Stephanie Grisham told Democrats on Tuesday night she wasn't just a Trump supporter, she was a "true believer" and one of his closest advisers, spending Easter, Christmas and Thanksgiving with the Trump family at Mar-a-Lago.
"Behind closed doors, Trump mocks his supporters," she said. "He calls them basement-dwellers."
During a pandemic-era hospital visit, as people died in the intensive care unit, Grisham said Trump was "mad that the cameras weren't watching him."
"He has no empathy," said Grisham. "No morals. And no fidelity to the truth. He used to tell me, 'It doesn't matter what you say, Stephanie. Say it enough, and people will believe you.'"
She pushed back during her speech, insisting that contrary to Trump's advice, what people say — and don't say — matters.
Grisham said she resigned the same day she asked former first lady Melania Trump whether it was ok to tweet that "peaceful protest are the right of every American, but there is no place for lawlessness & violence."
Mrs. Trump replied: "No," according to a screenshot of the conversation displayed at the convention.
"I couldn't be part of the insanity any longer," she said, noting she was "skewered" for not holding White House briefings. "Unlike my boss, I never wanted to stand at that podium and lie."
She earned applause as she noted she's once again behind a podium — "advocating for a Democrat."
Donald Trump suddenly changed his opinion of former President Barack Obama, as some polls showed that presumed Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris was improving her position in the 2024 race.
On Tuesday, CNN asked Trump about his view of Obama before the former Democratic president was scheduled to speak at his party's convention in Chicago that night.
"I like him. I think he's a nice gentleman, but he was very, very weak on trade," Trump replied. "If you take a look at what happened to our country trade-wise, it was a disaster. Take a look at Japan, take a look at China, take a look at what happened with some of these countries, what they did."
The Republican presidential nominee added: "But I happen to like him. I respect him, and I respect his wife."
CNN political analyst John King doubted that Trump had truly changed his opinion of Obama after years of racial attacks.
"He has, at some of his rallies, used Barack Obama's middle name, Barack Hussein Obama," King recalled after noting Trump's history of birtherism — questioning if Obama was born in the U.S. and was qualified to be president.
"He types it in all caps. Again, raising questions that Obama's not legitimate, that he's not American, that he shouldn't have been president."
"What does that tell me?" the CNN analyst added. "It tells me that Donald Trump, who occasionally listens to his political advisors and has very smart political advisors, has been told, guess what, sir, you're losing."
"You're losing because people think you're unhinged. You're losing because not only Black voters, but people in the suburbs don't like your tone."
When fellow host Jesse Watters asked what it was like experiencing Biden's speech, Pirro replied: "Well, I'll tell you, even my dogs fell asleep."
"Jesse, look, half of America didn't see Joe Biden's speech because it came on at 11:30," said Pirro, who has been one of Trump's staunch legal defenders on the network.
She speculated that many voters in swing states probably didn't hear the speech either — and theorized that was by design.
"I think it's part of the plan, to keep Joe Biden away from the public as much as they can, which is clear with the juxtaposition of when Joe was speaking versus when Kamala is speaking. But, you know, in addition to that, I mean, they could have brought him on earlier, really."
"I mean, they torched this guy, they threw him over a cliff and then they hid his final, you know, his final eulogy," Pirro continued. "And in that eulogy, I mean, Joe Biden was classic, Joe Biden. He lied in this convention where all they talk about is joy and love and we're so joyful and it's so wonderful and they could have bumped some of the other speakers, they could have bumped the abortion speakers, but they didn't want to do this. So, what does it tell you? They wanted him as far away from the public as they could."
Pirro highlighted what she believes is the difference between Republicans and Democrats.
"The Republicans stick with Donald Trump, through Russia collusion, through impeachments, indictments, convictions, and attempted assassination. And with Joe Biden and the Democrats, hey, as soon as it doesn't look like the guy is gonna win, to hell with democracy, forget the fact that Kamala hasn't gotten one vote. We're gonna have her run for president ... in the end, it was simply about the fact that they're getting rid of him as quickly as they can."
U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) told Fox Iran hacked Donald Trump's campaign because they hate him — and got immediate pushback from the network's host.
Speaking on Tuesday, Hawley said he can understand why Iran might oppose Trump because he put them "in a box" after he killed a denuclearization deal with them — and he should get credit with American voters for that.
"If there's an endorsement here, it's the fact that Iran hates Trump," said Hawley. "And that really ought to tell voters a lot."
Fox host Neil Cavuto hit back, stating that recent attacks by Iranian hackers also targeted President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris's campaign, according to the FBI.
Hawley said that the U.S. should retaliate by hacking Iran's entire energy infrastructure.
He then claimed that Iran likely loves the Democrats because of protests against Israel's action in Gaza which are taking place outside of this week's Democratic National Convention.
Gaza protests targeting the Democratic National Convention have so far proven to be smaller than expected, though still a significant show of force — and a curious contradiction, given they appear to be targeting the party that is relatively more intent on pursuing peace and Palestinian rights. But it's not an accident, former Republican speechwriter David Frum wrote for The Atlantic.
In fact, the most hardline of these protesters actively want former President Donald Trump to win — and not out of mindless nihilism. There is a strategic purpose to it.
"Of the two big parties, the Democrats are more emotionally sympathetic to Palestinian suffering," wrote Frum. "The Biden administration is working to negotiate the cease-fire that the pro-Palestinian camp claims to want. The administration has provided hundreds of millions of dollars of humanitarian assistance to Palestinians in Gaza. President Joe Biden’s terms for ending the fighting in Gaza envision a rapid movement to full Palestinian statehood. By contrast, former President Donald Trump usesPalestinian as an insult. His administration moved the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, and recognized Israel’s annexation of the Golan Heights. In 2016, Trump campaigned on a complete shutdown of travel by Muslims into the United States; Trump now speaks of deporting campus anti-Israel protesters. He has pledged to block Gaza refugees from entering the United States."
To understand why the protesters would want to tear down Democrats, then, wrote Frum, we must look to the 2000 election which saw Frum's old boss, President George W. Bush elected — possibly with an assist from the Green Party's Ralph Nader, who won more votes in a handful of states than Bush's margin of victory in them. Nader, he wrote, understood he was spoiling the election, and did it on purpose, saying, "You know when you’re told that you have nowhere to go, you get taken for granted. And when you get taken for granted, you get taken."
In other words, wrote Frum, the protesters believe if they can cost Vice President Kamala Harris the election, it ensures future Democrats will prioritize their demands.
Moreover, he wrote, while these protesters broadly get called "leftists" or "progressives," not all of them are, exactly — many are just singularly opposed to "American global hegemony," backing Hamas because it represents that opposition even while it is socially reactionary, anti-feminist, and anti-LGBTQ, and a Trump presidency could actively undermine America's power around the world, so it's barely even a sacrifice to them if Trump wins.
Furthermore, the big problem for these protesters, wrote Frum, is that "Their cause is not popular."
"Solid majorities of Americans accept Israel’s war in Gaza as valid and fiercely condemn the Hamas terrorist attacks as unacceptable ... From the point of view of any practical politician: If a cause is so unpopular that it cannot help its friends, why listen to its advocates?" he said.
So the only way they can push Democrats further toward their way of thinking is if Democrats believe ignoring them is at least as likely to cost them the election as ignoring voters who support Israel.
What all this means, he concluded, is that, "The protesters want chaos and even violence in order to defeat Harris and elect Trump. They are not ill-informed or excessively idealistic or sadly misled. They are not overzealous allies. They are purposeful adversaries. The Chicago convention delegates should recognize that truth, and act accordingly."
Former Democratic U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill highlighted clear differences between the Republican National Convention and its Democratic counterpart.
Speaking to MSNBC's Nicolle Wallace on Tuesday, the former Missouri lawmaker described the RNC as some clubhouse with a kind of political "no girls allowed" sign.
"Yeah, look at the split-screen, Nicolle, between the Republican convention and this one so far," said McCaskill. "The Republican convention was a testosterone-laden grievance machine, and coming out to the song 'Men Rule the World' and Hulk Hogan ripping off his shirt and you know. It was just ridiculous. It is like women don't have the right to vote."
She said that it contrasted with "moving testimonies of women who had faced health crises because of Roe being overturned and Trump's abortion ban."
She cited the powerful speech from Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and UAW President Shawn Fain taking his jacket off to show his t-shirt accusing Trump of being a scab.
"That shows a party that wants to reach to every corner of this country," continued McCaskill. "Trump's party doesn't want to do that. I don't know exactly who they're going for. They certainly do not pay attention to women's vote. I don't think they're doing a very good job with the union vote when he's advocating firing people who are threatening to strike with Elon Musk; I certainly think he's struggling with his effort at talking about black jobs, with people of color and their vote."
Former President Donald Trump went off onto a lengthy tangent during his speech on crime in Michigan asserting that suburban women ought to think he's the greatest president ever.
This came after the MAGA leader rattled off a long list of violent sexual assaults committed by migrants and immigrants in the country unlawfully.
"So when I return to the White House, we will stop the plunder, rape, slaughter, and destruction of our American suburbs, our cities and towns," said Trump. "And I think that women living in the suburbs, I keep hearing about the suburban woman doesn't like Trump. Well, I think it's a fake poll, because why wouldn't they like me? I keep the suburbs safe. I stopped low-income towers from rising right alongside of their houses and I'm keeping the illegal aliens away from suburbs. I think they like me a lot. I think it's a lot of fake polls. We've seen a lot of fake polls over the years, I was not supposed to win anything, and we won the big one, we won it, and did a lot better the second time than I did the first."
"But women want to have safety, they want to have a strong military, they want to have a strong police force, they want to be in their house and they want to be safe," Trump continued. "They don't want to be — have people pouring into their doors, and you can't do anything about it, right?"
When Trump says he "stopped low-income towers from rising" in the suburbs, he is likely referring to his decision to suspend the Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing rule, an Obama-era regulation that didn't mandate that suburbs build large housing projects, rather required that neighborhoods getting federal housing grants to ensure their development policies don't perpetuate racial segregation. The Biden administration reinstated the rule shortly after Trump left office.
Trump has made similar remarks before. During a Pennsylvania campaign rally in the 2020 election, he begged suburban women to like him, saying "I saved your damn neighborhood."
The Republican Party in general has seen slipping numbers in recent years among women, and among suburban voters, which has reduced their ability to build large majorities in congressional races and made battlegrounds out of states they used to dominate, like Georgia and Arizona.
Former President Donald Trump took time out of his day Tuesday to muse that people can't even go to the grocery store anymore without getting raped, mugged or even shot.
The Livingston County Sheriff and his deputies stood behind Trump in uniform to support the ex-president's plan to reduce crime. While Trump didn't outline his strategy, he cited a number of crimes he heard about — including the dangers of buying bread.
"You can't walk across the street to get a loaf of bread, you get shot, and you get mugged, you get raped, whatever it may be. You've seen it. I've seen it," Trump said.
"It's like they told him to talk about policy, and in his brain, he thought that meant to talk quietly. He's saying the same crazy stuff just in a 'put you to sleep' voice," said Seth Meyers writer John Lutz.
Writer and producer Jason Reid cautioned, "This guy’s cognitive state is deteriorating fast. Sad to see. Very old candidate."
"I literally just ran into the store to grab some groceries, including eggs and bread. I was neither raped nor shot," national security lawyer Bradley Moss fact-checked.
"He’s right, I got shot at by some kids on the weekend. It was a birthday pool party, and it was a water gun, but I still got shot at," quipped software engineer Alex Cole and X influencer with over 249,000 followers.
Professor Chris Towler pointed out, "I can’t imagine Trump’s continued rhetoric about getting raped is registering much with Independents with the E. Jean Carrol & Stormy Daniels verdicts hanging over his head."
Fox News cut away from Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump's speech on law enforcement after he complained that police were arresting people "for saying the election was rigged."
At an event in Michigan on Tuesday, Trump went off-script while sharing his vision for U.S. law enforcement.
"They shouldn't arrest people for saying the election was rigged, but they like that," the candidate opined. "They go after guys like me, but they don't go after people that kill people."
"It's a shame what's happened in our country," he continued. "We're going to win big, and we're going to turn it around, and we're going to turn it around fast."
"All right, President Trump speaking in Howell, Michigan, this afternoon," she said. "And clearly the focus is law and order, law enforcement, his respect for law enforcement."
Former President Donald Trump detoured into a rant against the Democratic National Convention in Chicago during a speech on crime delivered in Michigan on Tuesday.
The first night of the convention saw speeches in support of Vice President Kamala Harris given by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and President Joe Biden, among others.
"We have a fool for a president," said Trump Tuesday after spending several minutes complaining about the withdrawal from Afghanistan that he helped negotiate.
He then addressed multiple criticisms of his administration that were made in Chicago Monday, including claims that he dishonored military personnel and that he defended right-wing extremists at a rally in Charlottesville, VA.
"They lied last night about things nobody's ever seen. They lied about soldiers at a gravesite.They lied about Charlottesville. They lied about inflation, the inflation's been absolutely horrible, absolutely horrible and everyone knows it. We had virtually no inflation, they had 9 percent, but that wasn't including some of the things that went up more than anything else."
In fact, there is no evidence anything Democrats said about Trump's remarks about soldiers or the Charlottesville neo-Nazi rally was false, although some fact-checkers have quibbled over what specifically he meant when he called rally-goers "very fine people.
Trump then returned to the topic at hand and discussed crime.
"Mothers will no longer lose their children because of liberal policies and politicians that have given up on securing crime for America," said Trump. "We want a crime-free America. We will stop violent crime in the United States." He gestured to the police officers standing behind him. "People like this do the job better than anybody. They do the job justly and fairly but there's nobody like these people."
Crime in fact began rising in the final year of Trump's presidency, though not necessarily for reasons within his control, and most categories of crime, particularly murders, have been trending down under Biden, with murder rates approaching a 50-year low.
Taking the stage after United Auto Workers president Shawn Fain denounced Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump as a "scab," U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez made even clearer that the Democratic Party is unapologetically centering issues affecting working Americans ahead of the November elections.
The New York Democrat's speech—given just six years after she stunned the party establishment by ousting high-ranking corporate-friendly Rep. Joe Crowley—represented a shift away from a Democratic strategy that has leaned heavily on appealing to centrist voters and painting progressives like Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) as radicals, suggested some observers.
"Democrats giving AOC a primetime speaking slot at Democratic National Convention means they are finally embracing progressives and acknowledging this is part and parcel of their base and future," said journalist Wajahat Ali, noting that Ocasio-Cortez was given just 90 seconds to speak at the 2020 convention.
Ocasio-Cortez began with the story of her unexpected rise from restaurant worker to federal lawmaker, sharing that when she won her 2018 election she was one of tens of millions of Americans who were uninsured, "taking omelette orders as a waitress in New York City" while her family struggled to pay bills.
"Like millions of Americans, we were just looking for an honest shake," said the congresswoman. "And we were tired of a cynical politics that seemed blind to the realities of working people."
Those "cynical politics" are still centered by Republican politicians, Ocasio-Cortez said, who frequently attack her "by saying that I should go back to bartending."
"But let me tell you, I'm happy to, any day of the week," she said. "There is nothing wrong with working for a living."
Ocasio-Cortez told the delegates assembled at the United Center in Chicago and viewers at home that the candidacy of Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, present American voters with "a rare and precious opportunity."
"In Kamala Harris, we have a chance to elect a president who is for the middle class because she is from the middle class," said the congresswoman. "She understands the urgency of rent checks and groceries and prescriptions. She is as committed to our reproductive and civil rights as she is to taking on corporate greed."
Watch Ocasio-Cortez's speech below:
Ocasio-Cortez's speech came days after Harris introduced a far-reaching economic agenda including an expanded child tax credit, a federal ban on price-gouging in the grocery and food industries, and medical debt relief. On Sunday, Harris rejected a reporter's question about how she would pay for the policies, saying policymakers should focus on the "return on investment" that would come from pulling children out of poverty and ensuring people can pay for essentials.
New York City Council member Chi Ossé said in response to Ocasio-Cortez's speech Monday night that it was "phenomenal to watch an un-bought politician who holds populist, working-class values hold center stage at the DNC" and noted that the lawmaker was greeted by "the entire room chanting" her commonly-used nickname, AOC.
Progressive strategist Waleed Shahid added that he had "never imagined" seeing two grassroots leaders who had challenged their own institutions—Ocasio-Cortez and Fain—being invited to introduce the Democratic presidential nominee.
Elevating outspoken progressive leaders was a smart strategic decision by party leaders, said Evan Sutton of Firekit Campaigns, a former communications director for the American Federation of Teachers.
Like Fain, Ocasio-Cortez took direct aim at Trump, slamming him as "a two-bit union buster [who] thinks of himself as more of a patriot than the woman who fights every single day to lift working people out from under the boots of greed, trampling on our way of life."
"We know that Donald Trump would sell this country for a dollar if it meant lining his pockets and greasing the palms of his Wall Street friends," she said. "The truth is, Don, you cannot love this country if you only fight for the wealthy and big business."
"To love this country is to fight for its people, all people, working people, everyday Americans like bartenders, and factory workers, and fast food cashiers who punch a clock and are on their feet all day, doing some of the toughest jobs out there," Ocasio-Cortez added. "Imagine having leaders in the White House who understand them, leaders like Kamala and Tim."
The congresswoman's brief mention of Israel's U.S.-funded assault on Gaza—which a majority of Democratic voters view as genocide, according to a Data for Progress poll released in May—received applause as she said Harris is "working tirelessly to secure a cease-fire in Gaza."
But some asked where the evidence of such work can be found, as Israel continues to bombard schools and other civilian infrastructure in the enclave, which U.N. experts warned last month has been pushed into famine by Israel's continued blocking of humanitarian aid.
"I understand the political value of AOC getting thunderous applause for cease-fire in Gaza—the fact that the party really wants it COULD pressure Harris—but, so we are clear, Harris is not working tirelessly for cease-fire," said author and podcast host Kate Willett. "That would involve cutting off weapons."
Specifically, Raskin addressed Vance during his speech to let him know that he may not know what he really signed up for when he agreed to be Trump's running mate.
"Do you understand why there was a sudden job opening for running mate on the GOP ticket?" Raskin asked. "They tried to kill your predecessor. They tried to kill him because he would not follow Trump's plan to destroy and nullify the votes of millions of Americans."
Speaking to MSNBC on Tuesday, former Pence chief of staff Marc Short hemmed and hawed around but ultimately agreed with the assessment.
"Well, look, I'll always be proud of Vice President Pence's stance on Jan. 6th," said Short. "I think he stood for the Constitution, as he should have. And I think the reality is that more Republicans should have acknowledged the danger that we faced on Jan. 6th."
He lamented that Democrats are using the issue as a political talking point in attacking Trump.
"But too many, I think, Republicans have embraced the notion that Jan. 6th was simply a hoax when, in fact, it wasn't," he said.
Beshear this week spoke about his admiration of Hadley Duvall, a 22-year-old woman who was molested by her stepfather and impregnated with his child at just 12 years old. She was able to have an abortion then, but the United States Supreme Court took away this right in 2022 when it overturned Roe v. Wade.
"Hadley Duvall is one of the bravest people I've ever met," Beshear told MSNBC on Tuesday morning talking about how proud he is of her.
He recalled the birth of his children, "Can you imagine, can you imagine, having to go through that not knowing if your child will survive? Or not hearing that sound at birth. Nobody should have to go through that. Everyone should have options."
Mika Brzezinski the brought up false claims made by former President Donald Trump about Democrats supporting abortions even after babies are born.
"It's just lying to people," said Beshear. "I mean, just think about what some people have had to go through because of these laws. I mean, J.D. Vance calls pregnancy from rape 'inconvenient.' Inconvenience is traffic. I mean, it is — make him go through this. I mean, someone being violated. Someone being harmed and then telling them that they don't have options after that? That fails any test of decency, of humanity."
Vance took to X and unloaded on Beshear and claimed that the Kentucky governor was wishing that someone in Vance's family suffer through a sexual assault.
Beshear, however, told MSNBC on Tuesday that such claims were "ridiculous."
"But it's also deflection. J.D. Vance knows that he and Donald Trump are so wrong on this issue," said the governor. "And so he's trying to make himself and Donald Trump the victim. Listen, Hadley Duvall was a victim. The women that were on the stage last night. The couple that had to go through a non-viable pregnancy are victims. As a man, J.D. Vance will never have to face any of this personally."
