suggested using water tankers to put out the Notre-Dame fire?

On April 15, 2019, the Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris caught fire during a restoration effort. Its spire, originally built in the 13th century and recreated in the 19th century, toppled through the roof. The cathedral, a national icon, is visited by 12 million people annually.

notre dame before and after
Brian Kinney/Shutterstock, Christophe Petit Tesson, Pool via AP

Echoing similarly imprudent suggestions like nuking hurricanes, raking leaves to prevent forest fires, and using light and disinfectant to combat COVID-19, Trump proposed dropping tankers of water to douse the fire.

In response, the French national civil security force explained that such an action could destroy the entire cathedral.

In later remarks, Trump lamented the damage with sincerity:

It’s one of the great treasures of the world…That is a part of our growing up, it’s a part of our culture, it’s a part of our lives. That’s a truly great cathedral. I’ve been there and I’ve seen it, and there’s no cathedral, I think I can probably say there’s no cathedral in the world like it. It’s a terrible scene.

French President Macron called for the restoration of the cathedral to be completed within five years, though efforts were halted amid the COVID-19 pandemic, and concerns linger about the remaining structure’s integrity.

NBC News – Notre Dame fire: What was damaged
Politico – Trump suggests deploying flying water tankers for ‘horrible’ fire at Notre Dame Cathedral
Los Angeles Times – Trump tweets advice for saving Notre Dame; Paris fire officials say it’s a terrible idea
Wikipedia – Spire of Notre-Dame de Paris
Wikipedia – Notre-Dame de Paris

called in to Fox & Friends where he ranted for 53 minutes?

During the 53 minutes, Trump spoke at length about various conspiracy theories and made several false claims about the ongoing impeachment hearings. Among them, Ukraine’s supposed role in tampering with elections, and how the phone call with the Ukrainian leader at the center of the impeachment hearings was made up. He also directly admitted to holding up the military aid that had been agreed upon by Congress, saying, “I mean, I asked it very point-blank, because we’re looking for corruption. There’s tremendous corruption. Why should we be giving hundreds of millions of dollars to countries when there’s this kind of corruption?”

Trump had also previously called in to Fox & Friends for similar rants.

The New York Times – Trump’s Long List of Inaccurate Statements on ‘Fox & Friends’
Business Insider – Trump essentially admitted on live TV to doing the thing he’s accused of in the impeachment inquiry

gave a thumbs up in a photo with the orphan of a mass shooting?

After a 2019 mass shooting in El Paso that left 22 dead and 24 injured, Trump visited the scene to meet with survivors and first responders.

In one of the photos tweeted by wife Melania, he had a smile and a thumbs up as he stood next to her while she held an infant that had been orphaned by the killer. The infant suffered broken fingers as his mother collapsed on him to shield him from the attack.

Twitter/Melania Trump
Twitter/Melania Trump

The killer had made multiple white nationalist and anti-immigrant posts online. Trump himself has advocated politically extremist views, including infamously claiming at Charlottesville after a white nationalist rally that left a woman dead that, “there were fine people on both sides.”

Business Insider – Trump gave a thumbs-up in a photo with a baby orphaned by El Paso mass shooting
CNN – Trump gives thumbs up in photo with El Paso orphan
The Hill – El Paso orphan’s family explains Trump photo with baby
Wikipedia – 2019 El Paso shooting

showed no sympathy to a refugee whose family was murdered by ISIS?

Nobel Peace Prize recipient Nadia Murad visited the White House to speak with Trump and plead for help for her Yazidi people. She had been tortured and sold into sex slavery by ISIS, and even after ISIS’ demise, 95,000 Yazidi refugees couldn’t return home because of ongoing struggles between the Kurdish and Iraqi governments.

Trump had been disinterested throughout the meeting, even as Murad recounted, “All this happened to me. They killed my mom, my six brothers. They left behind them.” Trump asked, “Where are they now?” Murad replied, “They killed them. They are in the mass grave in Sinjar, and I’m still fighting just to live in safe. Please do something.” “I know the area very well,” Trump replied. “I’m going to look into it very strongly.”

Trump then asked why she received the Nobel Prize, about which he had to again explain what she had endured.

The Yazidi people and their plight became worldwide news in 2014, when they were forced to flee their homes in the face of an ISIS offensive. 40,000 men, women, and children were surrounded in the Sinjar Mountains until the Obama administration authorized air-strikes and drops of aid to prevent genocide.

The Washington Post – A Yazidi woman from Iraq told Trump that ISIS killed her family. ‘Where are they now?’ he asked.
USA Today – Iraqi refugee Nadia Murad to Trump: ISIS killed family. Trump responds: ‘Where are they now?’
The Hill – Yazidi woman who won Nobel Prize pleads with Trump to help her people
Wikipedia – Sinjar Massacre, Refugee crisis in the Sinjar Mountains

suggesting nuking hurricanes?

In advance of Hurricane Dorian, a White House source to Axios claimed that Trump said, “I got it. I got it. Why don’t we nuke them?” The source said that everyone present was shocked by the suggestion.

Trump immediately called the report fake news, even though a senior White House official defended his suggestion by saying, “His goal — to keep a catastrophic hurricane from hitting the mainland — is not bad. His objective is not bad.”

Trump went on to suggest he’d not even heard of Axios, the outlet that broke the story, despite having had multiple interviews with them and tweeting their stories in the past.

Trump also altered a map of the hurricane’s path with a Sharpie after incorrectly claiming that it would affect Alabama.

Axios – Scoop: Trump suggested nuking hurricanes to stop them from hitting U.S.
Wired – While You Were Offline: Could a Nuclear Bomb Stop a Hurricane?
Time – President Trump Denies Wanting to Nuke Hurricanes to Stop Them From Hitting the U.S.
USA Today – You can’t nuke a hurricane to stop it, as Trump reportedly suggested. Here’s why

altered a hurricane map with a Sharpie?

In an August, 2019 briefing on the approaching Hurricane Dorian, Trump claimed that Alabama would be affected:

And, I will say, the states — and it may get a little piece of a great place: It’s called Alabama.  And Alabama could even be in for at least some very strong winds and something more than that, it could be.  This just came up, unfortunately.  It’s the size of — the storm that we’re talking about.  So, for Alabama, just please be careful also.

The National Weather Service tweeted that this was in fact not the case. While 5 states declared national emergencies in advance of the hurricane, Alabama was not among them.

After multiple days of tweeting about how he was right, Trump displayed a hurricane map that appeared to be altered by Sharpie to extend the path into Alabama. It quickly became termed “Sharpiegate.”

Jonathan Ernst / Reuters

When questioned about this, Trump claimed he knew nothing about it.

Two days later, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), an agency within the Department of Commerce, issued an unsigned statement siding with Trump’s claims about Alabama. Shortly after, the New York Times reported that US commerce secretary, Wilbur Ross, had threatened the head of the NOAA with firings unless they publicly supported Trump’s claims.

In June, 2020, the Department of Commerce’s inspector general released a report on the issue. It confirmed that “the Department and NOAA issued the Statement in response to a request by the White House then-acting Chief of Staff, Mick Mulvaney, to Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross.”

The inspector general’s report further concluded that “the Statement undercut the NWS’s forecasts and potentially undercut public trust in NOAA’s and the NWS’s science and the apolitical nature of that science.”

A separate report by the National Academy of Public Administration found that NOAA’s scientific integrity had been compromised “intentionally, knowingly, or in reckless disregard.”

Trump also previously suggested stopping hurricanes with nuclear weapons.

Whitehouse.gov – Remarks by President Trump in Briefing on Hurricane Dorian
The New York Times – Trump Insists He Was Right About Hurricane Dorian Heading for Alabama
The Atlantic – Trump’s Most Pointless Lie
The Washington Post – Investigation rebukes Commerce Department for siding with Trump over forecasters during Hurricane Dorian
The Washington Post – NOAA leaders violated agency’s scientific integrity policy, Hurricane Dorian ‘Sharpiegate’ investigation finds
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration – Statement from NOAA, September 6, 2019
U.S. Department of Commerce, Office of Inspector General – Evaluation of NOAA’s September 6, 2019, Statement About Hurricane Dorian Forecasts
A Report by a Panel of the National Academy of Public Administration – An Independent Assessment of Allegations of Scientific Misconduct
Wikipedia – Hurricane Dorian–Alabama controversy

invited college football champions to the White House for fast food?

Trump served an assortment of pizza, hamburgers, and fries to the Clemson Tigers. He commented, “I think we’re going to serve McDonald’s, Wendy’s and Burger King with some pizza. I really mean it. It would be interesting. And I would think that’s their favorite food.”

Trump also noted that the fast food was due to the ongoing government shut down over border wall funding. However, two months later, he presented a similar feast to a North Dakota team.

Susan Walsh/AP

Trump has long had an affinity for fast food, which he has explained is because of its cleanliness.

 

The New York Times – White House Welcomes College Football Champions With Fast-Food Buffet
The Hill – Trump serves McDonald’s, Burger King to visiting Clemson football team
NPR – Feast Fit For A Burger King: Trump Serves Fast Food To College Football Champs
Associated Press – Fast food at White House for North Dakota football champs

lent credibility to QAnon conspiracy theorists?

QAnon is a series of conspiracy theories centered around an anonymous figure, “Q,” who claimed to be a senior government official that has provided cryptic messages about the Trump administration and its enemies. One of its central claims is that Trump had secretly been working to remove a cabal of Democratic pedophiles from government, which shares likeness to the debunked Pizzagate conspiracy. Many of its assertions have been proven to be false, and the FBI has determined that it could pose a domestic terrorism threat. Nevertheless, Trump and his campaign have repeatedly lent credibility to QAnon by featuring its followers on Twitter and at rallies.

Image result for trump q anon

Into 2020, Trump refused to condemn or disavow the conspiracy theory, saying he didn’t know much about it except that believers supported him.

Q-Anon has been linked to Russian organizations working to amplify disinformation.

Business Insider – A Trump campaign ad featured QAnon signs weeks after the FBI warned conspiracy theories are a domestic terrorism threat
Business Insider – Trump just retweeted a ‘QAnon’ conspiracy-theory hashtag to his 68 million followers
The Washington Post – Hours after an FBI warning about QAnon is published, a QAnon slogan turns up at a Trump rally
Reuters – Russian-backed organizations amplifying QAnon conspiracy theories, researchers say
Wikipedia – QAnon

rolled back regulations on coal pollution?

The Trump administration rolled back one of the most comprehensive Obama-era regulations with the hope of reviving the flailing coal industry. It erased regulations that required each state to meet certain carbon emission targets, and eased the environmental requires on waste from coal and fossil power plants. It also removed requirements for existing plants to upgrade to more efficient systems. The regulations were first instituted in response to a 2008 disaster in which over a billion gallons of waste from a coal ash pond flooded a Tennessee town, and another 2014 spill in North Carolina had millions of gallons pour into a river.

Trump, who has called climate change a “Chinese hoax,” has also overseen the rollback of protections for endangered species and regulations for offshore rigs.

New York Times – E.P.A. to Roll Back Rules to Control Toxic Ash from Coal Plant
Politico – Trump rolls back Obama’s biggest climate rule
US News & World Report – EPA Moves to Rollback Coal Power Plant Waste Rules

Market Watch – Trump administration rolls back Obama-era regulations on coal pollution

More assuredly to come soon

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