Trump Justice Department Lawyer Floats Criminal Charges for Jill Biden

Leo Terrell, a Trump-appointed lawyer in the Justice Department, wants to press charges against Jill Biden for “elder abuse.”

The former Fox News contributor posted on X Sunday night, shortly after Joe Biden publicly announced his cancer diagnosis, sharing a post calling out the former first lady for knowing about “President Biden’s health problems.”

“But still wanted him to run for President. Evil,” posted Ian Jaeger, a right-wing account, to which Terrell added his own commentary: “Elder Abuse! Criminal Charges??”

Terrell wasn’t the only figure on the right attacking the former president’s wife. Donald Trump Jr., the president’s son, took a shot at Jill Biden’s educational credentials, appearing to mistake her doctorate for a medical degree.

But while Trump Jr. is only a conservative influencer with a podcast, Terrell is the senior counsel to the assistant attorney general for civil rights in the DOJ, and could actually push for a trumped-up criminal investigation if he wanted. He would find no shortage of supporters on the right or in the White House, who have constantly pushed the narrative of the “Biden crime family” to distract from President Trump’s own criminal activities.

For the past two days, the right has run with a cover-up narrative about Joe Biden’s health on the part of Democrats, the left, the media, and anyone it distrusts, which apparently includes Jill Biden. To them, it’s a far more important subject than funding the government, or the current president’s own cognitive decline.

Donald Trump’s Justice Department is sending a message.

Interim U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey Alina Habba announced late Monday that she had dropped charges against Newark Mayor Ras Baraka for facing off with authorities at an ICE facility in his city earlier this month. But in a back-to-back press release, the Justice Department official revealed that the administration would instead be going after a sitting congresswoman who was also present that day.

Habba, Trump’s former personal attorney, declared charges against Representative LaMonica McIver for “assaulting, impeding and interfering with law enforcement,” and insisted that McIver’s conduct during the ICE facility clash “cannot be overlooked.”

“I have persistently made efforts to address these issues without bringing criminal charges and have given Representative McIver every opportunity to come to a resolution, but she has unfortunately declined,” Habba said in a statement.

McIver and Baraka have both denied accusations that they were violent at the protest.

“The charges against me are purely political—they mischaracterize and distort my actions, and are meant to criminalize and deter legislative oversight,” McIver said in a statement.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries torched the Trump administration last week for the charges against Baraka and for hinting they would go after McIver next. Jeffries argued that threatening to arrest a sitting congresswoman for visiting an ICE facility would be a clear example of executive overreach.

“It’s a red line,” Jeffries told reporters in the Capitol at the time. “They know better than to go down that road.”

McIver visited the Ice facility earlier this month alongside Representatives Rob Menendez and Bonnie Watson Coleman, fellow New Jersey Democrats. Baraka joined the trio for a tour. The lawmakers were reportedly at the facility to serve a summons for code violations to a representative of the facility’s operating company, Geo Group.

After Baraka passed the entry gates, the group was barraged by agents, with at least one of the lawmakers getting shoved. Baraka was ultimately arrested, and Habba accused him of trespassing and ignoring multiple warnings from Homeland Security to leave the premises.

But the lawmakers did not interpret the events of the day that way.

“What we experienced was the weaponization, is the abuse of power.… They know who we are … they manhandled us and arrested the mayor,” Coleman said, adding that “if they can treat members of Congress like that, imagine how they treat people on the streets.”

Representatives from around the country echoed that sentiment. In a post on X late Monday, Texas Representative Greg Casar wrote that the charges against McIver should “send a chill down the spine of every American.”

“If the president can arrest law-abiding elected officials in an attempt to silence them, then no American is safe from his abuses of power,” he wrote.

Senator Cory Booker broke from the Democratic Party to confirm convicted felon Charles Kushner—father of Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner—as the new U.S. ambassador to France.

Booker was the only Democrat to vote for the elder Kushner’s nomination. Kushner was convicted in 2005 for tax evasion, illegal campaign donations to the Democratic Party, and witness tampering. He even went so far as to retaliate against his sister—who was a cooperating witness against him— by paying a sex worker to seduce her husband and film it, likely for blackmail material. He was sentenced to two years in jail and was pardoned by President Trump at the end of 2020.

“Kushner admitted that he paid a private investigator $25,000 to arrange for the seduction and videotaping of the cooperating witness’ husband. Kushner admitted to personally recruiting the prostitute and instructing that the videotape be mailed to the cooperating witness,” the Department of Justice wrote in 2005. This is the man Booker bent over backward to make the new ambassador to one of our most important European allies.

Chris Christie, New Jersey’s former Republican governor, who investigated Charles Kushner as district attorney, described his case as “one of the most loathsome, disgusting crimes” he’d encountered.

“I don’t sit here before you today and tell you I’m a perfect person.… I am not a perfect person.… I made a very, very, very serious mistake, and I paid a very heavy price for that mistake,” Kushner said at his confirmation hearing earlier this month. “I think that my past mistakes actually make me better with my judgment, better in my view of life, better in my values to really make me more qualified to do this job.”

Booker’s break from the party has caused some real backlash, especially after he evoked the “good trouble” of civil rights leader John Lewis in his record-breaking symbolic filibuster in the Senate in April, an act that inspired many and raised his presidential profile. It’s become clear once again that Booker is all talk.

Booker and the Kushners go way back. Charles Kushner helped fund Booker’s first failed mayoral campaign in 2002, and Booker came to his defense when he was convicted in 2005.

“Charlie has helped fuel my hope, as well as made me believe that even in the questionable world of New Jersey politics, there are still spirits who don’t simply act in their self-interest,” Booker wrote glowingly of Kushner before he was sentenced.

Booker maintained his relationship with the Kushners. In 2013, Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner hosted Booker at their home in a fundraising event that raised $41,000 for Booker. He defended this relationship in 2017, well after their (unsurprising) conservative turn.

“Listen, I wouldn’t take a dime from them now, but this was a time when they were Democrats,” Booker said at the time. “I mean, they were supporting Hillary Clinton, uh, and the Kushner family were big New Jersey Democrats, and really helped to fight against Chris Christie and a lot of other folks.”

That sounds fine then, but now the Kushners are full MAGA. So how does Booker explain his most recent vote? Especially after his bleeding-heart filibuster?

“Cory Booker losing his newfound Resist Lib credentials by being the only Democrat in the Senate to vote to advance the nomination of convicted felon Charles Kushner (yes that Kushner) to become Ambassador to France is very funny to me,” political analyst Adam Carlson wrote on X. “Jersey gonna Jersey I guess.”

“There’s a lot going on in the world at the moment … and how’s the Senate spending its time?” Democratic Senator Tina Smith asked on X. “We’re voting on Jared Kushner’s dad (a convicted felon who Trump pardoned) to be Ambassador to France, sending a billionaire convicted felon (and relative) to serve as a top diplomat.”

Booker has yet to comment.

There’s no such thing as a free plane.

Donald Trump’s administration specifically sought out the luxury Boeing 747-8 jumbo jet from Qatar’s government to replace Air Force One, despite the president’s insistence that the plane was a gift, sources informed CNN.

A senior White House official told CNN that Trump tasked Steve Witkoff, the president’s special envoy to the Middle East (and shady crypto partner), with tracking down a replacement for Air Force One, after Trump learned that Boeing would not have new jets ready for another two years. Witkoff ended up leading initial conversations with the Qatari government, according to the White House official.

Boeing provided the Pentagon with a list of other clients who might be able to help with America’s search for a new plane, three sources told CNN. One of those sources said that Qatar was included on that list of clients and that the U.S. reached out about purchasing the luxury plane from the Qatari Defense Ministry, which indicated it was willing to sell. There were also discussions about leasing the plane, said another source.

Legal negotiations over the plane’s transfer are still ongoing, and it’s unclear how the plane went from being a potential purchase to a $400 million gift. Trump and his administration have repeatedly stressed that the plane will be free of charge, a gift of goodwill from a foreign government—sparking major backlash on both sides of the aisle over concerns of foreign corruption.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt called the potential transfer a “donation to our country” on Monday, but the plane is much more of a personal gift to Trump himself than to the people of the United States, whose tax-paying dollars could end up funding the costly rebuild for the president’s supposedly free gift.

Trump reportedly toured a Qatari plane with aides in February and began lamenting how luxurious the plane was compared to his own transportation options. Last week, Trump whined that the current Air Force One is a “much less impressive” plane than the lavish ones dictators use.

CNN’s reporting upends a recent claim from Senator Markwayne Mullin—which was then repeated by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent—that negotiations to receive a plane from Qatar began under Joe Biden’s administration.

Donald Trump ranted and raved during a speech to Kennedy Center trustees Monday night, complaining about the 2020 election.

At the White House event, Trump bragged about bringing the upcoming Olympics and World Cup to the United States before segueing into the 2020 election.

“We got the Olympics, and then we got, through [FIFA head Gianni Infantino], he’s the boss, he’s a friend of mine, we got the World Cup,” Trump said. “I got them both, and I said, ‘Man, I won’t be president and they’re gonna forget that I got them. Nobody’s gonna mention it.’”

Then he went into his pet subject how the 2020 election was stolen from him.

“And then they rigged the election, and then I said, ‘You know what I’ll do? I’ll run again and I’ll shove it up their ass,’” Trump told the audience.

“If they would’ve left us alone, and wouldn’t have cheated on the election, and wouldn’t have rigged it, I would’ve been retired right now. I would’ve been happily doing something else, and instead they have me for four more years, can you believe that?” Trump continued.

Trump also complained about the Kennedy Center’s programming, which he promised would change.

“The programming was out of control with rampant political propaganda, DEI, and inappropriate shows,” Trump said. “They had dance parties for quote ‘queer and trans youth.’ And I guess that’s all right for certain people.… But that wasn’t working out too well.”

The speech Monday night was another example of Trump’s bitterness and cognitive decline. He’s fixated on perceived slights and wants to take revenge against his enemies. The president also wants to remake Washington in his own image, dictating everything he can, including a nonprofit arts center. Now that Republicans control Congress, there’s little that can stop him except the courts.