Former basketball star Dennis Rodman and celebrity liaison to North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un believes that Kim and President Donald Trump may strike up a deal sometime in the near future.
Appearing on &#8220;<a href="https://www.foxnews.com/shows/fox-and-friends" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Fox &amp; Friends</a>,&#8221; Rodman predicted that President Trump would make a deal with Kim despite the fact that peace talks collapsed in Vietnam and issued an even bolder prediction: The North Korean dictator would visit America.
&#8220;I think he can [make a deal],&#8221; Rodman said, as reported by <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/sports/dennis-rodman-bold-prediction-kim-jong-un">Fox News</a>. &#8220;I think the fact that people better watch out for this: Kim Jong Un will be in America in 18 to 24 months. I guarantee it.&#8221;
When co-host Brian Kilmeade asked if this visit from Kim Jong Un would be an actual state visit, Rodman replied, &#8220;He’s coming to do one thing, to visit America.&#8221;
Rodman, who has visited North Korea on several occasions and even refers to Kim Jong Un as his &#8220;friend,&#8221; has been an outspoken supporter of Trump&#8217;s North Korea policy. In June of 2018, as the president and the dictator were gearing up for the first peace summit, the former Chicago Bulls champion even appeared on CNN wearing a MAGA hat and broke down into tears.
&#8220;In my heart and soul, when I was first selected to go to North Korea, I was very honored to be selected to go there,&#8221; <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/31759/watch-dennis-rodmans-maga-hat-emotional-interview-hank-berrien">Rodman said at the time</a>. &#8220;Once I went to North Korea, I didn’t really understand what the situation was as far as being over there. When I first met Kim Jong Un, I was more like, I didn’t know what to expect. I didn’t know who he was; I didn’t know what he represented; I didn’t know if he was someone important, but I knew something was going on. But once I got familiar with the culture and the situation over there, I got used to being there and I felt like I was at home.&#8221;
At one point, Rodman even said that Kim Jong Un wanted &#8220;progress in his country&#8221; and knew his people had a &#8220;heart and soul.&#8221;
&#8220;I think that country is normally hearing people that [are] always lying, deceitful, and not trustworthy, and that if Trump goes in there with a great heart, with his heart on the table, and let Kim Jong Un see him, really emotional, as far as speaking to him.&#8221; he said. &#8220;He’s (Kim) all about the 21st century, he’s trying to progress his country.&#8221;
&#8220;I believe in North Korea,&#8221; Rodman said through his tears. &#8220;I think people know that Kim Jong Un is not a dumb man. I think he understands who his grandfather and his father are, and I think that he’s trying to protect his people, and he’s trying to protect his honor and everything that has to do with his country.&#8221;
The &#8220;bromance&#8221; between Rodman and Kim Jong Un began in 2014 when he visited North Korea to play basketball for the dictator&#8217;s birthday. One <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-asia-25654590/rodman-sings-happy-birthday-to-kim-jong-un">odd clip </a>that went viral at the time even featured Rodman singing &#8220;Happy Birthday&#8221; to Kim in a basketball arena with spectators applauding him.

Dennis Rodman

Dennis Rodman: Trump Can Make A Deal With Kim Jong Un

Donald Trump

Kim Jong Un

North Korea

In yet another example of a media outlet reporting a “bombshell” that damaged President Donald Trump only to retract its central claim, The Wall Street Journal had to issue a major correction on a story about North Korea developing nuclear weapons after the leaders of the two countries met.
On Thursday, the paper <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/while-trump-and-kim-talk-north-korea-appears-to-expand-its-nuclear-arsenal-11564059627">claimed</a> that Defense Intelligence Agency analysts believed the isolated nation had developed up to 12 nukes since Trump met with the nation’s dictator, Kim Jong-Un, in June 2018. As The Daily Caller’s Chuck Ross <a href="https://amp.dailycaller.com/2019/07/28/wall-street-journal-correction-north-korea-nukes">pointed out</a>, various news outlets — including The New York Post, The Hill, and Business Insider — picked up the WSJ’s claims.
“Analysts at the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency say North Korea’s scientists may have produced 12 nuclear weapons since the first Trump-Kim meeting in Singapore last year. In total, Pyongyang could currently possess between 20 and 60 nuclear bombs, according to estimates by various security analysts,” WSJ initially reported.
The correction came two days later, on Saturday.
“A previous version of this article incorrectly stated that analysts at the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency said North Korea could have produced 12 nuclear weapons since the Trump-Kim handshake in Singapore in June 2018. (July 27, 2019)”
The significant correction also included edits throughout the piece. The paragraph about the 12 nuclear weapons has been deleted, and there is no longer a reference to Defense Intelligence Agency analysts. Instead, the article now describes its sources as analysts from non-government analysts, who say North Korea has continued to develop its long-range missile capabilities and fissile materials, but say nothing about creating actual nuclear weapons.
The original bombshell report was used to knock Trump for seemingly placing confidence in Kim. The Hill <a href="https://thehill.com/policy/defense/454961-analysts-activity-at-north-korean-facilities">noted</a> Trump’s past optimism regarding the North Korean dictator, including the belief Kim would not test nuclear weapons.
“One of the things, importantly, that Chairman Kim promised me last night is, regardless, he’s not going to do testing of rockets and nuclear,” Trump said after meeting with Kim in February. “Not going to do testing. So I trust him, and I take him at his word. I hope that’s true.”
The Hill has added a correction to their article in line with that of the Journal’s.
The New York Post <a href="https://nypost.com/2019/07/27/north-korea-has-allegedly-built-a-dozen-nukes-since-singapore-summit/">added</a> that the report and photos of the alleged nuclear weapons “suggest that despite hopeful rhetoric from the two sides, the North continues to have no intention of surrendering its nuclear arsenal.&#8221; The outlet also reported that a “second meeting between Trump and Kim in February ended in failure after the United States abruptly ended negotiations.” As of this writing, the Post has not corrected its story.
As The Intercept’s Glenn Greenwald <a href="https://theintercept.com/2019/01/20/beyond-buzzfeed-the-10-worst-most-embarrassing-u-s-media-failures-on-the-trumprussia-story/">previously reported</a>, the media has consistently reported “bombshells” meant to embarrass Trump (his article focus solely on the alleged Russian collusion story). The most significant example was CNN’s report that Donald Trump Jr. received an email about an upcoming batch of Democratic National Committee emails from Wikileaks. It turned out the photo they were sent had an altered date in the email, making it appear as though Trump Jr. received the email before the release, when, in fact, he received it after.

Wall Street Journal Issues Correction On Article Claiming North Korea Developed Nukes After Trump Summit

Wall Street Journal

The following is satirical.
More details are coming out about the historically historic meeting between the fat crazy man in North Korea and Kim Jong Un. President Trump and Kim met at the demilitarized zone after Trump sent Kim a playful spontaneous tweet, saying, “Dear murderous lunatic with stupid hair, meet me at the DMZ for laughs and denuclearization.” Kim immediately rushed to the meeting place with an entourage that included his agent, two publicists, a makeup girl, and 300,000 heavily armed infantrymen with eyes like zombies.
In a thrilling off-the-cuff moment, Kim invited Trump to become the first sitting U.S. president ever to step into a country where the first man to stop applauding for the leader turns up three weeks later in several different plastic bags.
Trump and Kim then took nineteen paces together, each more historically historic than the last, after which Kim offered to welcome the American press corps with a traditional North Korean disembowelment ceremony. President Trump promised the reporters it would all be in good fun, but the cowards preferred to escape with their lives.
In a private meeting, Trump and Kim then agreed to reopen the denuclearization talks, which faltered last February when Kim threatened to extinguish life on earth and Trump responded by poking him in the eye, then hitting him on top of the head with a mallet. The New York Times, a former newspaper, promptly responded to the incident with a harsh editorial accusing Trump of damaging the work of previous presidents whose more measured statesmanship had developed the relationship between our two countries to the brink of nuclear annihilation.
Trump and Kim then returned to South Korea for something to eat, after Kim remarked, “Man, I’m starving. And so is everyone else around here. Ha ha ha. Get it?”
After the summit, Trump said Kim was “a great little guy and a total mass murderer.” He even offered Kim a job in his administration, but the dictator declined, saying, “I’m crazy. But not that crazy.”

Too Many Kooks Spoil The Nuclear Standoff [Satire]

Satire

Trump Administration

On Monday, South Korean President Moon Jae-in lauded President Trump for meeting with North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un at the Korean Demilitarized Zone, calling it “historic” and declaring an “end of hostile relations” and the “start of an era of peace.”
Moon spoke with Trump and Kim at Panmunjom before the two leaders met without him, according to the <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7203349/South-Koreas-Moon-calls-Trump-Kim-summit-end-hostility.html">Daily Mail</a>, which added that Moon said the summit was “the fruits of amazing indignation,” citing Trump&#8217;s “unprecedented” Twitter offer to meet and Kim&#8217;s “bold” decision to accept it. The <a href="https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/east-asia/south-koreas-moon-jae-in-hails-trump-kim-meeting-as-result-of-astounding-imagination">Straits-Times</a> reported Moon stated, &#8220;That extraordinary proposal and bold response is the result of an astounding imagination that goes beyond common sense. This is unthinkable in the existing diplomatic grammar.”
Moon, who set up the first meeting between Trump and Kim in Singapore last year, himself met Kim three times in 2018 at Panmunjom. Trump, who met for a second time with Kim in Vietnam in February, was the first sitting U.S. president to visit North Korea. The Straits-Times noted, “Contact between the two sides has since been minimal — with Pyongyang issuing frequent criticisms of the U.S. position — but the two leaders exchanged a series of letters before Mr. Trump issued his offer to meet at the DMZ.”
Moon was born as a <a href="https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/resources/his-excellency-moon-jae-in-2017-global-citizen-award">son of a refugee</a> after his parents fled North Korea during the Korean War. He was elected as president of South Korea in 2016 after the impeachment of President Park Geun-hye.
In an <a href="https://en.yna.co.kr/view/AEN20190626007900315">interview</a> with the Yonhap News Agency last week, before the Trump-Kim meeting, Moon stated:
<blockquote>There&#8217;s no reason to regard the current situation as a stalemate in the peace process on the Peninsula just because the pace has remained slow. Chairman Kim sent a personal letter to President Trump and also expressed condolences to the South on the passing of former First Lady Lee Hee-ho through First Vice Department Director of the Workers&#8217; Party Central Committee, his sister, Kim Yo-jong. All of this sends a meaningful message. Last week, Chairman Kim reaffirmed his resolve for dialogue at a summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping, which also backs up this analysis.
There has already been considerable headway made in the peace process on the Korean Peninsula, and it is still making steady progress. The resumption of negotiations between North Korea and the United States will take it to the next level. I believe everything has now fallen into place for that to happen.</blockquote>
He added:
<blockquote>North Korea and the United States have already reached an agreement on the ultimate goal of denuclearization talks. In summary, North Korea&#8217;s complete denuclearization was to be exchanged for a security guarantee for the North&#8217;s regime and an end to their hostile relations. This agreement is still valid.
The task at the current stage is to decide how to implement the promises made to each other: the procedures and sequencing. This has something to do with the level of trust they have in each other. As their hostile relations have persisted for more than 70 years, it will be difficult to cross a sea of mistrust all at once. In addition, this process is inevitable because it is impossible to implement what has been agreed upon between the two sides in one stroke at any given moment.
For this reason, my administration has put emphasis on the structure of a virtuous cycle between negotiations and trust. It is all about building trust through dialogue and negotiations and, again, enabling that trust to produce positive results of dialogue and negotiations. This is no doubt the quickest and most solid path to achieve denuclearization.</blockquote>

South Korean President Praises Trump-Kim Meeting: ‘Start Of An Era Of Peace’

South Korea

President Donald Trump became the first president to cross the North Korean demilitarized zone on Saturday, stepping through the official enforced boundary between North and South Korea to shake hands with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un.
The two leaders then met privately for about an hour — much longer than expected — to discuss restarting anti-nuclear talks that stalled after a second international pow-wow ended late last year.
WATCH:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">The moment President Trump meets Chairman Kim at the DMZ and becomes the first sitting President to enter North Korea: <a href="https://t.co/VwqGAEmmxz">pic.twitter.com/VwqGAEmmxz</a>
— The White House (@WhiteHouse) <a href="https://twitter.com/WhiteHouse/status/1145266508110675971?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 30, 2019</a></blockquote>
Trump brought up the subject of meeting with Kim Jong Un earlier this week during the G20 conference in Osaka, Japan. He noted on Twitter and elsewhere that he could easily stop by North Korea on his way home if Kim Jong Un would be open to the idea of meeting, and did mention the DMZ.
&#8220;After some very important meetings, including my meeting with President Xi of China, I will be leaving Japan for South Korea (with President Moon). While there, if Chairman Kim of North Korea sees this, I would meet him at the Border/DMZ just to shake his hand and say Hello(?)!&#8221; the President tweeted on Friday.
Clearly, Kim Jong Un took him up on his offer.
&#8220;I was very surprised to hear about your offer on the tweet and only late in the afternoon I was able to confirm your invitation. I had wanted to meet you again and especially for both Koreas, this place is a sign of unfortunate history of the past,&#8221; <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-north-korea-kim-jongun-visit-president-us-a8981041.html">Kim Jong Un is reported as saying</a>.
“It is good to see you again,” Kim told Trump as Trump crossed into North Korea on foot. “I never expected to meet you in this place.”
“Big moment,” Trump answered. &#8220;Big progress.&#8221;
Trump took only about 20 steps into North Korea before the pair retired to &#8220;Freedom House&#8221; <a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2019/06/30/trump-north-korea-kim-jong-un-1390737">according to Politico</a>, a neutral meeting place where North and South Korea have routinely held talks. The visit ended with an open invitation from Trump to Kim Jong Un to travel to the United States and visit the White House, but no official, declared movement on either North Korean missile testing or American sanctions.
<a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2019/06/30/trump-north-korea-kim-jong-un-1390737">Politico reports that the pair met without the aid of John Bolton</a>, who left the G20 early to visit Mongolia, but that Trump thought the meeting was productive regardless.
&#8220;This was a great day,&#8221; the president told reporters after the meeting. &#8220;It will be even more historic if something comes out [of it].&#8221;
The Trump Administration has been trying to ink an anti-nuclear deal with North Korea since the beginning of Donald Trump&#8217;s presidency, and has held two major summits with the community country, encouraged by both South Korea and China. Unfortunately, the last round of talks held back in February ended early after North Korea refused to stop missile tests unless the United States immediately eased trade restrictions.
Trump is clearly hoping that the meeting at the DMZ will kick-start negotiations again, but North Korea seems reticent to give even the slightest ground in pursuit of peace. Since the last talks collapsed, North Korea has resumed missile tests and South Korean officials, while hopeful, seem less convinced that the meeting between the United States and North Korea will yield much in the way of results.
South Korean President Moon Jae-in called the meeting &#8220;brave,&#8221; and expressed hopes for a third conference.

WATCH: Trump Meets Kim Jong Un At DMZ, Becomes First President To Cross Into North Korea

North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un had his nuclear envoy to the United States executed along with several other officials who were involved in trying to secure a nuclear deal with the U.S. and ultimately failed, according to reports out of South Korea.
&#8220;Kim Hyok Chol was executed in March at Mirim Airport in Pyongyang, along with four foreign ministry executives after they were all charged with spying for the United States, the Chosun Ilbo reported, citing an unidentified source with knowledge of the situation,&#8221; <a href="https://ca.reuters.com/article/topNews/idCAKCN1T02PD-OCATP">Reuters</a> reported Thursday.
The source who spoke with the South Korean newspaper said, &#8220;He was accused of spying for the United States for poorly reporting on the negotiations without properly grasping U.S. intentions.&#8221;
The New York Times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/30/world/asia/north-korea-envoy-execution.html">reports</a> that the Chosun Ilbo reported that Hyok Chol was accused of being &#8220;won over by the American imperialists to betray the supreme leader.&#8221;
The Times notes that in recent weeks, South Korean analysts have begun &#8220;to speculate that Mr. Kim may be engineering a reshuffle or a purge of his negotiating team in the wake of the summit meeting, held in February in Hanoi, Vietnam. The meeting was widely seen as a huge embarrassment for Mr. Kim, who is supposedly seen as infallible in his totalitarian state.&#8221;
&#8220;On Thursday, Rodong Sinmun, the official newspaper of the North&#8217;s ruling Workers&#8217; Party, carried a commentary warning against &#8216;anti-party, anti-revolutionary acts&#8217; of officials who &#8216;pretend to work for the supreme leader in his presence but secretly harbor other dreams behind his back,&#8221; The Times added. &#8220;&#8216;Such characters won&#8217;t escape the stern judgment from the revolution,&#8217; the North Korean newspaper said. North Korean state media has issued such warnings when it needed to engineer a political purge or warn against possible lagging loyalty among the elites, South Korean analysts said.&#8221;
Reuters added that, according to the South Korean newspaper, &#8220;Kim Song Hye, who led preparations as part of Kim Yong Chol&#8217;s team, and Sin Hye Yong, a newly elevated interpreter for the Hanoi summit,&#8221; were sent to prison camps as punishment.
Neither Reuters nor The Times was able to independently verify the reports out of South Korea.

Kim Jong-Un Executes Special Envoy To U.S. For &#8216;Betraying Supreme Leader,&#8217; Reports Say

According to the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-47971164">BBC</a>, the hermit kingdom of North Korea has a somewhat unusual demand for all future denuclearization talks with the United States &#8212; namely, that U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo not be a part of them. The demand issued from the world&#8217;s last truly <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/north-korea/north-korean-gulags-terrible-or-even-worse-nazi-camps-auschwitz-n828751">Stalinist gulag state</a> follows Pompeo&#8217;s (accurately) describing North Korean madman dictator last week as a &#8220;tyrant.&#8221;
Per the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-47971164">BBC</a>:
<blockquote>
North Korea has demanded the removal of U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo from nuclear talks, accusing him of &#8220;talking nonsense&#8221; and being &#8220;reckless.&#8221;
A senior foreign ministry official said that further talks would be &#8220;lousy&#8221; if Mr. Pompeo was involved, asking that he be replaced by someone &#8220;more careful.&#8221; &#8230;
Mr. Pompeo visited North Korea four times last year &#8212; including for a meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.
Last week, during a U.S. Senate subcommittee hearing, Mr. Pompeo was asked if he would agree with descriptions of Mr. Kim as a &#8220;tyrant,&#8221; he then responded: &#8220;Sure, I&#8217;m sure I&#8217;ve said that.&#8221;
This was met with a strong reaction from North Korean foreign ministry official Kwon Jong-gun, who said that Mr. Pompeo &#8220;spouted reckless remarks, hurting the dignity of our supreme leadership&#8230; to unveil his mean character.&#8221;
</blockquote>
Alas, apparently this is too much to handle for the easily aggrieved North Korean dictatorship. According to the BBC report, North Korean foreign ministry official Kwon Jong-gun told Korean Central News Agency that &#8220;[e]ven in the case of possible resumption of dialogue with the U.S., I wish our dialogue counterpart would not be Pompeo but&#8230; [another] person who is more careful and mature in communicating with us.&#8221;
As part of the initial Trump-Kim denuclearization <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/31734/trump-jong-un-sign-document-historic-summit-heres-ryan-saavedra">summit last summer</a> in Singapore, Kim vowed to cease nuclear testing and the launching of new intercontinental ballistic missiles. Alas, The New York Times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/18/world/asia/north-korea-weapons-test.html">reported</a> just this week that Kim defied this vow and tested a new missile.
In February, Trump and Kim met for a second denuclearization summit in Vietnam. As The Daily Wire&#8217;s Ryan Saavedra <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/44048/north-korea-summit-falls-apart-heres-what-happened-ryan-saavedra">reported</a> at the time, it did not go according to plan:
<blockquote>
President Donald Trump walked away from the negotiating table with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un on Thursday in Vietnam after Kim reportedly demanded that the U.S. lift all economic sanctions on North Korea without first agreeing to any kind of serious commitment to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula.
&#8220;Trump said the summit fell through after the North demanded a full removal of U.S.-led international sanctions in exchange for the shuttering of the North&#8217;s Yongbyon nuclear facility,&#8221; Fox News&#8217; Gregg Re reported. &#8220;Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told reporters that the United States wasn&#8217;t willing to make a deal without the North committing to giving up its secretive nuclear facilities outside Yongbyon as well as its missile and warheads program.&#8221; &#8230;
When pressed for details about why the talks fell through at the post-summit news conference, Trump said: &#8220;Basically, they wanted the sanctions lifted in their entirety and we couldn&#8217;t do that. They were willing to de-nuke a large portion of the areas that we wanted, but we couldn&#8217;t give up all of the sanctions for that. So we continue to work and we&#8217;ll see, but we had to walk away from that particular suggestion. We had to walk away from that.&#8221;
</blockquote>

Comical: North Korea Demands Mike Pompeo Be Sidelined From Any Future Nuclear Talks

Mike Pompeo

Nuclear Weapons

Vietnam

After a copyright complaint from Warner Brothers, Twitter has pulled a fan-made Trump 2020 campaign video from President Trump&#8217;s feed.
&#8220;MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN,&#8221; Trump tweeted Tuesday afternoon, posting a video reportedly made by the group MateyProductions highlighting some of Trump&#8217;s presidential accomplishments, as well as some of his more famous detractors.
The video begins with a series of clips of then-President Barack Obama and aerial shots of famous sites in Washington, D.C. over ominous music: Hans Zimmer&#8217;s &#8220;Why Do We Fall&#8221; from the score of &#8220;The Dark Knight Rises.&#8221;
The screen goes black and the following statements appear: &#8220;First they ignore you &#8230; then they laugh at you &#8230; then they call you racist.&#8221; The video then flashes clips of Hillary and Bill Clinton and CNN&#8217;s logo.
The tone of the score shifts from brooding to more triumphant as footage of Trump attending key meetings and appearing at raucous rallies plays. Among the positive clips are reports on Brett Kavanaugh&#8217;s declaration of his innocence and Special Counsel Robert Mueller finding no collusion and Trump&#8217;s meeting with North Korean dictator Kim Jung Un.
Amid more footage of Trump&#8217;s critics, including Rosie O&#8217;Donnell and Amy Schumer, as well as Trump&#8217;s victories, including the improving economy, the screen presents the message: &#8220;Donald J. Trump &#8230; your vote &#8230; proved them all wrong.&#8221; The video ends by declaring &#8220;Trump: The Great Victory.&#8221;
Warner Brothers clearly didn&#8217;t appreciate the unauthorized use of the music from its popular film. &#8220;The use of Warner Bros&#8217; score from The Dark Knight Rises in the campaign video was unauthorized,&#8221; the studio said in a statement reported by <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/trump-dark-knight-rises-warner-bros-twitter-video-2020-campaign-a8862736.html">B</a><a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/adambvary/donald-trump-the-dark-knight-rises-warner-bros">uzzFeed</a>. &#8220;We are working through the appropriate legal channels to have it removed.&#8221;
A few hours after the studio filed its complaint, Twitter pulled the video. In its place was the message: &#8220;This media has been disabled in response to a report by the copyright owner.&#8221; Screenshot below:
[[{&#8220;fid&#8221;:&#8221;45182&#8243;,&#8221;view_mode&#8221;:&#8221;default&#8221;,&#8221;fields&#8221;:{&#8220;format&#8221;:&#8221;default&#8221;,&#8221;field_file_image_alt_text[und][0][value]&#8221;:false,&#8221;field_file_image_title_text[und][0][value]&#8221;:false},&#8221;type&#8221;:&#8221;media&#8221;,&#8221;field_deltas&#8221;:{&#8220;1&#8221;:{&#8220;format&#8221;:&#8221;default&#8221;,&#8221;field_file_image_alt_text[und][0][value]&#8221;:false,&#8221;field_file_image_title_text[und][0][value]&#8221;:false}},&#8221;attributes&#8221;:{&#8220;class&#8221;:&#8221;media-element file-default&#8221;,&#8221;data-delta&#8221;:&#8221;1&#8243;}}]]
Trump has since <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1115716910556090368?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1115716910556090368&amp;ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Ftwitchy.com%2Fgregp-3534%2F2019%2F04%2F10%2Ftwitter-removes-2020-campaign-video-from-realdonaldtrump-account-over-copyright-violation-a%2F">deleted</a> the original tweet.
Though The Independent initially reported that Trump could face &#8220;<a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/trump-dark-knight-rises-warner-bros-twitter-video-2020-campaign-a8862736.html">legal action</a>&#8221; for the video, which the outlet appears to have thought his team created, <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/adambvary/donald-trump-the-dark-knight-rises-warner-bros">BuzzFeed</a> reports that the video was actually created by a group called MateyProductions.
&#8220;The video appears to be lifted from a YouTube <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=79&amp;v=2kAQv3ZOAlU" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">video</a> posted to a Reddit thread on <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/b9m5do/trump_2020_coming_soon_keep_america_great/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">/r/The_Donald</a>. The video by MateyProductions cites Zimmer&#8217;s score, but it&#8217;s unclear if permission to use it was obtained,&#8221; BuzzFeed reports.
The link provided by BuzzFeed on YouTube is now <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=79&amp;v=2kAQv3ZOAlU">dead</a>.
The outlet also suggests that the studio might have reason to harbor some particular antipathy for the Trump administration: &#8220;Warner Bros. is a subsidiary of WarnerMedia, which was recently <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/daveyalba/att-time-warner-merger-ruling" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">acquired</a> by AT&amp;T after the Justice Department failed in its <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/ryanmac/att-time-warner-lawsuit" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">attempt</a> to block the merger, one of Trump&#8217;s 2016 <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/hamzashaban/att-time-warner-merger-test-of-trump-campaign-promises" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">campaign promises</a>.&#8221;
<div class="embed tweet"></div>
As <a href="https://twitchy.com/gregp-3534/2019/04/10/twitter-removes-2020-campaign-video-from-realdonaldtrump-account-over-copyright-violation-a/">Twitchy</a> points out, the video is still in circulation on Twitter, the platform thus far having failed to completely weed it out:
<div class="embed tweet">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
Trump just posted a campaign video for 2020 that uses prominent Democrats and is set to music from the Dark Night. Within hours of the post, Warner Brothers sued him for copyright infringement, demanding it be taken down.
(Good thing I posted it here.) <a href="https://t.co/9YbFvlxWXL">https://t.co/9YbFvlxWXL</a> <a href="https://t.co/5rVMhe2GjA">pic.twitter.com/5rVMhe2GjA</a>
&#8212; Amee Vanderpool (@girlsreallyrule) <a href="https://twitter.com/girlsreallyrule/status/1115783163639410688?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 10, 2019</a></blockquote>
</div>
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/45755/trump-approval-hits-high-not-reached-mueller-probe-james-barrett">Trump Approval Hits High Not Reached Since Mueller Probe Began</a>

Twitter Removes Trump 2020 Video From Trump’s Feed After Warner Bros Complaint

Twitter

On Monday morning, a huge billboard across the street from CNN&#8217;s office building in Hollywood, California, carried a strong anti-CNN message, reportedly created by conservative street artists. The billboard featured a picture of CNN President Jeff Zucker with the caption underneath him reading &#8220;CEO, CNNPC&#8221; and a huge message displayed across the central part of the billboard reading &#8220;Keep Korea Divided.*&#8221; In the lower left area of the billboard was written, &#8220;CNN Communist News Network,&#8221; while on the bottom right area of the billboard the asterisk that followed the Keep Korea Divided message was followed by &#8220;because OrangeManBad.&#8221;
<div class="embed tweet">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
Anti-CNN billboard appears next to CNN&#8217;s Hollywood headquarters <a href="https://t.co/GNUWi7yHMI">https://t.co/GNUWi7yHMI</a> <a href="https://t.co/HNK9HspQxz">pic.twitter.com/HNK9HspQxz</a>
&#8212; Hollywood Reporter (@THR) <a href="https://twitter.com/THR/status/1101540702146740224?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 1, 2019</a></blockquote>
</div>
According to <a href="https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/anti-cnn-billboard-appears-next-cnns-hollywood-headquarters-1191686?utm_source=twitter">The Hollywood Reporter</a> (THR), the billboard was created by the conservative street art group &#8220;The Faction&#8221; in response to CNN&#8217;s biased coverage of President Trump&#8217;s recent meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. THR reported that the NPC after Zucker&#8217;s name was a reference to &#8220;robotic liberalism allegedly displayed by mainstream journalists.&#8221;
The Hollywood Reporter spoke to a member of The Faction who said, &#8220;When Trump speaks glowingly of Kim Jong Un, it&#8217;s a tactic. Zucker and his journo-activists know this, but are more than willing to try to torpedo the summit &#8212; the future of the long-suffering North and South Korean people be damned.&#8221;
The Faction, according to THR, was responsible for a hilarious joke last August when it created numerous fake Donald Trump stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame to confuse vandals who repeatedly defaced the Trump star on the Walk of Fame. THR <a href="https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/trumps-walk-fame-star-multiplies-hollywood-1133678?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_source=t.co&amp;utm_medium=referral">reported</a> at the time:
<blockquote>
The effort comes from a conservative street artist who wishes to remain anonymous, but says he was motivated not only by the destruction of the president&#8217;s real star, but also a recent unanimous vote by the West Hollywood City Council to recommend the removal of Trump&#8217;s star due to accusations he has mistreated women. The anonymous artist says he&#8217;s not done with his mission to preserve Trump&#8217;s star. &#8220;Rip up the president&#8217;s Walk of Fame star or try to have it removed &#8212; like you&#8217;re the mayor of West Hollywood or something &#8212; and 30 more will pop up,&#8221; the artist tells The Hollywood Reporter.
The artist and his cohorts, who call themselves &#8220;The Faction&#8221; and are allies of prolific conservative artist Sabo, spent $1,000 on the stars, which they printed on sheets of floor vinyl with adhesive backing, and their mission was partially financed by &#8220;a young and anonymous entrepreneur.&#8221;
</blockquote>
Fox News Channel&#8217;s &#8220;MediaBuzz&#8221; host Howard Kurtz <a href="https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2019/03/03/howard_kurtz_cnn_and_msnbc_spent_almost_no_time_on_north_korea_summit_all_cohen_all_the_time.html">blasted</a> CNN and MSNBC for the paucity of coverage on their networks of the Trump-Kim summit. He stated that last Wednesday, MSNBC and CNN spent roughly two minutes discussing the summit and more than 90 minutes discussing Michael Cohen. He said on Thursday MSNBC&#8217;s primetime spent five minutes on North Korea and 88 minutes on Cohen, CNN spent 8 minutes on North Korea and 32 minutes on Michael Cohen.
Kurtz asserted, &#8220;Look, I get that Cohen might be the sexier story, and ratings may be a factor, but the other networks made an editorial decision that pounding away at the Cohen hearings, even a day later, endlessly replaying the best soundbites, was far more important than an effort, even an unsuccessful one, to get rid of Kim Jong Un&#8217;s nuclear arsenal.&#8221;
The anti-CNN billboard stayed up roughly seven hours before it was removed.

Conservative Street Artists Mock CNN With Huge Anti-CNN Billboard Across From CNN Office

In a series of social media posts Sunday, President Trump unloaded on Democrats for their &#8220;presidential harassment&#8221; campaign, including the hearing with convicted felon Michael Cohen they scheduled on the day the president was trying to work out a peace deal with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un. The Cohen hearing, said Trump, &#8220;may have contributed&#8221; to the breakdown in negotiations.
&#8220;After more than two years of Presidential Harassment, the only things that have been proven is that Democrats and other broke the law,&#8221; Trump said in a series of posts (below) on Sunday. &#8220;The hostile Cohen testimony, given by a liar to reduce his prison time, proved no Collusion! His just written book manuscript showed what he said was a total lie, but Fake Media won&#8217;t show it. I am an innocent man being persecuted by some very bad, conflicted &amp; corrupt people in a Witch Hunt that is illegal &amp; should never have been allowed to start &#8212; And only because I won the Election! Despite this, great success!&#8221;
Trump&#8217;s reference to Cohen&#8217;s new manuscript is to a since-scrapped book deal which Trump referenced earlier online. &#8220;Your heads will spin when you see the lies, misrepresentations and contradictions against his Thursday testimony,&#8221; Trump tweeted earlier, as noted by <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/432373-trump-claims-cohen-book-manuscripts-shows-testimony-was-total-lie-i">The Hill</a>. Cohen&#8217;s book, tentatively titled &#8220;Trump Revolution: From The Tower to The White House, Understanding Donald J. Trump,&#8221; was abandoned in May 2018 amid Cohen&#8217;s growing legal problems, the <a href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/michael-cohen-kills-his-own-book-on-the-trump-revolution-amid-legal-woes">Daily Beast</a> reported. The publisher said the manuscript was never submitted.
Trump added a quote from Republican Rep. Mark Green (TN) to his thread Sunday: &#8220;Look how they&#8217;re acting now and how we act when we&#8217;re in the majority. What the Democrats are doing is an abuse of power. They couldn&#8217;t find anything&#8230;they took a Fake Dossier &amp; couldn&#8217;t find any Collusion. Now they have a fake witness in Cohen,&#8221; Trump tweeted, citing Rep. Green.
&#8220;Presidential Harassment by &#8216;crazed&#8217; Democrats at the highest level in the history of our Country,&#8221; Trump added. &#8220;Likewise, the most vicious and corrupt Mainstream Media that any president has ever had to endure &#8212; Yet the most successful first two years for any President. We are WINNING big, the envy of the WORLD, but just think what it could be?&#8221;
Trump then smacked the Democrats for possibly having &#8220;contributed&#8221; to the breakdown in talks with North Korea&#8217;s Kim.
&#8220;For the Democrats to interview in open hearings a convicted liar &amp; fraudster, at the same time as the very important Nuclear Summit with North Korea, is perhaps a new low in American politics and may have contributed to the &#8216;walk.&#8217; Never done when a president is overseas. Shame!&#8221; he wrote.
Cohen was sentenced to three years in prison in December for, among a long list of crimes, lying to Congress. In front of the House Oversight Committee last week, Cohen vowed to provide an &#8220;accurate and truthful&#8221; account, this time, of what he knew about his former client&#8217;s &#8220;illicit acts.&#8221; The next day, Cohen was referred by two Republican Congressmen to the Justice Department for investigation for perjury during his testimony.
&#8220;While testifying under oath, Mr. Cohen made what appear to be numerous willfully and intentionally false statements of material fact contradicted by the record established by the Justice Department in United States v. Cohen, 18-cr-602 (S.D.N.Y.) (WHP),&#8221;Reps. Jim Jordan (OH) and Mark Meadows (NC) <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/44101/cohen-vows-be-truthful-congress-ends-getting-james-barrett">wrote</a> in a letter to Attorney General Bill Barr. &#8220;Mr. Cohen&#8217;s testimony was at times in direct contradiction to assertions contained in pleadings authored by the United States Attorney&#8217;s Office for the Southern District of New York (SDNY). There are other instances in which Mr. Cohen&#8217;s statements to the Committee were immediately contradicted by witnesses with firsthand knowledge of the subject matter.&#8221;
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/44101/cohen-vows-be-truthful-congress-ends-getting-james-barrett">Cohen Vows To Be &#8216;Truthful&#8217; To Congress, Ends Up Getting Referred To Justice Dept. For Lying</a>
Trump&#8217;s posts below:
<div class="embed tweet">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
After more than two years of Presidential Harassment, the only things that have been proven is that Democrats and other broke the law. The hostile Cohen testimony, given by a liar to reduce his prison time, proved no Collusion! His just written book manuscript showed what he&#8230;..
&#8212; Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1102237752744120322?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 3, 2019</a></blockquote>
</div>
<div class="embed tweet">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
&#8230;said was a total lie, but Fake Media won&#8217;t show it. I am an innocent man being persecuted by some very bad, conflicted &amp; corrupt people in a Witch Hunt that is illegal &amp; should never have been allowed to start &#8211; And only because I won the Election! Despite this, great success!
&#8212; Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1102233209708924930?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 3, 2019</a></blockquote>
</div>
<div class="embed tweet">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
&#8220;Look how they&#8217;re acting now and how we act when we&#8217;re in the majority. What the Democrats are doing is an abuse of power. They couldn&#8217;t find anything&#8230;they took a Fake Dossier &amp; couldn&#8217;t find any Collusion. Now they have a fake witness in Cohen.&#8221; Congressman Mark Green, (R-TN).
&#8212; Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1102288283713896448?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 3, 2019</a></blockquote>
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<div class="embed tweet">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
Presidential Harassment by &#8220;crazed&#8221; Democrats at the highest level in the history of our Country. Likewise, the most vicious and corrupt Mainstream Media that any president has ever had to endure &#8211; Yet the most successful first two years for any
&#8212; Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1102358716903579649?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 4, 2019</a></blockquote>
</div>
<div class="embed tweet">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
&#8230;.President. We are WINNING big, the envy of the WORLD, but just think what it could be?
&#8212; Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1102360081247682561?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 4, 2019</a></blockquote>
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<div class="embed tweet">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
For the Democrats to interview in open hearings a convicted liar &amp; fraudster, at the same time as the very important Nuclear Summit with North Korea, is perhaps a new low in American politics and may have contributed to the &#8220;walk.&#8221; Never done when a president is overseas. Shame!
&#8212; Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1102373344987496448?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 4, 2019</a></blockquote>
</div>

Trump Unloads On Democrats For ‘Presidential Harassment,’ May Have Prompted The ‘Walk’ Overseas

Michael Cohen

On Thursday, during a press conference following President Trump&#8217;s meeting with Kim Jong Un, the president was asked if he had spoken with the North Korean dictator about the abuse and subsequent death of American Otto Warmbier.
In response to the question, Trump <a href="https://www.vox.com/2019/2/28/18241334/trump-north-korea-press-conference-full-text">said</a>:
<blockquote>
I have. And I really don&#8217;t think it was in his interest at all. I know the Warmbier family very well. I think they&#8217;re an incredible family. What happened is horrible. I really believe something horrible happened to him, and I really don&#8217;t think the top leadership knew about it.
And when they had to send him home &#8211; by the way, I got the prisoners back and the hostages back. The others came back extremely healthy but Otto came back in a condition that was terrible. And I did speak about it, but I don&#8217;t believe he would have allowed that to happen. It just wasn&#8217;t to his advantage to allow that to happen. Those prisons are rough, they&#8217;re rough places and bad things happened. But I really don&#8217;t believe that he was &#8211; I don&#8217;t believe he knew about it&#8230;
He felt badly about it. He knew the case very well, but he knew it later. And you&#8217;ve got a lot of people, big country, a lot of people. And in those prisons and those camps you have a lot of people. And some really bad things happened to Otto, some really, really bad things. He tells me that he didn&#8217;t know about it, and I will take him at his word.
</blockquote>
<div class="embed tweet">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
President Trump on Otto Warmbier: &#8220;I really believe something very bad happened to him, and I don&#8217;t think that the top leadership knew about it&#8230;(Kim Jong-Un) felt very badly about it&#8230;He tells me that he didn&#8217;t know about it, and I will take him at his word.&#8221; <a href="https://t.co/EWnw7BzVNe">pic.twitter.com/EWnw7BzVNe</a>
&#8212; Axios (@axios) <a href="https://twitter.com/axios/status/1101114801814732801?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 28, 2019</a></blockquote>
</div>
Following the president&#8217;s comment, the Warmbier family released a <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/01/politics/otto-warmbier-family-trump-north-korea/index.html">statement</a>, which read in part:
<blockquote>
Kim and his evil regime are responsible for the death of our son Otto. Kim and his evil regime are responsible for unimaginable cruelty and inhumanity. No excuses or lavish praise can change that.
</blockquote>
On Friday, White House counselor Kellyanne Conway appeared on Fox News, and defended President Trump over the controversial remarks:
<blockquote>
The president agrees with the Warmbier family and holds North Korea responsible for Otto Warmbier&#8217;s death. He&#8217;s said that time and again. This president is responsible for having Otto Warmbier returned to this country and be reunited with his family in his final hours before he passed.
What the president is talking about [is] that Chairman Kim did not know what happened to Otto at the time of when it happened. And so, of course he holds North Korea responsible. He has deep affection and shares the grief for the Warmbier family, and that will never end, as will not the president agreeing with the Warmbier family that North Korea&#8217;s responsible.
But Chairman Kim did not know &#8211; what the president is saying is that there&#8217;s no indication Chairman Kim knew what happened [to] Otto Warmbier when it happened. It&#8217;s after he was returned here to the United States that we all learned of his sad and frankly unforgivable state.
</blockquote>
<div class="embed video fluid-video"><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen frameborder="0" height="385" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/FhHRwYMXMv4" width="720"></iframe></div>
Several politicians and media figures have offered their own statements, or outright condemned the president for what he said.
Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/432224-schumer-demands-trump-apologize-to-otto-warmbiers-parents">said</a> that Trump &#8220;owes Otto Warmbier&#8217;s parents an apology.&#8221;
Fox News&#8217; Chris Wallace slammed Trump, <a href="https://www.mediaite.com/trump/chris-wallace-rips-trump-why-on-earth-would-you-side-with-kim-jong-un-over-the-warmbier-family/">saying</a>: &#8220;Why on Earth would you side with Kim Jong Un over the Warmbier family and the sense of outrage?&#8221;
And former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley tweeted:
<div class="embed tweet">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Americans know the cruelty that was placed on Otto Warmbier by the North Korean regime. Our hearts are with the Warmbier family for their strength and courage. We will never forget Otto.
&#8212; Nikki Haley (@NikkiHaley) <a href="https://twitter.com/NikkiHaley/status/1101148561197158400?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 28, 2019</a></blockquote>
</div>
In January 2016, American college student Otto Warmbier was <a href="https://www.gq.com/story/otto-warmbier-north-korea-american-hostage-true-story">detained</a> during a trip to North Korea after being accused of stealing a government propaganda poster. He was then forced to publicly confess, reading from what many believe was a script written by state officials.
Despite his pleas to return home, Warmbier was sentenced to 15 years of hard labor. In June 2017, nearly a year and a half after he was initially detained, Warmbier was <a href="http://time.com/4817541/otto-warmbier-north-korea-us/">returned</a> to the United States in a coma. Less than a week later, he passed away.
North Korean officials blamed the coma on botulism, but according to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/13/world/north-korea-otto-warmbier-rodman.html">The New York Times</a>, an anonymous government official said that the U.S. government had &#8220;obtained intelligence reports &#8230; indicating that Mr. Warmbier had been repeatedly beaten while in North Korean custody.&#8221;
However, when coroner Lakshmi Kode Sammarco performed an external examination, she found &#8220;no obvious signs of torture,&#8221; reports <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2017/09/27/health/otto-warmbier-coroner-report/index.html">CNN</a>. Instead, the damage to Warmbier&#8217;s brain appeared to be the result of extended oxygen deprivation. The means by which Warmbier&#8217;s brain may have been starved of oxygen are unknown.

Kellyanne Conway Defends Trump Over His Controversial Otto Warmbier Comments

Otto Warmbier

On Thursday&#8217;s episode of &#8220;The Michael Knowles Show,&#8221; host Michael Knowles discusses the difference between the &#8220;red lines&#8221; of the Obama Administration and President Donald Trump after his summit with Kim Jong-un in Vietnam. Transcript and video below.
This is the quote that people are assailing Trump for, and this doesn&#8217;t sound good, I totally agree. When you listen to it you think, &#8220;Did he have to? I wish he didn&#8217;t have to say that.&#8221; This is the line that all of the mainstream media are gonna be playing for the next 48 hours:
<blockquote>
President Trump: Those prisons are rough, they&#8217;re rough places. [Kim Jong-un] tells me that he didn&#8217;t know about it, and I will take him at his word.
</blockquote>
Talking about the killing of Otto Warmbier, that American student who was killed by North Korea. He came back and he was brain dead, he died shortly thereafter. Trump says he&#8217;s asked did Kim Jong-un know about this, did Kim Jong-un do this? He says, look, those prisons are terrible. Kim Jong-un says he didn&#8217;t know about it, so I guess I&#8217;ll take him at his word.
Yeah, I get it, what you want him to do is go out there and say, &#8220;This jerk, he killed an American student!&#8221; and then like John Wayne, Trump is gonna pull a gun out of his jacket and shoot Kim Jong-un on site. That would feel really good, but that is not reality, that is not what&#8217;s going to happen. By the way, what Trump said here &#8212; factually, it&#8217;s probably true. I don&#8217;t think that Kim Jong-un ordered the killing of Otto Warmbier because he had nothing to gain and a lot to lose from it. I think probably what happened is they took in Otto Warmbier, they tortured him endlessly and they tortured him a little too much and something went wrong and then the kid went brain-dead. We still don&#8217;t know exactly why or how he went brain-dead, why or how his torture and his incarceration killed him, and then I think the North Korean regime was terrified. I mean, I think they really wanted to rough him up and use him as leverage. A guy who&#8217;s dead or dying is not much leverage then, really extract any concessions from it so just as a technical matter maybe he&#8217;s right. But what people are really criticizing him for is that he didn&#8217;t just assail Kim Jong-un for the North Korean killing of Otto Warmbier.
<div class="embed video fluid-video"><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen frameborder="0" height="410" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/EuXdK1yUKJc" width="728"></iframe></div>
Now Kim Jong-un says, &#8220;I didn&#8217;t know.&#8221; Yeah, maybe he didn&#8217;t. I don&#8217;t think he ordered the killing. Sure, maybe he didn&#8217;t know, maybe some guard took it too far. Is that awful? Yes. Does that make an American&#8217;s blood boil? Yes. Does it make us want to go to war? Yes. Here is where you see that Donald Trump is the exact opposite of Barack Obama.
Barack Obama talked real tough. Oh, he said the prettiest words, didn&#8217;t he? And then he gave away the farm. Oh, red lines&#8230; were talking tough on the mullahs&#8230;and then take anything you want. Flying airplanes full of American cash to drop off with the Iranian mullahs, thanking Iran for taking our sailors hostage, anything to get those sailors back. Concessions to Syria, concessions to everybody. But he would talk tough, he&#8217;d give good speeches, wouldn&#8217;t he? President Trump doesn&#8217;t talk tough on King Jong-un, he talks like he&#8217;s negotiating. He says &#8220;well Kim Jong-un, he&#8217;s a smart guy, yeah he&#8217;s a smart, smart guy. Yeah, well he says he didn&#8217;t know about his state&#8217;s killing of Otto Warmbier, I guess I&#8217;ll take him at his word.&#8221;
Ok, so he talks really nice, he talks in a flattering way, but then he doesn&#8217;t give away anything. Which of those two guys do you want to lead your country &#8212; the one who tells you every pretty little thing you want to hear and then sells out your country from underneath you? Or the guy who&#8217;s willing to make rhetorical concessions but never make any hard concessions, any tangible concessions? Obviously, you want the latter.
<a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-michael-knowles-show/id1266577963?mt%3D2&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1551536238237000&amp;usg=AFQjCNFBJRdJZvVHPIdV5AZSBCT2IWiNjg" href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-michael-knowles-show/id1266577963?mt=2" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Listen to &#8220;The Michael Knowles Show&#8221; on iTunes</a>
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KNOWLES: The Harsh Reality Of Trump&#8217;s Hanoi Summit

Michael Knowles

On Thursday, President Trump abruptly cut short his planned diplomatic triumph with North Korean dictator Kim Jung Un after Kim made clear he had no plans to denuclearize, and that he wanted all sanctions against his evil regime removed. Trump explained, &#8220;Sometimes you have to walk,&#8221; adding, &#8220;It was about the sanctions. Basically they wanted the sanctions lifted in their entirety, but we couldn&#8217;t do that.&#8221;
Trump was right to walk. Of course Trump should have walked away from the table &#8211; he had no other choice, given that Kim wasn&#8217;t going to give up his nuclear program, and wanted the world in return. That isn&#8217;t hard-nosed negotiating on Trump&#8217;s part. That&#8217;s mere refusal to utterly abandon any sensible North Korean policy. Let&#8217;s not grade on a curve here.
The problem is that Trump&#8217;s diplomatic failure was the result of an ill-considered and morally benighted approach to the North Korean regime in the first place. Here&#8217;s how diplomacy usually works: there are preconditions for getting the most powerful man on the planet, the representative of the world&#8217;s most powerful and free state and the planet&#8217;s greatest defender of liberty, to sit down with you. Negotiators are deployed; concessions are pre-planned. But no such pre-planning took place. This meeting didn&#8217;t break down over an ancillary issue cropping up at the last minute. This meeting took place because there was no common ground from the get-go.
Indeed, Trump&#8217;s strategy seemed to be to declare a mere meeting a triumph, which it eminently is not &#8211; the President of the United States can meet with any world leader at the drop of a hat. It&#8217;s an honor for those leaders to meet with the president, not the other way around. The purpose of the meeting: the publicity to be garnered from the meeting.
What about the negotiations themselves? Trump had no obvious strategy &#8211; his strategy seemed to rely merely on interpersonal warmth and insane levels of sycophancy. President Trump himself is driven by flattery; it&#8217;s the currency by which he operates. He tends to think that others operate in the same currency. By expending ridiculous levels of such currency, Trump hoped to win Kim over to some form of serious concession. How far was Trump willing to go? He was willing to call his relationship with Kim a &#8220;special relationship&#8221; &#8211; a phrase usually used with regard to the US&#8217;s relationship with Great Britain. He suggested that Kim was a &#8220;great leader.&#8221; He spelled out his strategy just two days ago: &#8220;I&#8217;ve developed a very, very good relationship &#8230; he&#8217;s never had a relationship with anybody from this country, and hasn&#8217;t had lots of relationships anywhere.&#8221; Trump said at a rally in West Virginia in September, &#8220;He wrote me beautiful letters, and they&#8217;re great letters. We fell in love.&#8221;
It seems never to have occurred to Trump that while he was trying to flatter Kim into giving up the only factor maintaining Kim&#8217;s power &#8211; his nuclear program &#8211; Kim was simultaneously trying to stroke Trump&#8217;s ego to get him to give him concessions. And it worked. To this point, Kim has offered no real concessions; Trump has now met with the world&#8217;s worst dictator twice, cancelled a joint US-South Korean naval exercise, and now explained that he takes Kim at his word that he didn&#8217;t know about the North Korean regime&#8217;s murder of American citizen Otto Warmbier &#8211; even though Trump himself hosted Warmbier&#8217;s family at the 2018 State of the Union Address, where he talked about the &#8220;ominous nature of this regime.&#8221;
It was a pathetic moment. And Trump&#8217;s strategy, which would only have been worth it if the United States had received something in return, has been exposed for the pathetic play-acting it always was. Foreign relations aren&#8217;t based in personal warmth. They&#8217;re based in the realities of power politics and national interest. Trump himself used to acknowledge that. But Trump&#8217;s obstinate belief in his own negotiating prowess and interpersonal skill has now put the United States in the position of quasi-endorsing and pandering before one of the worst human beings on the planet.

Trump Was Right To Walk Away From The Table. But His Overall North Korean Strategy Is A Debacle.

President Donald Trump made a shocking statement Thursday morning, absolving North Korean leader Kim Jong Un of responsibility in the death of American hostage Otto Warmbier.
Warmbier was held captive in North Korea for more than a year after being accused of stealing a North Korea propaganda poster during a university trip to Pyongyang in 2016. During his captivity, the then-21-year-old Warmbier was so mistreated that he sustained permanent phsyical damage, rendering him nearly comatose, unable to walk, speak, or even breathe without medical assistance.
North Korea claims Warmbier had a serious medical emergency while in captivity, leaving him in a near-vegetative state. Warmbier&#8217;s family says he was beaten and starved to the point where his body could no longer function.
Trump <a href="https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/politics/2017/06/19/donald-trump-otto-warmbier-at-least-he-got-home-his-parents/410190001/">secured Warmbier&#8217;s release in 2017</a>. He died not long after returning to the United States.
At the time of Warmbier&#8217;s return, Trump commented that Warmbier was the victim of North Korea&#8217;s &#8220;brutal regime,&#8221; <a href="https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/politics/2017/06/19/donald-trump-otto-warmbier-at-least-he-got-home-his-parents/410190001/">according to a local Ohio news organization</a>, and pledged to take on North Korea over the teenager&#8217;s death. &#8220;A lot of bad things happened &#8230; It is a brutal regime and we&#8217;ll be able to handle it,&#8221; Trump said.
On Thursday, after the latest attempt on the part of the Trump administration to entreat with the North Koreans, Trump seemed to soften his words, telling reporters that he had discussed Warmbier&#8217;s death with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and that he believes Kim Jong Un had nothing to do with Warmbier&#8217;s brutal treatment at the hands of North Korean authorities.
<a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2019/02/28/donald-trump-says-he-takes-kim-jong-un-his-word-otto-warmbier/3001504002/">USA Today reports</a> that Trump told media, &#8220;I don&#8217;t believe he knew about it,&#8221; Trump said of Kim. &#8220;He tells me that he didn&#8217;t know about it and I will take him at his word.&#8221;
&#8220;He knew the case very well. But he knew it later,&#8221; Trump continued. &#8220;And, you know, you&#8217;ve got a lot of people. Big country. Lot of people. And in those prisons and those camps, you have a lot of people. And some really bad things happened to Otto. Some really bad things.&#8221;
The comments came as a shock to Americans and to the American foreign policy community. Former United Nations ambassador Nikki Haley spoke out on the subject, openly disagreeing with the president, <a href="https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/432016-nikki-haley-americans-know-the-cruelty-north-korea-placed-on">according to The Hill</a>.
&#8220;Americans know the cruelty that was placed on Otto Warmbier by the North Korean regime,&#8221; Haley tweeted Thursday morning. &#8220;Our hearts are with the Warmbier family for their strength and courage. We will never forget Otto.&#8221;
Although Trump&#8217;s comments were met with immediate scorn from a bipartisan group of legislators and officials, this is not the first time that the president has referred to Warmbier&#8217;s treatment in the context of his interactions with North Korea. In fact, Trump has repeatedly said that it was Warmbier&#8217;s return and subsequent news of his condition that &#8220;inspired&#8221; the two countries to meet for the first time in Singapore.
Trump has claimed in the past that news of Warmbier&#8217;s cruel treatment and shocking death inspired Kim Jong Un, initially, to come to the bargaining table.
<a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/trump-credits-otto-warmbier-north-korea-summit-otto-did-not-n882276">In June of 2018</a>, according to NBC News, before the first summit between Trump and Kim Jong Un, Trump credited Warmbier for bringing the two countries together, telling media that Warmbier &#8220;did not die in vain.&#8221;
&#8220;Otto Warmbier is a very special person and he will be for a long time in my life. His parents are good friends of mine. I think without Otto, this would not have happened,&#8221; Trump told reporters at a press conference in Singapore.
&#8220;Something happened from that day, was a terrible thing. It was brutal,&#8221; Trump continued. &#8220;But a lot of people started to focus on what was going on, including North Korea. I really think that Otto is someone who did not die in vain. He had a lot to do with us today.&#8221;
That summit, unlike the most recent summit, ended with a joint declaration encouraging North Korea to pursue a de-nuclearization program.

President Donald Trump Defends Kim Jong Un On Otto Warmbier&#8217;s Death

President Donald Trump walked away from the negotiating table with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un on Thursday in Vietnam after Kim reportedly demanded that the U.S. lift all economic sanctions on North Korea without first agreeing to any kind of serious commitment to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula.
&#8220;Trump said the summit fell through after the North demanded a full removal of U.S.-led international sanctions in exchange for the shuttering of the North&#8217;s Yongbyon nuclear facility,&#8221; <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/trump-wasnt-prepared-to-lift-us-sanctions-on-north-korea-leading-to-abrupt-end-to-summit">Fox News</a>&#8216; Gregg Re reported. &#8220;Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told reporters that the United States wasn&#8217;t willing to make a deal without the North committing to giving up its secretive nuclear facilities outside Yongbyon as well as its missile and warheads program.&#8221;
&#8220;I&#8217;ve been saying very much from the beginning that speed is not that important to me,&#8221; Trump <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/27/politics/donald-trump-kim-jong-un-vietnam-summit/index.html">said</a> earlier on Thursday, prior to the talks falling through. &#8220;Speed is not important to me. What is important is that we do the right deal.&#8221;
<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/28/trump-says-china-has-been-a-big-help-in-us-dealings-with-north-korea.html">CNBC</a> noted: &#8220;Trump is pushing North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons as he dangles the prospect of an economic boost to the repressive country. Kim wants to see sanctions eased or lifted &#8212; but without losing the strategic benefits of his weapons of mass destruction.&#8221;
During a post-summit news conference, after talks fell apart, Trump said: &#8220;It wasn&#8217;t a good thing to be signing anything. We had some options, and at this time we decided not to do any of the options, and we&#8217;ll see where that goes.&#8221;
&#8220;Sometimes you have to walk, and this was just one of those times,&#8221; Trump added.
When pressed for details about why the talks fell through at the post-summit news conference, Trump said: &#8220;Basically, they wanted the sanctions lifted in their entirety and we couldn&#8217;t do that. They were willing to de-nuke a large portion of the areas that we wanted, but we couldn&#8217;t give up all of the sanctions for that. So we continue to work and we&#8217;ll see, but we had to walk away from that particular suggestion. We had to walk away from that.&#8221;
&#8220;(Kim) wants to de-nuke, but he wants to just do areas that are less important than the areas that we want. We know the country very well, believe it or not, we know every inch of that country,&#8221; Trump continued. &#8220;You always have to be prepared to walk. I could have 100 percent signed something today &#8212; we actually had papers ready to be signed &#8212; but it just wasn&#8217;t appropriate. I want to do it right: I&#8217;d much rather do it right than do it fast.&#8221;
Following the summit&#8217;s early ending, White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders released the following statement:
<blockquote>
President Donald J. Trump of the United States and Chairman Kim Jong Un of the State Affairs Commission of the Democratic People&#8217;s Republic of Korea had very good and constructive meetings in Hanoi, Vietnam, on February 27-28, 2019. The two leaders discussed various ways to advance denuclearization and economic driven concepts. No agreement was reached at this time, but their respective teams look forward to meeting in the future.
</blockquote>
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Statement from <a href="https://twitter.com/PressSec?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@PressSec</a> on failure of <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/HanoiSummit?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#HanoiSummit</a> to reach agreement. Signing ceremony has been abruptly cancelled between <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@realDonaldTrump</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/KimJongUn?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#KimJongUn</a> <a href="https://t.co/xDppSDGE5D">pic.twitter.com/xDppSDGE5D</a>
&#8212; Jon Sopel (@BBCJonSopel) <a href="https://twitter.com/BBCJonSopel/status/1101011691779706880?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 28, 2019</a></blockquote>
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North Korea Summit Falls Apart. Here’s What Happened.

On Wednesday, Senator Jeff Merkley (D-OR), whose leftism demanded that he <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/node/43215/edit?destination=admin/content/articles%3Ftitle%3DMerkley%26author%3DAll%26publishing_status%3DAll%26field_article_options_value%3DAll%26status%3DAll">refuse to answer</a> when asked if he agreed that America should never be a socialist country, attacked President Trump with a vile tweet in which he unfavorably compared Trump to North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un.
Tweeting about Trump meeting with Kim Jong-un, Merkley tweeted, &#8220;A president and a dictator met in Hanoi. One has demanded unquestioned loyalty, bragged about his nuclear arsenal, attacked the press, and employed family members as his advisors. The other is Kim Jong-un.&#8221;
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A president and a dictator met in Hanoi. One has demanded unquestioned loyalty, bragged about his nuclear arsenal, attacked the press, and employed family members as his advisors. The other is Kim Jong-un.
&#8212; Senator Jeff Merkley (@SenJeffMerkley) <a href="https://twitter.com/SenJeffMerkley/status/1100854533457096704?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 27, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Merkley&#8217;s comparison is malevolent and ignores what a monster Kim Jong-un truly is. As <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/north-koreas-prisons-are-as-bad-as-nazi-camps-says-judge-who-survived-auschwitz/2017/12/11/7e79beea-ddc4-11e7-b2e9-8c636f076c76_story.html?utm_term=.8af395513acc">The Washington Post</a> noted in 2017, Thomas Buergenthal, who served on the International Court of Justice and was in the Nazi death camp Auschwitz as a child, said Kim Jong-un should be tried for crimes against humanity. He said, &#8220;I believe that the conditions in the [North] Korean prison camps are as terrible, or even worse, than those I saw and experienced in my youth in these Nazi camps and in my long professional career in the human rights field.&#8221; Buergenthal was one member of a three-judge panel that listened to former prisoners and prison guards from North Korea and said there was enough evidence to charge the Kim regime with 10 of the 11 internationally recognized war crimes.
The Post wrote, &#8220;Anyone who questions the leaders or the system is liable to be thrown in a penal labor colony &#8212; often for life, and often together with three generations of their families to eliminate the &#8216;seed&#8217; of &#8216;enemies of the state.&#8217;&#8221;
130,000 North Koreans are rumored to be held in four huge camps; there are also &#8220;reeducation&#8221; camps that are widely reputed to be monstrously brutal. In 2017, U.N. investigators, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/inmates-in-north-korea-suffer-unspeakable-atrocities-2013-9">gleaning information from North Korean exiles</a>, said inmates in North Korea&#8217;s prison camps displayed &#8220;unspeakable atrocities&#8221; comparable with the Nazi atrocities in World War II.
Merkley&#8217;s hostility to Trump provoked him to <a href="https://www.oregonlive.com/politics/2019/01/merkley-hops-aboard-trump-impeachment-bandwagon.html">call for Trump to resign</a> in January after Buzzfeed claimed, in a report that was later debunked by Special Counsel Robert Mueller&#8217;s team, that the president had told Michael Cohen to lie to Congress about his business interests in Moscow. Merkley tweeted, &#8220;If this report of Trump suborning false testimony is confirmed, then Trump committed a felony and must resign or be impeached.&#8221;
But calling for Trump to resign was nothing new for Merkley; in December 2017, <a href="https://www.oregonlive.com/politics/2017/12/jeff_merkley_trump_should_resi.html">he said</a>, &#8220;The president should resign because he certainly has a track record with more than 17 women of horrific conduct.&#8221;
Merkley <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/merkley-trump-dark-path-695954/">has said</a> of Trump, &#8220;You have a president who wants to use the suffering of children for political leverage, and that is completely unacceptable.&#8221;
After a fatal stabbing in Portland in May 2017, Merkley was asked if Trump bore responsibility for a &#8220;wave of violence&#8221; in the United States. He <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2017/05/31/politics/jeff-merkley-donald-trump-portland-stabbings/index.html">answered,</a> &#8220;&#8221;You probably can&#8217;t tie him directly to one particular act of violence. But to the wave of violence, yes, he bears responsibility,&#8221; adding, &#8220;I feel like much of what has happened with these hate crimes falls directly from who he is.&#8221;

Dem Senator Targets Trump With Vicious Tweet Comparing Him To Kim Jong-Un

Jeff Merkley

After his initial meeting with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un in Hanoi, Vietnam on Wednesday, some American reporters began shouting questions about convicted felon Michael Cohen&#8217;s testimony against Trump in front of Congress this week. While Trump ignored the questions in the moment, they didn&#8217;t go unnoticed. According to multiple reports, those reporters were barred from attending a follow-up dinner &#8212; and some promptly took to Twitter to complain about it.
Here&#8217;s the moment that prompted the reported ban for certain members of the press:
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Trump ignored a reporter&#8217;s question about Michael Cohen, as Cohen, his former attorney, prepares for his first day of public testimony on Capitol Hill while Trump meets with Kim in Vietnam <a href="https://t.co/L2IWyCr4vn">https://t.co/L2IWyCr4vn</a> <a href="https://t.co/fNzIl9ceET">pic.twitter.com/fNzIl9ceET</a>
&#8212; POLITICO (@politico) <a href="https://twitter.com/politico/status/1100729920538456065?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 27, 2019</a></blockquote>
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&#8220;It was a moment of diplomatic stagecraft months in the making. But it didn&#8217;t take long for President Donald Trump&#8217;s domestic troubles to get in the way,&#8221; <a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2019/02/27/trump-kim-hanoi-summit-2019-1190046">Politico</a> reported. &#8220;As Trump sat alongside the North Korean leader, Kim Jong Un, at a luxury hotel here, he was immediately confronted by the explosive allegations that his former longtime lawyer and fixer, Michael Cohen, planned to deliver to lawmakers in Washington later Wednesday.&#8221;
The quick barage of questions included one that stood out: &#8220;Mr. President, any reaction to Michael Cohen and his testimony?&#8221;
In response, Trump ignored the questions and simply thanked the press in dismissal.
&#8220;Later Wednesday, the White House announced that it was limiting the number of reporters who would be permitted to attend a portion of Trump&#8217;s dinner with Kim &#8216;due to the sensitive nature of the meetings,'&#8221; Politico notes.
&#8220;Several print reporters, including the three wire services, were barred from the Trump-Kim dinner after @jeffmason1 and I had asked questions of the president during earlier events,&#8221; tweeted Jonathan Lemire, as noted by <a href="https://twitchy.com/gregp-3534/2019/02/27/reporters-who-shouted-questions-about-michael-cohen-at-trump-during-kim-jong-un-photo-op-barred-from-dinner/">Twitchy</a>.
&#8220;Wire writers from @Reuters @AP @business were excluded from going with the press pool to see the dinner between @realDonaldTrump and #KimJongUn,&#8221; wrote Jeff Mason. &#8220;AP colleague @JonLemire and I were among those. We both asked questions during the first &#8216;pool spray&#8217; when the two leaders shook hands.&#8221;
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Several print reporters, including the three wire services, were barred from the Trump-Kim dinner after <a href="https://twitter.com/jeffmason1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@jeffmason1</a> and I had asked questions of the president during earlier events.
&#8212; Jonathan Lemire (@JonLemire) <a href="https://twitter.com/JonLemire/status/1100732794366418944?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 27, 2019</a></blockquote>
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Wire writers from <a href="https://twitter.com/Reuters?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@Reuters</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/AP?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@AP</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/business?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@business</a> were excluded from going with the press pool to see the dinner between <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@realDonaldTrump</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/KimJongUn?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#KimJongUn</a>. AP colleague <a href="https://twitter.com/JonLemire?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@JonLemire</a> and I were among those. We both asked questions during the first &#8220;pool spray&#8221; when the two leaders shook hands.
&#8212; Jeff Mason (@jeffmason1) <a href="https://twitter.com/jeffmason1/status/1100730590372888577?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 27, 2019</a></blockquote>
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The reporters&#8217; questions about Cohen are references to the testimony he&#8217;s giving in front of the House Oversight Committee this week. On Wednesday, Cohen &#8212; who was sentenced in December to three years in prison for multiple charges, including fraud and campaign finance violations &#8212; gave his opening statement, which was released to the press in advance.
&#8220;I recognize that some of you may doubt and attack me on my credibility,&#8221; Cohen told the committee Wednesday. &#8220;It is for this reason that I have incorporated into this opening statement documents that are irrefutable, and demonstrate that the information you will hear is accurate and truthful.&#8221;
That &#8220;irrefutable&#8221; proof, Cohen said, would demonstrate that Trump had engaged in &#8220;illicit acts,&#8221; including while he was in office.
&#8220;I am ashamed that I chose to take part in concealing Mr. Trump&#8217;s illicit acts rather than listening to my own conscience,&#8221; said Cohen. &#8220;I am ashamed because I know what Mr. Trump is. He is a racist. He is a conman. He is a cheat. He was a presidential candidate who knew that Roger Stone was talking with Julian Assange about a WikiLeaks drop of Democratic National Committee emails.&#8221;
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/44000/here-are-checks-cohen-claims-are-proof-trumps-role-james-barrett">Read Cohen&#8217;s full statement here</a>.
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/44004/here-are-checks-cohen-claims-are-evidence-trumps-james-barrett">Here Are The Checks Cohen Claims Are Evidence Of Trump&#8217;s Role In Stormy &#8216;Hush Money&#8217; Deal</a>

WATCH: Here&#8217;s The Moment That Got Some Reporters Barred From Trump-Kim Dinner

Media Bias

The following is satirical.
Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un will be holding peace talks in Viet Nam, or maybe that&#8217;s an acid flashback I&#8217;m having. No, I don&#8217;t remember ever using acid, so I guess it&#8217;s really happening. The eccentric president of the United States and the utterly insane Supreme Leader of North Korea will get together to discuss such issues as whose red button is bigger, where you can get a really good haircut, and whether it&#8217;s better to call out journalists for bias or simply have them executed en masse.
According to sources in the American camp, the president plans to approach Kim with a proposal in which North Korea gives up its nuclear program and in return Trump refrains from bouncing Kim down the streets of Hanoi like a looney four-eyed basketball. According to North Korean sources, Kim is planning to offer a counter proposal in which he becomes Supreme Leader of everything that ever was or ever will be and in return Trump gets to worship him by dancing in circles singing, &#8220;There is no un like Kim Jong Un.&#8221;
After that, both leaders plan to punch each other in the face and then roll around on the floor clawing and scratching at each other while pieces of clothing fly in all directions and words like Pow and Bam appear in the air above them.
Americans say they have high hopes that the Kim-Trump summit in Hanoi will result in similar diplomatic gains to their first summit in Singapore last year, during which Kim promised to begin to think about considering reflecting on the possibility of one day wondering if perhaps he would be completely unwilling to dismantle his nuclear program and Donald Trump then declared victory and ordered a triumphant parade through Washington, D.C. to celebrate peace in our time.
If the summit is not successful, Kim plans to launch a first strike nuclear attack on Los Angeles, which might possibly wipe out Tokyo, after which he will mysteriously disappear into the foundation of Trump&#8217;s latest hotel in Moscow.
Should be fun.

KLAVAN: ‘There’s No Un Like Kim Jong Un’ [Satire]

On Friday, the White House announced that there would be a second summit between President Trump and North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un, to be held <a href="https://twitter.com/WhiteHouse/status/1086346489385943041">before the end of February</a>. Bloomberg <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-01-20/trump-kim-february-summit-expected-to-take-place-in-vietnam">reports</a> that the summit will be held in Vietnam:
<blockquote>
U.S. officials are planning for President Donald Trump to hold his second summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un next month in Vietnam, people familiar with the plans said, suggesting negotiations for the meeting were gathering pace.
The late-February summit would probably take place in the capital Hanoi, but Danang &#8212; the site of the 2017 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting &#8212; and Ho Chi Minh City in the country&#8217;s south have also been considered, the people said. The details came to light as nuclear envoys for the U.S., North Korea and South Korea held talks at a resort outside Stockholm, the Associated Press reported, citing the Swedish foreign ministry.
</blockquote>
The presumptive Vietnam summit follows last June&#8217;s historic Singapore summit between Trump and Kim, which was the first-ever historic meeting between an American president and a hermit kingdom dictator.
On Monday, however, things took a turn for the worse. On the first business day following the White House&#8217;s Friday announcement, the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a defense think tank, released a <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/north-korea/report-finds-another-undisclosed-north-korea-missile-site-says-there-n958801?cid=sm_npd_nn_tw_ma">report</a> claiming that there may be as many as 20 previously undisclosed North Korea missile sites. The CSIS researchers concretely identified Sino-ri Missile Operating Base, which had previously never been disclosed by the Kim regime:
<blockquote>
Situated about 130 miles north of the DMZ, Sino-ri Missile Operating Base houses the headquarters for the Korean People&#8217;s Army Strategic Rocket Forces missile brigade, a unit responsible for ballistic missiles. The base has been central to developing ballistic missiles that are capable of reaching South Korea, Japan, and even Guam, according to the report.
Beyond Parallel researchers estimate North Korea has 20 undisclosed sites where it continues to develop its ballistic missile program. Sino-ri is one of the oldest of those sites but is still operational today. Satellite photos dated Dec. 27, 2018, show an entrance to an underground bunker, hardened shelters, and a headquarters area, according to Beyond Parallel. The underground bunkers have rock and dirt berms in front that appear to protect them from artillery fire and airstrikes. The base is just under 7 square miles in size.
</blockquote>
The report comes one day after Trump tweeted his frustration at his perceived lack of media accolades surrounding his North Korea diplomacy.
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The Media is not giving us credit for the tremendous progress we have made with North Korea. Think of where we were at the end of the Obama Administration compared to now. Great meeting this week with top Reps. Looking forward to meeting with Chairman Kim at end of February!
&#8212; Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1087051223310712832?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 20, 2019</a></blockquote>
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The Trump administration has frequently promoted its North Korea diplomatic efforts as a cornerstone of its broader Asia-Pacific global strategy &#8212; and, specifically, as something that <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1006839007492308992">distinguishes</a> the Trump administration from its <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1008725438972211200">predecessor</a>. North Korea is considered to have on-hand <a href="http://isis-online.org/isis-reports/detail/north-koreas-nuclear-capabilities-a-fresh-look/10">potentially dozens</a> of strategic nuclear weapons. The threat of a nuclear North Korea serves as a major geopolitical hindrance to the United States&#8217; forward-looking strategy in the Asia-Pacific region. U.S. allies such as Japan and South Korea rely upon the United States&#8217; protective umbrella in order to protect their security without they themselves building their own nuclear arsenals.

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Kim Jong Un

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