Trump news: US shoots down Iran drone, as FBI reveals how president tried to silence Stormy Daniels
President 'fuelling and feeding off hate', Democrats warn
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Your support makes all the difference.US politicians have voiced disgust and alarm after a rally crowd responded to Donald Trump’s racist attacks on congresswoman Ilhan Omar with chants of “send her back”.
Democrats warned the president was “fuelling and feeding off hate” and “stoking the most despicable and disturbing currents in our society” by vilifying Ms Omar, a Somali refugee who arrived in the US as a child nearly three decades ago.
Senator Bernie Sanders said Mr Trump was “the most dangerous president in the history of our country,” while fellow 2020 election hopeful Elizabeth Warren called for him to face impeachment.
On Thursday, the president chided his supporters who chanted the statement at the rally, joining widespread criticism of the campaign crowd’s cry after fellow Republicans warned it could hurt the GOP in next year’s elections.
In a week that has corkscrewed daily with hostile exchanges over race and love of country, Mr Trump also claimed he had tried to stop the chant at a reelection event Wednesday night in North Carolina.
“I started speaking really quickly,” he told reporters. “I was not happy with it. I disagree with it.”
However, video shows the crowd’s “send her back” shouts resounded for 13 seconds as Mr Trump made no attempt to interrupt them. He paused in his speech and surveyed the scene, taking in the uproar.
Ms Omar responded on Thursday, telling reporters: “This is what this president and his supporters have turned our country” into, she said as she walked outside the US Capitol.
“This is not about me," she added. "This is about fighting about what this country truly should be and what it deserves to be.”
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There's no mention of the furore over last night's rally in Donald Trump's first tweets of the day.
Instead, he turns to the recent arrest and indictment on murder charges of alleged California gang members to make a point about immigration:
Donald Trump has torn into the mayor of San Juan, Puerto Rico's capital, calling her "despicable and incompetent" and suggesting US congress was "foolish" to grant $92bn of disaster relief to the Caribbean territory after Hurricane Maria devastated the island.
His tweet comes against a backdrop of protests against Puerto Rico's governor, Ricardo Rossello, who is being urged to resign over sexist and homophobic texts.
Some of those messages included slurs about San Juan's mayor, Carmen Yulin Cruz, who has been an outspoken critic of both Rossello and Trump.
A defiant Turkey has said it is considering “alternatives” to US fighter jets that could include Russian models or building its own aircraft a day after the United States suspended it from its programme to build and deploy advanced warplanes, writes Borzou Daragahi.
The US punished Turkey for its purchase of a Russian air defence system by pushing it from a long-term programme to upgrade NATO warplanes with F-35 advanced fighter jets.
And in other breaking news, financier Jeffrey Epstein has been denied bail.
Although the president has repeatedly attempted to distance himself from Epstein, Donald Trump has previously described him as "a friend", with a video of them both ogling young women resurfacing this week.
Unredacted search warrants for Michael Cohen have been released following the close of his federal case. The FBI has said Donald Trump, Michael Cohen and Hope Hicks had a series of phone calls in 2016 discussing how to keep Stormy Daniels (real name Stephanie Clifford) from going public about her alleged affair with the would-be president.
The unsealed filings say Donald Trump and former White House Communications Director Hope Hicks spoke with Michale Cohen on the 8 October 2016. This was the day after the infamous Hollywood Access Tapes were published.
In case anyone has forgotten, the tapes showed Donald Trump saying to TB host Billy Bush: "I don't even wait. And when you're a star, they let you do it. You can do anything. Grab them by the p****y. You can do anything."
So far the White House has not responded to the unsealed documents, and Donald Trump's Twitter feed is blank.
This afternoon the president will host Netherlands Prime Minister Mark Rutte at the White House.
This section of the warrant shows a conversation between Michael Cohen and Dylan Howard, an executive from American Media Inc. It is thought the exchange is in response to a Wall Street Journal story from 2016 about former Playboy model Karen McDougal's alleged affair with Trump, with authorities suggesting the "he" refers to Donald Trump.
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