back.
So the Supreme Court has litigated this for decades and has approached what they think is the appropriate balance with qualified immunity.
And I think it would go a long way just doing what the President did yesterday: having that national database of offenders so we ensure that a police officer doesn’t leave one department and then go to another.
Francesca.
Q Thank you, Kayleigh. You outlined the White House’s position on qualified immunity, defunding the police. But you also said earlier that the Democratic bill is full of bad ideas. What are the other “bad” ideas, besides those two, that the President would not sign a policing bill if they wound up in the final version?
MS. MCENANY: So, one of the things the bill does is it undermines due process. The Democrat bill would undermine the due process rights of every officer by making pending and unsubstantial allegations available to the public, causing reputationable [sic] — reputational damage based on allegations alone. That’s a really good example, because what our database does is once a claim has been adjudicated, we know something was done wrong, it goes into a database that remains private. It protects privacy of the officers, but it is utilized to ensure that officer does not get to go to another department.
What the Democrat bill would do is: If someone submits an allegation, well, we’re going to violate the due process rights of this officer and put it into a system.
We have to balance everything in this situation, making sure our good, hardworking, overwhelmingly good police officers are able to do their job, but ensuring that we do not have victims like the victims I heard about yesterday in the excruciating, painful, devastating stories of their sisters, of their mothers and of their fathers.
Q So, sorry, one other question on that and something else. So you’re saying those are the three? That’s it?
MS. MCENANY: There’s a number of things, but those are the ones that I’ve listed out so far. There’s a number of problems in the bill.
Q And on the President’s rallies, he has also said that he has rallies on the books in North Carolina and also Florida, two states that have seen recent spikes in coronavirus. Who told the President that it would be safe to have rallies in states that are seeing spikes right now?
MS. MCENANY: Well, we are confident that there are embers out there that exist, that we’ll be able to put out those embers. Florida has a great governor. He’s done a great job so far. We work closely with Governor DeSantis, and we believe that we will be at a safe place.
Yes.
Q But who said it was safe?
Q Kayleigh, Justice Gorsuch’s decision from the Supreme Court this week against anti-LGBT discrimination was focused on employment civil rights law, but also had implications on housing, healthcare. How does the President want this implemented? Does he wanted it implemented as extensively or as narrowly as possible?
MS. MCENANY: So what the President says is he’s read the decision, they’ve ruled; we live with the decision, and we live with the decision of the Supreme Court. So that’s where he stands currently. And in terms of how it’s implemented, DOJ will lead the multi-agency effort to help provide certainty to the regulated parties.
Q I understand DOJ’s rule, but the President also has the opportunity to express his opinion and to lead, much like President Obama, in 2013, who said he hoped the marriage decision from the Supreme Court would be implemented as extensively as possible. What is President Trump’s view on the appropriate scope of the Court’s decision?
MS. MCENANY: So DOJ will be guiding that entirely, so I will leave that to DOJ.
Q And, finally, has the President — will the President have any conversations with DOJ about the implementation about the Court’s decision?
MS. MCENANY: Not that I’m aware of. He might have had one I don’t know about, but not that I’m aware of.
Q And one more question. Does the President think that the Gorsuch decision is a win for civil rights?
MS. MCENANY: Sorry?
Q Does the President think the Gorsuch decision is a win for civil rights?
MS. MCENANY: So one thing I would say — I have not talked to the President about that personally, but one thing I wanted to read was from the Kavanaugh dissent. There are some real concerns that this was a complete distortion of how we do statutory interpretation, and Kavanaugh lays that out very nicely.
But one thing Justice Kavanaugh did say, and I thought it was a very powerful quote, is: “Notwithstanding my concern about the Court’s transgression of the Constitution’s separation of powers…” — which was a grave concern as the separation of powers point that the DOJ argued in court — “it is appropriate to acknowledge the important victory achieved today by gay and lesbian Americans.”
So I thought that that was a very good quote from Justice Kavanaugh.
Yes. Alexandra.
Q Thank you. On the plans to reduce U.S. troops in Germany, is there a timeline you can share with us? And could this decision, this plan, be changed or softened if Berlin agreed to increase its defense spending?
MS. MCENANY: So the President addressed our presence — American troop presence in Germany, and he said we’re bringing that number down from 52,000 — about what it’s at now — to 25,000. And the rationale for that, he articulated, was that Germany is very delinquent in their payments to NATO. They’re paying 1 percent. They’re supposed to be at 2 percent, and even 2 percent is low. It should be much more than that.
Q Would he change his plan if Germany agreed to increased (inaudible)?
MS. MCENANY: I wouldn’t get ahead of the President on making that decision.
Michael.
Q Hi. Thanks, Kayleigh. I have one question, and then I have two quick questions from colleagues who have sent to me as the pool person.
So, on my question, back when two White House officials tested positive for COVID, we all reported on an email that went out to West Wing employees instructing them that masks were mandatory to be worn in the West Wing at all times, with the exception of being when they were sitting at their desks, alone. Obviously, none of the White House people that I’ve seen today have been wearing masks at all.
Has that been rescinded? Has that instruction to West Wing employees been rescinded formally, or is it just still in place but nobody is paying attention to it? Or —
MS. MCENANY: So, masks are recommended, but not requi- –required. Excuse me. As I said.
Q Okay. And two quick questions.
MS. MCENANY: Could I — I want to get to everyone in the room, so —
Q Well, these are from people who can’t be in the room because of the restrictions.
MS. MCENANY: I understand. But I want to make sure I get to everyone in the room, and then we can come back.
Q Okay.
MS. MCENANY: So, Rob.
Q Can I just get a clarification on your equivalence between protests in the streets and this rally on Saturday? Is it the White House position that outdoor events carry the same risk as indoor events?
MS. MCENANY: It’s our position that the media should not be making decisions about their guidelines to us about social distancing based on political ideology or what they think is the worthiness of the cause.
Q But my point is, there a good scientific reasons for treating the two events different. One is outdoors and one is indoors.
MS. MCENANY: Right. And there’s not a good logical reason for this, so that’s the one thing I would keep going back to.
And can I also ask — can you tell us anything —
MS. MCENANY: Yes, Owen.
Q — about the Secretary of State’s trip to Hawaii to meet his Chinese counterpart?
MS. MCENANY: So, I have no information on that.
Owen. Yes.
Q Blake. Different mask.
MS. MCENANY: Oh, sorry. Blake. They subbed you in.
Q No worries. No worries.
MS. MCENANY: Good to see you Blake.
Q You too. A couple on the economic front. Earlier this month in Maine, the President was talking about Maine lobster, and he said the following: He said, “If the European Union doesn’t drop that tariff immediately, we’re going to put a tariff on their cars, which will be equivalent.” Can you give us an update on that? What is “immediately”? What is the status of potential tariffs on EU autos?
MS. MCENANY: I haven’t inquired about that today, but I will inquire about that, and I’ll try to get back to you before five, if that works.
Q And secondly, an infrastructure bill — can you just sort of give us a broad outline of what the administration wants to see? Is that a reauthorization of the highway bill that comes up at the end of the year? Is that added on to a potential phase four stimulus? What is the administration — what does the White House want as it relates to infrastructure?
MS. MCENANY: Yeah, I don’t want to get ahead of the administration on our official plans for that. Infrastructure is something we’ve talked about for a long time, and it’s something that we think that we could find common ground on. But it’s up to Democrats to really come to us and make that happen. It’s been mentioned as potentially a phase four, but that’s not in stone, but that has been mentioned. No formalized plans, though, on where infrastructure stands.
Q Is that a trillion dollars? Is it a trillion dollars? Up to it?
MS. MCENANY: We don’t have a number on that right now.
Yes.
Q On the Tulsa rally, can you give us a sense of which health experts the campaign and the White House consulted before deciding to hold it? Did anyone talk to the CDC about whether it be a good idea?
MS. MCENANY: Look, we are taking every single safety precaution that we can. And again, I would note this is probably question number 10 on rallies. And while we appreciate the great concern for our rally goers, you should exhibit that same concern for the protesters who are out there who are not socially distancing, in many cases, and not wearing masks.
Chanel.
Q Thank you, Kayleigh. Going back to the international front on China and India, you just mentioned that the administration is monitoring the situation, but the President has mentioned that he would be willing to mediate the conflict between China and India. Now, if he were to do so, what does that look like? Does that mean — does that look like a one-on-one conversation? Does that mean bringing the two leaders together? Has the President indicated what mediation looks like for China and India?
MS. MCENANY: So, again, no formal plans on that beyond what I already said in expressing our absolute condolences to the Indian soldiers that died as a result of today’s confrontation. We extend our deepest condolences there.
And I would note just that during the phone call on June 2nd of this year that President Trump had with Prime Minister Modi, they did discuss the situation on the India-China border.
Q On the relationship between President Trump and President Xi, the Chinese forces have been moving thousands of troops to that region that — it doesn’t seem like that region is going to see de-escalation anytime soon. If you were to characterize President Trump’s relationship with President Xi today, would you —
MS. MCENANY: Yeah, I —
Q Would you venture into that realm?
MS. MCENANY: I would just say what the President has said before: that he is really appalled at the fact that the coronavirus came out of China. They weren’t allowing flights into China but were allowing flights out. They slow-walked information. The WHO seemed to partner with China in slow-walking that information about asymptomatic spread.
So that is an appalling state of events, and the President is very upset by that action of China — or inaction, in some cases, I should say.
Thank you all very much. I hope you have a great rest of the day, and I hope we start seeing more consistent headlines. Thanks very much.
This afternoon President Trump announces the PREVENTS Task Force Roadmap which highlights the admin’s work to prevent veteran suicide and offer mental health resources to veterans. Anticipated Start Time 2:15pm ET [Video Added]
WH Livestream Link – Fox News Livestream Link – Fox Business Livestream
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U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer is testifying tomorrow at 10:00am to the House Ways and Means committee; later in the afternoon Ambassador Lighthizer will testify before the Senate Finance Committee.
The New York Times has received an advance copy of USTR Lighthizer’s opening statement, and the liberal publication is apoplectic the Trump administration plans to outline an even more aggressive stance toward the iff’s.
According to the pearl-clutching Wall St. class, Lighthizer is going to inform congress of Trump/USTR plans to demand tariff reciprocity; and Lighthizer will indeed raise tariffs against any nation that continues to attempt one-sided benefit. [EU will go bananas]
One method to approach tariff inequality would be for the U.S. to lower the import value threshold for non-tariff exemptions. Currently the U.S. does not apply import duties to any product valued under $800. This is a great benefit to China, southeast Asia, and U.S. on-line retailers such as ebay and Amazon; however, the zero tariff threshold hurts U.S. manufacturers because China and other nations do not reciprocate.
It is anticipated that USTR Lighthizer will inform congress the U.S. will lower that import threshold to match the same value level applied by other nations. Obviously the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Wall Street multinationals will not like this approach.
WASHINGTON — The Trump administration plans to continue its aggressive trade tactics this year by pushing for a “broader reset” of the tariffs set by the World Trade Organization, a top trade official plans to tell Congress in testimony on Wednesday.
Robert E. Lighthizer, the U.S. trade representative, will tell the House Ways and Means Committee that the tariffs the organization sets for various countries are “outdated” and far above the levels charged by the United States, according to a copy of his prepared remarks.
The United States “must ensure that tariffs reflect current economic realities to protect our exporters and workers,” Mr. Lighthizer’s prepared testimony says.
The remarks suggest that American officials will continue their offensive this year on the World Trade Organization, the international body charged with writing and enforcing trade rules. (read more)
Following the four year pattern of opposition, we can well expect the majority of purchased politicians to stand against the Trump administration efforts. That said, none of the doomsayer tariff predictions ever came true; and President Trump has the support of the majority with him against the United States Congress.
Data released by the Commerce Dept [pdf here] shows U.S. shoppers increased spending by a record 17.7% from April to May. The jump in spending was double the amount most economists and forecasters were predicting.
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(Reuters) Retail sales jumped 17.7% last month, the biggest advance since the government started tracking the series in 1992. Sales dropped a record 14.7% in April. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast retail sales would rise 8% in May. (link)
Earlier today President Trump delivered remarks from the Rose Garden and signed an executive order on safe policing. [Executive Order Here] Video and Transcript Below.
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[Transcript] – THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. Please. And thank you all for being here as we take historic action to deliver a future of safety and security for Americans of every race, religion, color, and creed.
We’re joined today by law enforcement professionals and community leaders. Though we may all come from different places and different backgrounds, we’re united by our desire to ensure peace and dignity and equality for all Americans.
I’ve just concluded a meeting with incredible families — just incredible families that have been through so much. The families of Ahmaud Arbery, Botham Jean, Antwon Rose, Jemel Roberson, Atatiana Jefferson, Michael Dean, Darius Tarver, Cameron Lamb, and Everett Palmer. These are incredible people. Incredible people. And it’s so sad.
Many of these families lost their loved ones in deadly interactions with police. To all of the hurting families, I want you to know that all Americans mourn by your side. Your loved ones will not have died in vain. We are one nation. We grieve together, and we heal together. I can never imagine your pain or the depth of your anguish, but I can promise to fight for justice for all of our people. And I gave a commitment to all of those families today with Senator Tim Scott and Attorney General Bill Barr. We are going to pursue what we said. We will be pursuing it, and we will be pursuing it strongly, Tim. Right? Okay?
I want to recognize Attorney General Bill Barr, who’s spent so much time on this and others matters like this. Bill, thank you very much for being here. Along with — (applause) — great job you’re doing. Along with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Tim Scott, and they’re going to be working on a Senate bill also that can go hand in hand with this. And also, Representatives Kelly Armstrong, Louie Gohmert, Jim Jordan, Guy Reschenthaler, and Pete Stauber.
And thanks also to Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody; the President of the Fraternal Order of Police Pat Yoes; President of the International Association of Chiefs of Police Steven Casstevens; and many other law enforcement leaders who are going to be joining me at the signing.
Today is about pursuing common sense and fighting — fighting for a cause like we seldom get the chance to fight for. We have to find common ground. But I strongly oppose the radical and dangerous efforts to [DEL: defend :DEL] [defund], dismantle, and dissolve our police departments, especially now when we’ve achieved the lowest recorded crime rates in recent history.
Americans know the truth: Without police, there is chaos; without law, there is anarchy; and without safety, there is catastrophe. We need leaders at every level of government who have the moral clarity to state these obvious facts.
Americans believe we must support the brave men and women in blue who police our streets and keep us safe. Americans also believe we must improve accountability, increase transparency, and invest more resources in police training, recruiting, and community engagement. Reducing crime and raising standards are not opposite goals, they are not mutually exclusive; they work together. They all work together.
That is why today I’m signing an executive order encouraging police departments nationwide to adopt the highest professional standards to serve their communities. These standards will be as high and as strong as there is on Earth.
The vast majority of police officers are selfless and courageous public servants. They are great men and women. When others run away from danger, police run straight into harm’s way, often putting their lives at stake to protect someone who they don’t know or never even met. Great danger.
Police officers run straight toward this incredible harm. Take the World Trade Center: They ran straight into the Twin Towers of 9/11. Many of them never returned. Never returned. Vast numbers of New York’s Finest never returned.
Last year, I presented the Medal of Valor to six heroic police officers who ended a murderous rampage so professionally in Dayton, Ohio. Hundreds of people would have been killed, surely, without them.
We ask our police to put on the uniform and risk their lives for us every day. The least we deserve and the least we can do — because they deserve it so much — they have to get our gratitude. And we have to give them great respect for what they do, for the job is one of the most dangerous jobs on Earth, one of the most difficult jobs on Earth.
Last year alone, 89 law enforcement officers were killed in the line of duty. In recent days, two members of law enforcement were killed amid riots and looting, and hundreds of police officers were injured just recently. One officer was shot in the head and is now laying in a hospital, almost totally paralyzed.
Despite our very good record on crime, law and order must be further restored nationwide, and your federal government is ready, willing, and able to help, as we did in Minneapolis. After it got out of control for four days, I sent in representatives, commonly known as the National Guard, and it was all put down very quickly. We’re willing to help. We’re willing to help in Seattle. We’re willing to help anywhere you want, and we’ll be there very quickly. It won’t take long.
There will be no more looting or arson, and the penalty will be very grave for those who get caught. Violence and destruction will not be tolerated. We cannot do that. The looters have no cause that they’re fighting for — just trouble.
Every day, police officers make great sacrifices to keep our communities secure and safe. In 2018, our police arrested nearly 12,000 people for murder, 25,000 people for rape, and nearly 1.5 million for assault. Very dangerous criminals.
In many cases, local law enforcement is underfunded, understaffed, and undersupported. Forty-seven percent of all murders in Chicago and sixty-eight percent of all murders in Baltimore went without arrests last year.
Americans want law and order. They demand law and order. They may not say it, they may not be talking about it, but that’s what they want. Some of them don’t even know that’s what they want, but that’s what they want. And they understand that when you remove the police, you hurt those who have the least, the most.
Nobody needs a strong, trustworthy police force more than those who live in distressed areas, and nobody is more opposed to the small number of bad police officers — and you have them. They’re a very tiny — I use the word “tiny.” It’s a very small percentage, but you have them. But nobody wants to get rid of them more than the overwhelming number of really good and great police officers. Some of them are standing with me and with me in the audience today, and I appreciate you being here. (Applause.) Thank you. Thank you. Great job.
What’s needed now is not more stoking of fear and division. We need to bring law enforcement and communities closer together, not to drive them apart.
Under the executive order I’m signing today, we will prioritize federal grants from the Department of Justice to police departments that seek independent credentialing, certifying that they meet high standards and, in fact, in certain cases, the highest standard — that’s where they do the best — on the use of force and de-escalation training.
For example, many believe that proper training might have prevented the tragic deaths of Antwon Rose and Botham Jean. As part of this new credentialing process, chokeholds will be banned, except if an officer’s life is at risk.
And I will say, we’ve dealt with all of the various departments, and everybody said, “It’s time. We have to do it.”
Additionally, we’re looking at new advanced and powerful less-lethal weapons to help prevent deadly interactions. New devices are being developed all the time, and we’re looking at the best of them. And cost is no object. No object.
Under this executive order, departments will also need to share of information about credible abuses so that officers with significant issues do not simply move from one police department to the next. That’s a problem. And the heads of our police departments said, “Whatever you can do about that, please let us know.” We’re letting you know. We’re doing a lot about it.
In addition, my order will direct federal funding to support officers in dealing with homeless individuals and those who have mental illness and substance-abuse problems. We will provide more resources for co-responders, such as social workers who can help officers manage these complex encounters. And this is what they’ve studied and worked on all their lives. They understand how to do it. We’re going to get the best of them put in our police departments and working with our police. We will have reform without undermining our many great and extremely talented law enforcement officers.
President Obama and Vice President Biden never even tried to fix this during their eight-year period. The reason they didn’t try is because they had no idea how to do it. And it is a complex situation.
Beyond the steps we’re taking today, I am committed to working with Congress on additional measures. Congress has started already, and they’ll be having bills coming out of the Senate and possibly out of the House. And hopefully they’ll all get together and they’ll come up with a solution that goes even beyond what we’re signing today. But this is a big, big step — a step that hasn’t been taken before.
But in order to make real progress on public safety, we have to break old patterns of failure. Many of the same politicians now presenting themselves as the solution are the same ones who have failed for decades on schools, jobs, justice, and crime. They’re all often, unfortunately, the same politicians running the cities and states where help is most needed. It’s an attitude, and it’s not working.
Today’s action is a big part of the solution to restoring, renewing, and rebuilding our communities. For the last three and a half years, my administration has been focused on creating opportunity, fighting for equal justice, and truly delivering results. Nobody has ever delivered results like we’ve delivered. Nobody has come close. (Applause.) And we worked with some great people. We’ve worked with fantastic people to get it done.
We enacted landmark criminal justice reform, something that nobody else could get done. They tried and they couldn’t even come close. And we got it done, and we got it done powerfully, and people appreciated it. But it’s something that with all the work and all the talk for so many years — criminal justice reform — nobody else could get done.
We secured permanent and record funding for HBCUs — that’s historically black colleges and universities — numbers that they never thought were possible and long-term financing, because they would come back to the White House; after my third year, I said, “Why are you here again?” Great people. About 42 people, the heads of black colleges and universities. Great people. They do such an incredible job.
And I’d see them, and after the third year I’d say, “Why are you doing this?” “We need money again.” I said, “Don’t we set it so you have, like, a 10-year program, a 5-year program?” “No, sir, for years and years we’ve had to come back every single year.” I said, “Well, the only bad thing about what I’m going to do is I’m going to give you long-term financing and I’m going to up the amount, but I won’t get to see you anymore. So that’s the bad part. But you can focus on education now instead of worrying about dealing with us in Washington.”
So we did that for the historically black colleges and universities. I’m very proud of it. They’re incredible. They’re incredible people. Got to know a lot of the heads of those colleges. They do an unbelievable job and don’t get the kind of notoriety that they should have.
We expanded affordable options for better healthcare. We created Opportunity Zones with Senator Tim Scott; brought it to me. We didn’t know if we could get it passed, Tim, right? But we got it passed, and I think it’s probably one of the great things that we’ve done in this administration. Tens of thousands of jobs, billions and billions of dollars being brought into areas and neighborhoods that would never, ever, ever be taken care of, monetarily. Areas that didn’t have 10 cents put them — in them for years and decades, and now people are investing, thriving, and the jobs have come back.
We achieved the lowest black, Hispanic, and Asian unemployment rates in American history. And we will do it again. We’ll do it again. We’re fighting for school choice, which really is the civil rights of all time in this country. Frankly, school choice is the civil rights statement of the year, of the decade, and probably beyond — because all children have to have access to quality education. A child’s zip code in America should never determine their future, and that’s what was happening. So we’re very, very strong on school choice, and I hope everybody remembers that. And it’s happening. It’s already happened, but it’s happening. We have tremendous opposition from people that know they shouldn’t be opposing it. School choice.
All children deserve equal opportunity because we are all made equal by God. So true. A great jobs market and thriving economy is probably the best thing that we can do to help the black, Hispanic, Asian communities. We saw that just recently, prior to the virus that came in from China just a few months ago. What a horrible thing it was all over the world — 188 countries now.
And I just want to say we’ve done incredibly well. We’re doing well. Things are happening that nobody can even believe. Our country is opening up. And it’s opening up rapidly. We had the best unemployment and employment. We had best unemployment and employment numbers — think of that — in the history of our country. We’re up to almost 160 million people working. There was never anything even close. And that’s for almost every group including black, Hispanic, Asian, women, young people, old people, young people without a high school diploma. Every group. Everybody was thrilled. Everybody had — just about –high-paying jobs.
Our country was never in a better position, and we were planning on massive growth — it was happening; it was already there — including big salary increases, which were already taking place for the last two and a half years. Big, big increases. Record increases. Nobody has seen anything like it. And then we got hit by the virus, along with the rest of the world. And now I’m building it up again. Here we go again. But I’m building it up again, and it’s moving fast. And it will be even better than before, because we also learned. It will be better than before.
Jobs are rapidly coming back, and retail sales that were just announced two hours ago — just a little while ago — they’re up a staggering 17.7 percent. (Applause.) The projection was anywhere from 6 to 8 percent. We’re up 17.7 percent. And what does that mean? The stock market went through the roof.
These good numbers, they drove it up to a level that — we’re almost at the same level. Hard to believe. We’re getting very close to the level we were before the pandemic and before all of the things that you’ve seen happen happened. That’s a great thing because, ultimately, it’s about jobs, it’s about — the government can never do anything like a great job for a person, where they look forward to getting up in the morning and going to work, and getting a much bigger check than they could ever get otherwise.
Today, and over the last 60 days, we’ve had one of the biggest stock market increases in the history of the stock markets. And two weeks ago, the 50-day increase was the single biggest.
Unless my formula is tampered with, we will soon be in a stronger position than we were before the plague came in from China. When the numbers reached the point that I know they will, there will again be a great unity and a great spirit in our country. People will have their job back that they might’ve lost. They’ll be making even more money than they did before.
We have some brilliant people working with me, and we put it together. We did it once and we’re very easily doing it again. We’re way ahead of schedule. You’ll see that. You’ll see the third quarter numbers will be very good. You’ll see fourth quarter will be really good. And you’ll see next year will be one of the best economic years this country has ever had. (Applause.)
And it’s all happening very quickly, way ahead of schedule, and I think you see that. People can’t even believe what they’re looking at.
But on top of all of that, before the end of the year, I predict we will have a very successful vaccine, therapeutic, and cure. We’re making tremendous progress. I deal with these incredible scientists, doctors, very, very closely. I have great respect for their minds. And they have come up with things, and they’ve come up with many other cures and therapeutics over the years. These are the people — the best, the smartest, the most brilliant anywhere.
And they’ve come up with the AIDS vaccine. They’ve come up with — or the AIDS. And they — as you know, there’s various things, and now various companies are involved. But the therapeutic for AIDS — AIDS was a death sentence, and now people live a life with a pill. It’s an incredible thing.
The Ebola vaccine and others — these are the people that have done it, or these are the people that have been around it, and they’re all competing. It’s an incredible thing. All of these brilliant firms, labs, companies are competing. And I will tell you, we’re very far advanced. We’ve already started tests and trials.
So I think we’re going to have a very, very good answer to that very, very soon. I always say, even without it, it goes away. But if we had the vaccine — and we will — if we had therapeutic, or cure — one thing sort of blends into the other — it will be a fantastic day. And I think that’s going to happen, and it’s going to happen very soon.
Americans can achieve anything when we work together as one national family. To go forward, we must seek cooperation, not confrontation; we must build upon our heritage, not tear it down; and we must cherish the principles of America’s founding as we strive to deliver safe, beautiful, elegant justice and liberty for all.
I’d like now to invite our great friends — because they are — our great friends from law enforcement, the offices representing their groups, to come up as I sign a very important executive order. And we’re asking Mitch and Tim and all of the people that are here from Congress to go back and see if they can get something done. I see Louie and Jim — Jim Jordan who are all here. A lot of representatives from Congress and the Senate.
If they can go back and add to what we’re signing today, it’ll be — it’ll be a big moment. It’ll be a big moment. But this is a tremendous step. This a step that could have been taken years ago but people chose not to do that. And that was, in my opinion, a big mistake. We could’ve solved a lot of the problems that we have now.
So if I could — law enforcement, if you could come forward. We’ve had the — please, come up. We’ve had the endorsement of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association, the Fraternal Order of Police, International Association of Chiefs of Police, International Union of Police Associations, Major County Sheriffs of America Association, National Association of Police Organizations, National District Attorneys Association, National Sheriffs Association, Sergeants Benevolent Association, and many others.
They’ve worked on this with me and my team, and have been fantastic. I want to thank my team. What a team it is. And we’ve taken very much into mind what they are saying, because these are the people that keep us safe, and they’ve done an incredible job.
Thank you all very much. Thank you. (Applause.)
(The executive order is signed.)
PARTICIPANT: Thank you, Mr. President. (Applause.)
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much, fellas. Take one of these for yourselves.
Thank you very much, everybody. (Applause.) Thank you very much. Thank you.
The White House provided some background information to media in advance of tomorrow’s executive order on police reform. Details Below:
[Transcript ] – First of all, I want to thank everyone for being here. Tomorrow, we plan to do an executive order that the President has been working on for the last couple of weeks. This is not a new thing. We started our police commission a couple of months ago in the beginning of the year after we did criminal justice reform.
The President is a president of action and I’ll go through what this executive order is going to be talking about.
We developed this by talk- — working very closely with law enforcement professionals and their representatives, as well as with families of people who were killed by law enforcement and also their representatives.
The goal of this is to bring police closer together with the communities. We’re not looking to defund the police; we’re looking to invest more and incentivize best practices.
The executive order has three main components to it.
♦The first component is going to be about — it’s going to be about creating credentialing and certification. We’re looking to incentivize best practices. There are a lot of great standards for use of force throughout the country. However, a lot of the police departments that have had problems are not using the most modern standard. Whether you look at Minneapolis or if you look at Ferguson or if you look at Baltimore, a lot of their training materials and standards are outdated, and this is something that we want to incentivize people to get certified on their practices and hopefully that will encourage better training and action.
♦The next thing is going to be about information sharing. That gives us the ability to track people who have excessive use of force complaints so that people can’t leave one law enforcement department and then get hired at another. There should be a place for people to know about people’s backgrounds so we can keep bad cops out. And nobody hates bad cops more than good cops. And we want to make sure that we can track that and take action.
♦The last part, which is also going to be critical, is with regards to mental health and homelessness and addiction. We want to be able to have co-responder programs where we’re going to incentivize. A lot of the work that police officers are doing today deals with medical issues and homelessness. And we want to make sure that police officers can do policing and that they can implement best practices throughout the country to figure out how they can deal with a lot of the other issues that come up along the way.
We think that this will be something that both the law enforcement community, as well as the community advocates have been asking for. This is something that our law enforcement commission, the Attorney General, and all the people that we’ve been talking to feel like is a very necessary development now in law enforcement.
So we think that this is steps that will actually make a big difference. And again, the President is going to call on Congress to hopefully pass legislation that can make a difference. And we’re looking forward to tomorrow and for the President to have the opportunity to have a discussion where he has both police officers and police officer representatives in the room with families of people who were killed by police officers, to have the discussion that the country needs to have so that we can turn the anger in the country right now into action and hopefully bring some unification and some healing.
I will say that this President has been about solutions. A lot of the President’s policies have been addressed towards solving the problems in the inner cities, whether it’s for advocating better schools, whether it’s trying to bring access to capital and more investment into the poorest areas through Opportunity Zones, bringing more money to higher education in historically black colleges, or even addressing criminal justice reform, which he was able to do with the historic passage of the FIRST STEP Act and a lot of the work we’ve done on second chance hiring.
The President promised, when he ran for office, to work hard for the forgotten men and women of this country. And his actions today, his policy platform, have achieved great results. And this is just another example of how, working with law enforcement, the President has been able to make adjustments that are able to hopefully bring the country forward and bring law enforcement and communities closer together by promoting practices that are state of art for community policing.
I’ll pass it over to [senior administration official]. Maybe you want to finish up on that.
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: Sure. Thanks so much. And so, this reform is very impactful because it’s all focused on community policing. We know that, in certain areas, the police have been disincentivized to stay in the car and not walk the beat, and that’s made communities less safe. And so what we want to do is thread the needle on having more cops, community police, but at the same time, build trust with the community. And that’s what this reform effort is all focused on.
And so we had the opportunity to not only work with various different police groups, but several faith leaders and groups that represent families.
And so, one of the big reforms that everyone agrees on and that we think is going to be revolutionary in the way we do policing is the creation of co-respondent services, which focuses on bringing on social workers who will go on a response with police for nonviolent response calls, specifically focused on mental health, drug addiction, as well as homelessness issues.
We find that law enforcement finds themselves dealing with these issues more often than not. And in many cases, they’re not the best one to respond to these type of efforts. And so though we have a database, we also made sure that this database system accounted for privacy and due process for those officers because we want to be fair in how we set up this system. But again, as my colleague reiterated, most good cops — all good cops, the biggest thing they hate is bad cops. You know, and so they want to be able to have a system that they can trust and that no one can go around the system.
And then we also really want to focus on retention and recruitment — specifically, recruiting people from the communities that they live in. We want police officers who are in the police department to be a part of their community. And what better way than recruit directly from that community?
And so we look forward to tomorrow’s event. And I’ll sit back for any questions.
Q Hey, this is Franco Ordoñez with NPR. Thank you so much for doing this. I had a question about unions and accountability. One of the concerns was how difficult it is to have accountability for officers. Derek Chauvin of Minneapolis, he had, I understand, 17 number of complaints against him. How does this address the issue of accountability, particularly what some say are roadblocks from unions — police unions?
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: So there’s a lot of accountability in the credentialing process. Many of these local accountability (inaudible) is going to be put on local mayors who maybe not take the time to get their police department credentialed. And so we’re going to really need them to hold accountability for their local law department, local laws.
I mean, there’s so many different police departments around the country that could’ve done a better job if they just took the time on the front end with doing the credentialing. We’re, of course, going to put some incentive in place by rewarding police officers and police departments that do the right thing. But we think there is certainly some accountability from local leaders to help us do this.
You know, the federal government can only do so much, so we do need local partnerships. But we’re going to do all we can to use our platform to bring police and communities together.
Q Hey there, it’s Michael Moates. I’m with the America First Project. I just wanted to ask you: If you look at the numbers from the different leadership across, you know, Atlanta, Seattle, Minneapolis, obviously there is a lot of Democratic leadership there. Is there going to be withholding of grants? Are you all looking other options of discipline for those who don’t comply?
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: What we found is prioritizing funding really changes the way that people go around seeking funding from the federal government. And so you don’t necessarily have to demonize them or withdraw funds, but if you create an equal system based off of best practices, there’s going to be more so a race to create the best application to get access to the funding. And that’s usually how it works, which is why we’re prioritizing the funding, rather than trying to do anything that would seem like we’re trying to defund police departments.
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: And what we’re finding is that there is actually a fairly good ecosystem of standards and training behaviors. And, you know, some places do it great and others less sub-par. And, you know, what we want to be doing is incentivizing people to take on those best standards, and improve their training, and do the retention of good officers. And by doing that, that will be the way that you can hopefully start doing it.
But you’re never going to solve this problem by demonizing the police. You have to solve this problem by working with law enforcement and with the police to make progress together. And there’s a lot of willingness, and I believe that this executive order will have the support of all the major federal law enforcement groups in a very, very positive way.
Q Hi, it’s Andrew Feinberg with Breakfast Media. Thanks for doing the call. I have two questions. Shortly — shortly after the President took office, in 2017, the DOJ’s COPS Office stopped doing investigations and publishing reports into problems in local departments. And shortly before Jeff Sessions resigned as Attorney General, he issued a memorandum directing the Civil Rights Division to stop doing pattern-and-practice investigations and entering into consent decrees — making it harder to enter into consent decrees with police departments to stop civil rights abuses.
Those types of investigations and consent decrees were widely considered to be some of the strongest tools in the DOJ’s toolbox for dealing with abuse and misconduct in local police departments. Would the President consider directing the Attorney General to rescind that memorandum and allow these investigations and practices to start again? And if not, why not?
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: We’re focused on bringing the police and the community together. We think going in a certain direction may dis-incentivize police from going to high-crime areas. You can look at some localities, like Baltimore, that had consent decrees. And now, plenty of neighborhoods in Baltimore are being victimized, and crime is on the rise because police officers are afraid to do their job because there is no protection for police officers.
I think we have to think about this: Most people want to be able to call the police if they need them. Just because some bad apples don’t perform their job, that doesn’t mean you throw out the baby with the bath water.
And so what we’re trying to do is create a system which brings police and community together and focuses on public safety. With that public safety narrative, we have less of these bad interactions and more of the positive ones. And so that’s what we focused on.
Q Yes, hi, this is Carrie Sheffield with JusttheNews.com. I had a question about, specifically, what the executive order is going to include in terms of what pieces might there be that need to be passed through legislation. And, I guess, specifically, the three components that you mentioned, are these all going to be through DOJ? What’s the legal mechanism for how these will be enforced? And then, what, if anything, is not going to be included, in terms of executive power and your just making of the suggestion? If you could differentiate those two.
And then, a quick question for [senior administration official]. You mentioned that there are a lot of officers who are not from the community. Is there any steps — or evidence to say that this is a problem or it is more common, that it is — there’s results, in terms of seeing that it’s better to have officers from the community?
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: Yeah, let me start by saying that a lot of the law enforcement is local. Right? And so, at the federal level, there are certain things that we can impact and there are certain things we can’t impact. And so what we’ve been trying to do with this executive order is work with law enforcement to try to set some guiding principles and incentivize best behavior at the local level.
We’ve — you know, we launched the first — you know, we launched a commission earlier this year, right after we did criminal justice reform, to study improvements with modern technology and what could be done in policing now throughout the country.
Once this is signed, the Attorney General will then take the principles from the President and work to turn that into specific guidance. And then also, Congress is going to need to look at it, and we’ll call on them to work on different areas to see if they can both provide funding and legislation to put some of these programs into place.
And do you want to —
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: Yeah. I was just going to — I can just add to that, that there is a lot of — here that certainly can be put into statutory law. But the President wanted to act. He didn’t want to have to wait on Congress to act on it this issue, because bringing the community together now is extremely important, specifically for public safety. We’re speaking on behalf of many communities that want more law enforcement there to help protect them and keep them safe.
And so we’re always going to — the first business of the President is protect people. We’re always going to make sure that happens.
Insofar as the stats on community policing, that comes from my experience, but a number of community advocates have asked for more of that and also the police. And so that’s an area where everyone has had common ground.
Q Hi, this is Jeff Mason with Reuters. Thanks, everybody. The question I have, just as I’m thinking about how to write about this, is: What exactly — how exactly does the executive order fulfill these objectives that you’re talking about? When you say you want to incentivize best practices and information sharing, and the piece about mental health, does that mean the executive order will tie funding around the country to this or will mandate the funding — federal funding be tied to these things? Just connect the dots, if you can, for us about exactly how the order will work.
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: So it’s not tying; it’s incentivizing. I mentioned, earlier, priority points. It’s creating that ecosystem that rewards good behavior. One of those good behaviors: If I’m applying for a federal grant, maybe you want to look at accreditation that makes you more competitive. You got to understand that most of our discretionary money is competitive. So if you put in the ecosystem that we’re going to prioritize funding if you have this, then they’re going to do exactly what that is.
I mean, a lot of these police departments follow whatever the rules are to the T. And so we if we put that as the priority point, it’s going to change the way that they apply for this and they’ll do that accreditation.
Q Hi, this is Shannon Pettypiece with NBC. One of the issues that people have raised is the issue of racism in police forces or racial stereotypes among police officers. Is that something that the President is going to address tomorrow? And is that a concern that he sees needs to be dealt with?
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: So, look, I think that there was some misreporting out about this earlier. And tomorrow is about working with law enforcement and the families of those who have been killed, you know, unfortunately, and trying to bring people together with policy that will bring the country forward.
And I think that, you know, the President sees, you know, law enforcement as — vast, vast, vast majority — as great. They do a great job. They keep our communities safe. He stands with them. And he wants to figure out how to do things to eliminate situations where you have bad officers.
I think, you know, he was horrified and, you know, we were all horrified by the video that we saw with Mr. Floyd in Minneapolis. And we want to make sure that we can continue to give the resources to the local communities to get closer with the — with their police forces to do better, to build more trust.
But again, it goes back to the President’s full suite of policies that help the forgotten communities, where he’s looking to — where he’s looking to help people have opportunities to go to better schools and get better jobs and have access to capital. And hopefully that brings more opportunity to the community, which will lead to less crime and more safety.
But, [senior administration official], you may want to address that.
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: Sure. I think [senior administration official] hit the nail on the head. There is no one issue when it comes to the community. There are a lot of historic factors and disparities that’s brought us here today. Everything COVID did on shining the light on a lot of disparities such as access to capital and public health. And then we had the protest that came about.
But the President created infrastructure to help with the disparities long before any issues happened, because he was very proactive about giving everybody a chance at the American dream. And so it’s only allowed for us to bring more partners on the local level. We’ve had a hard time having local leadership lean into actually dealing with the problems of some of these communities. Hopefully, (inaudible) this executive order comes out, more of them will come to the table to partner with this President.
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: And what the President has been very clear on is he’s willing to work with anybody he wants to address the issues if they arise. And, again, if you look at the suite of actions that he’s taken over the last three and a half years, he has a big record of success of really focusing on forgotten communities and trying to deliver for people, regardless of their race, religion, creed.
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: Last question.
Q Hey guys. Thanks. This is Christian Datoc from Daily Caller. I’m just curious: If Congress were to pick up any of these components in future legislation, would the President sign that piece into law, even if it included provisions on qualified immunity? Kayleigh McEnany stated last week that that’s a non-starter for the White House. Just wondering if anything has changed on that front.
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: Yeah, I would — I think Kayleigh’s words still hold today. And again, the President is always flexible and he’ll look at what comes to him. But I think that would be a very — a very high hill to climb. I don’t see anything that has that in there passing Congress any time soon.
But, [senior administration official], do you want to just make a few final comments?
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: Yeah. I think the meat of this executive order is focusing on those certification bodies that will work on training people through de-escalation techniques, use of force standards, including those policies that prohibit chokeholds except in those situations where deadly force is allowed by law.
And we’re leveraging our ability to execute discretionary grants and prioritizing those police departments that take the time to get that credentialing. And so that’s the meat of this, and we think that goes a lot further than anything that anyone has put on the table right now.
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: All right, that’s it, everybody. Thanks so much for the call. The embargo is now lifted. Remember, this is on background and can be attributed to senior administration officials. Thanks so much for the time.
The U.S. media are in ideological alignment with blue state governors and congressional democrats to hype COVID-19 panic as a method to keep the economy from reopening. To advance this narrative the crowds during mass protects they approve of are ignored; but any crowd at an event they do not align with is used to push panic. Everyone can see this.
The New York manufacturing index shocked everyone earlier today showing a strong rebound. The index “unexpectedly” surged 48 points in June surprising all economic forecasters. Meanwhile, National Economic Council Chairman Larry Kudlow appears on Fox News to discuss the dynamics.
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As Kudlow notes, President Trump is looking to use any potential phase-4 legislative package to inject a massive ‘America First’ boost, via tax incentives for manufacturing business interests to return to the U.S. The administration does not see a need for additional direct spending, bailouts, or continued payments; however, this is an opportunity to provide tax incentives to boost U.S-centric economic activity.
It’s important to remember the dynamic of U.S. multinationals (Wall St), and how many of them align with Democrat and media efforts to hold down the U.S. economy. There are trillions at stake.
Wall Street multinationals are attempting to retain their prior investments in China and southeast Asia; the last thing they want is an incentive program (expensing, tax relief etc) putting pressure on them to return jobs and manufacturing to the United States. The multinationals prefer their decades-long built globalist supply chains that they paid congress to create.
Because of the specific interests, and the ideology, the multinationals, U.S. media, the resistance movement and democrat politicians are in alignment to support Wall Street against President Trump’s America-First agenda.
The singular force fighting for the benefit of Main Street USA is President Trump and his economic war council. In essence the Trump administration is in a battle against all the global interests, foreign and domestic, who are determined to keep the U.S. economy from expanding and getting stronger.
These are all simply different battles, with varying levels of escalation, in an economic policy war that has been waged for over three years. President Trump is fighting to deconstruct a globalist system created over decades. We are now at the apex of the battle where no political weapons are out-of-bounds… including the weaponization of viruses; and the political deployment of highly controlled racial reserve units.
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Manufacturing activity in New York State stabilized unexpectedly in June after three months of broad weakness brought on by coronavirus-related business shutdowns, and companies’ six-month outlook shot to a decade high, the New York Federal Reserve said on Monday.
The regional Fed bank’s Empire State Manufacturing Index surged 48 points to a reading of negative 0.2 from negative 48.5 in May. Economists polled by Reuters were looking for a reading of negative 29.8, according to the survey median. (link)
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Wow. Today, in celebration of President Trump’s birthday, thousands of boats assembled in massive flotillas around the country to celebrate. Here’s some videos of the events starting with over a thousand boats in Jacksonville, Florida:
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Lighthouse Point, Florida:
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Palm Beach, Florida:
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Bradenton, Florida:
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San Diego, California (The boardwalk at Seaport Village):
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Jupiter Inlet, Florida:
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Detroit Michigan:
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Fort Lauderdale, Florida:
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Jess@JLDOSS76
Happy Birthday@realDonaldTrump supporting the #TrumpBoatParade #flotilla from the sidelines.. #FlagDay #flagday2020 #America #USA #JunoBeach #jupiter #myhometown #MAGA #WWG1WGAWORLDWIDE #WWG1WGA @DanScavino @DonaldJTrumpJr @EricTrump @LaraLeaTrump
Donald J. Trump✔@realDonaldTrump
June 14th just happens to be my birthday, thank you! Love our Boaters, Love our Country! #MAGA
I have created this site to help people have fun in the kitchen. I write about enjoying life both in and out of my kitchen. Life is short! Make the most of it and enjoy!
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