Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD) questioned the integrity of the FBI after investigators have leaked information apparently aimed at damaging Hillary Clinton's campaign while protecting Donald Trump.
The ranking member of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform questioned the double standard, which he has blamed on political pressure Republican lawmakers have put on FBI Director James Comey.
"The American people basically want fairness, but it appears clear that there is a double standard," Cummings said Tuesday night on MSNBC's "All In With Chris Hayes."
He said Comey promised before the committee in July that he would not subject Clinton to a double standard during the election, but some within the agency appear to have politicized the investigation.
"I am worried about the integrity of the FBI," Cummings said.
Cummings questioned Comey's decision to release scant information about an investigation linked to Clinton while sitting on possible links between Trump's campaign and Russian efforts to influence the election.
"We don't get a mumbling word, and a number of us in Congress have asked for months about information with regard to Mr. Trump, his advisors and the Russian government (about) any type of coordination or cooperation going on between them, and we have got not a mumbling word -- not one syllable," Cummings said.
Given all the other scandals surrounding his campaign this year, it's easy to forget there are major questions about Donald Trump's ties to organized crime.
Yahoo News reporter Mike Isikoff has unearthed an old video of Trump standing next to Robert LiButti, a notorious high-rolling gambler who was banned from casinos in New Jersey in the early '90s due to his ties to mob boss John Gotti.
The video was taken at a WrestleMania event in which Trump and LiButti were seated next to one another. What's more, LiButti's daughter tells Yahoo News that this seating was not just some freak coincidence.
"We were his guests," she told Isikoff of Trump.
Why would Trump and LiButti go to a wrestling event together? One reason might be that Trump offered him tickets to events as a perk to keep him coming to his casinos, as reporter David Cay Johnston tells Isikoff that he was "the biggest loser at Trump casinos and therefore Trump’s most important customer."
Trump earlier this year said that while it was possible LiButti used to visit his Atlantic City casinos, he didn't recognize the man's name and wouldn't be able to identify him if he were standing close to him.
The clouds parted, the sun rays shone down and a chorus of angels sang the holy name of Donald Trump. At least that's how his supporters see it.
According to a series of interviews from CNN, one Trump supporter believes that The Donald has "the character of God," despite bragging about groping women and facing a federal lawsuit in December over the alleged rape of an underage girl. Wisconsin Trump voter Debbie Shields explained he is a "loving compassionate father," who "God chose for a time as this." She thinks the whole sexual assault thing is being blown out of proportion by a sensationalist media.
Another Wisconsin supporter, who is identified only as Shirley, explained that Democrats " that they can win on, so all they can do is try to pick on Trump and his character."
Sue Rasmussen agrees, explaining that we all falter in the expectations of God a few times. "So, we've all missed the mark," she said of the .
"He's not perfect," said former Ben Carson supporter Ron Lovelin. "I'm not looking for perfect. I'm looking for someone to save this country."
Paul Robertson admitted that it bothered him to hear Trump talk about grabbing women by the genitalia on the "Access Hollywood" bus in 2005, but it isn't changing his support. "Is it a deal breaker? No," he explained. Trump's business chops are what the country needs, according to Robertson.
"I think those women need to grow a set," Wisconsin voter Carol Robertson said of the women who have come forward to accuse Trump and endured threats from his supporters. "You know, it's been a lot of years. Get over it," she advised the women who say they were sexually assaulted.
Down a Georgia country road, camouflaged members of the Three Percent Security Force have mobilized for rifle practice, hand-to-hand combat training -- and an impromptu campaign rally for Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.
"How many people are voting for Trump? Ooh-rah!" asks Chris Hill, a paralegal who goes by the code name "Bloodagent."
"Ooh-rah!" shout a dozen militia members in response, as morning sunlight sifted through the trees last weekend.
As the most divisive presidential election in recent memory nears its conclusion, some armed militia groups are preparing for the possibility of a stolen election on Nov. 8 and civil unrest in the days following a victory by Democrat Hillary Clinton.
They say they won't fire the first shot, but they're not planning to leave their guns at home, either.
Trump's populist campaign has energized militia members like Hill, who admire the Republican mogul's promise to deport illegal immigrants, stop Muslims from entering the country and build a wall along the Mexico border.
Trump has repeatedly warned that the election may be "rigged," and has said he may not respect the results if he does not win. At least one paramilitary group, the Oath Keepers, has called on members to monitor voting sites for signs of fraud
Armed paramilitary groups first gained prominence in the early 1990s, fueled by confrontations in Ruby Ridge, Idaho and Waco, Texas, culminating in a militia sympathizer's 1995 bombing of a federal office building in Oklahoma City that killed 168 people.
Their numbers dwindled following that attack but have spiked in recent years, driven by fears that President Barack Obama will threaten gun ownership and erode the power of local government. The Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks extremist groups, estimates there were 276 active militias last year, up from 42 in 2008.
In recent years, armed groups have confronted federal authorities in a series of land-use disputes in the western United States. Federal officials fear more clashes could come after seven militants were acquitted on conspiracy charges for occupying a federal wildlife refuge in Oregon.
Many fear Clinton would push the county further to the left.
"This is the last chance to save America from ruin," Hill said. "I'm surprised I was able to survive or suffer through eight years of Obama without literally going insane, but Hillary is going to be more of the same."
Extremist groups emboldened
The Oath Keepers, a prominent anti-government force that sent gun-toting members to the 2014 race riots in Ferguson, Missouri, called on members last week to monitor voting sites on election day for any signs of fraud.
An hour south of Atlanta, the Three Percent Security Force started the day around the campfire, taking turns shooting automatic pistols and rifles at a makeshift target range. They whooped with approval when blasts from one member's high-powered rifle knocked down a tree.
The group operates independently, but is affiliated with a national armed movement that calls for members to defend individual rights in the face of what they see as an overreaching federal government. The movement draws its name from the notion that no more than 3 percent of the American population fought in the Revolutionary War against Britain.
Amid the war games, Hill weighed plans for a possible armed march on Washington if Clinton wins.
He said he doesn't want his members leading the way, but they will defend the protesters if need be. His group will not hesitate to act if a President Clinton tries to disarm gun owners, he said.
"I will be there to render assistance to my fellow countrymen, and prevent them from being disarmed, and I will fight and I will kill and I may die in the process," said Hill, who founded the militia several years ago.
Trump's candidacy has emboldened extremist groups to speak more openly about challenging the rule of law, said Ryan Lenz, a researcher at the Southern Poverty Law Center.
"Prior to this campaign season, these ideas were relegated to sort of the political fringe of the American political landscape," he said. "Now these ideas are legitimized."
Over the past week, some prominent Trump supporters have hinted at violence.
"If Trump loses, I'm grabbing my musket," former Illinois Representative Joe Walsh wrote on Twitter last week. Conservative commentator Wayne Root fantasized about Clinton's death while speaking at a Trump rally in Las Vegas on Sunday.
Back in Georgia, the Three Percent Security Force wrapped up rifle practice in the midday sun. They then headed further into the trees to tackle an obstacle course with loaded pistols at their sides, ready for whatever may come.
"We've building up for this, just like the Marines," he said. "We are going to really train harder and try to increase our operational capabilities in the event that this is the day that we hoped would never come."
(Reporting by Justin Mitchell and Andy Sullivan; Editing by Stuart Grudgings)
Donald Trump has repeatedly told his followers to monitor polling places on election day -- and some of his most devoted white nationalist followers are heeding his advice.
Politico reports that Trump-supporting neo-Nazi groups are planning to flood polling areas in Philadelphia next week to not only watch for supposed "voter fraud," but also to actively discourage people to stay at home.
One of the groups' vote suppression tactics will be to hand out free alcohol and marijuana to voters in the "ghetto" to encourage them to get wasted instead of voting.
"We also have some teams going in to the ghettos in Philly with 40s and weed to give out to the local residents, which we think will lead to more of them staying home," a representative for the pro-Trump website TheRightStuff.biz told Politico. "We have had success with this in the past."
Politico also reports that the Oath Keepers militia group is training its members to conduct undercover "sting" operations to monitor polling places for supposed fraud, and is aiming to watch "thousands of precincts across the country."
Nonetheless, there's no evidence that these tactics will be effective and there's good reason to believe they will backfire.
"If on the morning of Election Day it turns out that we have white supremacists standing around looking threatening at polling places, I think it would arouse anger," Mark Potok of the Southern Poverty Law Center tells Politico. "People would vote just to prove they’re not being intimidated by these radical racists."
The saving grace of the election has been the ways in which the late-night comedy shows have managed to parlay Trump into a limitless pot of gold at the end of satire rainbow. Just by grabbing a speech from The Donald and slowing it down by half a second, Kimmel scored.
Now the host is going a different route. What if he speeds Trump up? The result is a coked-up comedy that will make you laugh out loud.
Our democratic system of government counts on voters rejecting these claims that our electoral outcomes are at risk. Citizen trust in election outcomes and the accurate tabulation of votes is fundamental to the legitimacy of representative government.
How American elections are administered
As a political scientist who studies election administration and works with election officials to make the voting process successful, I know from firsthand experience that rigging a presidential election would not involve just undermining one system — it involves undermining thousands.
A key feature of the American system of election administration is hyper-localism. More than 5,000 municipal and county election officials administer elections across more than 8,000 local jurisdictions across the United States.
A 2009 survey of local election officials found that about half of local election officials are nonpartisan, meaning they are not Democrats or Republicans. The other half is about evenly split between Democrats and Republicans. In other words, only 25 percent of election officials support either party, significantly limiting the number of potential coconspirators who may back any given outcome.
Moreover, the United States Constitution grants broad power to state legislative bodies regarding the regulation of elections. States regulate ballot design, vote tabulation technology, absentee ballots and early voting. This means that someone attempting to rig an election would need to master 50 states’ methods of administering elections, including polling place management.
Another roadblock is the sheer number of votes involved. Presidential elections generally prompt higher turnout than any other election. In the 2012 presidential election, 130 million people cast their ballots. President Obama received nearly five million more votes in the popular vote compared to Republican nominee Mitt Romney. The sheer size of the electorate suggests that attempting to “rig” the system would require a level of coordination even greater than the coordination needed to “get out the vote” on Election Day itself.
Voters who know their history may be under the impression that influencing the popular vote isn’t really necessary. In 2000, Palm Beach County Florida played an outsized role in the outcome of the presidential election. That year, as few as 537 votes divided Vice President Al Gore from then Texas Gov. George W. Bush. Those few votes had the power to decide into whose column Florida would fall, and which candidate would win the Electoral College.
This recent history may tempt voters to think that would-be riggers need to tamper with the outcome in only one county to change the vote. Yet, nobody could have reliably predicted that Palm Beach County would be the lynch pin in 2000. The odds of a state result within half a percentage point – close enough to trigger a recount – are only about 7 percent, according to the website fivethirtyeight.com.
Let us examine each type of rigging method Trump identifies as a problem.
Rigging by voter impersonation
Voter impersonation involves casting a fraudulent ballot.
One could do that by getting a group of people to register to vote multiple times under false names. In this way, a single person could pretend to be more than one person and go to several polling locations to cast several ballots.
Alternatively, one could get a group of people to go to multiple polling locations, pretend to be someone else and hope that someone else had not yet voted and would not vote later in the day.
In either case, the costs of voter impersonation are high not only because of the risk of arrest for illegal activity, but also because actually engaging in such activity requires extensive planning, time and travel cost.
Although many Americans believe that voter fraud is “very common,” it is, in fact, rare.
The famed urban machines at the turn of the century like New York City’s Tammany Hall were often accused of controlling electoral outcomes through fraud and manipulation at the polls, but much of the evidence for stolen elections is largely anecdotal in nature.
When fraud is attempted now, as it apparently was during Iowa’s early voting period, the system worked to stop the attempt.
“There is … no evidence in at least a generation that [voter impersonation fraud] has been used in an effort to steal an election,” Hasan has written. “The reason voter impersonation fraud is never prosecuted is that it almost never happens.”
Rigging by impersonating deceased voters
Trump also claims that dead people vote.
Here, the concern is that deceased people remain on voter registration lists after their deaths, permitting living people to impersonate them and vote in their place.
It’s certainly true that inaccuracies exist on the voter rolls. According to a Pew Center on the States issue brief, voter registration lists across the 50 states suffer from inaccuracies largely because of they have “not kept pace with advancing technology and a mobile society.”
In many states, for example, registration information is entered into computers manually. When people move, even within a state, their voter registration does not move with them. When a citizen changes his or her address with one government agency, that information is not communicated to the election department. Citizens need to reregister to vote every time they move. The report states that “1.8 million deceased individuals are listed as voters.” To put that number in context, 2.4 million U.S. residents die each year.
The question then turns to how an organization, person or political campaign interested in perpetuating fraud could turn these 1.8 million deceased voters into votes.
Bad actors would have to proactively locate the deceased voters – focusing on key states or even counties – and then impersonate them to successfully turn an election.
Does it happen? The evidence is scant. According to a report from New York University’s Brennan Center investigating voter fraud, the vast majority of cases in which allegations of fraud by dead voters are asserted end up being clerical errors when voter lists are matched against death lists.
Rigging by having noncitizens vote
Trump has also asserted that noncitizens have successfully registered to vote and will be able to successfully cast ballots during the 2016 election.
Here we need to look at motives. The costs associated with attempting to register and vote as a noncitizen are high, including criminal prosecution and deportation. The reward of committing such fraud for the individual noncitizen is simply the addition of one vote. A campaign would need to convince hundreds or thousands of noncitizens to take this substantial risk to influence the outcome in even one county – and then keep quiet about it.
According to the Brennan Center, no documented cases exist in which individual noncitizens have “either intentionally registered to vote or voted while knowing they were ineligible.”
All of this adds up to a system of election administration that is virtually impossible to penetrate in the name of massive fraud that would shift the results of an election. So don’t believe it when someone tries to tell you the vote is rigged.
In recent weeks, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has repeatedly claimed that this year’s election is rigged and has predicted rampant voter fraud.
While it’s unprecedented to call an election “rigged” before voting has even taken place, there is a history of candidates and the media crying foul after suspicious results.
The most recent presidential election that had rumblings of rigging was 2004. Two years later, Robert Kennedy Jr. published an article in Rolling Stone claiming that Ohio election officials had made decisions that stole the election from Democratic candidate John Kerry. (If Kerry had won Ohio’s electoral votes, he would have defeated Republican president George W. Bush that year.) But while some Democrats parroted Kennedy’s allegations, Bush’s margin of victory in Ohio – over 100,000 votes – led many to dismiss them.
However, the most plausible claims of a rigged presidential election were made in 1876, 1888, 1960 and 2000. In each case, the losing candidate and party dealt with the disputed results differently.
If there’s a close or contested vote this year, perhaps the candidates could take a cue from the past.
1876: A compromise that came at a price
By 1876 – 11 years after the end of the Civil War – all the Confederate states had been readmitted to the Union, and Reconstruction was in full swing. The Republicans were strongest in the pro-Union areas of the North and African-American regions of the South, while Democratic support coalesced around southern whites and northern areas that had been less supportive of the Civil War. That year, Republicans nominated Ohio Governor Rutherford B. Hayes, and Democrats chose New York Governor Samuel Tilden.
But on Election Day, there was widespread voter intimidation against African-American Republican voters throughout the South. Three of those Southern states – Florida, Louisiana and South Carolina – had Republican-dominated election boards. In those three states, some initial results seemed to indicate Tilden victories. But due to widespread allegations of intimidation and fraud, the election boards invalidated enough votes to give the states – and their electoral votes – to Hayes. With the electoral votes from all three states, Hayes would win a 185-184 majority in the Electoral College.
A certificate of Louisiana’s electoral vote for Rutherford B. Hayes.
Competing sets of election returns and electoral votes were sent to Congress to be counted in January 1877, so Congress voted to create a bipartisan commission of 15 members of Congress and Supreme Court justices to determine how to allocate the electors from the three disputed states. Seven commissioners were to be Republican, seven were to be Democrats, and there would be one independent, Justice David Davis of Illinois.
But in a political scheme that backfired, Davis was chosen by Democrats in the Illinois state legislature to serve in the U.S. Senate (senators weren’t chosen by voters until 1913). They’d hoped to win his support on the electoral commission. Instead, Davis resigned from the commission and was replaced by Republican Justice Joseph Bradley, who proceeded to join an 8-7 Republican majority that awarded all the disputed electoral votes to Hayes.
Democrats decided not to argue with that final result due to the “Compromise of 1877,” in which Republicans, in return for getting Hayes in the White House, agreed to an end to Reconstruction and military occupation of the South.
Hayes had an ineffective, one-term presidency, while the compromise ended up destroying any semblance of African-American political clout in the South. For the next century, southern legislatures, free from northern supervision, would implement laws discriminating against blacks and restricting their ability to vote.
1888: Bribing blocks of five
In 1888, Democratic President Grover Cleveland of New York ran for reelection against former Indiana U.S. Senator Benjamin Harrison.
Back then, election ballots in most states were printed, distributed by political parties and cast publicly. Certain voters, known as “floaters,” were known to sell their votes to willing buyers.
Harrison had appointed an Indiana lawyer, William Wade Dudley, as treasurer of the Republican National Committee. Shortly before the election, Dudley sent a letter to Republican local leaders in Indiana with promised funds and instructions for how to divide receptive voters into “blocks of five” to receive bribes in exchange for voting the Republican ticket. The instructions outlined how each Republican activist would be responsible for five of these “floaters.”
Democrats got a copy of the letter and publicized it widely in the days leading up to the election. Harrison ended up winning Indiana by only about 2,000 votes but still would have won in the Electoral College without the state.
Cleveland actually won the national popular vote by almost 100,000 votes. But he lost his home state, New York, by about 1 percent of the vote, putting Harrison over the top in the Electoral College. Cleveland’s loss in New York may have also been related to vote-buying schemes.
Cleveland did not contest the Electoral College outcome and won a rematch against Harrison four years later, becoming the only president to serve nonconsecutive terms of office. Meanwhile, the blocks-of-five scandal led to the nationwide adoption of secret ballots for voting.
1960: Did the Daley machine deliver?
The 1960 election pitted Republican Vice President Richard Nixon against Democratic U.S. Senator John F. Kennedy.
The popular vote was the closest of the 20th century, with Kennedy defeating Nixon by only about 100,000 votes – a less than 0.2 percent difference.
Because of that national spread – and because Kennedy officially defeated Nixon by less than 1 percent in five states (Hawaii, Illinois, Missouri, New Jersey, New Mexico) and less than 2 percent in Texas – many Republicans cried foul. They fixated on two places in particular – southern Texas and Chicago, where a political machine led by Mayor Richard Daley allegedly churned out just enough votes to give Kennedy the state of Illinois. If Nixon had won Texas and Illinois, he would have had an Electoral College majority.
While Republican-leaning newspapers proceeded to investigate and conclude that voter fraud had occurred in both states, Nixon did not contest the results. Following the example of Cleveland in 1892, Nixon ran for president again in 1968 and won.
2000: The hanging chads
In 2000, many states were still using the punch card ballot, a voting system created in the 1960s. Even though these ballots had a long history of machine malfunctions and missed votes, no one seemed to know or care – until all Americans suddenly realized that the outdated technology had created a problem in Florida.
Then, on Election Day, the national media discovered that a “butterfly ballot,” a punch card ballot with a design that violated Florida state law, had confused thousands of voters in Palm Beach County.
The Florida butterfly ballot confused a number of voters, who ended up voting for Reform Party candidate Pat Buchanan thinking they had voted for Democratic candidate Al Gore.
Many who had thought they were voting for Gore unknowingly voted for another candidate or voted for two candidates. (For example, Reform Party candidate Pat Buchanan received about 3,000 votes from voters who had probably intended to vote for Gore.) Gore ended up losing the state to Bush by 537 votes – and, in losing Florida, lost the election.
But ultimately, the month-long process to determine the winner of the presidential election came down to an issue of “hanging chads.”
Over 60,000 ballots in Florida, most of them on punch cards, had registered no vote for president on the punch card readers. But on many of the punch cards, the little pieces of paper that get punched out when someone votes – known as chads – were still hanging by one, two or three corners and had gone uncounted. Gore went to court to have those ballots counted by hand to try to determine voter intent, as allowed by state law. Bush fought Gore’s request in court. While Gore won in the Florida State Supreme Court, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled at 10 p.m. on Dec. 12 that Congress had set a deadline of that date for states to choose electors, so there was no more time to count votes.
The national drama and trauma that followed Election Day in 2000 (and in 1876) probably won’t be repeated this year. Of course, a lot will depend on the margins and how the candidates react.
Most eyes will be on Trump, who hasn’t said whether or not he’ll accept the result if he loses.
As the disappointing disaster of become more and more known, one picture is beginning to develop and that is that his own arrogance has cost him more than what he's donating to his campaign.
Trump certainly "underestimated the incredible amount of public scrutiny he'd get as a presidential candidate," Seth Meyers told his "Late Night" audience Tuesday. "Now that scrutiny may be hurting him in the place he cares about most: his wallet."
Meyers played a speech from early October in which Trump admitted that he once use to get favorable publicity but now things are a little more difficult. "My life was so simple," Trump admitted. "I had a beautiful simple life."
"That, of course, is a line from the Donald Trump movie, 'It's a Beautiful Simple Life. So Beautiful. Like You Wouldn't Believe, The Simplest And Most Beautiful Life. Everybody Says So,'" Meyers joked. Interestingly, in that film, every time a bell rings, a Victoria's Secret angel gets groped.
It seems so long ago, but "remember, before he became a presidential candidate, Donald Trump was a blustery New York City businessman known mostly to voters not for the person he was behind closed doors but for the character he played in tabloids and on TV?" Meyers asked. As it turns out, that guy no longer exists.
Thanks to over a year of certainty, the campaign "unearthed, for public view, all kinds of deeply unflattering information about Trump's business record, from his six bankruptcies to his loss of nearly $1 billion in 1995," Meyers explained. Everything from his six bankruptcies to a nearly $1 billion loss in 1995. If that isn't enough, a New York Times report confirmed this week that Trump avoided paying millions in taxes by using a sketchy loophole that Congress has since outlawed. Trump, of course, blames Hillary Clinton for his use of the tax loophole, because she didn't ban those laws when she was one of 100 U.S. Senators or as First Lady.
The downfall isn't unique to only The Donald either, he's dragged his daughter Ivanka into the mess. Standing behind her father has prompted boycotts of her fashion and accessory line and public scrutiny into the way in which she's treated her workers while fighting for paid family leave. The luxury wasn't allotted to her workers until they had to fight her for it.
"There was also the impression that because Trump was wealthy that he must also be smart," Meyers continued. "But the image of Trump as a genius billionaire has also been undercut during this campaign. Most recently by his own campaign aides, who talk about him the way you talk about a child."
A New Yorker story revealed Trump's campaign manager Kellyanne Conway refrained from launching into a well-deserved tirade telling Trump, "You had these people saying, 'Delete the app! Stop tweeting!'" but instead, Conway would say to Trump, "Here are a couple of cool things we should tweet today." Conway went on to explain the positive thinking was like telling someone, "How about having two brownies and not six?" Meyers couldn't believe that this was considered a victory.
The only way to handle such a man-baby is by making all of the campaign's good ideas sound like they came from Trump himself. One donor even came up with a name for it: "Trump has the following personality," the donor told the New Yorker. "NIH-NFW, meaning 'If it's not invented here ... then it's no f*cking way."
Conway admitted she had to resort to going on television to communicate to Trump. They actually have to do interviews and then make Trump watch the interview so that he can understand them. By his campaign's own account, "Trump is a child who has to be manipulated to listen to his aides," Meyers explained.
Then there's the issue of his donations to charity. The latest story is one that Trump crashed a fundraiser for children with HIV/AIDS, went up on stage and was heralded by event attendees. He never donated a dime to the charity that night or any night. Trump actually took a seat from another donor that was on stage and sat there pretending to be a donor.
Then there was the time Trump served as principal for a day at a Bronx elementary school. At one point he handed the children a fake million-dollar bill as a donation to the chess team that was headed to a national tournament. The $1 million pledge actually turned out to be a $200 donation.
In the end, "the character Trump played in tabloids and on TV of a generous, intelligent billionaire has been undercut by his presidential campaign," Meyers said. Owners of buildings and hotels that lease Trump's name are ready to remove their gold letters and opt for something a little more classy.
Lola Gayle, STEAM Register Election rigging concerns are an ever-present issue during most elections. Many voters wonder if their vote will be registered accurately, or perhaps feel that voting systems may be vulnerable to tampering. Of course these concerns have great merit when you consider that voting is a fundamental aspect of participating in a democracy.…
CBS Late Show host Stephen Colbert was absolutely delighted to hear that GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump had written a BDSM-lite novel in 2012, which -- if you are a lover of fine literature -- is sadly out of print.
"There's an entire book Donald Trump doesn't want you to see," Colbert joked, "Because he apparently wrote a '50 Shades of Grey'-type novel about 'the graphic sex lives of those living and working in Trump Tower,' such as an employee having sex on the set of 'Celebrity Apprentice.'"
"Oh, it's the perfect steamy read for anyone who's ever wanted to read about Gary Busey in a three-way with Meatloaf and Melissa Rivers," he added.
Titled 'Trump Tower' -- with the late night host saying that was better than the working title: 'Symbolic Penis' -- Colbert shared a bit of the deathless prose.
From the book: "After the woman fell asleep, Mikey came out, looked around and saw there were at least six women not wearing tops. He proclaimed, 'I'm dead. I've gone to boob heaven.'"
"Yes, 'boob heaven!' Colbert smirked. "Evidently, Donald Trump started writing this novel in fourth grade."
Colbert also shared some less famous presidential erotica.
Sheriffe David Clarke and Democratic party strategist Julie Roginsky appeared on the Kelly File on Tuesday night, where they discussed President Obama's latest defense of Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.
Obama appeared on Full Frontal Monday night and sat down for an interview with Sam Bee. The two discussed sexist attitudes toward Clinton, which the President echoed during a rally in Ohio on Tuesday as well.
Clarke, referring to Clinton as Mrs. Bill Clinton, says people's dislike for Clinton isn't because she is a woman, but because she is hiding something.
He says, "She's hiding the truth. She tries to play herself off as a victim like she's Little Red Riding Hood but she's more like the Big Bad Wolf, as soon as you turn your back on her, she'll bite you. Now, look, this is politics."
Clarke continues, "My response to what President Obama said is, if she can't stand the heat, she should get out of the kitchen."
Roginsky fires back, "She's not Mrs. Bill Clinton." She continues, "She happens to be Hillary Rodham Clinton, who is her own person running as an individual. She's a former Senator, she is a [former] secretary of state. She's not 'Mrs. Bill Clinton,' and I think you just encapsulated exactly why a lot of women think--" Clarke cuts her off.
The sheriff suggests that he doesn't have to list off Clinton's bio when talking about her, but Roginsky calls him out.
"It's not her bio, but it's also not your job to assume that she's just a little woman who is married to Mr. Bill," adding, "She runs with that name because she happens to be married to the former president, but she's certainly not 'Mrs. Bill Clinton.'"
Clinton surrogate Bakari Sellers wasn't into CNN commentator Dana Bash's insights on the GOP on Tuesday night.
During a CNN panel on Anderson Cooper 360, panelists discussed the growing divide in the Republican party and whether the GOP is to blame for the movement that allowed Donald Trump to blossom this past year.
Sellers recalled a picture that was on stage ahead of the South Carolina primary that portrayed the "future of the Republican party." The photo was of Rep. Trey Gowdy, Sen. Tim Scott, and Gov. Nikki Haley of South Carolina, and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio.
"That terrified me," Sellers says, "because that showed that for some reason, that the Republican Party had outreach mechanisms, the Republican Party was growing its base, the Republican Party was looking like the country."
He continues, "Donald Trump spoke to a part of the Republican Party that they've been cultivating for the past ten years. Every time you call Barack Obama a Kenyan, Muslim, insurgent rebel, or every time you get endorsed by KKK papers, this is what happens."
Bash chimed in at this point and claimed that it's not "fair to say that the party has been cultivating them." She says, "I think that the tail has been wagging the dog a little bit in that sense."
Noticing that Sellers is clearly at odds with her thoughts on the matter, Bash continues, touching on the Republicans that the South Carolina primary had showcased.
"Those are all four young people and Donald Trump certainly is leading the current Republican party," she says. "He's the nominee, he got the most votes. But the Republicans I talk to hope that there is time still for the party to transform itself."
