US Presidential Election: Trump dominates the headlines with his latest remarks

Trump calls Obama, Clinton 'co-founders' of Islamic State

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump called U.S. President Barack Obama and Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton "co-founders" of Islamic State on Thursday, igniting fresh criticism of his inflammatory campaign style. Read More

The reason I post several articles on the same remarks is that each article offers further commentary on those remarks. They also examine the remarks from different angles.

Trump Calls Obama the 'Founder of ISIS' Over Anti-Terror Strategy

Donald Trump on Wednesday night appeared to blame President Barack Obama for the global terror threat, erroneously accusing him of creating ISIS and saying the group "honors" him. Read More

Donald Trump calls Obama 'founder of ISIS'

Donald Trump on Wednesday repeatedly called President Barack Obama the "founder" of ISIS and labeled Hillary Clinton the "co-founder." Read More Donald Trump: President Barack Obama 'Is the Founder of ISIS'

Donald Trump made a startling accusation against President Barack Obama during a Florida rally Wednesday night, telling supporters that the commander in chief is the "founder of ISIS." Read More

Trump ramps up attack on Obama as founder of Islamic State

And he gives Clinton credit for being the terrorist group's co-founder. Read More

The inflammatory accusation comes as Trump has set off another round of hand-wringing within the Republican Party, returning to his freewheeling ways after the GOP convention with overtures for Russia to hack Clinton’s emails, attacks on the Muslim-American family of a fallen war hero, and a suggestion that “Second Amendment people” are the only ones who can stop Clinton.

Trump Attacks Obama As 'The Founder Of ISIS'

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump declined multiple opportunities to walk back his latest charge that President Obama founded the radical Islamic State terrorist organization. Read More

Trump’s ‘Obama founded ISIS’ comment exemplifies why his campaign is on the brink of doom

Donald Trump likes to outrage. He prides himself on it. He's got the perfect excuse, rolled out a year ago this week: He's simply not "politically correct." He's not PC, he told Fox News' Megyn Kelly in the first Republican debate last August, which is why he makes jokes about the physical appearance of women. Trump avoids the nuanced pronouncements of more experienced politicians and is clearly comfortable with being imprecise in how he makes his points. In his eyes, he's simply telling it like it is.

"All I do is tell the truth," he said during his interview with CNBC on Thursday. "I am a truth-teller."

Part of what motivates Trump to make questionable statements is that he feeds off the approval of his base. He has been repeating the line about Clinton being responsible for the rise of the Islamic State for a while. But the response from blaming Obama was different. His description of the president as the founder of the Islamic State at that rally this week gained volume and frequency as the crowd ate it up. It was almost Pavlovian, watching Trump ride the wave of applause as he said, over and over, that the U.S. president had founded the group. Read More

"There's a reinforcement back and forth: Trump embraces arguments common among a subset of the conservative right and that subset applauds his candidacy.

This may also help explain Trump's bigger flub from earlier this week. On Tuesday, he said at a rally that "Second Amendment people" might be the only way to keep Clinton from appointing justices once she was president. Despite Trump's attempts to reframe the comments as somehow suggesting he was talking about electoral organizing, it was pretty clear that he was picking up on a dark joke that's not uncommon on the right: That at some point government overreach might need to be addressed with the use of the weapons the Second Amendment protects. He was saying something that he probably knew resonated with many people who like him.

Politicians always pander to their bases, but it rarely looks like this. Trump does his 'truth-telling,' which often means saying things that have been an undercurrent on the right for years. He gets loud appreciation for saying those things. It's a spin cycle." Philip Bump, The Washington Post

The one thing keeping Donald Trump from becoming president

What is different between the way Trump is campaigning now and the way he did during the primaries? He does rallies, he does interviews, and other than spending some more time raising money (which he doesn't seem to be spending), there isn't any difference. What's different is the result. In the primaries, Trump's strategy worked. He could blow into a town in New Hampshire or South Carolina, hold a big rally, dominate coverage of the campaign, do some interviews on Fox News and overwhelm his opponents. He's doing the same thing now, but it's not working.

What is different between the way Trump is campaigning now and the way he did during the primaries? He does rallies, he does interviews, and other than spending some more time raising money (which he doesn't seem to be spending), there isn't any difference. What's different is the result. In the primaries, Trump's strategy worked. He could blow into a town in New Hampshire or South Carolina, hold a big rally, dominate coverage of the campaign, do some interviews on Fox News and overwhelm his opponents. He's doing the same thing now, but it's not working. Read More

What is Trump planning to do with the money his campaign is raising if he is not going to use it for ads and organization?

Inside Donald Trump’s Meltdown

In the two and a half weeks since the Republican convention Donald Trump has done so much damage to his candidacy that the RNC chairman Reince Priebus told him he’d have been better off playing golf at his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida. The bombastic GOP nominee features on the cover of TIME once again this week, but under very different circumstances. Previous instances have spotlighted Trump’s takeover the GOP. Now it’s how the party is trying to handle his polling slide and endless parade of controversial statements. In an interview with TIME, Trump rejected the notion that his campaign was in trouble, but admitted to being down a handful points in the polls (somewhat understating his predicament). He also describes his internal tension over whether to listen to outside advisers telling him to act more subdued and presidential, and the supporters and his own gut telling him to be even more bombastic in the 89 days ahead. Read More

Could Donald Trump actually think he’s doing a good job in his campaign?

In an interview on CNBC on Thursday, Trump tried his hand at explaining why things are actually going pretty well. The numbers (added by us) point to notes at the end. Read More

US Nazi leader: Trump presidency will be 'real opportunity' for white nationalists

American Nazi Party chairman, Rocky Suhayda, asserted on his radio program in July that he expects Trump to win the presidency, and "it's gonna surprise the enemy." Read More

This article and the next one are a couple of overlooked articles from the presidential primaries earlier in the summer. They offer a glimpse into how one group views Trump's candidacy.

Former KKK leader: Trump-Hitler comparisons might be good for Hitler

David Duke said comparisons of Donald Trump to Adolf Hitler might be helping the Nazi leader rather than hurting the Republican presidential front-runner. Read More

Saving Mike Pence

If Trump doesn’t win, Pence’s time on the ticket threatens the governor’s future in politics. Read More

GOP state rep says Trump tweet got him booted from seating at Pence rally

A Republican state representative said he showed up to a town hall for vice presidential nominee Mike Pence on Wednesday only to find that he no longer had a place to sit. While State Rep. Niraj Antani (R-Ohio) had initially been seated in a VIP area for elected officials, he says he was relegated to the general admission section because of a tweet he'd written about Donald Trump. Read More

The culture of the Trump campaign would appear to reflect its candidate who boasts of double punching back anyone he perceives as throwing a blow at him. No turning the other cheek for Trump.

Ohio GOP Lawmaker Says VIP Seating At Pence Event Revoked Over A Tweet

A Republican state representative in Ohio said that the Donald Trump campaign withdrew an offer for him to sit in the seating area for lawmakers at a Wednesday town hall with vice presidential candidate Mike Pence over a tweet he published about voters disapproving of Trump. Read More

"Antani told Politico that he will 'probably' vote for Trump, but that he is no longer likely to endorse the Republican nominee.

'I don’t care about the tweet, I don’t care abut the seating, this is more how they treat people who weren’t with them in the primary,' he said. 'This is how they treat someone whose willing to come on board. I wonder how they treat people who are against them.'" Caitlin MacNeal, Politico

Disgraced ex-congressman sits behind Trump at rally

Donald Trump on Wednesday again slammed Hillary Clinton and her campaign for allowing the father of Orlando shooter Omar Mateen to sit in the stands behind her at a recent rally. But sitting behind Trump was ex-congressman Mark Foley, who resigned in disgrace in 2006 after sending sexually explicit messages to underage teenage boys. Read More

"'When you get those seats, you sort of know the campaign. You sort of know the campaign,' Trump said at the rally in Sunrise, Florida. As Trump upbraided Clinton for having Mateen in the stands behind her, Foley smiled, applauded and even waved at Trump.

'How many of you people know me?' Trump asked those seated behind him.

Foley, visible just to Trump's left, quickly raised his hand in response." Jeremy Diamond, CNN

One-fifth of Republicans won't vote for Trump

Nearly one-fifth of registered Republicans want Donald Trump to drop out of the race for the White House, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll, reflecting the turmoil his candidacy has sown within his party. Read More

Battleground map shifting in Clinton’s favor – for now

The 2016 battleground map is tilting in Hillary Clinton's favor, according to the latest ratings from the Fox News Decision Team -- as recent polling shows the Democrat widening her lead over Donald Trump in a handful of states likely to decide the White House race. Read More

No, Hillary Clinton does not want to ‘abolish’ the Second Amendment

Donald Trump's latest on-stage outrage was really two. The one that got the attention this week was his apparent suggestion that “Second Amendment people” rise in an armed insurrection against the federal government if Hillary Clinton wins the election. The second was his premise for the claim: that “Hillary wants to abolish, essentially abolish, the Second Amendment.”

The addition of “essentially” does not render this absurd statement any less absurd. Ms. Clinton plays up her opposition to the National Rifle Association, but her positions are, if anything, too modest. Read More

US election: Hillary Clinton blasts Donald Trump for 'casual inciting of violence'

Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton says Donald Trump's comment that gun owners "could stop" her "crossed the line" and show he does not have the temperament to be US president. Read More

"Michael Hayden, a former CIA chief, said if anyone else had said the same thing as the Republican nominee it may have been a different story.

'If someone else had of said that outside the hall, he'd be in the back of a police wagon now with the Secret Service questioning him,' he said.

'You get to a certain point in this business, you're not just responsible for what you say, you are responsible for what people hear and that might be a good lesson here.'" Michael Vincent, ABC

Clinton rounds on Trump for ‘casual inciting of violence’

Senior Republicans in GOP struggle to devise strategy to derail billionaire’s candidacy Read More

CNN reported yesterday that the US Secret Service, which investigates threats against sitting presidents and party nominees, has had “more than one conversation”with Mr Trump’s campaign regarding the comments about Clinton and gun rights.

However, a federal official familiar with the matter took issue with the report and told Reuters there had been no formal conversations with the campaign regarding the comment.