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Annoyed and full of anger, Donald Trump is launching violent attacks these days - against Congress, his own party, his own ministers and even the Supreme Court.
What the incumbent president spread on Twitter from his residence in Mar-a-lago (Florida) were anything but Christmas messages.
Three weeks before the end of his term in office, Trump is holding the country in suspense - and is once again strongly offending his own party.
On Boxing Day, for example, Trump once again demanded a one-off payment of $ 2,000 (around 1700 euros) for almost every American as part of the new Corona stimulus package.
In the bill, however, only 600 dollars (about 490 euros) - a sum that Trump's own Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin had negotiated and praised himself for it.
The White House had even signaled Trump's support for the aid package to the Republicans in Congress.
But Trump initially remained silent, which is unusual, and then fired against the project - even if he has so far not explicitly announced a veto.
A Coast Guard boat outside Trump's property in Mar-a-Lago, Palm Beach, Florida.
From here he tweets angry messages
Source: AP / J.
David Ake
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On Sunday it was unclear whether Trump would sign the stimulus package of 900 billion dollars (about 730 billion euros), which was passed in Congress by a large majority.
The extensive law, 5593 pages long, is ready for Trump to sign in Mar-a-lago.
The Republicans are puzzling again what the incumbent president is up to.
Since the general budget law is linked to the Corona stimulus package, there is a risk of renewed government
standstill (“shut down
”)
without the president's green light
.
This would mean that government employees would be sent on compulsory leave from Tuesday.
The $ 1.4 trillion budget bill would fund the government through September 2021.
Federal aid for the unemployed ran out on Saturday and should be extended with the aid package.
Millions of Americans are affected.
Many can no longer pay their rent, no longer pay off their home loan, and have lost their health insurance.
Two years ago, Trump
provoked
a month-long
“shut down” in
order to raise funds for the construction of a border wall with Mexico.
Trump refuses to sign the corona aid package
For months, Democrats and Republicans in the US Congress struggled for new Corona aid.
Now a finished law is ready.
But Donald Trump does not go far enough.
Source: WELT / Dietmar Deffner
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The Democrats and Republicans, first and foremost Finance Minister Mnuchin, had been negotiating the stimulus package for months.
It would be the first law Washington passed since March to cushion the economic impact of the corona epidemic.
Around ten million Americans have lost their jobs, and most of them have lost their health insurance.
Corona has not made more sacrifices in any other country.
Over 332,000 Americans died and a good 19 million were infected.
117,344 Americans with corona are currently in hospitals, and the number is rising.
Programs like the German short-time work allowance do not exist in the USA.
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Trump had always celebrated the tax cuts he had implemented for higher earners.
Now he gives the social populists.
The stimulus package provides for a one-off payment of $ 600 for every adult who earns less than $ 75,000 a year.
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Trump wants $ 2,000, plus $ 2,000 for each additional family member.
That would be $ 8,000 for a family with two children.
“I just want our great people to get $ 2,000 instead of the measly $ 600 that is now in law,” Trump wrote on Twitter.
This demand is a maximum provocation for the Republican Party, which at least verbally always takes to the field against a sprawling state.
The powerful Senate majority leader, Republican Mitch McConnell, was determined to keep the new stimulus package below $ 1 trillion.
The Democrats agreed to this after unsuccessfully fighting for more than twice that amount.
They couldn't believe their luck when Trump suddenly wanted to pay out $ 2,000 to almost every American.
They wanted to vote on it in the House of Representatives on Christmas Eve.
The Republicans, however, blocked a place for the payment required by their own president.
Instead of $ 600 or $ 2,000, the Americans get nothing for the time being - after Trump's finance minister had already announced the check, which many had urgently expected, for these days.
Trump's previous blockade of the aid package is already melting aid for the unemployed.
The new law provides for a $ 300 federal grant per week.
This money, too, if Mnuchin had its way, should have been flowing long ago.
Since this grant is only to be granted until mid-March, it would be reduced from eleven to ten weeks if it came into force soon.
President-elect Joe Biden, who will move into the White House on January 20, 2021, sees Trump's “irresponsibility as devastating”.
The Republicans are in a bind
The House of Representatives wants to vote on Trump's veto against the defense budget this Monday.
This too had been passed by both chambers of the Congress with a broad, non-partisan consensus.
At 740 billion dollars (about 610 billion euros) it is about twelve times as large as the German defense budget.
With a two-thirds majority, both houses of Congress can override Trump's veto.
The Senate, in which the Republicans have a majority, could vote on Tuesday.
Trump has put the Republicans in a bind.
Either they stand by their vote, which they recently gave, and stand against Trump.
Or they loyally follow the president, revoke their own decision and alienate the military.
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Trump is angry about the defense budget law because, among other things, it blocks the withdrawal of American soldiers from Germany, which he angrily announced.
A “gift” for China and Russia is the law, tweeted the president during the Christmas break, which also makes it impossible to “bring home” US soldiers abroad.
Trump is also angry because the law provides for the renaming of military facilities that have previously been dedicated to Confederate civil wars.
In addition, from Trump's point of view, online platforms are not regulated strongly enough by the law.
House spokeswoman, Democrat Nancy Pelosi, calls Trump's veto an act of “breathtaking irresponsibility” that denies the military much-needed funds.
Various Republicans are angry too.
Should the defense budget not come into force, this would be a novelty.
A rejection of Trump's veto by Congress would also be a first - and by the way a symbolically strong indicator of the dwindling power of the incumbent president.
Even two months after the presidential election, Trump continues to try to defend his power with claws and teeth.
Regardless of the fact that election winner Biden has a comfortable majority on the electoral body and despite dozens of unsuccessful lawsuits, Trump still speaks of “election fraud”.
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Trump attacked the Supreme Court as "completely incompetent and weak".
He is disappointed that the (mostly conservative) constitutional judges are not serving as vicarious agents.
Trump also appealed to Senate Republicans to "stand up and fight for the presidency."
This means his presidency.
Republican senators "leaned back", tweeted Trump on Christmas Day while fighting the "radical left Democrats": "I will NEVER FORGET!"
In another angry tweet, Trump put the Justice Department in quotation marks - because it does not support its slogans of mass election fraud.
It did not do anything against the election fraud.
"See you in Washington on January 6th," wrote Trump, calling on his supporters to come to the capital - on the day that Congress will officially review the election results.
In another tweet, Trump speaks of the American presidential election as an "election of a third world country".
Meanwhile, White House staff received an email stating that the move would begin in the week of January 4th, Politico magazine reported.
The employees were asked to empty their refrigerator and microwave.
All White House stationery and "Presidential Presents" were to be returned.
Work materials were said to be disinfected when they are returned.
How Trump's Wall to Mexico affects wildlife
Almost 650 kilometers of border fence with Mexico have been completed.
Now Trump is putting pressure on and wants to add as many kilometers as possible before Joe Biden takes over the office.
US correspondent Steffen Schwarzkopf reports how the animals in the Sierra Madre mountains are suffering from the project.
Source: WELT / Steffen Schwarzkopf