Donald Trump News for June 16, 2016

(Trump.news) Whodunit? As we noted yesterday, the Washington Post said that opposition research on presumptive GOP presidential nominee Donald J. Trump was stolen from the Democratic National Committee, reportedly by hackers from Russia. And while we reported the story, many of us around here wondered aloud why Russia might be seen to be assisting the Trump campaign; was it because President Vladimir Putin believes Trump would be easier to deal with than a President Hillary Clinton?

Well, that dynamic changed overnight. Gawker published some of the  research after the news site said it had received it from an anonymous source – one that promised to send the rest of it a little at a time. And this morning Politico reports that Trump now believes that the DNC “hacked” itself on purpose:

Donald Trump has his own theory on how a trove of Democratic National Committee opposition research on him appeared to make its way to the public — the DNC itself leaked it.

The file, which the Washington Post reported was stolen by Russian government hackers, was published Wednesday afternoon by The Smoking Gun and Gawker, which said it received the document from an anonymous source who identified himself only as “Guccifer 2.0.” But Trump saw the release differently, accusing the DNC of releasing the research as a diversionary tactic.

“We believe it was the DNC that did the ‘hacking’ as a way to distract from the many issues facing their deeply flawed candidate and failed party leader,” Trump said in a statement released Wednesday. “Too bad the DNC doesn’t hack Crooked Hillary’s, 33,000 missing emails.”

That’s an interesting theory – the news surrounding Clinton regarding the Justice Department’s and FBI’s continuing investigation into her emails and potentially illegal ethics violations concerning foreign donations to her family foundation while she was secretary of state is certainly not good. But any release of opposition research would be a boon to the opponent, in this case Trump, because it gives his campaign the Clinton campaign’s ‘battle plan,’ so to speak, which then allows him time to prepare and respond.

Either way, it’s an intriguing development. You can read the full Politico story here.

Doubling down on common sense: Trump yesterday repeated his previous position on banning immigration from majority Muslim countries – especially those that are currently hotbeds of terrorism – until the U.S. government can put in a system to properly vet them. Post-Orlando, Trump noted:

Trump said the Orlando terrorist, Omar Mateen, who killed at least 49 people inside a gay nightclub on Sunday may have been born in the U.S. but “his ideas were born from someplace else.”

“We have to maybe check, respectfully, the mosques and we have to check other places because this is a problem that, if we don’t solve it, it’s going to eat our country alive,” Trump stated.

Breitbart News has the story, here.

Presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Clinton, however, responded that Trump’s plan would not have saved a single life in Orlando (actually his time-out on Muslim immigration combined with his support for wider application of the Second Amendment would have saved lives) but what can we expect from a presidential candidate bereft of ideas and a huge negative trust factor? Besides, we can stop people from certain regions of the Muslim world from entering the U.S. – Clinton’s former boss (that would be President Obama) did just that while she was still secretary of state. For six months. and on the counsel of U.S. intelligence agencies, Obama ordered a halt to immigration from Iraq. The Federalist has the November 2015 story, here. #hypocrite

Trump scolds the GOP Establishment: Does anyone in the Republican establishment even remember when they set out to force Donald Trump to support the “eventual GOP nominee” by showing up in his office at Trump Tower New York City and presenting him with a pledge to sign? Why now that he appears to be the nominee-in-waiting can they not accept it?

Trump appears to have had enough and who can blame him? Yesterday he took the GOP outliers to task, as reported by RealClearPolitics:

“Our leaders have to get a lot tougher. And be quiet. Just please be quiet. Don’t talk. Please be quiet,” Trump said at a rally in Atlanta Wednesday afternoon. “They have to get tougher, they have to get sharper, they have to get smarter.”

Mainstream Republican pundits are convinced that Trump is tanking after “controversies” last week involving things he said about Obama and terrorism and a Hispanic federal judge. But these controversies were manufactured; Americans – and especially Trump voters – are being told that his comments were “controversial,” when, if you took a survey of his supporters, you might find just the opposite, that they struck chords among the party faithful and that, once again, Trump has said what is on everyone’s mind.

But look, here’s the thing: At the same time these pinheads keep calling on Trump to “unite the party,” they work behind the scenes to keep it divided. What gives?

Trump’s right. Sit down and shut up, boys and girls. The nomination has been secured. See the RealClearPolitics report here, which notes that Trump will “go it alone” if need be.