Tonight high energy President Donald Trump travels to Lake Charles, Louisiana, to hold a Keep America Great Rally at James E. Sudduth Coliseum. President Trump is expected to speak at 7:00pm CDT / 8:00pm EDT.

RSBN Livestream Link – GST Livestream Link – Fox News Livestream Link

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Lucky Day, Lucky Day!  The president is traveling with the Eastbank All-Stars team, who recently won the Little League World Series Championship. They were told they are “catching a ride home” to Louisiana.  Cool stuff!  WATCH:

Chopper pressers are the best pressers. Earlier this evening as President Trump departing the White House for a rally in Louisiana, he paused to take questions from the press pool. [Video Below, Transcript Will Follow]

Lots of dragon-dancing with a very hungry panda.

President Trump, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and Treasury Secretary Mnuchin gathered with their Chinese counterparts in the Oval Office for a lengthy  announcement of “phase-one” of a U.S-China trade agreement.  Vice-Premier Liu He leads the Chinese delegation.  [No point sheet on USTR website yet]  According to the presser:

Phase One has reached ‘agreement in principle‘, and includes: Intellectual Property issues; Banking and Financial Services to include currency devaluation; and major agricultural purchases ($50 billion +).  There will be several phases, and each phase will have an individually tailored enforcement mechanism. [Note: this approach sounds similar to the ‘six sectors and stages’ USTR Lighthizer discussed in March 2019.]

The Phase One agreement details still have to be put on paper over the next five to six weeks.  The U.S. and China are hopeful to have ‘phase one‘ complete by December. In exchange for current AG purchase commitments, and as an act of good faith while phase-one is finalized, the U.S. will suspend the tariff rate increases scheduled to take effect on October 15th. The tariff increase from 25% to 30% has been ‘suspended‘.

The scheduled U.S. tariff increases for December are still planned; however, they will be assessed as part of the ongoing negotiations.  Meanwhile, touchy issues like tech company Hauwei, 5G, telecom and the Chinese firms on the U.S. blocked “entity list” (ie. trade ‘blacklist’) are not part of the discussions.  Those issues fall under U.S. National Security and will not be part of any ongoing trade negotiations.

[Video Below]

Overall I wouldn’t read too much more into this than appears on the surface.

China needs to buy food.  There are a limited number of export markets that can generate the scale of agricultural imports that China demands.  A hungry Chinese people only make the issues in/around Hong Kong worse.   Pandas can become very aggressive when hungry….  China needs to buy food.

President Trump wants to sell food to help the U.S. farmers; mostly operating under BIG AG multinational contracts (ie. contract farming).   The scale of Chinese purchases is too significant to overlook….  So Trump trades the suspension of a 5% tariff to gain $50 billion in farm purchases.  That’s most of the visible picture on this deal.

That said…. as USTR Lighthizer has previously stated, the issues of consequence are going to be in the enforcement mechanisms.  An agreement on IP and Banking/Financial Services is great, but the part that matters is the enforcement mechanism.  I wouldn’t put too much faith in Phase-1 being successful until we see some indication that China will acquiesce to U.S. enforcement provisions.

If you say: “China will never comply with U.S. enforcement”… well, I wouldn’t disagree; nor would USTR Lighthizer… he’s admitted as such.  So is a deal really possible?  Too soon to know, and too few details.

Panda gets food. Farmers get sales.  That’s the only known takeaway so far.

All other pro -vs- con analysis (predictions and projections) are for domestic audiences, politics and stock market consumption.  I still think an actual deal is unlikely.

Right now we’ve got happy pandas and happy farmers…. everything else is TBD.

Fox News Anchor Shepard Smith resigns from Fox News effective immediately:

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No word yet on his replacement.

Interestingly….

[Yesterday – NYT Link]

(Via New York Times) Attorney General William P. Barr met privately Wednesday evening with Rupert Murdoch, the media mogul who is one of President Trump’s frequent confidants but whose Fox News is viewed by the president as more hostile toward him than it used to be.

The meeting was held at Mr. Murdoch’s home in New York, according to someone familiar with it. It was unclear if anyone else attended or what was discussed. Aides to both Mr. Murdoch and Mr. Barr declined requests for comment on the meeting. (more)

And today:…

Curious timing.

Earlier today Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin held a press conference at the White House to announce a new executive order constructed by the Trump administration that would deliver economic sanctions due to Turkish activity in Northern Syria.

“These are very powerful sanctions. We hope we don’t have to use them. But we can shut down the Turkish economy if we need to,” Treasury Secretary Mnuchin tells reporters.

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Additionally, Secretary Mnuchin notes there has been “significant progress” in the U.S-China trade discussions over the past two days. Vice-Premier Liu He is schedule to meet President Trump in the oval office at 2:45pm.

[Transcript] SECRETARY MNUCHIN: Hello everybody. So, I just met with President Trump, and he has authorized and will be signing a new executive order giving the Treasury Department, in consultation with himself and Secretary Pompeo, very significant new sanctions authorities that can be targeted at any person associated with the government of Turkey, any portion of the government. This will be both primary sanctions and secondary sanctions that will be applicable.

The President is concerned about the ongoing military offensive and potential targeting of civilians, civilian infrastructure, ethnic or religious minorities. And also the President wants to make very clear: It is imperative that Turkey not allow even a single ISIS fighter to escape.

Again, I want to emphasize: At this point, we are not activating the sanctions. But, as the President has said, he will provide very significant authorities based upon the continuing efforts.

So he will be signing this. They will be active. We will be working in consultation with the Department of Defense and Department of State to moderating this very quickly. We are putting financial institutions on notice that they should be careful, and that there could be sanctions.

Again, there are no sanctions at this time, but this will be the broadest executive authorities delegated to us.

Q When you spoke with the President, was there any concern about the actions he took that led to this? And can you tell us when would you put the sanctions in? What would it take for you to actually activate?

SECRETARY MNUCHIN: Okay. Well, on — no, I don’t think he thinks his actions are what led to this. It is a complicated situation. It’s a situation that we’re all concerned about, and the humanitarian situation. And there are very clear discussions that will be going on between the Department of Defense and the State Department. I just got off the phone with the Finance Minister, and we will be communicating specifics that we’re not going to telegraph here.

Q Thank you, Mr. Secretary. Can you give us an update on the China trade negotiations that are ongoing today?

SECRETARY MNUCHIN: I didn’t think anybody would be asking me about that. (Laughter.)

Q Could you give us an update on the China trade negotiations that are going on today? Is it possible that we get to the end of the day today with no new specific deals agreed to? Or are we definitely going to see something today?

SECRETARY MNUCHIN: Okay. So, I wanted to make sure everybody knew in advance I wasn’t talking about China, because I didn’t want to think I was calling a specific China meeting.

We have had productive two days of discussions. Ambassador Lighthizer and myself with the Vice Premier and others, we will be meeting with the President shortly. We will be updating the President on those. He’ll then be meeting with the Vice Premier. I wouldn’t be surprised if, like usual, he decides to invite a few of you in, but I’m not going to make any other comments in advance of us meeting with the President.

Q The stock market is very optimistic about what it sees over at the USTR’s office. Are they right to be optimistic?

SECRETARY MNUCHIN: The stock market is always right. (Laughs.)

Q No, no. But is there — is there reason for optimism?

SECRETARY MNUCHIN: Again, I’m not going to make any more comments. I’ve said we’ve had productive two days of discussions. We’ll be making more announcements after we meet with the President.

Q So far, Turkey has not been dissuaded by anything this administration has done or the President has said. What makes you confident that the announcement that you just made is going to change Turkey’s (inaudible)?

SECRETARY MNUCHIN: Well, I don’t — I don’t agree with your premise. I’m not going to comment on specific confidential discussions that have been going on on different levels. So, I don’t think that’s a good premise.

But, again, these are very powerful sanctions. We hope we don’t have to use them. But we can shut down the Turkish economy if we need to.

Q Mr. Secretary, how does the threat of these sanctions help these U.S. allies who say they have been abandoned?

SECRETARY MNUCHIN: Again, it’s a complicated military situation that is ongoing. There are discussions. I think the President has had very specific discussions. As I said, the Department of Defense — we have expectations. This is a way of making sure that we protect the humanitarian issues and the other people on the ground.

Q As far as you know, have any plans specifically changed about Turkish President Erdoğan still visiting the White House? Are things still in good faith?

SECRETARY MNUCHIN: I’m not aware of anything that’s changed. But, again, I’m not confirming that. I just haven’t heard anything one way or another.

Q Mr. Secretary, what kind of consultations are you having with lawmakers like Lindsey Graham, Senator Van Hollen — who have been really very critical of the pullout of U.S. troops from Syria?

SECRETARY MNUCHIN: Secretary Pompeo has been speaking to them daily. I’ve been speaking to the Secretary multiple times a day.

I think the message to Congress is — I know that people were contemplating sanctions. We’re on top of sanctions. The President will use them when necessary.

Thank you everybody.

END 1:52 P.M. EDT

A report from the Wall Street Journal outlines a request by lawyers for the fake CIA ‘whistleblower’ that ultimately spells doom for the entire phony construct of the impeachment construction by anonymous complaint.

The Wall Street Journal is reporting the anonymous gossipers’ lawyers are now requesting official impeachment testimony by letters not an in-person appearance.  If this is accurate such a request speaks directly to the abject stupidity of the claim:

WASHINGTON—Lawyers for the CIA officer whose whistleblower complaint helped ignite an impeachment inquiry into President Trump have asked Congress whether their client could submit testimony in writing instead of appearing in person, according to people familiar with the matter.

The request reflects concerns about whether the whistleblower could testify to Democrats and Republicans without revealing his identity, and fears that doing so would lead to it being publicly leaked, jeopardizing his personal safety. The intelligence committees haven’t yet responded to the inquiry about potential written testimony, the people said.

It was already ridiculous to think a presidential impeachment, to remove the most powerful elected political representative of The United States, could continue based on an anonymous complaint.  However, expecting the same complainant/accuser to remain invisible during the process is so far beyond nonsensical, the light from where nonsense emanates wouldn’t reach this narrative for a year.

Yes, feel free to pummel the left-wing nuts based on the absurdity of this request.  Only the most raving Moonbat imaginable would think they could impeach a sitting U.S. President via a ‘Dear Sir’ complaint letter to congress.

These are obviously not stable-minded people.

Oh, please, please, please hold that impeachment vote now.  It is more clear than ever where this nuttery is heading.

If you thought it was delicious to watch the media meltdowns on election night 2016, just imagine the meltdowns as the media attempts to sell impeachment via a strongly worded  letter of complaint to their resistance constituents….

Perhaps he could testify via text messages, or… wait, even better,… via tweets.  Too damn funny.

….He hurt muh feelz… impeach forty pies!

Two years of litigation, thousands of resistance hours used, millions spent on lawyers, and they don’t even get a T-Shirt.  Oh dear…  too funny.

(New York Times) If investigators are going to get their hands on President Trump’s tax returns, they will have to find them somewhere other than Deutsche Bank.

The German bank has told a federal appeals court that it does not have the president’s personal tax returns, the court said on Thursday. (read more)

Be Best !

Chopper pressers are the best pressers. As President Trump departed the White House he paused to take questions from the press pool. [Video and Transcript below]

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[Transcript] – THE PRESIDENT: So, we just completed a negotiation with China. We’re doing very well. We’re having another one tomorrow. I’m meeting with the Vice Premier over at the White House. And I think it’s going really well, I will say. I think it’s going really well.

So, we had a very, very good negotiation with China. They’ll be speaking a little bit later, but they’re basically wrapping it up, and we’re going to see them tomorrow, right here. And it’s going very well.

Q Mr. President, what about the story about former President — Vice President Joe Biden and Ukraine, that he received $900,000 to himself, from Burisma Holdings? Do you think that’s true?

THE PRESIDENT: What happened? Who took $900,000?

Q There’s a story out there that your personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, said on “Sean Hannity” last night that there is a possibility that Joe Biden took $900,000 out of —

THE PRESIDENT: I hope it’s not true that — Joe Biden took $900,000? I haven’t heard that. I hope it’s not true. For the sake of the country, I hope that’s not true. But I don’t know anything about it.

Q Do you know the whistleblower’s name?

THE PRESIDENT: What?

Q Do you know the whistleblower’s name?

THE PRESIDENT: Who?

Q Do you know the whistleblower’s name?

THE PRESIDENT: I don’t know. But I know the whistleblower has been very inaccurate because when we released the transcript of the conversation that I had with the President of Ukraine, who — frankly, today, was very good; somewhere in Ukraine, I guess, gave a news conference on unrelated things — was asked a question, and he said, “President Trump behaved in a perfectly fine manner. There was nothing wrong in any way, shape, or form.” Something to that effect. So, I appreciate that.

But the President of Ukraine, that should be case over, because the President of Ukraine said that the call was absolutely fine. I think he said that it resembled very much — and he remembered it — it was just like the transcript.

Now, the transcript is a perfect transcript. There shouldn’t be any further questions. But the President of Ukraine just made that statement, so that’s good.

Q Mr. President, what conversations have you had with Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman?

THE PRESIDENT: I don’t know those gentlemen.

Q You were in pictures with them.

THE PRESIDENT: Now, it’s possible I have a picture with them, because I have a picture with everybody. I have a picture with everybody here. But somebody said there may be a picture or something where — at a fundraiser or somewhere. And so — but I have pictures with everybody.

Q Have you talked with them?

THE PRESIDENT: I don’t know if there’s anybody I don’t have pictures with.

I don’t know them. I don’t know about them, I don’t know what they do. But, I don’t know, maybe they were clients of Rudy. You’d have to ask Rudy. I just don’t know.

Q Have you spoken with Rudy Giuliani today, sir? Have you spoken to him?

THE PRESIDENT: No.

Q Mr. President, should the Senate allow a full trial if the House does impeach? The Republican (inaudible) Mitch McConnell said he would.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I don’t know how you can impeach on a conversation with the President of a country — in this case, Ukraine — which was a perfect conversation, where the President of Ukraine just said there was no pressure put on him whatsoever, that we had an absolutely perfect conversation. Then, on top of that, and maybe less importantly, frankly, but on top of that, we have a transcript of the conversation, fortunately, that’s perfect.

And I do think this: I think it’s very unfair to heads of countries when they think every time they make a conversation or have a conversation with the President of the United States, it’s going to be on, you know, all over the world. I think that’s very unfair.

But, in the case — in the case of what we’re talking about, we released a perfect conversation. The President of Ukraine just confirmed that. And that should be case over.

I will say this: Adam Schiff took that conversation before he saw it and fabricated a conversation. To me, that’s criminal. What he did is criminal.

Q Mr. President, do you intend to block Ambassador Yovanovitch from testifying tomorrow?

THE PRESIDENT: I just don’t think you’re running country — I just don’t think that you can have all of these people testifying about every conversation you’ve had. In this case, we have a transcript. And I’ve given it almost immediately. It’s called “transparency.” Nobody has been more transparent than me. So, you have a transcript. And in this case, you also have the President of Ukraine confirming that, absolutely, it was a perfect conversation.

But the Democrats have committed crimes because they made up the conversation. The whistleblower was wrong. You know, I don’t think people should be allowed. You have to run a country. I don’t think you should be allowed to do that.

Q Mr. President, have you spoken to the U.S. diplomat’s —

THE PRESIDENT: Say it?

Q Have you spoken to the U.S. diplomat’s wife, Anne Sacoolas?

THE PRESIDENT: I can’t hear.

Q Have you spoken to the U.S. diplomat’s wife, Anne Sacoolas?

Q Have you spoken with the U.S. diplomat’s wife, Anne Sacoolas?

THE PRESIDENT: Are you talking about in the UK?

Q Yeah.

THE PRESIDENT: They’re in the process of being spoken to. We’re working on that. I did have a conversation yesterday with Boris Johnson, a good one. And we’re talking about diplomatic immunity. It’s a very interesting situation. We are trying to work something out.

Q Will you reconsider the decision?

THE PRESIDENT: So we’re going to work — we’re going to try and work something out. I think we’ll be able to.

Q Mr. President — Mr. President, sir, Secretary Perry was just subpoenaed by the House Intel Committee for documents related to the — to Ukraine, sir. Any response to that?

THE PRESIDENT: How many people can they talk to? We had a simple conversation. Everybody knows what the conversation was because I gave it immediately when I heard about it.

The whistleblower, who seems to be a Democrat that’s involved with a lot of people, gave a false interpretation of the conversation because we have the conversation.

The President of Ukraine just said, just now, that the conversation was absolutely perfect. No problem. It was a very good conversation. So I don’t know why they’d be calling Rick Perry. I don’t know why they’d be calling all these people. It’s a very bad situation for our country.

Q How do you know the whistleblower is a Democrat, sir?

THE PRESIDENT: It was reported.

Q Are you concerned that Rudy Giuliani could be indicted in all of this?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I hope not. Again, I don’t know how he knows these people —

Q They’re his clients.

THE PRESIDENT: What?

Q They’re his clients.

THE PRESIDENT: Okay, well, then, they’re clients. I mean, you know, he’s got a lot of clients. So, I just don’t know. I haven’t spoken to Rudy about it. I don’t know.

I will say this: From what I heard — I just heard about this — they said, “We have nothing to do with it. We’re totally — we have nothing to do with it.”

Q Were you joking when you asked China to investigate the Bidens?

THE PRESIDENT: Was I what?

Q Were you joking when you asked China to investigate?

THE PRESIDENT: China has to do whatever they want. If they want to look into something, they can look into it. If they don’t want to look into it, they don’t have to. Frankly, are far as I’m concerned, if China wants to look into something, I think that’s great. And if they don’t want to, I think that’s great too. That’s up to China.

Yeah.

Q Mr. President, thank you. Is it safe to say that Trey Gowdy is now your Chief Counsel and Rudy Giuliani is moving to the back?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, Trey Gowdy is a terrific guy. I think there’s a problem with he can’t start for another couple of months because of lobbying rules and regulations. So, you’ll have to ask about that.

I just heard Trey Gowdy can’t start until sometime after January because of the lobbying rules and regulations. So, I don’t know. So, we’ll have to see.

Q So Giuliani stays on?

THE PRESIDENT: I haven’t spoken to him. I haven’t spoken.

Go ahead.

Q Which of the three choices on Syria that you just articulated in a tweet do you think you will follow?

THE PRESIDENT: Perhaps the last one, I hope. I hope the last one. Of the three, I hope it’s going to be the last one.

Look, we have no soldiers in Syria. We’ve won. We’ve beat ISIS. And we’ve beat them badly and decisively. We have no soldiers.

The last thing I want to do is bring thousands and thousands of soldiers in and defeat everybody again. We’ve already done that.

So what we have is really two choices: You have the choice of bringing in the military and defeating everybody again, or you have the choice of financially doing some very strong things to Turkey so that they take it a little bit easy on, really, competition that is — I don’t think it’s being fairly treated in many ways, okay? We have a very good relationship with the Kurds. Or we can mediate. I hope we can mediate, John. I hope we can mediate.

Q Has Turkey gone beyond the limits, in your opinion, so far?

THE PRESIDENT: Say it?

Q Has Turkey gone beyond the limits you set up so far?

THE PRESIDENT: Turkey knows where I stand. And the last thing — okay, very simple: We had a big victory. We left the area. I don’t think the American people want to see us go back in with our military, go back into that area again.

We won. We left the area. I don’t think we want to go back in. Let’s see what happens. We are going to possibly do something very, very tough with respect to sanctions and other financial things.

Q Mr. President, on Minnesota — you’re headed to Minnesota. Do you think you can win in Minnesota? It’s a long-time blue state.

THE PRESIDENT: I think we can win. It’s been a long time since a Republican won. We have a 20,000-seat auditorium. You know, we have the — it’s essentially Madison Square Garden. And it’s sold out. Over 80,000 people requested tickets. It’ll be totally sold out. I don’t know who’s going, but it’ll be totally sold out. If you’re not going to be there, I’m going to miss you. But they have a line now that’s many blocks long. It’s amazing. We have a line, right now in Minnesota, that’s many blocks long. I think I can win in Minnesota.

Q Do you think Ilhan Omar is helping you win in Minnesota?

THE PRESIDENT: I think Omar is helping us win in Minnesota and other places. I’ll see you all — I’ll see you in Minnesota. I’ll see you in Minnesota.

END TRANSCRIPT