Former president Donald Trump praised Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong Un, and Viktor Orbán while campaigning in Durham NH on December 16, making clearer his intentions to turn this country into an authoritarian regime. Using Adolph Hitler’s rhetoric, Trump described the immigrants coming to the United States as “poisoning the blood of country…. They poison mental institutions and prisons all over the world, not just in South America … but all over the world. They’re coming into our country from Africa, from Asia,” he said.
Trump loyalists in the Republican Party have held back military aid to Ukraine and Israel until the United States changes its immigration policy, prompting the Senate to delay its holiday recess in order to settle on a new border security deal that would satisfy Republicans.
Trump also criticized New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu for his endorsement of Nikki Haley, who is in second place for the Republican nomination behind Trump in the Granite State. Sununu has been a frequent Trump critic. The former president called Sununu a “spoiled brat” and said he was selfish, “like his father, actually,” referring to John Sununu, who served as chief of staff for former president George H. W. Bush. (The elder Sununu declared in 1988, “Iowa picks corn, New Hampshire picks presidents.”)
In praising Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, Trump said Orbán is “the man who can save the Western world” by promoting traditional values that deny rights to women and minorities. Trump believes that to do so requires a dictator who can restore that vision of a traditional society.
Former New Jersey governor Chris Christie, who also is running for the Republican nomination, told CNN's State of the Union that Trump is “dog-whistling to Americans who feel absolutely under stress and strain from the economy and from the conflicts around the world, and he’s dog-whistling to blame it on people from areas that don’t look like us.”
President Joe Biden Jr. has boycotted New Hampshire whose law requires the Granite State to hold the first-in-the-nation primary, giving critics of the president free rein while allowing Democrats to choose another candidate. Millionaire Representative Dean Phillips (D-Minnesota) is on the ballot, along with New Age author Marianne Williamson, Star Locke of Texas, Frankie Lozada of New York, Stephen Lyons of Maryland, Raymond Michael Moroz of New York, Derek Nadeau of New Hampshire, Jason Michael Palmer of Maryland, Mando Perez-Serrato of California, Donald Picard of Massachusetts, Paperboy Love Prince of New York, Richard List of Maryland, Vermin Supreme of Massachusetts, John Vail of New Hampshire, President R. Boddie of Georgia, Terrisa Bukovinac of Washington DC, Eban Cambridge of California, Gabriel Cornejo of Nevada, Mark Stewart Greenstein of Connecticut, Tom Koos of California, and Paul LaCava of Massachusetts.
At his rally, Trump said, “Joe Biden and the Democrat Party are incapable of solving any problem. They haven’t solved anything; they’ve only created problems. As long as Joe Biden is in the White House, the American Dream is dead.”
Polling by Decision Desk HQ shows Trump leading Republicans in New Hampshire with 45.9 percent support, while former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley is in second place with 20.8 percent, former New Jersey governor Chris Christie with 12.8 percent, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis with 8.9 percent, and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy with 8.6 percent.
The New Hampshire primary is just over a month away, on January 23.
Do you have a story to tell?
The News Café is a virtual meeting place where, each weekday, we discuss the news of the day: local, statewide, national, and international. Subscribers can share their knowledge, thoughts, and questions about any topic, and we may select some of those subjects for more in-depth analysis.
The News Cafe is a reader-supported publication. Although the posts are available to all subscribers at no charge, I appreciate the financial support for the time and resources it takes to do this work. Please consider “upsubscribing” to a paid subscription.
You also may donate to libertyindymedia@icloud.com through Zelle.
Either way, thank you for being here.
Also see our other Substack news site, By The Way.
One of the saddest things I’ve ever seen is Trump rally participants holding up “Live Free or Die” signs while cheering for him. Seriously, don’t they see the irony in that? For a man who freely expresses his intent to be a dictator. I guess not.
I can only hope that a number of people attending the rally go for the show. Not because they actually believe in him. Unfortunately I believe the opposite. And, remain completely confounded by them.