By Patricia Zengerle, Idrees Ali and Steve Holland
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -President Joe Biden's administration is readying about $800 million of additional military aid to Ukraine and could announce it as soon as Friday, three sources familiar with the matter said on Thursday.
Biden would authorize the assistance using his Presidential Drawdown Authority, which allows the president to authorize the transfer of excess weapons from U.S. stocks, the sources told Reuters.
The sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that an announcement could slip into next week, cautioning that weapons packages can change in value before they are announced.
The White House declined to comment.
Since Russian troops poured over the Ukrainian border in February in what Russian President Vladimir Putin termed a "special military operation," the conflict has settled into a war of attrition fought primarily in the east and south of Ukraine.
Washington has sent billions of dollars in security assistance to the Kyiv government.
(Reporting by Patricia Zengerle, Idrees Ali and Steve Holland in WashingtonEditing by Leslie Adler and Matthew Lewis)
According to a recent report, federal judges are weaponizing their retirement to put their own selections in their place.
According to Slate, it all began in 2018 when Judge Michael Kanne of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit announced his retirement. But when his former clerk wasn't appointed as the replacement, he withdrew the announcement. Under Joe Biden's administration that has now happened at least three other times.
The report explained there's a kind of appointment quid pro quo afoot with at least three federal judges trying to pick their replacements.
"The most recent incident involves Judge David Hurd of the Northern District of New York. After he had announced his retirement and the president publicly nominated his successor, Hurd wrote to the president that his retirement plans were scotched. Why?" Slate asked. "Because the judge objected that his successor’s office would be located in Albany, New York, rather than Utica."
READ: Liz Cheney releases recording that proves her rival lied on Fox News about concession call
Federal judges generally get whatever kind of retirement they want, but this appears to be going too far, wrote Richard M. Re.
Instead of bowing to the demands of judges, Re said that President Joe Biden should use it as an opportunity to push for change and hold judges to their retirement announcements by making them binding.
"Not only would it prevent Hurd’s shenanigans from spreading to the highest court in the land, but it could also allow the justices to commit to retire after a fixed term of service," Re explained. "In other words, the justices themselves could create Supreme Court term limits. And doing so might prove attractive, especially if it helps to stave off more intrusive reforms, like court-packing."
By Ahmed Aboulenein and Kanishka Singh
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The United States said on Thursday it will boost its supply of monkeypox vaccine by making available an extra 1.8 million doses of Bavarian Nordic's Jynneos shot, as the number of reported cases in the country rose above 13,500.
Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), gave the figure for reported cases as of Aug.17, which represent more than a third of the global total of 39,000, at a White House briefing.
"It's critical that we do all we can to keep this dangerous virus from spreading," Secretary of Health and Human Services Xavier Becerra said at the briefing.
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is making 360,000 vaccine vials available to order from next week, said Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response Dawn O'Connell, which is the equivalent of 1.8 million doses.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) last week authorized administering Bavarian Nordic's Jynneos shot intradermally, between the layers of the skin, increasing by fivefold the doses that can be used from a vial.
Bavarian Nordic has raised doubts about the safety of the method, citing a lack of data and evidence that injecting Jynneos in this way could result in increased reactions compared to injecting it underneath the skin.
The additional doses would be available for states and local health departments that administer the vaccine intradermally, and have used 90% of their current supply, White House monkeypox response coordinator Bob Fenton said.
The U.S. is also making 50,000 courses of SIGA Technologies Inc's TPOXX antiviral treatment available for people who test positive, said Fenton. State and local health departments can start ordering them next week.
In addition, President Joe Biden's administration is setting aside vaccine doses for areas hosting large gatherings of high-risk groups, he said, which state and local health departments can order on top of their existing allocations and supply.
"HHS is launching a pilot program that will provide up to 50,000 doses from the National Stockpile to be made available for pride and other events that will have high attendance of gay and bisexual men," Fenton added.
Around 98% of monkeypox cases nationwide occurred among those assigned the male sex at birth, Walensky said.
Among cases with known recent sexual history and gender, 93% were among men who reported recent sexual contact with other men, down from 99% in late July.
The pattern of sexual transmission in men is not typical. In Africa, where monkeypox has been circulating since the 1970s, 60% of cases are in men, and 40% occur in women.
Of the more than 6,000 U.S. cases for which race and ethnicity data is available, about 35% occurred among white, non-Hispanic people, Walensky said, adding that another 28% were in Black people and 33% in Hispanic people.
The median age of cases is 35, she added.
(Reporting by Ahmed Aboulenein and Kanishka Singh; Editing by Mark Porter, Frances Kerry and Alexander Smith)
Former U.S. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos on Wednesday compared an encounter she had with President Joe Biden to sexual harassment under new definitions for colleges and universities proposed by his administration. DeVos said that the first time she met Biden in early 2019 she had recently broken her pelvis and was using a wheelchair. Biden put his hands on her shoulders and his forehead on her forehead "for several seconds," DeVos said during an appearance on Megyn Kelly's podcast, adding she had "nowhere to go to or escape." "If he had done that as a student on a college campus under his p...
Two days before supporters of former president Donald Trump attacked the U.S. Capitol, the U.S. Secret Service discovered a “series of violent threats” made on social media, including against Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and President Joe Biden, but did not pass them on to the Capitol Police until the evening of January 6 – after the violence of the insurrection had ended.
Let’s listen to former Secret Service agent Jonathan Wackrow in a recent CNN interview describe just some of the issues now facing the Secret Service regarding their handling of the January 6th attacks.
The Secret Service's email messages were obtained by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), a liberal watchdog group.
“On January 4, Secret Service agents discovered a Parler account, which we’ve chosen not to name, posting a series of violent threats towards lawmakers," CREW reported. "Other profiles with the same name appeared on Twitter, MeWe, Bitchute, Youtube and Facebook.”
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“January 6 starts #1776 all over again…Fight for EVERYTHING” the account posted on Dec. 31, 2020, and listed “Enemies,” including Pelosi. The list, which was posted by a Parler user, also included Joe Biden, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.
A Twitter post from the same day as the threat against Pelosi stated, “TIPS FOR THE BRAVE AND COURAGEOUS PATRIOTS GOING TO DC TO FORCE CONGRESS TO REFUSE BIDEN’S RIGGED ELECTION.” The “tips” included admonitory comments such as “Keep MAGA gear hidden until AFTER checking in” at hotels, “DC is very BLUE and a hotbed for ANTIFA/BLM. Stay with the large group, especially at night,” and “be wary” of DC police officers.
“Biden will die shortly after being elected,” the account wrote Jan. 2nd. “Patriots are gonna tear his head off. Prison is his best case scenario.”
“We’re all on a mission to save America. Lone wolf attacks are the way to go,” read another post. “Stay anonymous. Stay alive. Guns up Patriots!!”
The Secret Service didn't pass along the threats to the Capitol Police until 5:55 pm on January 6, 2021, hours after the mob attacked the Capitol. Speaker Pelosi was at the Capitol on the 6th without any knowledge of the explicit comments which called for her harm.
The Secret Service has come under fire in recent months over deleted text messages from the days surrounding January 6th.
A former U.S. Attorney called for a full investigation into the U.S. Secret Service’s failure to share intelligence it had detailing the violent threats.
Joyce Vance, a former US Attorney who is now a law professor and NBC News legal analyst tweeted Wednesday, “This is deeply disturbing and requires a full investigation. The Capitol Police are responsible for protecting the Speaker.”
The U.S. Secret Service is an agency under the Department of Homeland Security. DHS Inspector General Joseph Cuffari is currently under investigation by two House Committee chairs, Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) and Bennie Thompson (D-MS), who on Tuesday accused him of “obstruction.”
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Dr. Mehmet Oz’s U.S. Senate campaign in the key swing state of Pennsylvania has not been going well. Some polls are showing his Democratic challenger, Lt. Gov. John Fetterman, with a double-digit lead, and Oz has been inundated with brutal mockery in response to a shopping video that was meant to disparage President Joe Biden and other Democrats but, according to critics, misfired badly. Fetterman, in fact, has fundraised more than $500,000 from Oz’s widely ridiculed “crudité” video.
MAGA Republicans have been hoping to find a way to derail Fetterman’s campaign. One of them is Steve Bannon, host of the “War Room” podcast and former White House chief strategist in the Trump Administration. But Bannon’s line of attack is being slammed by critics as both ridiculous and desperate; Bannon is implying that Fetterman has a “satanic” appearance.
In a Gettr post on Wednesday, August 17, Bannon shared an over-the-top article from the right-wing Washington Free Beacon; the article showed Fetterman’s family members next to someone who was dressed as an animé character and claimed that Fetterman was part of a “Democratic grooming scandal.”
Bannon wrote, “Is Fetterman satanic?? His look, his vibe, his associations ... has there been anyone in the history of the country that exudes more just pure evil than this guy.... the Citizens of the Commonwealth need to ask themselves — do we want someone who hangs with Satanic Groomers to represent us in the US Senate."
When Bannon’s Gettr post was shared on Twitter — a platform that the “War Room” host was banned from after saying that Dr. Anthony Fauci and FBI Director Chris Wray should be beheaded — it didn’t take long for him to be inundated with ridicule and mockery. Florida-based attorney Ron Filipkowski, on August 17, tweeted, “Pretty sure when Steve Bannon calls you ‘satanic’ that means you are winning.” And similarly, journalist/author James Surowiecki tweeted, “To me, this just seems like clunky, self-evidently false nonsense from Bannon, and it really shows is how Republicans are scrambling to find a line of attack against Fetterman…. Fetterman ‘exudes pure evil’ is so distant from reality that it has no force.”
Another Twitter user, Seth Daire, @SethDaire, posted, “That's not even subtle QAnon rhetoric by Bannon, which dehumanizes and demonizes those they scapegoat. Also, have you seen Bannon's look, his vibe, his associations?”
Daire, in another tweet, argued that Bannon and other MAGA Republicans on the far right promote violence when they push ridiculous conspiracy theories. Daire wrote, “For those who asked, Satanic Groomers aligns with ideas central to Pizzagate and QAnon, and by framing his opposition that way, it dehumanizes and demonizes, which makes it easier for them to justify violence and harassment. Bannon has QAnon followers, even though he isn't QAnon.”
Writer Mark Russell mocked the appearance of Bannon, who former President Donald Trump describes as “Sloppy Steve” even though he considers him an ally. Russell, talking about Bannon, tweeted, “Says the guy who perpetually looks like he just stepped out of a panel van to buy duct tape.”
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NOW WATCH: Former US attorney calls for 'full investigation' after report Secret Service failed to share Pelosi threat
Former US attorney calls for 'full investigation' after report Secret Service failed to share Pelosi www.youtube.com
Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) on Thursday took a veiled shot at some of the candidates his party is running for the United States Senate.
According to NBC News' Frank Thorp, McConnell was asked by reporters how he was feeling about his party's prospects in the upcoming midterm elections.
"I think there's probably a greater likelihood the House flips than the Senate," McConnell said. "Senate races are just different, they're statewide, candidate quality has a lot to do with the outcome."
McConnell's comments on the Senate being less likely to flip are particularly striking given that the GOP only needs a net gain of one seat to retake control of the chamber.
IN OTHER NEWS: January 6 participant gets banned from courtroom after repeatedly harassing witnesses
That said, polls have shown Republican candidates struggling to gain traction even as President Joe Biden's approval rating remains stuck in the low 40s.
Of particular concern for Republicans are three candidates that were hand-selected by former President Donald Trump: In Pennsylvania, Mehmet Oz has been repeatedly attacked by rival John Fetterman as a rich carpetbagger and is now trailing in many polls by double-digit margins; in Georgia, Herschel Walker has been dogged by revelations that he fathered multiple secret children and allegedly threatened to kill his ex-wife; and in Arizona, Blake Masters has taken criticism for praising the Unabomber's manifesto.
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NOW WATCH: Former US attorney calls for 'full investigation' after report Secret Service failed to share Pelosi threat
Former US attorney calls for 'full investigation' after report Secret Service failed to share Pelosi www.youtube.com
Over the past several years, the IRS has slowly been defunded, which means there are fewer resources available for the IRS to go after the ultra-wealthy armed with a team of lawyers. After the search warrant was executed at former President Donald Trump golf club, Mar-a-Lago, GOP members have stepped up their attacks, the Washington Post reported Thursday.
In a recent tele-town hall by Rep. Tom Cole (R-OK), the lawmaker promoted the false House Republican talking point that the IRS was hiring 87,000 agents who would audit everyone in the United States.
"That was just another one of the reasons why I voted no on the legislation,” Cole said. “Sorry that we couldn’t defeat it.”
Republicans all voted against the Inflation Reduction Act, which gave $80 billion to the IRS over 10 years to enforce the tax code. It was two days after the FBI executed the search warrant at Mar-a-Lago.
IN OTHER NEWS: Trump angrily lashes out over report that lawyers are refusing to represent him
“If the FBI can raid the home of a former US President, imagine what 87,000 more IRS agents will do to you,” tweeted Rep. Jim Banks (R-IN).
"A job listing on the IRS website weeks before the legislation became law noted that applicants should be ready to 'Carry a firearm and be willing to use deadly force, if necessary,'" wrote the Post. It sent REpublicans into the stratosphere of conspiracy panic.
“Are they going to have a strike force that goes in with AK-15s already loaded, ready to shoot some small-business person in Iowa?” ranted Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) on "The Fox & Friends."
“It’s political suicide to raise people’s taxes and double the size of the most unpopular bureaucratic agency, but Democrats chose to do that," lied a Republican strategist who refused to give their name to the Post. "No one likes paying taxes, no one likes being harassed by the IRS and being squeezed for everything they have. So it’s an easy selling point to voters."
Republicans are desperately trying to paint Democrats as raising taxes on Americans, though the bill passed only raises taxes on those making over $400,000 a year.
“And under my plan, nobody earning less than $400,000 a year will pay an additional penny in new taxes. Nobody,” Biden said in a speech Tuesday evening.
When the GOP's talking point didn't seem to be working, they started claiming that everyday Americans were all going to get audited. It implies that they weren't being audited already. The problem is that everyday Americans are already getting audited; it's the millionaires and billionaires that are getting a pass because it's too difficult and costly.
The report explained that the GOP is elated by the Democratic bill that added to the IRS budget. The reality is that in 2020 an IRS report showed they processed just 7.4 million filings and in 2021 they were able to process 35.8 million in that same time period. It meant that most Americans got their tax returns faster.
The attacks on the IRS are now adding to the anti-government sentiment seen among supporters of Trump. Already FBI agents have been threatened and doxxed. A Cincinnati FBI office was attacked by a Trump supporter who also was at the Capitol on Jan. 6.
“If Joe Biden is willing to use the federal government to go after the big guy,” referring to Trump, “if they can do it to people in power, what can they do to you with no army of lawyers and no big voice?” said another GOP strategist.
Other Republican strategists have claimed that Democrats are focusing on the IRS when they should be funding more police at the border. Trump previously sent National Guard soldiers to the border resulting in a report that most of them were simply sitting around with nothing to do. When Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) tried the same ploy, it too was a "disaster."
After so many attacks on federal agents, it's as if Rep. Cole realized his disparaging comments came with a risk.
“I would just tell everybody, please, no matter where you are on the issue, no matter how mad you are, please don’t do anything untoward,” Cole told those at the tele-town hall. “That’s just not appropriate and dangerous for all concerned.”
Cole's home state is no stranger to anti-government terrorism. In 1995, anti-government activist Timothy McVeigh blew up the federal building in Oklahoma City.
With President Joe Biden's approval rating stuck in the low 40s, Republican Senate candidates should in theory be having an easy time with raising money and putting their Democratic rivals on the defensive.
However, as Politico's Playbook notes, this has not been the case, as several Trump-backed Republican Senate candidates have struggled to gain traction in what should be a favorable political environment.
"In Pennsylvania, a ferocious Democratic campaign to paint Mehmet Oz as an out-of-touch carpetbagger has left him trailing in multiple polls," Playbook notes. "Herschel Walker may be a Georgia Bulldogs legend, but key voters appear to be doubting him after a series of gaffes and abuse allegations. The backing of Silicon Valley titan Peter Thiel hasn't yet been enough to sell Blake Masters' sharp-edged conservatism to Arizona voters."
Oz has been performing particularly poorly against Democratic rival John Fetterman, as several polls have come out showing him trailing by double-digit margins.
David Bergstein of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee tells Politico that "Senate campaigns are candidate-versus-candidate battles" and that "right now, the Republican roster of recruits, it's looking like a bunch of rotten crudités."
The reference to "crudités" is a shot at Oz's already-infamous campaign video shot inside a grocery store in which he complained that Biden was to blame for the high price of crudités, which Fetterman was quick to point out are referred to as "veggie trays" in Pennsylvania.
ABC News cited an old interview with Kash Patel, the former chief of staff for the Defense Department under Donald Trump, in which he revealed his plot to post declassified documents on his personal website. While ABC noted his remarks came weeks before the FBI search of Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort, there are at least six other times where Patel outlined his plot, legal analyst Marcy Wheeler and Just Security noticed.
The same day that Kash Patel bragged he would take on his new job organizing Trump's National Archives directory, the Justice Department gave Trump the subpoena that he turn over surveillance footage from Mar-a-Lago. Patel, who previously worked for Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA), then went on other right-wing streaming "shows" to talk about his plot.
Conservative writer John Solomon penned a column revealing in June that Trump was subpoenaed for videos looking at the place where the government documents were being kept. It was then revealed that Solomon was also given the National Archives assignment that Patel scored too.
"That’s because if Trump deliberately allowed people not permitted access to classified documents or his negligence allowed people to remove such documents, it would trigger other parts of the Espionage Act than the one that prohibits someone from stealing classified documents and refusing to give them back (and all are covered by the warrant)," wrote Wheeler.
IN OTHER NEWS: GOP candidate for Congress says Garland should ‘probably’ be ‘executed’ – later claims he was just being ‘facetious’
As Just Security pointed out, Patel tipped his hand that the documents were actually classified.
“Part of that transparency comes in the form of, you know, providing the American public with information that should never have been classified or kept from them in the first place," he said. He went on to explain that Trump "declassified" the documents "on the way out of the White House." There's no paper trail to confirm this, however.
As Wheeler pointed out, however, Patel's understanding of the documents began as early as May 2022, when he told Breitbart that Trump had declassified all of the documents but that there was no prior effort at the White House to declassify the documents. It means that months ago, Patel not only knew all of this was coming, but he was already blaming "the left," saying they would claim Trump was disclosing classified information from Russiagate and the attempted bribery of Ukraine that resulted in his first impeachment.
“The White House counsel failed to generate the paperwork to change the classification markings, but that doesn’t mean the information wasn’t declassified,” Patel said. “I was there with President Trump when he said ‘We are declassifying this information.’"
READ: January 6 participant gets banned from courtroom after repeatedly harassing witnesses
At the end of June, Trump specifically directed the National Archives "to give him access to the documents related to the Russia probe that were declassified in the final days of his administration," wrote Politico. John Solomon then got to look through the documents to write about. Through Solomon, Trump then claimed that he has a blanket power to declassify anything he wants.
As it turns out, Trump's White House Counsel Pat Cipollone and his deputy, Patrick Philbin, were talking to the FBI about Trump taking documents to Mar-a-Lago, the New York Times also reported this week.
On July 4, Patel told another right-wing streaming show that the government bureaucrats "stopped the declassification process." So, again, he confessed that the documents Trump had were still classified.
"I apologize I can’t get it declassified overnight, but I’m on it,” he said.
Throughout the whole interview, he kept wavering on whether the documents were declassified while saying he was working to declassify them.
RELATED: Allies are urging Trump not to release Mar-a-Lago surveillance footage — here's why
He went on to talk about how he knows "first hand" what some of the documents were about. "If Kash knows that [it's] because Trump let him wade through Top Secret documents he was no longer cleared to access — then Trump may have additional criminal liability," wrote Wheeler.
The New York Times reported, “It is not clear why Mr. Trump had classified documents at Mar-a-Lago. There is no evidence yet that he was planning to release the material.” But as Just Security explained, that flies in the face of the interviews with Patel leading up to the search warrant.
On another note, Michael Flynn's protege Ezra Cohen-Watnick was appointed to be chairperson of the Public Interest Declassification Board before Christmas in 2020. Politico reported not long after the 2020 election that prior to the appointment to the board, Cohen-Watnick "has been acting in the role of top spec ops official since the summer and became the Pentagon’s acting top intelligence official last week."
Benjamin Powell, Paul-Noel Chretien, a former CIA & DOJ lawyer; and Michael Lawrence, from the CIA and NSA were also appointed to the board.
President Joe Biden has been good about ensuring that Trump appointees were removed from boards, but these seem to be flying under the radar.
New York Republican Carl Paladino, running for a U.S. House seat, said Attorney General Merrick Garland should probably be "executed" in a radio interview this past weekend, and later when pressed backtracked, claiming he was just being "facetious," as The Buffalo News first reported.
"So we have a couple of unelected people who are running our government with an administration of people like Garland," Paladino said in an attack on President Joe Biden in a Saturday interview with the far-right wing Breitbart media site.
Garland "should be not only impeached he should probably, should be executed, the guy is just lost," Paladino said.
Paladino called Garland, a former U.S. Supreme Court nominee and former Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, a "lost soul" who is "trying to get an image and his image, his methodology is just terrible."
"To raid the home of a former president is just, people are scratching their heads and they're saying, 'What is wrong with this guy?'"
Later in the interview Breitbart Radio host Matthew Boyle asked Paladino, "Carl, what you just said about Garland, you said you think 'he should be impeached and probably executed.' Can you explain that? What do you mean by that?"
"I'm just being facetious," Paladino replied. "The man should be removed from office. He's shows his incompetence. He wants to get his face in front of the people. And in short, he's got some mettle to him, but his choice of issues and his choice of methodology is is is very sad. And then he wants to take full blame for it, you know he'll he'll stand there."
Paladino, who is strongly endorsed by U.S. Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY), the Chair of the House Republican Conference, has a long history of controversial remarks and actions.
Just last month the New York Post reported he "has a convicted sex offender on his company payroll who also now works as 'assistant treasurer' of his campaign."
"Joel Sartori was controller of Ellicott Development when he was busted in 2013 for accessing child porn on a company computer," The Post adds. "Sartori was convicted of two felonies — possessing and promoting kiddie porn — and sentenced to 10 years’ probation in 2017, court records show."
As CNN has reported, Paladino has called Black people "dumb and hungry," claimed they are "conditioned" to only vote for Democrats, while insisting he’s not "a racist." He also said a woman who had accused Donald Trump of sexual assault "probably enjoyed" it.
Stefanik, the third most powerful House Republican, on June 3 praised Paladino as an “inspirational” leader, a “doer,” and “the kind of leader we need today.” That endorsement came just days before it was revealed Paladino in 2021 had called Adolf Hitler “inspirational,” and “the kind of leader we need today” (audio.)
Stefanik later doubled down on her endorsement despite Paladino’s praise for Hitler, a genocidal fascist responsible for the murders of approximately 17 million people.
As CNN also reported, in 2016, “Paladino had said he would like to see Michelle Obama ‘return to being a male and let loose in the outback of Zimbabwe where she lives comfortably in a cave with Maxie, the gorilla,’ and that he hoped Barack Obama would die of Mad Cow Disease after having sex with a cow.”
Listen to Paladino's remarks about Attorney General Garland below or at this link:
Image: Screenshot via Facebook
InfoWars host Alex Jones has publicly announced that he will no longer "pigheadedly" support former President Donald Trump. Instead, he is now throwing his support behind Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R).
Jones made the announcement this week during an InfoWars broadcast as he recalled a number of the former president's political initiatives he now claims to have disagreed with.
According to Business Insider, Jones "said he disagreed with Trump over Operation Warp Speed — the former president's initiative launched in May 2020 to produce COVID-19 vaccines — but backed him anyway."
The far-right host also insisted that he believed Trump should have remained in the White House to "prevent the 'nightmare scenario' of Joe Biden being elected president."
He went on to declare his support for the Florida governor. "That said, I am supporting DeSantis. DeSantis has just gone from being awesome to being unbelievably good," Jones said.
He also insisted he believes there is "'real sincerity' in DeSantis' eyes" when viewing footage of the Republican governor.
"We have someone who is better than Trump. Way better than Trump," Jones said, as he suggested that DeSantis is who Trump "should be like."
Although Jones has been known as a fierce supporter of Trump, he was also one of the far-right individuals who pushed back against the former president's efforts encouraging Americans to get the COVID-19 vaccine.
Jones remarks come just days after Fox News' Laura Ingraham also suggested that it may be time to move on from Trump.
This week, Ingraham said that it appears Americans are "exhausted" by Trump's ongoing legal woes and other challenges and that it may be "time to turn the page."
By Jason Lange
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Half of U.S. Republicans say federal law enforcement officials behaved irresponsibly since searching former President Donald Trump's Florida home for classified documents taken from the White House, a Reuters/Ipsos poll found this week.
FBI agents on Aug. 8 removed 11 sets of classified records from Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, some of which were labeled "top secret," a status reserved for the most sensitive U.S. national security information.
Trump announced that the search had taken place and has alleged without providing evidence that it was a politically motivated act, while Democratic President Joe Biden's Justice Department has said it is applying the law impartially.
The two-day Reuters/Ipsos poll completed on Wednesday suggests Republican voters could be largely siding with Trump despite the Republican Party's longstanding support for law enforcement.
Still, a significant slice of Republican respondents backed the FBI in the poll, a view closer to those of prominent Republicans such as former Vice President Mike Pence who on Wednesday called on the party to stop attacking the agency.
Fifty-four percent of Republican respondents said the FBI and Justice Department have behaved irresponsibly following the Mar-a-Lago search, compared to 23% who said they behaved responsibly. The rest said they didn't know.
Views on the unprecedented search reflect the nation's polarized politics. While Republicans have mostly lined up behind Trump, 71% of Democrats and about half of independents said federal law enforcement has acted responsibly.
Four days after the search, the Justice Department confirmed it was investigating whether the Espionage Act had been violated when documents were removed from the White House and taken to Trump's home.
U.S. media organizations on Thursday will ask a federal judge to release the evidence that the Justice Department submitted to convince a court it had probable cause to believe a crime had been committed.
Trump remains wildly popular among Republicans and is considering a 2024 presidential run.
The FBI has warned that threats against federal law enforcement have increased since the Mar-a-Lago search.
Concerns about political violence have surged since the deadly Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters who tried to stop lawmakers from certifying Biden's victory in the 2020 presidential election.
Three days after the search of Trump's home, an armed man with right-wing views tried to breach an FBI office in Cincinnati, Ohio. He was shot dead by police following a car chase and gun battle.
The Reuters/Ipsos poll showed 85% of Americans think it is unacceptable for someone in their political party to commit violence to achieve a political goal. But among Republicans and Democrats alike, 12% of respondents said that kind of violence was OK.
The Reuters/Ipsos poll is conducted online in English throughout the United States. The latest poll gathered responses from 1,005 adults, including 436 Democrats and 387 Republicans. It has a credibility interval - a measure of precision - of four percentage points.
(Reporting by Jason Lange; Additional reporting by Rose Horowitch; Editing by Scott Malone and Daniel Wallis)
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