The sanctions were passed with a veto-proof majority because of Russian election interference in 2016. They followed sanctions passed in 2012 for human rights violations, called the Magnitsky Act.
Trump specifically named Obama as being among those that didn’t reach out to the families of fallen soldiers, saying, “If you look at President Obama, and other presidents, most of them didn’t make calls, a lot of them didn’t make calls. I like to call when it’s appropriate, when I think I am able to do it.” When this was shown to be untrue, Trump backtracked by saying, “President Obama I think probably did sometimes, and maybe sometimes he didn’t. I don’t know. That’s what I was told. Other presidents did not call. They’d write letters. And some presidents didn’t do anything.”
Army Sergeant La David Johnson was killed during an ambush in Niger by elements of ISIS. The event was the largest loss of American lives in Africa during combat since the Battle of Mogadishu in 1993.
Sgt. La David Johnson / Associated Press
La David’s pregnant widow said that Trump forgot her husband’s name during a phone call he’d made to offer condolences. Trump also remarked about her husband that, “He knew what he signed up for, but it hurts anyways.”
When the widow’s account of the phone call was reported, Trump said she was wrong because he has “one of the greatest memories of all time.”
He also tweeted that he had said the name “without hesitation.”
I had a very respectful conversation with the widow of Sgt. La David Johnson, and spoke his name from beginning, without hesitation!
He explained, “One of the things with the wall is you need transparency, you have to be able to see through it. In other words, if you can’t see through that wall – so it could be a steel wall with openings, but you have to have openings because you have to see what’s on the other side of the wall.”
In another instance, he said the need for transparent walls was from the possibility of harm from projectiles from the southern side. Trump explained, “as horrible as it sounds, when they throw the large sacks of drugs over, and if you have people on the other side of the wall, you don’t see them–they hit you on the head with 60 pounds of the stuff? It’s over.”
He reiterated the need for a see-through wall during a subsequent press conference, where he noted that it would be “a more powerful wall and a more beautiful wall.”
The Executive Order removed guidelines allowing transgender students to use the public school bathrooms that match their identity. The original order threatened to be withheld for institutions that failed to comply.
Trump admitted he fired Comey because of the “Russia thing” in an interview with Lester Holt:
“And, in fact, when I decided to just do it, I said to myself, I said: ‘You know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made up story, it’s an excuse by the Democrats for having lost an election that they should’ve won.’”
This contradicted the original White House memo that stated Comey was fired because of his handling of the Hillary email investigation. He again backtracked the comments later after claiming that the interview had been “fudged,” though no evidence was offered.
