According to a new report from The Daily Beast, at the White House on Friday — shortly after the Wednesday riot at the U.S. Capitol that he incited — outgoing President Donald Trump “literally yelled” that he is “NOT GOING TO RESIGN!” After that Capitol riot, which is connected to at least five deaths — including one of a Capitol Police officer, Brian Sicknick, who lost his life after a member of the pro-Trump mob struck him with a fire extinguisher — calls for Trump’s immediate exit have grown. Two GOP Senators, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, have joined the calls for Trump’s immediate departure from power. Even though he’s set to leave office later this month, Trump retains the powers of the presidency, and he can do more damage.
In case you’re wondering how the president’s been doing this weekend… https://t.co/CWeO5EfnjL pic.twitter.com/5a9BbeO9bV
— Asawin Suebsaeng (@swin24) January 10, 2021
According to that Daily Beast report, after belligerently yelling that he’s not going to resign, Trump devolved “into a tirade about how Democratic lawmakers will regret their push to impeach him a second time,” adding that they are supposedly “hurting “the country” by doing so.” House leaders have indicated that they’ll be imminently taking up a second round of impeachment proceedings against Trump, although these proceedings likely would not be able to be completed in time to remove Trump from office before the scheduled end of his term, even if enough Republicans were to support the effort to give Democrats’ side a majority in the Senate.
Besides his apparently furious reactions to calls for his resignation, Trump has also been “livid at Twitter for banning his @realDonaldTrump account, demanding to know if there were legal remedies to the permanent suspension,” according to The Daily Beast, which adds that “the president and several close advisers are now discussing the possibility of Trump sitting for multiple media interviews in the coming days, in an attempt to boast about his time in office.” To be clear: hundreds of thousands of Americans have died of COVID-19 on Trump’s watch. His time in office is a failure.
During a weekend appearance on Fox, top Trump ally Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) suggested prosecuting social media companies under federal legislation that covers organized crime, which is just unhinged. During the same Fox interview, Nunes said that Republicans “have no way to communicate” in the wake of the suspension of the conservative social media site Parler from Apple and Google app stores… although as of Sunday morning, the Parler website remained functional, and, critically: Nunes made these comments alleging a suppression of Republicans’ ability to communicate while being broadcast live on national television. His claim that Republicans can’t “communicate” is ridiculous.
