#Canada Future Leadership

[hypelens]

Justin Trudeau Faces Intense Scrutiny Amid Resignation Pressure: What’s Next for Canada?

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau finds himself at the center of a political storm as speculation about his potential resignation dominates headlines. A combination of mounting domestic challenges, political controversies, and shifting public sentiment has placed his leadership under a microscope. This article unpacks the key developments, public reactions, and potential outcomes as Trudeau faces one of the most challenging periods of his political career.

Resignation Rumors: Fact or Political Maneuver?

Reports of Trudeau's potential resignation emerged following weeks of criticism from political adversaries and even some within his party. These rumors have sparked nationwide debate about the future of Canadian leadership. According to sources, Trudeau is facing mounting pressure from both Liberals and Conservatives to address ongoing issues, including economic concerns, environmental policies, and foreign relations.

CNN reported live updates as political commentators speculated whether Trudeau could weather the storm or step down to preserve party unity. The Wall Street Journal highlighted growing dissatisfaction among Canadians, citing polls that reveal declining approval ratings for Trudeau's government.

Domestic Challenges Amplify Pressure

Trudeau’s tenure has been marked by significant achievements but also numerous challenges. Recent events have exacerbated public frustrations, including:

Economic Woes: Rising inflation and housing affordability issues have left many Canadians struggling to make ends meet.

Environmental Policies: Critics argue that Trudeau's government has failed to strike a balance between promoting green initiatives and supporting the energy sector.

Ethics Controversies: Past scandals, including the SNC-Lavalin affair, continue to haunt his administration and erode public trust.

These issues have provided ample ammunition for opposition parties, who are leveraging the public’s discontent to call for a change in leadership.

Trump’s “Merger” Comment Sparks Controversy

Adding a bizarre twist to the story, former U.S. President Donald Trump made headlines by suggesting a “merger” between the United States and Canada under his leadership. Speaking at a rally, Trump claimed that such a union would solve many of Canada’s economic and political challenges.

The suggestion, while widely dismissed as impractical, has drawn sharp criticism from Canadian officials and media outlets. The Hill reported that many viewed Trump’s comments as an opportunistic attempt to undermine Trudeau’s credibility during a vulnerable moment.

Public and Political Reactions

The Canadian public remains divided on Trudeau’s leadership. While some laud his progressive policies, others argue that his government has failed to address pressing national concerns effectively. Social media platforms are ablaze with discussions, reflecting a polarized electorate.

Political opponents have seized the moment to push their agendas. Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre has called for Trudeau’s immediate resignation, citing the need for “fresh leadership to restore confidence in the government.” Meanwhile, members of the New Democratic Party (NDP) have urged Trudeau to refocus on economic reforms rather than stepping aside.

International Implications of Trudeau’s Leadership

Trudeau's leadership extends beyond Canada’s borders. As a prominent global figure, his decisions impact international relations, particularly with the United States, European Union, and China.

Key concerns include:

Trade Relations: A change in leadership could alter Canada’s stance on key trade agreements, affecting industries on both sides of the border.

Climate Change Commitments: Trudeau has been a vocal advocate for climate action, and his resignation could create uncertainty around Canada’s environmental policies.

Geopolitical Alliances: As tensions with China and Russia escalate, Trudeau’s departure could shift Canada’s foreign policy approach.

What’s Next for Trudeau and Canada?

While Trudeau has not publicly confirmed or denied rumors of resignation, political analysts suggest several possible scenarios:

Trudeau Steps Down: This could trigger a leadership race within the Liberal Party, with key figures like Chrystia Freeland and Mark Carney emerging as potential successors.

Trudeau Stays On: He may attempt to rebuild public trust and navigate his government through this turbulent period.

Snap Election: If the political climate remains unstable, a snap election could be called, giving Canadians the opportunity to decide the country’s direction.

Conclusion: A Pivotal Moment for Canadian Politics

Justin Trudeau’s leadership is at a crossroads, and the decisions made in the coming weeks will have lasting implications for Canada’s political landscape. Whether he chooses to step down or continue leading, the challenges he faces underscore the complexities of governing in today’s polarized and unpredictable world.

Stay tuned for further updates as this story develops, and Canada navigates through a critical chapter in its history.

[immunobiz]

🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦 Le pouvoir et le gain personnel ne devraient jamais primer sur le bien-être des citoyens. 🇨🇦 Il est essentiel de tenir nos dirigeants responsables et d’exiger de l’intégrité dans leurs actions. Luttons pour un avenir où l’honnêteté, la transparence et un véritable service envers les Canadiens sont nos priorités ! 💪✨

Power and personal gain should never come before the welfare of the people. 🇨🇦 It's essential to hold our leaders accountable and demand integrity in their actions. Let's strive for a future where honesty, transparency, and true service to Canadians lead the way! 💪✨ 🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦🇨🇦

[allthecanadianpolitics]

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will face mounting pressure from his caucus this week to step down from the leadership of the Liberal party. A group of backbench MPs, primarily from Atlantic Canada and southwestern Ontario, are in discussions to formally release an ask for the prime minister to consider the future of the Liberal party in making a decision about whether to stay at the helm of it. Though MPs for months have lamented behind closed doors, and yes even to reporters, that they were resigned in their belief the prime minister was staying on, things changed this week during caucus Wednesday.

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Tagging: @newsfromstolenland

[mariacallous]

As Moldova hurtles toward critical elections on Sunday, the stakes couldn’t be higher. Malicious actors, bankrolled by foreign sources, are working to sway the country’s public. And their target? President Maia Sandu — fighting not only for reelection but for her country’s future as a European democracy.

 As Moldova’s first female president, Sandu’s candidacy has become ground zero for a flurry of gendered disinformation attacks, all designed to undermine her leadership and derail the nation’s EU membership referendum, which coincides with the election.

This is no ordinary election. It’s an all-out assault on Moldova’s sovereignty, and at the heart of the battle lies one simple truth: Whoever controls the narrative determines Moldova’s future.

In a crowded field of 10 candidates, Sandu’s still expected to win the first round, despite being buffeted by efforts to weaken and discredit her and the women serving in her administration. These attacks are gendered, insidious and relentless, looking to exploit traditional gender norms in a country where 97 percent of the population believes women should be “cherished and protected by men.”

But this isn’t about traditional values — it’s about manipulating them to maintain Russia’s grip on Moldova.

Disinformation targeting female leaders isn’t just a women’s issue. It’s a democracy issue; it’s a human rights issue; and in the digital age, it’s also a matter of national security. These weaponized lies are meant to fracture the foundations of participatory governance and erode trust in democracy.

Our organization, #ShePersisted, has been tracking these toxic trends since 2022, identifying common gendered narratives aimed at women in politics across major digital platforms in countries like Italy, Hungary and Ukraine. Now, it’s Moldova that’s become the latest battleground in Russia’s destabilization playbook.

The parallels to the U.S. are striking here. Much like Vice President Kamala Harris, who has similarly been the target of disinformation campaigns, Sandu’s candidacy has been a lightning rod for misogyny cloaked in political rhetoric. And just as we’ve seen false claims about Harris’s identity and qualifications, Moldova’s social media platforms are awash with deepfake videos and conspiracy theories aimed at the sitting president.

Both women have dealt with an onslaught of digital attacks designed to weaken the public’s trust in their leadership — attacks that are gendered, racist and xenophobic — and it’s no accident these narratives spread so easily. Social media algorithms reward the most divisive content. For the Kremlin, manipulating online discourse by gaming algorithms is as easy as shooting fish in a barrel, all thanks to the oligarchs of tech that foster this environment, where digital distortions flourish in the name of keeping users hooked and advertisers paying.

In Moldova in particular, the malign actors are explicitly pro-Russian, using inauthentic and coordinated behavior to seed and amplify their attacks. And the campaigns are part of a broader strategy to destabilize the country, oust pro-European Sandu and drag Moldova back into Russia’s orbit.

The Kremlin’s use of deepfakes and false narratives — claiming Ukrainian F-16s will soon land on Moldovan soil and fabricating stories about compulsory EU-mandated “sexual education” — mirrors the chaos it tried to sow in the 2016 U.S. election. Its methods, however, have become more sophisticated. According to a joint statement by the U.S., Canada, and the U.K., Russia is now actively using “disinformation, criminal and covert activities, and corruption to undermine sovereignty and democratic processes” in the upcoming Moldovan elections.

Despite the red alert, though, it’s still largely U.S.-based digital media companies that are acting as modern-day conflict profiteers.

Earlier this year, #ShePersisted combined social listening with forensic data analytics to understand the toxicity directed at women leaders in Moldova. The results? A chilling glimpse into the future of global disinformation campaigns.

From deepfakes of Sandu resigning while wearing a hijab to offers of bribes for voters to reject Moldova’s EU integration, the manipulation is as multifaceted as it is dangerous.

In one case, exiled oligarch and opposition leader Ilan Shor — widely seen as “Moscow’s man in Moldova” — used Facebook to run hundreds of ads that were viewed 155 million times. And the fact that he could do this while not, in fact, being in Moldova is a testament to the power online infrastructure afforded him, as Meta has repeatedly failed to track and remove these coordinated campaigns.

But the threats aren’t confined to political manipulation. Human traffickers and scam artists are leveraging these same platforms to victimize Moldovans too. In a country where 80 percent of the population is deeply concerned about human trafficking, social media platforms have become the primary tool for traffickers, targeting vulnerable women and girls.

And what has Meta done? Almost nothing. Regardless of clear abuse, social media giants continue to prioritize profits over safety, allowing both gendered disinformation and criminal exploitation to thrive.

For Moldova, the road ahead is now fraught with peril— it’s a path the U.S. knows all too well. And as Sandu prepares for a tight election, the parallels between the challenges faced by women leaders worldwide are impossible to ignore.

Whether it’s Harris or Sandu, gendered disinformation is among the most powerful tools bad actors use to erode democratic progress around the world today. And if social media platforms don’t step up to enforce their own rules — removing posts inciting violence, disabling accounts that spread gendered falsehoods and curtailing the amplification of disinformation — they’ll continue to be complicit in corrosion of democracy.

Moldova’s election isn’t just a fight for one woman’s political future, it’s a fight for the future of democracy itself. Like any good fight, it requires action — in this case, both online and off. And if we fail to address the weaponization of gendered disinformation now, the next battlefield could be much nearer to home.

[whencyclopedia]

Embattled Nation: Canada's Wartime Election of 1917

In the midst of one of the most turbulent periods in Canada’s history, Patrice Dutil and David Mackenzie delve into what they deem as the most significant and tumultuous elections since confederation. Their work, 'Embattled Nation: Canada’s Wartime Election of 1917 ', meticulously explores the 1917 election between Conservative leader Sir Robert Borden and the Liberal opposition of Sir Wilfred Laurier.  

Patrice Dutil and David MacKenzie provide a detailed and well-researched account of Canada's political and social landscape during World War I, focusing on the 1917 election and the issue of conscription. The book is commendable for its extensive use of evidence and meticulous documentation of events, offering readers a thorough understanding of the period's complexities. Their use of diary entries and personal accounts from Borden, Laurier, and those around them gives a sense of authenticity to the events being described. The book also provides a thorough context for the period with extensive maps, statistics, election information, and statistics of the war effort that effectively paint the scene of 1917. Finally, this book helpfully contextualizes the existing linguistic and cultural divides between French and English Canada which would aid readers greatly in future discussions.

However, despite its solid evidentiary foundation, the book falls short in convincingly arguing that the 1917 election was the most contentious in Canadian history and that it nearly saw the collapse of the confederation. The authors emphasize the deep divisions between English and French Canadians and describe how conscription became a central and divisive issue. Yet, they also acknowledge that there was majority support for the Union government and conscription, which complicates their argument about the election nearly breaking up the country.

Portraying the election as a moment that almost led to the dissolution of Canada seems somewhat overstated. While the authors provide ample evidence of French-Canadian opposition and the resulting social unrest, they do not fully reconcile this with the broader national support for the Union government and the conscription policy. This oversight weakens their central thesis about the election's unparalleled contentiousness. While it is true that perhaps this election did deepen the divide between French and English Canada, it did not do so to the extent to which one could say that the country was near collapse, at least not with the way this book presented its evidence.

While it is true, by the provided evidence, that much of French Canada vehemently opposed conscription, they did not oppose the country as a whole, with a referendum to succeed, having only marginal support and never actually making it to a vote on the Quebec parliamentary floor. There were indeed protests and riots during the time. Still, they were fed by feelings of alienation and betrayal by the Borden government, not the Confederation, with Laurie receiving much support from French Canada. It is accurate to say that both the Liberal and Conservative governments were almost torn apart, yet, in the end, both parties survived relatively unscathed under the united leadership of Laurier and Borden, respectively.

Patrice Dutil is a Professor in Toronto Metropolitan University's Politics and Public Administration Department while David Mackenzie is a Professor in the university's History Department. Overall, Embattled Nation is a valuable resource for understanding the political dynamics of wartime Canada and the cultural rift between English and French Canadians. It provides an often unexplored context to the First World War in Canada, giving insight into the French-English divide, one of Canada's most prevailing conflicts. To understand the impacts of the First World War on Canada, one must first understand how the war impacted the home front. However, its assertion that the 1917 election was the most divisive in Canadian history could have been more convincingly articulated, given the authors' admissions of widespread support for the Union government and conscription from a majority part of the Country. Perhaps refining the thesis to focus more on the French-English connection rather than the election itself with an increased focus on the protests and riots would make for an overall more convincing argument. Meanwhile, it is accurate to say that the 1917 election was pushed by issues surrounding conscription; the election itself was fairly unanimous thanks to the political maneuvering by the Borden government. With more focus on those aspects and a closer examination of the reactions to said maneuverings, the argument that this period in Canadian history was the most tumultuous becomes more evident and more convincing.

Continue reading...

[fastenoffyal]

"Amplifying the leadership of persons with disabilities for an inclusive and sustainable future"

December 3 is the International Day for Persons with Disabilities. This day promotes an understanding of disability issues, and mobilizes support for the dignity, rights, and well-being of people with disabilities. We're big into this kind of support - it's one of the principles (perhaps the most crucial principle!) upon which our event was founded. Accessibility - true accessibility - is so much more than wheelchair ramps and alt text on webpage images. We encourage everybody to learn more. To that end, we're highlighting some terrific relevant resources, including resources related to the fibre arts, and some links to help you search for makers with disabilities.

The UN's webpage on the IDPD

Accessibility resources from Accessibility Services Canada (tons of great resources linked to from here)

W3C's Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0

Accessibility & inclusivity articles from Digits & Threads

Why accessibility is important in the crafting world

Accessibility resources from experts and PWD

Return on Disability's 2024 annual report

FOYAL 2024 participating designers with disabilities

Yarn Database's designer search (you can filter for designers with disabilities)

[toffee-and-tandoori]

hiii! if you want to: 3, 15 & 16 for the 2024 season asks <3

for the f1 2024 season asks! feel free to ask me more questions <3

hello caitlin my beloved - thank you for the questions!

before i get started i still have the pierresteban pseudo-ficlet we were discussing in my drafts that i will eventually get back to...i've just had this wicked combination of busy with real-word responsibilities and lacking motivation with alpine's fuckass treatment of esteban. only alpine could somehow luck into one of the most wholesome moments of the season and then fuck it up :(

anyways without further ado here are my answers!

3. funniest thing that happened this year.

i know i'm forgetting a ton of hilarious moments from this season but off the top of my head i have to go with george steven bradburying his way to the win in austria. that was truly some slapstick comedy and not only did we get a classic russelism on the radio, it exposed two of my greatest on-the-grid enemies for...subpar racecraft let's say...

15. a prediction for next year.

this may be wishful thinking on my part but i predict that all of the rookies (or novices in the case of ollie and liam) will score points next year!

16. what you're most excited to see next year.

i SHOULD be most excited for lewis and charles at ferrari together next year. and to be clear i can't wait for them to be teammates and hopefully crush the competition. but as someone who is both a chirlie and a...lewirlie (???) i am also TERRIFIED of the inevitable pitting of two bad bitches against each other :(

but luckily for me i have haasteban era to look forward to <3. and all of the snippets we've been lucky to receive so far just make me more and more excited! laura mueller supremacy (seriously though the first female race engineer in f1 history!!!). esteban looking hot af in the haas gear. esteban...being treated like a human being? having competent leadership? a car that doesn't completely suck? what novel concepts! esteban taking ollie under his wing (like 2021 estenando). future chesteban interactions through shared custody of ollie???

a part of me will miss pierresteban teammates era but honestly i think it's for the best for it to end on the insane high of the brazil double podium. those two have been pitted against each other from their earliest karting days by SO MANY FORCES because of all the similarities they share and clearly alpine doesn't know how to handle...well anything. we would've had more incidents like australia 2023, suzuka 2023, monaco 2024, canada 2024, austria 2024 etc. and i just know it wouldn't have ended well. to paraphrase casablanca...at least we'll always have são paulo <3.

[head-post]

UK voters prioritise relations with Europe over US

Voters believe the UK should prioritise relations with Europe over the US, a poll has revealed.

Some 44% of people believe the UK’s economic future lies with its immediate neighbours in the EU, compared to 19% who think the government should prioritise ties with the US, a YouGov poll commissioned by Best For Britain has revealed.

The poll, which polled more than 4,300 people, was conducted between 25 and 27 November, as President-elect Donald Trump looks set to raise trade tariffs on goods imported into the US. He has already raised the threat of tariffs with his closest neighbours, Canada and Mexico, in an attempt to curb migration, and has also imposed new duties on Chinese goods.

The blow to the previous government’s Global Britain strategy, which aimed to expand Britain’s trading partners to fast-growing economies around the world, has caused voters to view these countries unfavourably.

China, India, Saudi Arabia and Brazil all received 12 per cent or lower confidence scores from respondents.

Voters who previously supported the Tories but switched to Labour in the summer were among those who backed closer ties with Europe, suggesting the government can be confident it will not split its electoral coalition by prioritising trade with the bloc. Some 160 people surveyed were part of this group of voters.

Although polls show that the public favours closer ties with Europe over the US, Sir Keir Starmer has rejected suggestions that Britain should make that choice, recently calling them “simply wrong.” The Prime Minister sought to lay the groundwork for a warm relationship with the Trump administration by meeting the president-elect in New York in September.

Since coming to power, he has also tried to repair Britain’s relations with European countries, meeting leaders from across the continent during his five months as prime minister.

A test of whether his strategy will bear fruit will be the renegotiation of the Trade and Co-operation Agreement – the bedrock of UK-EU relations after Brexit – in 2026.

The influential commission, made up of MPs and business leaders, which made recommendations on the UK-EU relationship after Brexit, will reconvene. The UK Trade and Business Commission will sit under the new leadership of Labour MP Andrew Lewin.

Read more HERE

[nora-durst]

A list of national grassroots feminist organizations that are going to be looking for membership right now:

Young Feminist Party (formerly known as Generation Ratify): founders of the #ERANow movement, a student-run organization trying to get the Equal Rights Amendment finally published to enshrine the rights of women and gender expansive folks in the Constitution. I know personally that they are going full throttle ahead in the next couple of months to try and get Biden to do this before Trump takes office as our surest bet to protect trans and abortion rights. Most of their membership is based on the East Coast but they are a national organization that anyone can join from anywhere.

The Feminist Front: an organization of youth 15-35 advocating for feminism that fights back (hence the name “front”). They organize around reproductive rights, protecting trans youth, prison abolition, combatting disinformation in immigrant communities, and Palestinian freedom. They work closely with the Young Feminist Party. Their leadership is located in LA and NY but they are a national organization that anyone from anywhere can join and they are eager to expand to more local chapters.

Palestinian Feminist Collective: an intergenerational body of Palestinian and Arab feminists that centers the Palestinian struggle for social and political liberation through anti-colonialism. Their current project is the Palestinian Feminist Futures Calendar & Program, where they created a calendar of Palestinian feminist art and have a monthly Zoom event centered around the activist principles of each art piece.

Black Feminist Future: a political hub of Black feminists focused on galvanizing and harnessing the social and political power of Black women and gender-expansive folks. They are focused on developing Black feminist leaders, disrupting the culture of misogynoir, and improving the material conditions for Black women, girls, and gender-oppressed people. They host town halls, raise funds for Black reproductive justice organizations, conduct labs and trainings, work to get out the vote for Black feminist candidates, and organize in-person socials for Black feminists to meet and build organizing power. They are mostly based in the Southern United States but you can join from anywhere.

Af3irm: An organization of women engaged in transnational feminist, anti-imperialist activism and dedicated to the fight against oppression in all its forms through militant movement-building and grassroots organizing in the United States. They have local chapters in LA, San Diego, Hawai’i, Boston, and New York/New Jersey.

Radical Women: a socialist feminist collective of cis women, trans women, and nonbinary people united by anti-capitalist feminist ideals engaged in multi-issue organizing for social and economic justice. They are a national organization based in Seattle; they have national online meetings on the 4th Saturday of each month at 2pm PT/5pm ET. They also have an Australian chapter.

Gender Liberation Movement: a volunteer-run national collective centering bodily autonomy and self-determination in the face of gender-based sociopolitical threats; specifically, abortion and trans healthcare access. In September, they organized the first-ever Gender Liberation March and are currently organizing an action that will take place in Washington D.C. in December as the Supreme Court hears the case that is challenging Tennessee’s trans-affirming healthcare ban. I believe they are mostly located in NY but you can join from anywhere.

The Ruth Project: a youth advocacy organization fighting against gender discriminatory policies. Their big initiatives are fighting sexist school dress codes, protecting Title IX, and promoting sexual harassment education. They are a national organization with members all across the US; they also have initiatives in Canada and Europe.

UltraViolet: an intersectional community working for feminist cultural and political change. Right now they are focused on expanding and protecting reproductive healthcare, ending sexual assault and harassment (including SA in the cyber sphere and AI), and fighting back against sexism and disinformation in the media. They work through social media campaigns, online petitions, and by leveraging connections to influence and pressure journalists, executives, board members, elected officials, and celebrities to make decisions that improve the material conditions of women. They’re a national organization that can be joined from anywhere.

I also want to shout-out Rising Majority, which is actually a collective of organizations that several of the above organizations are a part of. They host lots of great Zoom and in-person events across the country where you can meet folks from the above orgs as well as other like-minded folks, and learn more about organizing in general. They are built around long-term strategies for the next 25 years to build a united front of progressives and leftists and bring more people into the movement.

Lastly, a few things:

This list is not exhaustive by any means! I will likely be reblogging this with additions in the coming days. I wanted to specifically list feminist orgs because that is the organizing space I am most familiar with; I also wanted to only list non-local organizations that the highest amount of people would be able to join. I will probably update this list at some point soon with more local feminist orgs.

Please reblog with your own additions if you have any!

Many of these organizations focus on different specific issues, have different org structures, and use different strategies; some may be a better fit for you or more in alignment with your specific beliefs than others, and that’s okay! We need all kinds of people utilizing all kinds of strategies to build out our power.

You don’t need to know the first thing about organizing to join these orgs! They need volunteers and people on the ground. They will train you and guide you and help you and will take whatever you might bring to the table, even if it’s just attending their monthly calls. They just want people who believe in their cause and are willing to stand with them.

If for whatever reason you can’t join them, donate to them! Many of these orgs are very small and need all the help they can get.

Now is the time to get off your phone, get involved, get organized. We are stronger together, in community.

Feel free to DM me with any questions!

[zee-man-chatter]

Ronald Reagan summarized his long-held suspicions about the effectiveness and morality of the role of government in people’s lives by saying, “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are ‘I’m from the government and I’m here to help.’”

Big, greedy corporations and a very socialist Trudeau government are turning Canada into a country that is producing less and costing more to live in. Food companies are enjoying record profits, while workers can barely afford to eat. Considering the corporations fund the politicians, it's not looking good for the future, but this can't last forever either. Somethings got to break!

[sonneillonv]

Just in case you want to be angry tonight! Transcript under the cut in case you hit a paywall.

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Reach Out Updated: April 30, 2024 6:27 PM EDT | Originally published: April 30, 2024 7:00 AM EDT

Former President Donald Trump sat down for a wide-ranging interview with TIME at his Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach, Fla., on April 12, and a follow-up conversation by phone on April 27.

Over the course of the interviews, Trump discussed his agenda for a second term, which includes deporting millions of people, cutting the U.S. civil service, and intervening more directly in Justice Department prosecutions than his predecessors. He also discussed his thinking on other issues, including abortion, crime, trade, Ukraine, Israel, and the prospects for political violence in this election cycle.

Read More: How Far Trump Would Go

Below is a transcript, lightly edited for clarity, of the interviews between Trump and TIME National Politics Reporter Eric Cortellessa. Click here to read our fact-check.

Let’s start with Day One: January 20, 2025. You have said that you will take a suite of aggressive actions on the border and on immigration—

Donald Trump: Yes.

You have vowed to—

Trump: And on energy.

Yes, yes. And we'll come to that, certainly. You have vowed to launch the largest deportation operation in American history. Your advisors say that includes—

Trump: Because we have no choice. I don't believe this is sustainable for a country, what's happening to us, with probably 15 million and maybe as many as 20 million by the time Biden's out. Twenty million people, many of them from jails, many of them from prisons, many of them from mental institutions. I mean, you see what's going on in Venezuela and other countries. They're becoming a lot safer.

Well, let's just talk—so you have said you're gonna do this massive deportation operation. I want to know specifically how you plan to do that.

Trump: So if you look back into the 1950s, Dwight Eisenhower, he's not known for that, you know, you don't think of him that way. Because you see, Ike, but Dwight Eisenhower was very big on illegal immigration not coming into our country. And he did a massive deportation of people. He was doing it for a long time. He got very proficient at it. He was bringing them just to the other side of the border. And they would be back in the country within a matter of days. And then he started bringing them 3,000 miles away—

What’s your plan, sir?

Trump: We will be using local law enforcement. And we will absolutely start with the criminals that are coming in. And they're coming in in numbers that we've never seen before. And we do have a new category of crime. It's called migrant crime. It's, ugh, you see it all the time. You see it in New York City where they're having fistfights with police. And far worse than that. You see it all the time. And you're seeing it in all of the cities, especially the Democratic-run cities, which is a lot of the big ones, but you're seeing it in Chicago, you're seeing it in New York and L.A. and getting worse than in other places.

Does that include using the U.S. military?

Trump: It would. When we talk military, generally speaking, I talk National Guard. I've used the National Guard in Minneapolis. And if I didn't use it, I don't think you'd have Minneapolis standing right now, because it was really bad. But I think in terms of the National Guard. But if I thought things were getting out of control, I would have no problem using the military, per se. We have to have safety in our country. We have to have law and order in our country. And whichever gets us there, but I think the National Guard will do the job. You know, had Nancy Pelosi used the National Guard. You know, I offered them whatever they wanted, but I often—

You would use the military inland as well as at the border?

Trump: I don't think I'd have to do that. I think the National Guard would be able to do that. If they weren't able to, then I’d use the military. You know, we have a different situation. We have millions of people now that we didn't have two years ago.

Sir, the Posse Comitatus Act says that you can't deploy the U.S. military against civilians. Would you override that?

Trump: Well, these aren’t civilians. These are people that aren't legally in our country. This is an invasion of our country. An invasion like probably no country has ever seen before. They're coming in by the millions. I believe we have 15 million now. And I think you'll have 20 million by the time this ends. And that's bigger than almost every state.

So you can see yourself using the military to address this?

Trump: I can see myself using the National Guard and, if necessary, I'd have to go a step further. We have to do whatever we have to do to stop the problem we have. Again, we have a major force that’s forming in our country, when you see that over the last three weeks, 29,000 people came in from China, and they're all fighting age, and they're mostly males. Yeah, you have to do what you have to do to stop crime and to stop what's taking place at the border.

Would that include building new migrant detention camps?

Trump: We wouldn't have to do very much of that. Because we'll be bringing them out of the country. We're not leaving them in the country. We're bringing them out. It’s been done before.

Will you build new ones?

Trump: And it was done by Obama in a form of jails, you know, prisons. And I got blamed for that for four months. And then people realized that was done by him, not by me.

So are you ruling out that you would build new migrant detention camps?

Trump: No, I would not rule out anything. But there wouldn't be that much of a need for them, because of the fact that we're going to be moving them out. We're going to bring them back from where they came.

I ask because your close aide and adviser Stephen Miller said that part of what it would take to carry out this deportation operation would include new migrant detention camps.

Trump: It’s possible that we’ll do it to an extent but we shouldn't have to do very much of it, because we're going to be moving them out as soon as we get to it. And we'll be obviously starting with the criminal element. And we're going to be using local police because local police know them by name, by first name, second name, and third name. I mean, they know them very well.

How are you going to get state and local police departments to participate in this? Under what authority is the President able to do that?

Trump: Well, there's a possibility that some won't want to participate, and they won't partake in the riches, you know. We have to do this. This is not a sustainable problem for our country.

Does that mean you would create funding incentives from the federal government for state and local police departments?

Trump: It could very well be. I want to give police immunity from prosecution because the liberal groups or the progressive groups, depending on what they want to be called, somewhat liberal, somewhat progressive, but they are—they’re very strong on the fact that they want to leave everybody in, I guess, I don't know. You know, sanctuary cities are failing all over the place. And I really believe that there's a pent-up demand to end sanctuary cities by people that were in favor of sanctuary cities, because it's just not working out for the country.

So by your own telling, these are new, bold, and aggressive actions that you would take.

Trump: I don't think they're bold actions. I think they’re actions that are common sense. But I really believe, Eric, that they’re actions that—it's incredible that they've allowed so many people to come into our country, especially considering they were unchecked and unvetted, most of them. They're just pouring in. They're pouring in at levels that no country has ever seen before. It's an invasion of our country.

Well, let me put it this way: They’re new and they're certainly going to be tested in the courts. If the courts rule against you, do you commit to complying with all court orders upheld by the Supreme Court?

Trump: I will be complying with court orders. And I'll be doing everything on a very legal basis, just as I built the wall. You know, I built a tremendous wall, which gave us great numbers. I also was willing to do far more than I said I was going to do. I was also and am willing to—they should have completed the wall. I completed what I said I was going to do, much more than I said I was going to do. But as you do it, you realize you need more wall in different locations, locations that, at one point, people thought you wouldn't be able to—you wouldn't need.

But, and—the first glimpse I found that Biden, frankly, wanted open borders, because I never believed it. It just didn't make sense. The first time I really saw that was when he didn't want to install the wall that was already built and could have been thrown up, hundreds of miles of additional work could have been thrown up in a period of three weeks.

I want to talk about your plan to build the wall in just a second, but just to come back on that. So you commit to complying with all Supreme Court orders? All orders upheld by the Supreme Court?

Trump: Yeah, I would do that, sure. I have great respect for the Supreme Court.

So come back to the border wall for a second because in the last term, you tried to negotiate border funding with Democrats, Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer, and had an opportunity for $25 billion. Didn't work. Got the $1.4 billion—

Trump: But with the $25 billion things came that were unacceptable.

Codifying the DREAMER protections—

Trump: Well, a lot of other things besides that. There were a lot of bad things. Sure, they gave you money for the wall. I basically took the money from the military, as you know. I consider this an invasion of our country and I took the money from the—

So my question is, what do you plan to do in the second term? Are you going to move right away on day one to direct federal funds to continue building the wall? Are you going to aim for legislation? How do you plan to do?

Trump: I think what we will do is we will complete—and when you say and when I say complete the wall, I built much more wall than I ever thought necessary. But as you build it, you find out that you need it. And we built it, and there were certain areas then you find out that are leaking and they leak. Like a politician leaks, they leak. And we would get that and we would build that and then you build something else. And it was just a system, we had a great system going. And we could have added another 200 miles of wall and good territory for it. Because it really does work, you know, walls work. Walls and wheels. I would say, you know, a lot of, see what you have here, your tape recorder, everything else is going to be obsolete in about six months. You'll have something that's much better. But the two things that are never obsolete are walls and wheels.

Something you said a moment ago. You said, “We want to protect police from prosecution.” What do you mean by that?

Trump: Police have been—their authority has been taken away. If something happens with them, even if they're doing a very good job, they take away their house, they take away their pension, they take away their, I mean, essentially, they end up losing their families over it. They take away everything. They prosecute people. And we have to give the police back the power and respect that they deserve. Now, there will be some mistakes, and there are certain bad people and that's a terrible thing. But there are far more problems with what's happened now, where police are standing outside of a department store as it’s being robbed and 500 mostly young people are walking out carrying air conditioners and televisions and everything else. And the police would like to do something about it. But they're told to stand down. They said don't do it. And if you do anything about it, if you stop crime, we're going to go after your pension, your home, your family, your wife or your husband. And you know, police are being prosecuted all the time. And we want to give them immunity from prosecution if they're doing their job.

Would you try to pass a law for that through Congress?

Trump: Excuse me.

Would you push a bill through Congress to do that?

Trump: We’d have to take a look at that.

Let’s shift to the economy, sir. You have floated a 10% tariff on all imports, and a more than 60% tariff on Chinese imports. Can I just ask you now: Is that your plan?

Trump: It may be more than that. It may be a derivative of that. A derivative of that. But it will be somebody—look when they come in and they steal our jobs, and they steal our wealth, they steal our country.

When you say more than that, though: You mean maybe more than 10% on all imports?

Trump: More than 10%, yeah. I call it a ring around the country. We have a ring around the country. A reciprocal tax also, in addition to what we said. And if we do that, the numbers are staggering. I don't believe it will have much of an effect because they're making so much money off of us. I also don't believe that the costs will go up that much. And a lot of people say, “Oh, that's gonna be a tax on us.” I don't believe that. I think it's a tax on the country that's doing it. And I know. Look, I took in billions of dollars from China. Nobody else ever did anything on China. I also let people know what the threat of China was. China was going along making $500 to $600 billion a year and nobody was ever even mentioning it until I came along. What's happening in Detroit is very sad because electric cars with this EV mandate, which is ridiculous, because they don't go far. They cost too much and they're going to be made in China. They're all going to be made in China.

Mr. President, most economists—and I know not all, there isn't unanimity on this—but most economists say that tariffs increase prices.

Trump: Yeah.

Are you comfortable with additional inflation?

Trump: No, I've seen. I've seen—I don't believe it'll be inflation. I think it'll be lack of loss for our country. Because what will happen and what other countries do very successfully, China being a leader of it. India is very difficult to deal with. India—I get along great with Modi, but they're very difficult to deal with on trade. France is frankly very difficult on trade. Brazil is very difficult on trade. What they do is they charge you so much to go in. They say, we don't want you to send cars into Brazil or we don't want you to send cars into China or India. But if you want to build a plant inside of our country, that's okay and employ our people. And that's basically what I'm doing. And that’s—I was doing and I was doing it strongly, but it was ready to really start and then we got hit with COVID. We had to fix that problem. And we ended up handing over a higher stock market substantially than when COVID first came in. But if you look at the first few years of what we did, the numbers we had were breathtaking. There's never been an economy—

Sir, the economy was certainly humming during your first term. There's no question about it. But, you know, Moody's did say that your trade war with China cost the U.S. economy $316 billion and 300,000 jobs. [Editor’s note: The estimate of $316 billion was made by Bloomberg Economics, not Moody’s.]

Trump: Yeah. Moody’s doesn’t know what they’re talking about. We had the greatest economy in history. And Moody's acknowledges that. So how did it cost us if we had such a good economy? Everybody admits it. If we didn't do that, we would have no steel industry right now. They were dumping steel all over this country. And I put a 50% tariff on steel. It was gonna go higher. And the people that love me most are businesses, but in particular, the steel industry. They love me because I saved their industry. I've had owners of steel companies and executives of steel companies come up and start crying when they see me. They say, nobody, nobody helped us until you came along. China was dumping massive amounts of steel into our country. And we saved the steel industry.

Do you think that businesses pass along the cost of a tax to the consumer?

Trump: No, I don’t believe so. I believe that it cost the country that—I think they make less. I actually think that the country that is being taxed makes less. I don't believe—

You don't believe that businesses pass on the cost?

Trump: No, I think what happens is you build. What happens to get out of the whole situation is you end up building, instead of having your product brought in from China, because of that additional cost, you end up making the product in the United States. And that's been traditionally what happened. If you look at what goes on. If you look at China, they don't want our cars. They charge them tremendous numbers. You look at India. India is a very good example. I get along very well with the people, representatives of India. Modi is a great guy, and he's doing what he has to do. But we had a case with Harley Davidson, I had Harley Davidson on the White House. I said, “How are you doing? How's business? Very good? Everything's good?” I said, “Just out of curiosity, how do you deal with India?” “Not Well.” Now you’ve got to remember, this is five years ago, four years ago, they said, “Not well. We can't do business with India, because they charged us such a big tariff, it was over 100%.” And at that price, you know, there's a point at which the consumer breaks and can't buy. They said, “But they will do anything for us to build a Harley Davidson plant in India. They don't want us to give motorcycles to India, but they do want us to build a plant.” I said, “Well, I'm not going to be very happy with that.” But that's ultimately what happened. They built a plant in India. And now there's no tax, and I'm saying we're doing the same thing. We're gonna build plants here. Now something that's taking place that nobody's talking about, maybe don’t know, but I have a friend who builds auto plants. That's what he does. If you ask him to build a simple apartment someplace, he wouldn't know how to do it. But he can build the plant, millions of feet, the biggest plants in the world. He's incredible. And I said to him, “I want to see one of your plants.” And he said to me, “Well, are you ready to go to Mexico? Are you ready to go to China?” I said, “No, I want to see it here.” He said, “We're not really building them here, not the big ones, the big ones are being built right now in Mexico or China.” China now is building plants in Mexico to make cars to sell into the United States. And these are the biggest plants anywhere in the world. And that's not going to happen when I'm President, because I will tariff them at 100%. Because I'm not going to allow them to steal the rest of our business. You know, Mexico has taken 31% of our auto manufacturing, auto business. And China has taken a much bigger piece than that. We have a very small percentage of that business left and then you have a poor fool like the gentleman is at the United Auto Workers who is okay with the fact that we're going to do all electric cars and it's so sad to see because the all electric cars are just not what the consumer wants.

Sir, I understand your position—

Trump: And by the way, I have no problem with all electric. I think it's great. And you can buy electric, I think it's fine. They don't go far. They have problems. They don't work in the cold. They don't work in the heat. There's a lot of problems. When I was in Iowa where they were all over. They were all over the streets. It was 40 degrees below zero the night of the Iowa caucuses.

I was there with you.

Trump: Right. That’s right. I’ve never heard of cold weather like that.

Just to clarify something you said a moment ago: You're considering a 100% tariff on Chinese and Mexican imports?

Trump: I didn't say that. They charge us 100%. But they charge us much more than that. India charges us more than that. Brazil charges us what—Brazil's a very big, very big tariff country. I ask people, Who are the worst to deal with? I'm not going to give that to you because I don't want to insult the countries because I actually get along with them. But you'd be surprised. The E.U. is very tough with us. They don't take our foreign products. They don't take our cars. We take Mercedes Benz and Volkswagen and BMW. They don't take our cars. If we want to sell a Chevrolet, even if we want to sell a Cadillac, a beautiful Cadillac Escalade, if we want to sell our cars into Germany, as an example, they won't take them.

Let's come back to Europe later.

Trump: I said to Angela Merkel, “Angela, how many Chevrolets are in the middle of Berlin?” She said none. I said, “You're right about that. But we take your cars, including cars that aren't that expensive, like Volkswagen, relatively speaking.” I said, “Do you think that's fair?” She said, “Probably not, but until you came along, nobody ever mentioned it.”

Sir, you've been critical of how Israel has prosecuted its war against Hamas. In a recent interview, you said that it needed to “get it over with” and “get back to normalcy.”

Trump: Yeah.

So as President, would you consider withholding American military assistance to Israel to push it to winding down its war?

Trump: Okay. So let me, I have to start just as I did inside. [Asks an aide to turn down the air conditioner.] I don't have to go through the whole thing. But as you know, Iran was broke. Iran is the purveyor of—

No, I know that but would you—

Trump: No, but think of the great job I did. It would have never happened. It would have never happened. You wouldn't have had—Hamas had no money. Do you know that?

I do understand that, sir, I just want to know—

Trump: No, but I hope it can be pointed out. During my term, there were stories that Iran didn't have the money to give to any—there was very little terrorism. We had none. I had four years of—we had no terrorism. We didn't have a World Trade Center knocked down. You know, Bush used to say, “Well, we’ve been a safe country.” I said they knocked down the World Trade Center in the middle of your term. Do you remember that one during the debate? That was a good one. But it was true, very true. But we had no terror during our—and we got rid of ISIS 100%. Now they're starting to come back.

I want to know—you said you want to get Israel to wind down the war. You said it needs to “get it over with.” How are you going to make that happen? Would you consider withholding aid?

Trump: I think that Israel has done one thing very badly: public relations. I don't think that the Israel Defense Fund or any other group should be sending out pictures every night of buildings falling down and being bombed with possibly people in those buildings every single night, which is what they do.

So you won’t rule out withholding or conditioning aid?

Trump: No, I—we have to be. Look, there's been no president that's done what I've done for Israel. When you look at all of the things that I've done, and it starts with the Iran nuclear deal. You know, Bibi Netanyahu begged Obama not to do that deal. I ended that deal. And if they were smart and energetic, other than trying to get Trump, they would have made a deal because they were in bad shape. They should have made a deal with Iran. They didn't prosecute that. They didn't make that deal. But I did Golan Heights.

You did.

Trump: Nobody even thought of Golan Heights. I gave them Golan Heights. I did the embassy and in Jerusalem. Jerusalem became the capital. I built the embassy. I even built the embassy.

Right.

Trump: And it's a beautiful embassy for a lot less money than anybody ever thought possible. And you've heard that. But there's been no president that's done what I've done in Israel. And it's interesting. The people of Israel appreciate it. I have like a 98%—I have the highest approval numbers.

Do you know who doesn’t have a high approval rating right now in Israel, though?

Trump: Bibi.

Yeah. Do you think it's time for him to go?

Trump: Well, I had a bad experience with Bibi. And it had to do with Soleimani, because as you probably know by now, he dropped out just before the attack. And I said, “What's that all about?” Because that was going to be a joint and all of a sudden, we were told that Israel was not doing it. And I was not happy about that. That was something I never forgot. And it showed me something. I would say that what happened on—the October 7 should have never happened.

It happened on his watch.

Trump: No, it happened on his watch. And I think it's had a profound impact on him, despite everything. Because people said that shouldn't have happened. They have the most sophisticated equipment. They had—everything was there to stop that. And a lot of people knew about it, you know, thousands and thousands of people knew about it, but Israel didn't know about it, and I think he's being blamed for that very strongly, being blamed. And now you have the hostage situation—

Has his time passed?

Trump: And I happen to think that on the hostages, knowing something about the enemy, and knowing something about people, I think you have very few hostages left. You know, they talk about all of these hostages. I don't believe these people are able or even wanting to take care of people as negotiations. I don't—I think the hostages are going to be far fewer than people think, which is a very sad thing.

You think you could work better with Benny Gantz than Netanyahu in a second term?

Trump: I think Benny Gantz is good, but I'm not prepared to say that. I haven't spoken to him about it. But you have some very good people that I've gotten to know in Israel that could do a good job.

Do you think—

Trump: And I will say this, Bibi Netanyahu rightfully has been criticized for what took place on October 7.

Do you think an outcome of that war between Israel and Hamas should be a two state solution between Israelis and Palestinians?

Trump: Most people thought it was going to be a two-state solution. I'm not sure a two-state solution anymore is gonna work. Everybody was talking about two states, even when I was there. I was saying, “What do you like here? Do you like two states?” Now people are going back to—it depends where you are. Every day it changes now. If Israel’s making progress, they don't want two states. They want everything. And if Israel's not making progress, sometimes they talk about two-state solution. Two-state solution seemed to be the idea that people liked most, the policy or the idea that people liked above.

Do you like it?

Trump: It depends when. There was a time when I thought two states could work. Now I think two states is going to be very, very tough. I think it's going to be much tougher to get. I also think you have fewer people that liked the idea. You had a lot of people that liked the idea four years ago. Today, you have far fewer people that like that idea.

You said–

Trump; There may not be another idea. You know, there are people that say that that situation is one of the toughest, the toughest to settle.

Yeah, absolutely.

Trump: Because children grow up and they're taught to hate Jewish people at a level that nobody thought was possible. And I had a friend, a very good friend, Sheldon Adelson, who felt that it was impossible to make a deal because the level of hatred was so great. And I think it was much more so on one side than the other, but the level of hatred of Jewish people was so great, and taught from the time they were in kindergarten and before. He felt that—and he was a great dealmaker. He was a very rich man. He was a rich man because of his ability to make deals. And he loved Israel more than anything else. He loved Israel, and he wanted to protect Israel. And he felt that it was impossible to make a deal because of the level of hatred.

Do you feel that way now?

Trump: I disagreed with it. But so far, he hasn’t been wrong.

You said you're proud to be one of the first presidents in generations to have not gotten the United States into a war. You addressed this a little bit in the press conference. But if Iran and Israel got into a war, will you join in Israel side?

Trump: I have been very loyal to Israel, more loyal than any other president. I've done more for Israel than any other president. Yeah, I will protect Israel.

You came out this week and said that abortion should be left to the states and you said you won't sign a federal ban. So just to be clear: Will you veto any bill that imposes any federal restrictions on abortions?

Trump: You don’t need a federal ban. We just got out of the federal. You know, if you go back on Roe v. Wade, Roe v. Wade was all about—it wasn't about abortion so much as bringing it back to the states. So the states would negotiate deals. Florida is going to be different from Georgia and Georgia is going to be different from other places. But that's what's happening now. It's very interesting. But remember this, every legal scholar for 53 years has said that issue is a state issue from a legal standpoint. And it's starting to work that way. And what's happened is people started getting into the 15 weeks and the five weeks or the six weeks and they started getting into, you know, time periods. And they started all of a sudden deciding what abortion was going to be.

People want to know whether you would veto a bill, if it came to your desk, that would impose any federal restrictions. This is really important to a lot of voters.

Trump: But you have to remember this: There will never be that chance because it won't happen. You're never going to have 60 votes. You're not going to have it for many, many years, whether it be Democrat or Republican. Right now, it’s essentially 50-50. I think we have a chance to pick up a couple, but a couple means we're at 51 or 52. We have a long way to go. So it's not gonna happen, because you won't have that. Okay. But with all of that being said, it's all about the states, it's about state rights. States’ rights. States are going to make their own determination.

Do you think that—

Trump: And you know what? That’s taken tremendous pressure off everybody. But we—it was ill-defined. And to be honest, the Republicans, a lot of Republicans, didn't know how to talk about the issue. That issue never affected me.

So just to be clear, then: You won't commit to vetoing the bill if there's federal restrictions—federal abortion restrictions?

Trump : I won't have to commit to it because it’ll never—number one, it’ll never happen. Number two, it’s about states’ rights. You don't want to go back into the federal government. This was all about getting out of the federal government. And this was done, Eric, because of—this was done, this issue, has been simplified greatly over the last one week. This is about and was originally about getting out of the federal government. The last thing you want to do is go back into the federal government. And the states are just working their way through it. Look at Ohio. Ohio passed something that people were a little surprised at. Kansas, I mean, places that are conservative and big Trump states, I mean, Ohio and way up Kansas, all these states, but they passed what they want to pass. It's about states rights.

I understand, sir. Your allies in the Republican Study Committee, which makes up about 80% of the GOP caucus, have included the Life at Conception Act in their 2025 budget proposal. The measure would grant full legal rights to embryos. Is that your position as well?

Trump: Say it again. What?

The Life at Conception Act would grant full legal rights to embryos, included in their 2025 budget proposal. Is that your position?

Trump: I'm leaving everything up to the states. The states are going to be different. Some will say yes. Some will say no. Texas is different than Ohio.

Would you veto that bill?

Trump: I don't have to do anything about vetoes, because we now have it back in the states.

Okay.

Trump: They’re gonna make those determinations.

Do you think women should be able to get the abortion pill mifepristone?

Trump: Well, I have an opinion on that, but I'm not going to explain. I'm not gonna say it yet. But I have pretty strong views on that. And I'll be releasing it probably over the next week.

Well, this is a big question, Mr. President, because your allies have called for enforcement of the Comstock Act, which prohibits the mailing of drugs used for abortions by mail. The Biden Department of Justice has not enforced it. Would your Department of Justice enforce it?

Trump: I will be making a statement on that over the next 14 days.

You will?

Trump: Yeah, I have a big statement on that. I feel very strongly about it. I actually think it’s a very important issue.

Got it. You think this issue should be left to the states. You've made that perfectly clear. Are you comfortable if states decide to punish women who access abortions after the procedure is banned?

Trump: Are you talking about number of weeks?

Yeah. Let’s say there’s a 15-week ban—

Trump: Again, that’s going to be—I don't have to be comfortable or uncomfortable. The states are going to make that decision. The states are going to have to be comfortable or uncomfortable, not me.

Do you think states should monitor women's pregnancies so they can know if they've gotten an abortion after the ban?

Trump: I think they might do that. Again, you'll have to speak to the individual states. Look, Roe v. Wade was all about bringing it back to the states. And that was a legal, as well as possibly in the hearts of some, in the minds of some, a moral decision. But it was largely a legal decision. Every legal scholar, Democrat, Republican, and other wanted that issue back at the states. You know, Roe v. Wade was always considered very bad law. Very bad. It was a very bad issue from a legal standpoint. People were amazed it lasted as long as it did. And what I was able to do is through the choice of some very good people who frankly were very courageous, the justices it turned out to be you know, the Republican—

States will decide if they're comfortable or not—

Trump: Yeah the states—

Prosecuting women for getting abortions after the ban. But are you comfortable with it?

Trump: The states are going to say. It’s irrelevant whether I’m comfortable or not. It's totally irrelevant, because the states are going to make those decisions. And by the way, Texas is going to be different than Ohio. And Ohio is going to be different than Michigan. I see what's happening.

President Trump, we're here in Florida. You're a resident of Florida.

Trump: Yeah.

How do you plan to vote in the state’s abortion referendum this November that would overturn DeSantis’s six-week ban?

Trump: Well, I said I thought six weeks is too severe.

You did.

Trump: You know, I've said that previously.

Yes.

Trump: I think it was a semi-controversial statement when I made it, and it's become less and less controversial with time. I think Ron was hurt very badly when he did this because the people—even conservative women in Florida thought it was—

Well this referendum would undo that. Are you gonna vote for it in November?

Trump: Well, it'll give something else. I don't tell you what I'm gonna vote for. I only tell you the state's gonna make a determination.

Okay, sir. Violent crime is going down throughout the country. There was a 6% drop in—

Trump: I don't believe it.

You don’t believe that?

Trump: Yeah, they’re fake numbers.

You think so?

Trump: Well it came out last night. The FBI gave fake numbers.

I didn't see that, but the FBI said that there was a 13% drop in 2023. [Editor's note: This statistic refers specifically to homicides.]

Trump: I don’t believe it. No, it’s a lie. It’s fake news.

Sir, these numbers are collected by state and local police departments across the country. Most of them support you. Are they wrong?

Trump: Yeah. Last night. Well, maybe, maybe not. The FBI fudged the numbers and other people fudged numbers. There is no way that crime went down over the last year. There's no way because you have migrant crime. Are they adding migrant crime? Or do they consider that a different form of crime?

So these local police departments are wrong?

Trump: I don't believe it's from the local police. What I saw was the FBI was giving false numbers.

Okay. So if elected, going on to the Department of Justice. If elected, would you instruct your Attorney General to prosecute the state officials who are prosecuting you, like Alvin Bragg and Fani Willis?

Trump: Well, we're gonna look at a lot of things like they're looking. What they've done is a terrible thing. No, I don't want to do that. I was not happy looking at Clinton. I was not happy. I think it's a terrible thing. But unfortunately, what they've done is they've lifted up the lid and they've—what they've done to me is incredible. Over nothing.

Well you said Alvin Bragg should be prosecuted. Would you instruct your Attorney General to prosecute him?

Trump: When did I say Alvin Bragg should be prosecuted?

It was at a rally.

Trump: I don’t think I said that, no.

I can pull it up.

Trump: No.

So just to be clear: You wouldn’t instruct your Attorney General to prosecute Alvin Bragg?

Trump: We are going to have great retribution through success. We're going to make our country successful again. Our retribution is going to be through success of our country.

Would you fire a U.S. attorney who didn't prosecute someone you ordered him to? Him or her?

Trump: It depends on the situation, honestly.

So you might?

Trump: It would depend on the situation. Yeah.

Okay, so sir, you said that you would appoint a real special prosecutor to go after Biden and his family—

Trump: Well, it depends what happens with the Supreme Court. Look, a president should have immunity. That includes Biden. If they've ruled that they don't have immunity, Biden, probably nothing to do with me, he would be prosecuted for 20 different acts, because he's created such. You take a look at not only his criminal acts of taking a lot of money and being a Manchurian Candidate. Look at what happened in Afghanistan. Look at what happened throughout the world. Look at what happened with him allowing Russia to do that with Ukraine. That would have never happened with me, and it didn't happen. And I knew Putin very well.

President Trump, isn’t going after your political opponents what they do in a banana republic?

Trump: That’s what’s happening now. Yeah.

Well okay—

Trump: No, no, no, no. Eric, that’s what’s happening now. I’ve got to be on Monday—in fact, we’re doing this today because Monday was a little bit tougher, because I have to be in a criminal court on Monday.

That’s right.

Trump: Over a non-criminal case. It's not even a criminal case. And it's like I said, if you go to Andy McCarthy, or if you go to Jonathan Turley, two real experts, or if you go to all the legal scholars that wrote, they say, this isn't even a criminal case. And I have a judge who's more conflicted than any judge anyone's ever seen. And he's a mean guy who hates Trump. And you take a look at what's going on there. You just asked me, you know, you're talking about—you just asked me a question and they're doing that to me!

Well, sir, just to be clear—

Trump: Wait a minute, I haven't had a chance to do it to them. I would be inclined not to do it. I don't want to do it to them. But a lot of that's going to have to do with the Supreme Court. Look, we are going in another two weeks to the Supreme Court. And they're going to make a ruling on presidential immunity. If they said that a president doesn't get immunity, then Biden, I am sure, will be prosecuted for all of his crimes, because he's committed many crimes. If they say, on the other hand, that a president has immunity, and I happen to think a president has to have immunity, because otherwise it's going to be just a ceremonial position. But Biden has done so many things so badly. And I'm not even talking the overt crime. I'm talking about the border, allowing all of the death and destruction at the border—

Sir—

Trump: Allowing all of this stuff. If a president doesn't have immunity. So when you asked me that question, it depends on what the Supreme Court does.

Well on that question, your lawyer, John Sauer, argued in court recently that if you as President ordered a Navy SEAL team to assassinate a political rival, you shouldn’t be prosecuted. Do you agree with your lawyer?

Trump: Well, I understood it differently. I thought it was a political rival from another country. I think I understood it differently, and I'm not sure. And John Sauer also said that first you go through an impeachment and then you make that determination based on impeachment. But a president, if you don't don't have immunity from prosecution, fairly strong immunity from prosecution. Now, if you do something just overtly very bad and very stupid, that's a different situation. That may be one of those cases.

Gotcha. So just to come back to something you were saying a moment ago, I just want to say for the record, there's no evidence that President Biden directed this prosecution against you. But even if we—

Trump: Oh sure there is.

Well, even if we stipulated that—

Trump: I always hate the way a reporter will make those statements. They know it’s so wrong. It’s just sort of to protect yourself. But no, no. His head of the Justice Department, one of the top few people, was put into the DOJ. Fani, Mr. Wade, Fani’s lover, spent hours in Washington with the DOJ working on my case. The DOJ worked with Leticia James on my case. The DOJ worked with deranged Jack Smith. He's a deranged person on my case. No, no, this is all Biden—

But the question, though—

Trump: And by the way, let me go a step further.

Okay.

Trump: On my case with a woman that I never—that I have no idea who she is, until she made a phone call. “Do you know her?” And I said, “This is something that's a figment of her imagination.”

You’re talking about E. Jean Carroll?

Trump: Then I got sued. Until that, I had no idea who this woman was, I have no, I had nothing to do with this woman. That was done by a political lawyer in front of a highly, in my opinion, a totally inappropriate judge, who was conflicted for a lot of reasons, who wouldn't allow us to put in evidence, he was so bad, he was so evil. But I've had three of those judges in New York now, three of them. That's all I get. And it's a very unfair situation. They've gone after me, it's called election interference. But it's even beyond election interference, what they've done, and they've never seen, and I sort of, it's amazing when you say that Biden knew nothing. Biden knew everything. Just like, he knew nothing about Tucker's business and his business.

Even if we stipulate that, do two wrongs make a right?

Trump: No, I don't, I wouldn't want to, I wouldn't want to do anything having to do with. I wouldn't want to hurt Biden. I'm not looking to hurt Biden. I wouldn't want to hurt him. I have too much respect for the office. But he is willing to hurt a former President who is very popular, who got 75 million votes. I got more votes than any other sitting president in history. And I have probably eight cases right now that are all inspired by them, including my civil case.

Medicare—

Jason Miller: Eric, the President has his dinner in about 15 minutes. So he has a few more minutes here.

Trump: Are you staying? Are you going to have dinner with everybody?

Yeah, yeah. We only have 15 minutes left?

Trump: Yeah, his dinner is at 7:15.

In that case, let’s just do some rapid-fire questions.

Trump: All right. Do you think you could do this interview with Biden?

You know, he didn’t say yes. So I’m grateful that you’re giving me the opportunity.

Trump: He will never say yes, cause he’s off. He’s off, way off.

Let's take a second to talk about January 6. You have called the men and women who have been prosecuted for their actions on January 6 “hostages” and “political prisoners.” More than 800 of these people have been sentenced through our judicial system, most of whom pleaded guilty. Some of them have been convicted by juries. You've said you will pardon them. Are you calling into question the conclusions of the justice system in more than 800 cases?

Trump: It’s a two-tier system. Because when I look at Portland, when I look at Minneapolis, where they took over police precincts and everything else, and went after federal buildings, when I look at other situations that were violent, and where people were killed, nothing happened to them. Nothing happened to them. I think it's a two-tier system of justice. I think it's a very, very sad thing. And whether you like it or not, nobody died other than Ashli.

Will you consider pardoning every one of them?

Trump: I would consider that, yes.

You would?

Trump: Yes, absolutely.

All right, so—

Trump: If somebody was evil and bad, I would look at that differently. But many of those people went in, many of those people were ushered in. You see it on tape, the police are ushering them in. They’re walking with the police.

I want to ask you another question on this. There are some former allies and staff who don't support you in this election and have cited your attempts to overturn the 2020 election. What would you say to voters who like your policies, but who believe that someone who attacked a cornerstone of democracy—the peaceful transfer of power—cannot be entrusted to preserve it?

Trump: Well, actually, I did the opposite of attack. I'm the one that tried to stop it. I offered 10,000 soldiers and Nancy Pelosi turned me down. So did the mayor of Washington, she turned me down in writing.

What would you say to those voters, though?

Trump: That I offered. Number one, I made a speech that was peaceful and patriotic that nobody reports. Nobody talks about it: peacefully and patriotically. Nobody talks. You know, the committee never used those words. They refused to allow those words. Number two, I had like five tweets that were, go home, blah, blah. I got canceled because of those tweets.

No—

Trump: No, I got canceled because of those tweets. I didn't get canceled because of bad things I said. I got canceled because of good things I said. Because when you read my tweets, and when you see the speech that I made, and when you see the statement that I made in the Oval Office in the Rose Garden, during this very dramatic and horrible period, I'm a very innocent man. Nancy Pelosi is responsible, because she refused to take the 10,000 soldiers or National Guardsmen that I offered. She refused to take them. The mayor of Washington refused to take them too. And they're responsible, you know, for the Capital.

Speaking of this, looking forward—

Trump: One other thing they did that’s so horrible and the press refuses to talk about it. They destroyed all evidence.

Are you worried about political violence in connection with this November's election?

Trump: No. I don't think you’ll have political violence.

You don’t expect anything?

Trump: I think we're gonna have a big victory. And I think there will be no violence.

Mr. President, you've talked a lot about your plan to obliterate the deep state. What exactly does that mean?

Trump: It means we want to get rid of bad people, people that have not done a good job in government. And we look at people like a company would look at people. You know, when you buy a company, you go in and you look at, how do you like the job? Job performance. They have job performance standards. And yeah, we would like to get rid of people that haven't done a good job. And there are plenty of them.

How do you plan to do that? Your team is preparing to give you the power through Schedule F, which would allow you to fire civil servants.

Trump: We’re looking at a lot of different things. Civil service is both very good and very bad. You have some people that are protected that shouldn’t be protected. And you have some people you almost want to protect because they do such a good job. I know a lot of people that are in civil service and they’re outstanding people.

Would you hire anyone who believes Joe Biden won the 2020 election?

Trump: I have no doubt that what we said was fact. The press, the fake news media, doesn't want to talk about it. You know, I have a lawsuit against the Pulitzer Foundation over the Russia, Russia, Russia hoax, because they talked about it for two and a half years and it turned out to be a total scam. And then certain writers got Nobel Prizes—

The RNC is holding litmus tests on employees, asking if they believe the election was stolen or not. Would you do the same? [Editor's Note: While the RNC is reportedly asking job applicants this question, it has denied it is a litmus test for employment.]

Trump: I wouldn’t feel good about it, because I think anybody that doesn't see that that election was stolen. It just—you look at the proof. It's so vast, state legislatures where they didn't go through the legislature. They had to go through the legislature. You look at it, it’s so vast, all of the different things. I could give you report after report on state after state of all of the fraud that was committed in the election, and if you had a really open mind, you would say I was right.

I want to get to your policies on Russia and Ukraine in a second, but President Trump, we just passed the one year anniversary of Evan Gerskovich’s detainment in Russia. Why haven't you called for his release?

Trump: I guess because I have so many things I'm working on. I have hundreds of things. And I probably have said very good things about him. Maybe it wasn't reported. But I think he's a very brave young man.

Will you do it now?

Trump: You’re talking about Wall Street Journal?

Yeah.

Trump: Oh, I would certainly call. I’ll call for it right now in your story if you'd like.

Excellent.

Trump: But I do have. I do have many, many things. And here's a difference between me and Biden: I'll get him released. He'll be released. Putin is going to release him.

Can we talk about—

Trump: I think Biden has dealt with Putin very poorly. Putin should never have gone into Ukraine. And he didn't go in for four years with me. I get along very well with Putin, but the reporter should be released and he will be released. I don't know if he's going to be released under Biden.

But you would try to get him released as President?

Trump: Yeah, I would get him released. Yes.

You said that Russia—

Trump: I’m surprised that Biden. Well, I'm not surprised with anything with Biden. But I think it's a terrible precedent. And I'm very surprised that he hasn't been released, but I will get him released, if he's not released by the time we get to office.

Sir, you have said that you're willing to let Russia “do whatever the hell they want” to NATO countries that don't spend enough on their defense. If Putin attacked a NATO state that you believe was not spending enough on their defense, would the U.S. come to that country's assistance?

Trump: Yeah, when I said that, I said it with great meaning, because I want them to pay. I want them to pay up. That was said as a point of negotiation. I said, Look, if you're not going to pay, then you're on your own. And I mean that. And the question was asked to me: If we don't pay? It was asked to me long before this event. Do you know that, after I said that, do you know that billions of dollars poured into NATO? Do you know that?

I know that, sir. Secretary General Stoltenberg gave you credit for that. He said that your threat to pull out of NATO—

Trump: Correct.

Led to the allied countries giving $100 billion more on their defense.

Trump: Both then and three years before. Do you know that NATO—the cupboards were bare. They had no cash, they were dying, we were spending almost 100% of the money on NATO. We were protecting Europe. And they weren't even paying.

The question, though, is would you—

Trump: Eight. Only eight countries were paying. The rest of them were delinquent. And I said to them, if you don't pay, enjoy yourselves, but we're not going to protect you. I said it again a few weeks ago, two months ago, I said it again. And I said it, that if you don't pay. Look, that's the way you talk as a negotiator. I'm negotiating because I want them to pay. I want Europe to pay. I want nothing bad to happen to Europe, I love Europe, I love the people of Europe, I have a great relationship with Europe. But they've taken advantage of us, both on NATO and on Ukraine. We're in for billions of dollars more than they're in in Ukraine. It shouldn't be that way. It should be the opposite way. Because they're much more greatly affected. We have an ocean in between us. They don't. And when I say things like that, that’s said as a point of negotiation, and I did a very good job because billions of dollars came in recently.

You said in 2016 in an interview, you said “in order to get reform, you have to be willing to walk away.”

Trump: I said, for instance, the question was asked when we had a very big meeting, rather secret, but the press knew about it. We had 28 countries at that time. And a gentleman stood up who happened to be the head of a very important country. And he said, “Are you saying”— because I said to him, “You guys aren't paying your bills, we're paying your bills. It's not fair. You're hurting us on trade. And then on top of it, we're defending you. We're spending most of the money on NATO with the United States.” I said it's not fair. And the man stood up and said, “Are you saying that if we aren't paying our bills, if we don't pay our bills, and Russia attacks us, are you saying that you will not protect us?” I said that's exactly what I'm saying.

Now, after I said that, billions of dollars poured in. It was like magic. Obama never said that. Obama would go give a speech and he’d leave. Bush would go give his speech and he’d leave. I went, I looked at the numbers, and I said, wait a minute, the United States is paying for NATO. We're paying for close to 100% of NATO.

So the question, though, sir—

Trump: And not being treated right, because we're being treated very badly by most of the same countries on trade.

So you want to renegotiate the terms of the treaty, it sounds like. Do you want to—

Trump: No, I just want them to pay their bills. I don't have to renegotiate it. It's like Biden. Biden has the right to close up the border right now. He doesn't need anything from Congress. Same thing with NATO. I don't need to renegotiate the terms of the treaty. All I need to do is have them pay their bills. They don't pay their bills.

Do you want to maintain 80 years of American leadership in defending the West, especially Europe, or do you want to change the architecture of the post-war world that has kept us out of a World War for the last 80 years?

Trump: I want them to pay their bills. Very simple. NATO is fine. See, the problem I have with NATO is, I don't think that NATO would come to our defense if we had a problem.

You don't?

Trump: No, I don't believe that. I know them all. It's a one-way street, even if they paid. I want them to pay. But I believe if we were attacked, NATO wouldn't be there. Many of the countries in NATO would not be there.

Would you continue to provide military and humanitarian aid to Ukraine?

Trump: I’m going to try and help Ukraine but Europe has to get there also and do their job. They're not doing their job. Europe is not paying their fair share.

Orban says he came here and met with you, and said that you wouldn’t give a penny. Is he wrong?

Trump: No, I said I wouldn't give unless Europe starts equalizing. They have to come. Europe has to pay. We are in for so much more than the European nations. It's very unfair to us. And I said if Europe isn't going to pay, who are gravely more affected than we are. If Europe is not going to pay, why should we pay?

So you may not aid Ukraine?

Trump: Look, we get hurt on trade. We get hurt on trade. European Union is brutal to us on trade. We went over it, the cars, they don't want our agriculture. They don't want our cars. They don't want anything from us. It's like a one-way street. Well it’s the same thing with NATO. They treat us very badly. They don't pay their bills. Now, I came along and they start paying their bills. I'll tell you something, Secretary Stoltenberg said, and I hope he says it now, but he certainly said it then loud and clear, he has never seen any force like Trump. Because every president would come over, they'd make a speech and they'd leave. Trump came over and he got us billions and billions of dollars. I got them hundreds of billions of dollars from countries that were delinquent. And he was my biggest fan. I hope he still is, but I don't know that he is, you know, maybe he is, maybe he is. But even this recent go-round, right, because you're asking me a question. There are two parts of that question. One is, four years ago, and one is now. I did a hell of a job getting money for NATO because nobody else—NATO had no money. NATO couldn't have even prosecuted what they're doing right now. They had no money. All they were doing was building stupid office buildings. They built a $3 billion office building.

Taiwan—

Miller: Eric, Eric, I gotta wrap because his dinner is coming up.

Can we just do the rapid fire then, because—

Miller: Eric, I literally have three minutes until this dinner starts.

Okay, you said—

Trump: By the way, you understand what I just said?

Yeah, yeah.

Trump: He spent $3 billion by the same architect—

Let’s just go through this rapid fire because of the time.

Trump: But you understand?

I do. I do, Mr. President. You said you only want to be dictator for a day. What did you mean by that?

Trump: That was said sarcastically as a joke on Sean Hannity. He said, “Do you want to be a dictator?” I said, “Only for one day. I want to close up the border and I want to drill, baby, drill.” Then I said, “After that, then I never want to be a dictator.” That was done. That was said sarcastically. That was meant as a joke. Everybody knows that.

Do you see why—okay, you say you were joking, but do you see why—

Trump: No, no, wait. If you read it, it was a joke. I wanted to be for one day. You know why? Because we have an incompetent fool that’s allowing people to come into our country. We have an incompetent fool that drove energy prices so high over such a short period of time. And by the way, you know, he's gone to a lot of my policies now. But the day after the election, if they win, there won't be any more oil.

Do you see why so many Americans see language like that, you know, dictator for a day, suspending the Constitution—

Trump: I think a lot of people like it.

But you see why they see that as contrary to our most cherished democratic principles?

Trump: No. I think the press does. Not because they don’t understand it. They understand it as well as you do, as well as anybody does. That was said in fun, in jest, sarcastically.

Only four—

Trump: It’s like “Russia, if you’re listening.” Remember “Russia, if you’re listening”?

Yeah.

Trump: That was said in the exact same vein. “Russia, if you're listening.” Everybody knows that was said sarcastically. But they cut off the laughter. You know, they cut it off immediately. As soon as it was—immediately, it was cut off. But that was said, sarcastically, a joke, it was in jest. This is the same thing. I said, “I want to be dictator for one day, I want to close up the border. And I want to drill, baby, drill.” And then I said, “After that, I don't want to be a dictator.” Now—

You did.

Trump: I did. But nobody reports that.

Well, we have a chance to have a good conversation and get the full truth here, which is what I’m trying to do.

Trump: But you understand what I mean.

I know what you mean.

Trump: I hope you report it. Because that was said.

I’m giving you a chance to respond.

Trump: Good. That was also said, Eric, with a smile. I'm laughing. And Sean Hannity, it was a question that he asked me.

It scares people, though, sir. It scares people.

Trump: I don't understand why it would. Everybody. Anybody that saw it would say I was laughing. He was laughing. The whole place was laughing. You know, it was a town hall?

I saw it.

Trump: And the town hall, they were laughing like hell. That was said in jest.

Only four of the 44 people who served in your cabinet the last time are endorsing you in this election. [Editor’s note: Roughly half a dozen Trump cabinet members had endorsed him at the time of this interview.] A number, as you know, have come out and said they won't support you in this election.

Trump: I don’t know. Like who? I’ve gotten many. I got Mnuchin!

Your former chiefs of staff, your former secretary of defense—

Trump; Well, I don’t know. Look, I mean—

The question, though, is why should voters—

Trump: Well, wait. Even this week, Mnuchin endorsed me. Pompeo endorsed me. Who are the people that? I mean, some didn’t because I didn't think they were very good. Look, when people think you don't like them and you're not going to bring them back. I'm not going to bring many of those people back. I had some great people. I had some bad people. When they think they are not in favor and they're not coming back, they're not inclined to endorse.

Well, the question I have to ask you, sir, is why should voters trust you?

Trump: I’ve had a lot of people endorse me.

You’ve gotten a lot of—

Miller: I’ll send him the full list.

You’ve gotten a lot of endorsements. I don’t dispute that. But the question I have to ask—

Trump: No, I mean that. I’ve had a lot of people endorse me from cabinets. Now, I have to tell you this, I haven’t asked for a lot of endorsements.

They come to you know. I know, sir.

Trump: If I call up 95% of those people that you say, if I made one phone call, they’d be endorsing me in two minutes.

The question I have to ask you is: Why should voters trust you when so many of the people who watched you the most closely in the first term don't think you should serve a second?

Trump: Well, they don't because I didn't like them. Some of those people I fired. Bill Barr, I fired Bill Barr. I didn't want him. Other people. I thought he did a terrible job. As soon as he was going to be impeached, he was going to be impeached by the Democrats, he totally folded. Bolton was a fool. He was a stupid fool. But actually, he served a good purpose because he's a nutjob. And every time he walked into a room, people thought you were going to war. He's one of the people, one of the many people, that convinced Bush to go into the Middle East, blow the place up and end up with a whole destroyed world. And nothing. What did anybody get out of it? We blew up the Middle East. And nobody got anything out of it. That was one of the Bolton people. You could go past. You could give me every single person you're talking about. And I would tell you a reason why I wouldn't want their endorsement. Now I had great people like, you know, I rebuilt the military.

Miller: The president's late for his dinner.

Biden doesn’t have any cabinet members who have come out against him.

Trump: Because Biden’s a very different kind of a guy than me. He keeps bad people. For instance, when you had Afghanistan, he kept Milley. Milley should have been fired immediately. Milley should have been fired based on his statement to China. If he actually made those statements, that's a very serious thing. You know, the statement to China, if he actually made them, and I guess he did, because they're on tape. That is really a serious problem. But he should have been fired for that. Other people should have been. Many people should have been fired. I did fire people, I fired a lot of people. Now I let them quit because ,you know, I have a heart. I don't want to embarrass anybody. But almost every one of those people were fired by me.

You could look at the military people. I said, “Hand me a letter, general, hand me a letter,” every one of them. So they handed me a letter. I don't think I’ll do that again. I think, from now on, I’ll fire. You know why? Because they say that they quit. They didn't quit. I said, “Hand me a letter.” That's a gentleman's thing to do. “General, hand me a letter.” I took care of ISIS. I had people saying it would take five years. I did it in a very short period of time. We have a great military, if you look at our military, I have great support from our military, from the real people, from the real generals, not the television generals. But I could ask for endorsements from 90 to 95% of the people that you're telling me. Every one of them would give me an endorsement.

Would you—

Miller: Eric, Eric, I do have to get the president to his dinner. I’m sorry.

Both the Heritage Foundation's Project 25 and the American Conservative magazine, they're a big supporter of yours, have proposed abolishing the 22nd amendment that limits presidents to two terms. They say that, you know, if you come back into office, you will have served two non-consecutive terms, and that if the popular will is there for you, there's no reason you shouldn't be able to—[Editor's note: The proposal came from the American Conservative, not Project 25.]

Trump: I didn't know they did that.

Well, would you definitely retire after a second term, or would you consider challenging the 22nd amendment?

Trump: Well, I would, and I don't really have a choice, but I would.

You would consider it?

Trump: I’m at a point where I would, I think, you know, I would do that. Look, it’s two terms. I had two elections. I did much better on the second one than I did the first. I got millions more votes. I was treated very unfairly. They used COVID to cheat and lots of other things to cheat. But I was treated very unfairly. But no, I'm going to serve one term, I'm gonna do a great job. We're gonna have a very successful country again—

But you’d consider it?

Trump: And then I'm gonna leave.

You’d consider it, you said.

Trump: Consider what?

Challenging the 22nd amendment.

Trump: I don't know anything about it. I mean, you're telling me now that somebody's looking to terminate. I wouldn't be in favor of it. I wouldn't be in favor of a challenge. Not for me. I wouldn't be in favor of it at all. I intend to serve four years and do a great job. And I want to bring our country back. I want to put it back on the right track. Our country is going down. We're a failing nation right now. We're a nation in turmoil.

Miller: Eric, we’re way past—the President’s gotta get to his dinner. I’m sorry.

Is there anything we didn’t talk about that you wanna talk about before they—

Trump: No.

Any question that I didn’t ask you that I should have?

Trump: No, I thought it was a good interview, actually.

Well, I really appreciate—

Trump: I mean, if it’s written fairly, it’s a good interview.

I had so many more questions I’d love to ask you.

Trump: And I find them to be very interesting questions.

I just try to ask good, probing questions. I have a lot more I’d love to talk about.

Trump: All I ask is one thing: Treat it fairly.

I will, sir.

Trump: I will say this, let me just say this. Everybody wants to work for me. And a lot of people say, “Oh, would he work for me? Oh, would he be a Vice President? Would he accept?” Vice President? I’ve got everybody in the nation calling me begging me to be vice president. I have everybody calling me wanting to be in the cabinet. Everybody wants to work for me. Everybody. And the practice of saying, “General, give me a letter” or “somebody give me a letter,” that's a nice thing to do. I don't think I'll do it anymore. But that's a nice thing to do. But everybody wants to work for me. We're gonna have a very successful administration. And the advantage I have now is I know everybody. I know people. I know the good, the bad, the stupid, the smart. I know everybody. When I first got to Washington, I knew very few people. I had to rely on people. And some of those people gave me very good advice.

People close to you tell me you’re more skeptical now—

Trump: Of what?

Of people betraying you in Washington?

Trump: I'm not more skeptical. I know the way nature—that's the way nature works. And I run a tough operation and some people can't take it. You know, working for Biden is very easy. He never fires anybody. He should fire everybody having to do with Afghanistan. He should fire everybody having to do with the border. I would have fired everybody and it would have been a big story.

Miller: Eric, he’s 10 minutes late for his dinner.

All right, all right. I don’t mean to be rude.

Trump: No, I find it very interesting.

Thank you, sir.

Trump: Thank you very much. Follow-up Phone Interview With Trump

Two weeks after the Mar-a-Lago interview, TIME conducted a 20-minute phone interview with Trump on April 27. Below is a lightly edited transcript of that conversation.

Last time we spoke, you said you had an announcement coming over the next two weeks regarding your policy on the abortion pill mifepristone. You haven't made an announcement yet. Would you like to do so now?

Trump: No, I haven’t. I’ll be doing it over the next week or two. But I don't think it will be shocking, frankly. But I'll be doing it over the next week or two. We’re for helping women, Eric. I am for helping women. You probably saw that the IVF came out very well. And, you know, I set a policy on it, and the Republicans immediately adopted the policy.

That’s true.

Trump: And that was a good policy for women. You know, it's about helping women, not hurting women. And so IVF is now, I think, really part of what we do. And that was important. I think that might have been right around the time of our interview. But in terms of the finalization—and you saw that Alabama and other states have now passed legislation to approve that.

Right, right. And of course there was the law in Arizona that was passed since then too.

Trump: Right.

Mr. President, for the first time ever, Iran recently launched a massive attack against Israel from its own territory.

Trump: Right.

If Israel and Iran get into a war, should the US support Israel in striking Iran militarily?

Trump: Yes, if a situation like occurred. A lot of people say it was a ceremonial, it was a ceremonial attack. Because they allowed everybody to know what happened, et cetera, et cetera. If that’s the case, it would be a good thing, not a bad thing. But a lot of people say that that attack was, you know, I mean, everybody knew about it. I heard about it long before the attack was made, and so did many others. So it would depend, obviously, but the answer is yes. If they attack Israel, yes, we would be there.

Gotcha. Well, on that front, right now there are campus protests across the country, as you know, against Israel and against Israel's war in Gaza and against the United States’ posture there.

Trump: Right.

Your former Secretary of Defense says you once suggested shooting protesters in the leg during the Black Lives Matter—

Trump: Yeah, which Secretary of Defense was that?

That was Esper.

Trump: Well, he was my worst Secretary of Defense. He was a weak, ineffective person. He was recommended by some RINOs that I don't have too much respect for. But I was, you know, I was not there very long. So I had to rely on people. No, he was a very ineffective Secretary of Defense. No, but I would, are you talking about in the case of colleges, or what are you talking about?

I was just going to ask, would you use the American military against protesters as President?

Trump: Well, I would use certainly the National Guard, if the police were unable to stop. I would absolutely use the National Guard. It would be something, I mean, if you look at what happened in Washington with monuments, I passed the law. I took an old law, brought it into effect that you get a minimum of 10 years without any adjustment if you do anything to desecrate a monument and everything was immediately set up. I didn’t have to use very much. That was having to do with the monuments. That was the monument period, where they liked to rip down monuments.

And I signed into effect a law that gives you 10 years, not one day less than 10 years of prison if you desecrate a monument. You know, that was very effective. I don’t know, I think you saw it, everything stopped after that.

I remember that period, sir. So you would rule out using the military on protesters?

Trump: Well, I would use the National Guard. I don't think you'd ever have to use much more than that.

So you have spoken a lot about “woke-ism” on college campuses. Polls show a majority of your supporters have expressed the belief that anti-white racism now represents a greater problem in the country than anti-Black racism. Do you agree?

Trump: Oh, I think that there is a lot to be said about that. If you look at the Biden Administration, they're sort of against anybody depending on certain views. They're against Catholics. They're against a lot of different people. They actually don't even know what they're against, but they're against a lot. But no, I think there is a definite anti-white feeling in this country and that can't be allowed either.

How would you address that as President?

Trump: I don't think it would be a very tough thing to address, frankly. But I think the laws are very unfair right now. And education is being very unfair, and it's being stifled. But I don't think it's going to be a big problem at all. But if you look right now, there's absolutely a bias against white and that's a problem.

I want to get to your thoughts on China. Do you think the U.S. should defend Taiwan if China invades?

Trump: Well, I’ve been asked this question many times and I always refuse to answer it because I don't want to reveal my cards to a wonderful reporter like you. But no. China knows my answer very well. But they have to understand that things like that can’t come easy. But I will say that I have never publicly stated although I want to, because I wouldn’t want to give away any negotiating abilities by giving information like that to any reporter.

I understand your position there—

Trump: It puts you in a very bad position if you actually come out and make a statement one way or the other.

I understand, sir. Taiwan's foreign minister said U.S. aid for Ukraine was critical for deterring China from attacking Taiwan. Do you agree with that?

Trump: Well, I think they think the concept, because they have the same concept. Are we going to be helping them the same as we helped Ukraine? So they would want to think that, they think if you’re not helping Ukraine, you’re most likely not going to be helping them. So I think it’s difficult from their standpoint in terms of the policy. That’s a policy of the United States. It’s to help various countries that are in trouble.

You said you would back Israel if it goes to war with Iran. Do you think the U.S. can keep troops in the Middle East and contain the expansionist goals of Russia and China at the same time, or would we need to withdraw troops to realistically manage our obligations overseas?

Trump: I think we have a lot of options. And I think we’re in a lot of places where we shouldn't be, and we probably aren't in some places where we should be. We have a lot of options as to troops. And one of the things we have, we can manage our expectations, troops can be put in certain locations very quickly.

Would you withdraw troops from South Korea?

Trump: Well, I want South Korea to treat us properly. As you know, I got them to—I had negotiations, because they were paying virtually nothing for 40,000 troops that we had there. We have 40,000 troops, and in a somewhat precarious position, to put it mildly, because right next door happens to be a man I got along with very well, but a man who nevertheless, he’s got visions of things.

And we have 40,000 troops that are in a precarious position. And I told South Korea that it's time that you step up and pay. They’ve become a very wealthy country. We've essentially paid for much of their military, free of charge. And they agreed to pay billions of dollars. And now probably now that I’m gone, they're paying very little. I don't know if you know that they renegotiated the deal I made. And they're paying very little. But they paid us billions, many billions of dollars, for us having troops there. From what I’m hearing, they were able to renegotiate with the Biden Administration and bring that number way, way down to what it was before, which was almost nothing.

Gotcha. President Trump, you have been—

Trump: Which doesn’t make any sense, Eric. Why would we defend somebody? And we’re talking about a very wealthy country. But they're a very wealthy country and why wouldn't they want to pay? They were actually, they were a pleasure to deal with. Not easy initially, but ultimately, they became a pleasure to deal with. And they agreed to pay billions dollars to the United States for our military being there. Billions, many billions.

President Trump, you have been the leader of the world's most powerful democracy and you have dealt with the leaders of authoritarian countries. Why is democracy better than dictatorship?

Trump: Well, it's because the word freedom. You have freedom. And you have all of the advantages with none of the disadvantages. You have freedom if you have a real democracy. I think we’re becoming less of a democracy when I look at the weaponization of the Justice Department, the FBI. When you look at what happened with FISA. When you look at all the things that have happened, we’re becoming less and less of a democracy. But with democracy, if it's a properly-run democracy, which it will be, if and when I get back into office, it’ll be a very proper democracy, not like what we have right now. I don't even think what we have right now is, where a presidential candidate has to spend eight hours a day in court instead of campaigning over nothing. Over zero. Over nonsense. And all speared and all spread out and—and really done by the Biden administration. And I think that's no longer democracy. I think that's third-world country stuff.

I want to get you to respond to one other thing you said that stirred some controversy. You once wrote on Truth Social that you might have to terminate parts of the Constitution. What did you mean by that?

Trump: I never said that at all. I never said that at all. When I talk about certain things, we are, there is nothing more important than our Constitution. But the Democrats have violated our Constitution with crooked elections and many other things. They violated it by using the FBI and the DOJ to go after people very unfairly, very unconstitutionally. I have a judge that gave me a gag order, where I'm the leading candidate, I'm leading Biden. I'm the Republican candidate who's substantially leading Biden. I don't know if you've seen the recent polls, Eric. But in fact, if you would, we will send them to you. Jason, if you could send them to Eric, it would be great.

Jason Miller: Yes, sir.

Trump: But we're substantially leading in all of the swing states and overall, and you know, I’m in a court case. A Biden-inspired court case, where the judge has put a gag order on me where I'm not allowed to answer many very important questions. And so that's a violation of our Constitution. And I would end those violations of Constitution. So that's what I was referring to. They have broken the Constitution. They have gotten very far astray from our Constitution. I'm talking about the fascists and the people in our government right now, because I consider them, you know, we talk about the enemy from within. I think the enemy from within, in many cases, is much more dangerous for our country than the outside enemies of China, Russia, and various others that would be called enemies depending on who the president is, frankly.

President Trump—

Trump: Because if you have the proper president, you'll be able to handle them very smartly, and everybody will be very satisfied. But if you don't have the proper president, I agree they would be strong enemies. But the enemy from within is a bigger danger to this country than the outside enemy, on the basis of having a president that knows what he's doing. Because if a President is good, solid, the proper person, and you're not gonna have a big problem with China, Russia or others, but you still have a problem from the sick people inside our country.

Mr. President, in our last conversation you said you weren't worried about political violence in connection with the November election. You said, “I think we're going to win and there won't be violence.” What if you don't win, sir?

Trump: Well, I do think we're gonna win. We're way ahead. I don't think they'll be able to do the things that they did the last time, which were horrible. Absolutely horrible. So many, so many different things they did, which were in total violation of what was supposed to be happening. And you know that and everybody knows that. We can recite them, go down a list that would be an arm’s long. But I don't think we're going to have that. I think we're going to win. And if we don't win, you know, it depends. It always depends on the fairness of an election. I don't believe they'll be able to do the things that they did the last time. I don't think they'll be able to get away with it. And if that's the case, we're gonna win in record-setting fashion.

One last question, Mr. President, because I know that your time is limited, and I appreciate your generosity. We have just reached the four-year anniversary of the COVID pandemic. One of your historic accomplishments was Operation Warp Speed. If we were to have another pandemic, would you take the same actions to manufacture and distribute a vaccine and get it in the arms of Americans as quickly as possible?

Trump: I did a phenomenal job. I appreciate the way you worded that question. So I have a very important Democrat friend, who probably votes for me, but I'm not 100% sure, because he's a serious Democrat, and he asked me about it. He said Operation Warp Speed was one of the greatest achievements in the history of government. What you did was incredible, the speed of it, and the, you know, it was supposed to take anywhere from five to 12 years, the whole thing. Not only that: the ventilators, the therapeutics, Regeneron and other things. I mean Regeneron was incredible. But therapeutics—everything. The overall—Operation Warp Speed, and you never talk about it. Democrats talk about it as if it’s the greatest achievement. So I don’t talk about it. I let others talk about it.

You know, you have strong opinions both ways on the vaccines. It's interesting. The Democrats love the vaccine. The Democrats. Only reason I don’t take credit for it. The Republicans, in many cases, don’t, although many of them got it, I can tell you. It’s very interesting. Some of the ones who talk the most. I said, “Well, you didn’t have it did you?” Well, actually he did, but you know, et cetera.

But Democrats think it’s an incredible, incredible achievement, and they wish they could take credit for it, and Republicans don’t. I don't bring it up. All I do is just, I do the right thing. And we've gotten actually a lot of credit for Operation Warp Speed. And the power and the speed was incredible. And don’t forget, when I said, nobody had any idea what this was. You know, we’re two and a half years, almost three years, nobody ever. Everybody thought of a pandemic as an ancient problem. No longer a modern problem, right? You know, you don't think of that? You hear about 1917 in Europe and all. You didn’t think that could happen. You learned if you could. But nobody saw that coming and we took over, and I’m not blaming the past administrations at all, because again, nobody saw it coming. But the cupboards were bare.

We had no gowns, we had no masks. We had no goggles, we had no medicines. We had no ventilators. We had nothing. The cupboards were totally bare. And I energized the country like nobody’s ever energized our country. A lot of people give us credit for that. Unfortunately, they’re mostly Democrats that give me the credit.

Well, sir, would you do the same thing again to get vaccines in the arms of Americans as quickly as possible, if it happened again in the next four years?

Trump: Well, there are the variations of it. I mean, you know, we also learned when that first came out, nobody had any idea what this was, this was something that nobody heard of. At that time, they didn’t call it Covid. They called it various names. Somehow they settled on Covid. It was the China virus, various other names.

But when this came along, nobody had any idea. All they knew was dust coming in from China. And there were bad things happening in China around Wuhan. You know, I predicted. I think you'd know this, but I was very strong on saying that this came from Wuhan. And it came from the Wuhan labs. And I said that from day one. Because I saw things that led me to believe that, very strongly led me to believe that. But I was right on that. A lot of people say that now that Trump really did get it right. A lot of people said, “Oh, it came from caves, or it came from other countries.” China was trying to convince people that it came from Italy and France, you know, first Italy, then France. I said, “No, it came from China, and it came from the Wuhan labs.” And that's where it ended up coming from. So you know, and I said that very early. I never said anything else actually. But I've been given a lot of credit for Operation Warp Speed. But most of that credit has come from Democrats. And I think a big portion of Republicans agree with it, too. But a lot of them don't want to say it. They don't want to talk about it.

So last follow-up: The Biden Administration created the Office of Pandemic Preparedness and Response Policy, a permanent office in the executive branch tasked with preparing for epidemics that have not yet emerged. You disbanded a similar office in 2018 that Obama had created. Would you disband Biden's office, too?

Trump: Well, he wants to spend a lot of money on something that you don't know if it's gonna be 100 years or 50 years or 25 years. And it's just a way of giving out pork. And, yeah, I probably would, because I think we've learned a lot and we can mobilize, you know, we can mobilize. A lot of the things that you do and a lot of the equipment that you buy is obsolete when you get hit with something. And as far as medicines, you know, these medicines are very different depending on what strains, depending on what type of flu or virus it may be. You know, things change so much. So, yeah, I think I would. It doesn't mean that we're not watching out for it all the time. But it's very hard to predict what's coming because there are a lot of variations of these pandemics. I mean, the variations are incredible, if you look at it. But we did a great job with the therapeutics. And, again, these therapeutics were specific to this, not for something else. So, no, I think it's just another—I think it sounds good politically, but I think it's a very expensive solution to something that won't work. You have to move quickly when you see it happening.

Well, Mr. President, you've been extremely generous with your time, both in Mar-a-Lago and today, so thank you. I appreciate the opportunity to ask you these questions.

Trump: Thank you, Eric. And it’s an honor getting to know you. And call me anytime you want, okay?

All right, I will, sir. Thank you.

Trump: Okay. Thank you very much.

Correction, April 30: The original version of this transcript mis-attributed a proposal to abolish the 22nd amendment. It was proposed by the American Conservative magazine, but not by the Heritage Foundation's Project 25.

[allthecanadianpolitics]

Some recent news on the Canadian response to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic

Medical research series calls on Canada to do independent inquiry into COVID-19 response

A new medical research series calls on Canada to conduct an independent inquiry into the country’s COVID-19 response, citing Canada’s failures in the equity of its domestic and global health deliverance.

The BMJ’s international editor Dr. Jocalyn Clark commissioned the series from Canadian experts to look in-depth into key issues in Canada’s pandemic response, including leadership, co-ordination and data sharing between provincial territorial and federal entities, equity research, the high death rate among nursing homes and Canada’s global contribution to vaccine sharing.

“These in-depth analyses are important because they help draw lessons about what went wrong, where were the missteps, how can these be prevented in the future and how can we be better prepared for the next health crisis or public-health emergency in the future,” Dr. Clark said.

You can access the full series here: https://www.bmj.com/canada-covid-series

Exposing deep institutional failures in the COVID-19 response in Canada

From the start, it was as if government authorities didn’t really want to know, or want us to know, what was happening. They didn’t implement any way of understanding how much infection was circulating in the population, instead relying on people with symptoms to come forward. Then, two years into the pandemic, Ontario ended whatever monitoring and reporting was put in place. These were irresponsible actions in the face of the most devastating public health crisis of the last 100 years.

The absence of data has left the public with the false impression that COVID-19 is no longer a real problem. This is made worse by the shocking lack of clear communication from authorities that the SARS-CoV-2 virus can linger in the air for hours and that it cannot be social-distanced or hand-sanitized away. (emphasis added)

[laresearchette]

Tuesday, October 29, 2024 Canadian TV Listings (Times Eastern)

WHERE CAN I FIND THOSE PREMIERES? THE FIRM (Paramount+ Canada) RULES OF ENGAGEMENT (Paramount+ Canada) AN UNFINISHED LIFE (Paramount+ Canada) WIZARDS BEYOND WAVERLY PLACE (Disney Channel Canada) 8:00pm/8:30pm

NEW TO AMAZON PRIME CANADA/CBC GEM/CRAVE TV/DISNEY + STAR/NETFLIX CANADA:

AMAZON PRIME CANADA ONE SHOT: OVERTIME ELITE (Season 2)

NETFLIX CANADA OLIVIA RODRIGO: GUTS WORLD TOUR TOM PAPA: HOME FREE VANDERPUMP RULES (Seasons 3-4)

MLS SOCCER (TSN3) 6:45pm: Columbus vs. New York Red Bulls (TSN3) 8:50pm: Real Salt Lake vs. Minnesota

NHL HOCKEY (SN1) 7:00pm: Flyers vs. Bruins (TSN2) 7:00pm: Kraken vs. Habs (TSN5) 7:00pm: Blues vs. Sens (SN1) 10:00pm: Kings vs. Sharks

MLB BASEBALL (SN) 7:30pm: Dodgers vs. Yankees - Game 4

NBA BASKETBALL (TSN/TSN4) 7:30pm: Mavericks vs. Timberwolves (TSN/TSN4) 10:00pm: Pelicans vs. Warriors

CHUCK AND THE FIRST PEOPLES' KITCHEN (APTN) 7:00pm: Chuck visits the Sioux Valley Dakota Nation in Manitoba where bison are being reintroduced after millions were slaughtered during colonization.

THIS HOUR HAS 22 MINUTES (CBC) 8:00pm

TODD TALBOT BUILDS: THE PASSIVE HOUSE PROJECT (Cottage Life) 8:00pm

THE GREAT BRITISH SEWING BEE (Makeful) 8:00pm: It’s Week 2, and there are three challenges inspired by sport. The sewers are asked to create a half zip fleece, an outfit from cricket kit and a national strip fit for the world stage.

STILL STANDING (CBC) 8:30pm: Windsor, NS: When Nova Scotia Textiles Ltd closed its doors after 106 years in operation, Windsor, NS embraced its reputation as the home of massive pumpkins and its claim as "the birthplace of hockey."

CHURCHY (BET Canada) 8:30pm/9:00pm/9:30pm (SEASON PREMIERE): Corey Carr Jr. faces a major setback when he's passed over for a leadership role in his dad's church, and he boldly announces his departure and plans to lead a ministry in Lubbock, Texas. In Episode Two, Corey adjusts to his new role at Bethlehem Temple, consulting an elderly couple on intimate issues and a young man about lust, while also processing his grandmother's declining health. In Episode Three, with Pastor Stinney on vacation, Corey struggles with preaching and managing a chaotic funeral; Keisha's career success and her sister's advice cause her to doubt her relationship.

LITTLE BIG COMMUNITY (APTN) 9:00pm: On the Island of Hawai'i, Kānaka Maoli have revived an ancient way of life, where caring for the land brings mutual benefit. Meet Alika and Lacyann, who have renewed family traditions, creating a meaningful legacy for future generations.

THE NEW WAVE OF STANDUP (CBC) 9:30pm: Canada's new comics gather for one night of standup at the Just For Laughs Vancouver festival; featuring Faris Hytiaa, Sam Sferrazza, Jordanne Brown.

A GOOD GAME (APTN) 10:30pm: Nathan Shirley coached teenagers in Bosnia for Hockey Without Borders. Today, these players are living the dream of representing their country at the IIHF's under twenty world championships being held in Istanbul, Turkey.

[mariacallous]

In January 2020, Mexico made history as the first Latin American country to adopt a feminist foreign policy. Pioneered by Sweden six years earlier in 2014, feminist foreign policy (FFP) initially began as a niche effort in the Nordic region. For many years, Sweden stood alone on the global stage, emphasizing that its FFP focused on enhancing women’s “rights, resources, and representation” in the country’s diplomatic and development efforts worldwide. That effort was the result of the vision and leadership of Sweden’s foreign minister at the time, Margot Wallström, although there was widespread support for the policy across the government and it was continued by subsequent ministers.

It would be another three years before other nations followed suit: In 2017, Canada announced a Feminist International Assistance Policy. At the end of 2018, Luxembourg’s new coalition government committed to developing a FFP in their coalition agreement. And in 2019, Mexico and France pledged to co-host a major women’s rights anniversary conference in 2021 while beginning to explore the development of feminist foreign policies simultaneously.

I had an inside view on that process having convened the existing FFP governments and numerous international experts just before Mexico’s announcement. Together, we developed a global definition and framework for FFP. As I wrote for this magazine in January 2020, this approach was largely followed by the Mexican policy. The goals for Mexico in adopting an FFP were to increase the rights of women and LGBTQ+ individuals on the world stage, diversify their diplomatic corps, boost resourcing for gender equality issues, and ensure that internal policies within the foreign ministry aligned with this approach, including a zero-tolerance policy toward gender-based harassment.

Now, under the leadership of a new female foreign minister, Alicia Bárcena, and following the election of Mexico’s first woman president, Claudia Sheinbaum, I was excited to travel to Mexico City in July as it hit another milestone: becoming the first country outside Europe to host the annual ministerial-level conference on FFP. It was an opportunity for me to take stock of what Mexico has achieved since it adopted an FFP, and to see what progress it has made toward its goals.

Initially convened by Germany’s Annalena Baerbock in 2022 and then by the Dutch last year, Mexico took a unique approach to the conference by focusing it on a specific policy issue—in this case, the forthcoming Summit of the Future. This conference, taking place at the U.N. General Assembly in September, aims to begin laying the groundwork for the successor goals to the Sustainable Development Goals framework. It is already a fraught and polarized process, and progressive leadership is sorely needed.

Last week provided clear evidence that Mexico is making progress in modeling that leadership—including in consistently advocating for progressive language in often contentious international multilateral negotiations, such as the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP). For example, in its interventions at the latest COP, Mexico placed human rights, intersectionality and gender equity at the heart of climate action and recognized the role of women environmental defenders and Indigenous women in a just transition.

“Mexico is often a lone voice in holding the line on critical human rights, Indigenous rights and gender equality language at the climate talks, even among the FFP countries,” said Bridget Burns, the executive director of the Women’s Environment and Development Organization who has spent the last 15 years organizing women’s rights activists in climate negotiations and attended the July conference to speak on the sustainable development panel.

Mexico’s decision to link their hosting of the FFP Conference to the Summit of the Future—as evidenced in an outcome document they published and are circulating for signature ahead of the General Assembly’s high-level week in September—challenged FFP governments to engage a feminist approach in mainstream foreign policy dialogue, not just in gender-related discussions like the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women. “The Summit of the Future aspires to a better tomorrow, but lofty goals won’t translate to real systemic change without feminist civil society,” said Sehnaz Kiymaz, senior coordinator of the Women’s Major Group.

On the multilateral front, Mexico has shown leadership by co-chairing the Feminist Foreign Policy Plus Group (FFP+) at the UN, alongside Spain. This body held the first ministerial-level meeting on FFP at the General Assembly last year and adopted the world’s first political declaration on FFP. Signed by 18 countries, governments pledged “to take feminist, intersectional and gender-transformative approaches to our foreign policies,” and outlined six areas for action in this regard. This was the first time FFP countries publicly pledged to work together as a group to address pressing global challenges through a feminist approach. While smaller subsets of this cohort have worked together multilaterally to condemn women’s rights rollbacks in Afghanistan or in support of an international legal framework on the right to care and be cared for, the first big test of this more systematic approach will be the forthcoming Summit of the Future, where feminists have been advocating for gender to be referenced as a cross-cutting priority.

Mexico has also recently ratified two international instruments to directly benefit women: Convention 189 of the International Labor Organization (ILO) on domestic workers and Convention 190 of the ILO on violence and harassment in the workplace. Under the mantle of its FFP, Mexico has championed the importance of care work in the advancement of women’s rights and countries’ development at the U.N. Human Rights Council and at the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean through the Global Alliance for Care Work.

While international women’s rights activists at the conference largely gave positive feedback on Mexico’s track record, the response from Mexican civil society was more critical. Activists organized a side event to present their more skeptical view of Mexican FFP. María Paulina Rivera Chávez, a member of the Mexican coalition and an organizer of the event, argued a conference could only go so far. “It is fundamental to decenter the state, understanding that feminist foreign policies must be horizontal,” she said.

A major theme of that side event and of Mexican activists’ interventions in the official ministerial conference was the incongruence of the Mexican government’s leadership on feminist approaches internationally while women’s human rights at home have suffered. Such criticisms of the Andrés Manuel López Obrador government are not unfounded. In one particularly troubling interview a few years ago, he suggested that Mexico’s high rate of femicide—11 women are murdered daily, with rates on the rise compared to other crimes—was merely a false provocation by his political opponents. Negative biases against women are pervasive in Mexico, with 90 percent of the population holding such biases.

Mexico has made strides in improving gender equality in other areas, however. Women now make up half of the Mexican legislature and have been appointed to lead high-level institutions, such as the Supreme Court, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the Central Bank, with cascading positive effects on gender equality. Bárcena, for instance, clearly asserted from her first speech on the job that Mexico’s FFP would remain a top priority. This is no accident. At the federal level, significant efforts have been made to enforce gender parity laws and implement more than 80 percent of the legal frameworks promoting, enforcing and monitoring gender equality as stipulated by international benchmarks. Mexican women have also seen some improvements in maternal mortality rates, access to internet services, and protections to the right to abortion, with numerous national commitments to improve gender equality, such as measures to alleviate the burden of care on women.

But while there has been an increase in the number of women in the legislature and government positions, women from Indigenous, Afro-descendent, and working-class backgrounds continue to be underrepresented in political roles. And there has been a steady increase over the last decade in femicides, disappearances and sexual violence which Mexican feminist organizations and international actors have found are directly linked to the militarization of law enforcement under the guise of Mexico’s war on drugs and organized crime.

Additional criticisms of the Mexican FFP itself include the foreign ministry’s insularity and reluctance to engage with Mexican feminist activists in the development and implementation of its FFP. There was also a hesitation by the previous foreign ministry leadership to collaborate with Inmujeres, Mexico’s gender ministry, preferring to keep control of the FFP within the foreign ministry alone. It is not uncommon for gender ministries to be excluded in foreign policymaking as they are often perceived as lacking the necessary expertise or authority on foreign policy. However, Inmujeres is an exception in this regard and the criticism was valid. This was on my mind as I participated in the conference last month, and straight out of the gate I could observe a clear departure from the past approach under Bárcena’s leadership: The foreign ministry officially partnered with Inmujeres to co-host the conference, and the heads of both agencies were equally prominent voices throughout the three-day event. Similarly, the foreign ministry also made efforts to engage Mexican feminist civil society in conference planning, inviting civil society to a consultation day in the weeks leading up to the conference.

Following the right-wing electoral successes and likely abandonment of FFP in countries like Sweden, Argentina, and potentially the Netherlands, the success of a Mexican model of FFP is all the more important. Mexican activists I spoke with expressed optimism about Bárcena’s leadership, which they had not extended to her predecessor. Certainly, there is some cynicism about whether Mexico’s next president, a woman, will be any better on the issue of femicide than her mentor and predecessor, López Obrador, but there is some room for hope. If the leadership of a female foreign minister like Bárcena has been more effective in mobilizing political and convening power behind FFP, there’s potential that Sheinbaum will also show more interest than her predecessor.

While Mexican civil society has critiqued that Sheinbaum did not present a plan on how she would continue and improve the country’s FFP and repair the government’s relationship with feminist civil society, Sheinbaum’s plan—entitled 100 Pasos Para La Transformación—takes a human rights-based approach to gender equality. This is promising, because political approaches, which are more common, tend to reduce the human rights of women, girls, and gender-diverse persons as a means to an end, such as better economic, education, or health outcomes. The plan proposes measures to alleviate the care burden on women, safeguard sexual and reproductive health and rights, protect LGBTQ+ communities, promote gender parity in cabinets, improve land rights for rural women, reduce femicides, and more.

That Sheinbaum has not explicitly addressed the importance of Mexico’s FFP is not necessarily surprising. Most feminist and women’s rights organizations are understandably more focused on issues within their own borders, and foreign policy rarely drives political power and the focus of the electorate. Discussion of feminist foreign policy is thus typically the domain of the foreign minister and in some cases other relevant ministers—such as international development in Germany, or the trade ministry in Sweden under its previous government. (Canada’s Justin Trudeau stands out as a rare exception, having championed feminism and Canada’s feminist approach to policymaking at the Group of Seven and international gender equality forums throughout his tenure as prime minister.)

But even without top-down leadership from a president, savvy officials within the Mexican foreign and gender ministries are using FFP to make progress. While there has not yet been a public accounting of the progress made in implementing FFP, the clear leadership Mexico is demonstrating on the world stage in key negotiations, its successful conference, and the anticipated new government set the stage for Mexico to boldly advance its FFP. It will serve as a valuable example to the world.

[spann-stann]

Setting Blurb: The Texan MacroCommunity (Reworked)

As society began to break down within the United States leading up to, and during World War Three, the New Tribal Movement emerged and called for the recreation of tribes as socio-political units. The most and prominent of these was the Hispano-Gaels, an organization that blended pre (and post) Columbian Latin American and Gaelic Celtic culture. The Hispano-Gaels were the most vocal of the and aided like-minded groups across the United States as WW3 broke out. Eventually, the federal government began to pull support from all states west of the Mississippi, and then dissolved anticlimactically during the Leave Riots.

During the twenty year gap between WW3 and the Warlords' Wars, three cities formed the cores of new protostates in the former Lone Star State: Houston and the Hispano-Gaels, San Antonio and the Tejano Republic, with Austin and the "old regime loyalist" Texas in the middle. The Hispano-Gaels spent those twenty years "Tribalizing" their territory in the greater Houston area, with some expansion north into Dallas-Fort Worth. It was around this time that a young Ignacio Rotthey was inducted into the Hispano-Gaelic leadership, and he quickly made a name for himself with his diplomatic skills. Convincing the Tejanos that the Austin were calling for aid in subduing the rest of Texas (which wasn't incorrect, Austin had sent feelers out to Cascadia and New England), Ignacio was able to form an alliance between the Hispano-Gaels and Tejanos, and then conquer Austin. Patronage of the "right" leaders made San Antonio a Hispano-Gaelic client in all but name, and Texas, excluding the Panhandle, was theirs.

Several decisions and policies of the Hispano-Gaels made in regards to what Texan society would become would later be used in the future CorpEmp. Parents were incentivized to train their children how to perform their work (what would later develop into the Great Class System), and the territory controlled by Austin was carved up into smaller and more manageable clients (predecessor to the National Delimitation Zones). The city of Austin itself, a bombed and shelled wreck, was used as a dumping ground for "noncompliants" until they were later expelled to the independent Cordons Sanitaire.

The Texan Tribal Federation, as it was called at the time, began to consolidate its borders and reach out to the rest of Post-America. The Grand State of Virginia, an expansionist protostate under the Kellam dynasty, was the first to answer to Ignacio's calls for cooperation. Their first act of mutual aid and friendship was their intervention in the American South, ensuring that there were only allies and clients between the two. Other like-minded groups requested aid in the Mid and Southwestern portions of the former United States, as well as a few in what used to be Canada and Mexico. After solidifying the formation of the "League of Corporate Communities" and putting down a rival alliance in Cascadia and the New England. It was also around this time that the Tribal Federation completed talks the Panhandle's Comanche, Apache and Hispano communities in New Mexico, and a Native American-led Oklahoma. The Texan Federation would annex New Mexico and Oklahoma (much like Virginia annexing Maryland and the Carolinas).

This League further expanded to the rest of the Americas, Europe, Russia, and China. Ignacio's calls for greater cooperation resulted in the League transforming from a defensive alliance to a federation with its own governing body. Ignacio would become the elected head of state, and would then be later crowned Emperor following the new Corporate Empire (CorpEmp)'s expansion into Africa and the rest of Asia. As a way of not showing favoritism to any one member of CorpEmp, Ignacio abdicated his position as ruler of Texas in favor of creating an itinerant court.

Adelsverein Standestaat: One of two provinces created from the former Austinite territory, the Adelsverein Standestaat was formed around central Texas' German heritage. As the titular culture of the region, Texasdeutsch is now the primary language spoken. They make really good kolaches.

Cimmerian Tribal Zone: The second province carved out of occupied Austin was awarded to one of the Hispano-Gael's subordinate tribes, the Cimmerians. Interestingly enough, the home of Robert E. Howard was within the borders of the Cimmerian's new territory. Many of the tribe took this as a sign. These adopted sons of Conan the Barbarian have a few daughter colonies across CorpEmp space.

Comanche Corporate Republic: The homeland of the Comanche was restored after the sublimation of the United States, with their borders recognized by the Hispano-Gaels during their absorption of the Texas panhandle. The Comanche have become the both an energy and martial powerhouse within Texas, second only to the Hispano-Gaels in their contribution to the Imperial Armed Forces.

The Hispano-Gaelic Tribal Zone: The core territory of the Hispano-Gaels, their Tribal Zone serves as the capital province of Texas. Although Hispano-Gaels are the titular tribe, their Tribal Zone has a large amount of smaller vassal tribes concentrated in the metropolitan areas of Dallas and Corpus Christi. Despite the Rotthey's passing of the dynastic torch, the Hispano-Gaelic people are diehard supporters of CorpEmp.

Hispano-Gaelic Septs: As they incorporated New Mexico and Oklahoma into their Tribal Federation, the Hispano-Gaels elected to settle a warband or two in those ares as Septs of the tribe. Over time, these Septs would help the locals assimilate into Hispano-Gaelic culture (or at least into the New Tribal Movement), and create new sources of manpower for the Imperial Armed Forces.

Land Force Demesne Hood: While it had been looted by various warlords and militias following the collapse of the American Government, the old Fort Hood was reconstituted first as a staging area for the conquest of Austin, and then as a land hold for the newly created Imperial Army. As a Land Force Demesne, Hispano-Gaelic warriors and other martial peoples residing in Texas arrive to prove their worth in the Austin proving grounds and become members of the Imperial Armed Forces.

Neo-Mescalero Tribal Zone: One of the two restored homelands for the Apache within the Texan MacroCommunity. The Neo-Mescalero took control of the territory along the southern Texan-New Mexican border.

Neo-Jicarilla Tribal Zone: The second restored Apache homeland in Texas. The Neo-Jicarilla concentrated in the northwestern corner of New Mexico that wasn't seized by the Navajo-Hopi .

Nuevomexicano Corporate Republic: When the United States went *poof*, the Hispano population of New Mexico seized the northeastern corner of New Mexico as their "homeland". They really like to put turquoise on everything over there.

Sequoyah Corporate Republic: The Sequoyah Corporate Republic was incorporated into Texas following the annexation of Oklahoma. While still home to many Native American tribes that were forcibly relocated to the state, many have begun to migrate to their former homelands in neighboring Dixica, or to the many orbital habitats constructed across Imperial space.

Tejano Corporate Republic: The first protostate to ally with the Hispano-Gaels, San Antonio and south Texas serves as the homeland for Texas' early Hispanic settlers. Alamo Armorworks, the premier manufacturer of ground combat vehicles, has its headquarters in San Antonio.

[jackoshadows]

The Art Gallery of Ontario, one of the biggest galleries in Canada has fired it's curator of indigenous arts, Wanda Nanibush over her comments about Gaza/Israel after a pro-Israel group complained

A Canadian art gallery has fired an indigenous person and curator for recognizing colonialism and the genocide of an indigenous population for what it is.

Arts and cultural workers in Canada are calling attention to the sudden departure of Indigenous curator Wanda Nanibush from Toronto’s Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO). Members of the local arts community began raising suspicions last week when they noticed that Nanibush, AGO’s inaugural curator of Canadian and Indigenous art, was no longer featured on the museum’s website.

Now, an anonymously leaked complaint sent by the organization Israel Museum and Arts, Canada (IMAAC) to the AGO on October 16 has spurred concerns that Nanibush’s public comments on the Israeli occupation and bombardment of Palestine may have played a role in the decision. Signed by the leadership of the Toronto-based group, including Art Canada Institute Founder and Executive Director Sara Angel, the email complaint alleges that Nanibush was “posting inflammatory, inaccurate rants against Israel.” The letter, verified by Hyperallergic, decries Nanibush’s social media posts referring to Israel’s role in genocide and colonialism, actions also decried by multiple human rights experts and organizations. Formerly known as Canadian Friends of the Israel Museum, the IMAAC supports Jerusalem’s Israel Museum and its programming, according to the organization’s website. 

“It’s an appalling letter,” Ontario-based multidisciplinary artist and activist Jamelie Hassan told Hyperallergic. A recipient of the 2001 Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts, Hassan pointed out that Nanibush’s departure now raises questions about who will continue to lead the museum’s Indigenous art exhibitions. 

Hopkins noted that Nanibush has been a vocal critic of “the insidious nature of colonialism and the ongoing violences of settler colonialism.” 

“What her departure implies is that this is no longer a comfortable conversation for large institutions and that the work that many of us have been doing to create more just institutions is now no longer stable and safe,” Hopkins continued. “When topics like decolonization are rendered taboo, the future for Native voices in this field is bleak.”

The leaked letter in question: