Donald trump

Donald Trump “has something” on Vladimir Putin that allowed the former president to control him, according to Bill O’Reilly.

In an interview with Tucker Carlson broadcast on X—the social network formerly known as Twitter—on September 27, the conservative commentator told the former Fox News host that everything with Trump is a deal.

“He was an effective president,” O’Reilly said. “He’s a populist, not a conservative, doesn’t have any of that stuff going on. It’s deal after deal after deal after deal.” O’Reilly then added that this is how the 77-year-old controlled Putin during his time in the White House.

“He won’t tell me what he has on Putin,” O’Reilly, 74, told Carlson. “But I know he has something.”

Since being shared by Carlson, the clip has received over 9.1 million views. The interview aired at the same time as the second Republican presidential primary debate on Fox News , Carlson’s former employer.

The 54-year-old said that he was fired by the station in April as part of the Fox Corporation’s settlement with Dominion Voting Systems, the company that provided the voting machines for the 2020 general election. Dominion sued the media organization over Tucker’s claims that President Joe Biden ‘s win was a fix, saying that Dominion’s software changed people’s votes.

Also an ex- Fox News host, O’Reilly published The United States of Trump: How the President Really Sees America in 2019. A long-time friend of the business mogul, the book was pitched as an “insider’s look at the life of Donald Trump .”

The United States of Trump featured exclusive interview material with the politician, and examined how his childhood and career influenced his worldview and presidency. In the book, O’Reilly described Trump as a “essentially a loner, with few close friends” and an avid watcher of cable-news opinion shows.

He also interviewed Trump’s children, with Donald Trump Jr. telling O’Reilly of his father: “I don’t second-guess because there’s always a method to the madness with him.”

In December 2021, Trump and O’Reilly embarked on The History Tour together . The series of events across the U.S. promised to discuss the history of the Trump administration with O’Reilly and their audience, although the tour was reportedly poorly attended .

This is the second time O’Reilly has said that America holds power over Russia. In 2022, the journalist added that the United States weapons arsenal could wipe Putin off the face of the earth.

“Putin is saber-rattling about using nukes, and ‘I’m going to do this, and I’m going to do that,” O’Reilly told Newsmax while promoting his book Killing the Killers: The Secret War Against Terrorists .

“The weaponry of the United States is far beyond anything that Putin has. If we chose to, we can wipe him and his government off the face of the earth in less than a day. We have those weapons in space right now, aimed right at Vlad.”

Newsweek has reached out to Bill O’Reilly and Donald Trump for comment via email.

The two adult sons of Donald Trump need to stop talking about the apparent value of Mar-a-Lago after a judge ruled that the former president inflated its worth in financial statements, according to Trump’s niece.

Mary Trump, author, podcast host, and frequent critic of her uncle , hit out at Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. after the judge overseeing New York Attorney General Letitia James’ fraud $250 million lawsuit against the three men and the Trump Organization ruled that the former president misled banks and insurers by inflating the value of his properties in his annual statements of financial conditions for years in order to obtain financial perks.

The judge’s decision was met with dismay from Trump and his two sons , with the former president calling it part of a “widespread, radical attack” against him and saying he is planning to appeal.

In a lengthy post on X, formerly Twitter , Mary Trump accused Eric and Donald Trump Jr. of lying about the value of Mar-a-Lago in the wake of Engoron’s ruling.

“Of course, we didn’t expect the adult sons to sit back and accept the results of the court’s fairly determined decision. We know from long experience that when they lose on the merits, they immediately attack the institution itself. (Wonder where they got that from?)” she wrote.

“But Judge Arthur Engoron didn’t just make up Mar-a-Lego’s valuation. He cited the Palm Beach County Tax Assessor’s number, which is between $18 million and $[27] million. Donald had no problem with that valuation when it was used to determine his taxes!”

In his ruling, Engoron noted that Trump valued the resort between 2011 to 2021 at $347 million to $739 million based on the premise that it was unrestricted property and could be developed for residential use. During this same period, the resort was assessed by Palm Beach County as having a market value based on its restricted use as a social club ranging between $18 million and $27.6 million.

As noted by both Mary Trump and Engoron, the former president’s assessment of the value of Mar-a-Lago is around 2,300 percent higher than the tax assessor’s appraisal.

“Here’s the question: Are Donald and Eric willing to pay 2,300% more in taxes? If not, I suggest they keep their mouths…Letitia James is listening,” she added.

Newsweek reached out to the Trump Organization via email for comment.

In a series of posts on X, Eric Trump dismissed Engoron’s ruling and claimed that Mar-a-Lago is actually valued at around $1 billion, making it the “most valuable residential property” in the country.

Donald Trump Jr. also posted on X that if his father had said Mar-a-Lago was worth $18 million then the former president would be “charged with trying to underpay” his real estate taxes.

“If Mar-a-Lago is worth $18 million… I’ll take 10 please!!!” he added.

During his April deposition as part of James’ investigation, Trump said that he would be able to call on people who could value his Mar-a-Lago property at as much as $1.5 billion . When asked where he got this number from, Trump replied the assessment was “just broker talk.”

“We will have people come in, you know, experts at this, to show a price of 1.5, I believe the price will be; $1.5 billion,” Trump said.

Tuesday’s ruling from Engoron now means that the October 2 civil trial to resolve James’ suit will not need to determine if Trump had provided “false and misleading” statements inflating the value of his properties and assets by billions of dollars—the biggest claim put forward by the New York Attorney General’s office—but will mainly decide on the penalty .

A retired four-star Army general has compared loyalists of former President Donald Trump to Nazis in 1930s Germany.

In an appearance on MSNBC ‘s All in with Chris Hayes , Barry McCaffrey said what the United States is seeing today with Trump-supporting Republicans “is a parallel to the 1930s in Nazi Germany.”

“This is all worth being extremely concerned about,” he said when asked about Trump’s recent comments about General Mark Milley and the months-long campaign by Sen. Tommy Tuberville , a close Trump ally, to change Pentagon policy, including on abortion, by holding up military nominations and promotions.

On Friday, Trump, the frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination, lashed out at Milley , the retiring chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, over phone calls he made to China in the final months of Trump’s presidency.

On his Truth Social platform, he claimed Milley had committed “an act so egregious that, in times gone by, the punishment would have been DEATH!”

Milley has defended the calls , and said he has “adequate safety precautions” amid concerns Trump’s comments could spark violence.

On MSNBC, McCaffrey said Trump’s followers were part of a “lawless cult.”

He said: “I don’t say that’s the Republican Party. That’s 15 to 25 House members, a couple of senators and all those who are Trump MAGA loyalists. This is a cult. It’s a lawless cult, and it’s a major threat to the armed forces of the United States and our security.”

Asked for a response to McCaffrey’s comments, a spokesperson for Tuberville told Newsweek : “This is pretty unhinged. There’s nothing to respond to here.”

McCaffrey, a decorated Vietnam War veteran, was in the U.S. Army for 32 years and later served as director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy under President Bill Clinton .

He added that Trump’s comment about Milley was “shameful” but that Milley would not be intimidated.

“He’s a Princeton hockey player, he’s a tough guy, he had years in combat, his mom and dad fought in World War Two,” McCaffrey said of Milley.

“But it’s a shameful act on the part of those speaking in a manner to support authoritarian government. This is outrageous.”

In an interview that will air on 60 Minutes on Sunday, Milley said : “I’m a soldier, I’ve been faithful and loyal to the Constitution of the United States for 44 1/2 years, and my family and I have sacrificed greatly for this country, my father and mother before them.

“You know, as much as these comments are directed at me, it’s also directed at the institution of the military…every single one of us, from private to general, are loyal to the Constitution and will never turn our back on it.”

Newsweek reached out to McCaffrey via social media and a Trump spokesperson via email for comment, respectively.

Update 9/28/23, 9:45 a.m. ET: This article was updated with comment from a Tuberville spokesperson.

A Republican presidential candidate has claimed he is “steps away” from “effectively” denying Donald Trump the ability to gain the 270 electoral college votes necessary to win the 2024 election, despite legal doubts being cast on his challenge.

John Anthony Castro, who has run unsuccessfully for several elected offices in his home state of Texas prior to filing for the Republican presidential nomination, is seeking injunctions in various jurisdictions to bar the GOP primary frontrunner from being allowed to stand.

Filings he previously shared on social media show challenges to Trump’s candidacy in Wyoming, Utah, Oklahoma, North Carolina, West Virginia, Montana, Kansas and Idaho. He has also reportedly filed a claim in New Hampshire.

Denying the likely Republican nominee access to the ballots would deprive him of as many as 50 electoral college votes before a single polling station had opened.

“They think what I’m doing is a ‘political stunt,'” Castro wrote on X, formerly Twitter on Wednesday evening. “Denial is powerful.”

He added: “I’m steps away from securing the 9th Circuit behind me along with the 1st and 4th Circuits, which effectively denies Trump a path to 270 electoral votes.”

The tax consultant’s remarks appear to contend he may be close to a legal win over the states of Idaho, North Carolina, West Virginia and New Hampshire, though he provided no evidence of any legal advances that might justify his claims.

To the contrary, Elgine McArdle, chair of the West Virginia Republican Party, filed a motion this week to intervene in the case on behalf of the state party against Castro’s case.

“I cannot and will not stand idly by as our voters are deprived of their choices in the presidential election,” she wrote in a statement. “This legal challenge is the latest assault on President Trump, his campaign, and his supporters.”

Newsweek approached the Trump campaign via email for comment on Thursday.

Dozens of lawsuits have been filed around the country seeking to disqualify Trump from running in 2024 based on the 14th Amendment, which bars anyone who swore an oath to the U.S. Constitution and then “engaged in insurrection” from running for elected office.

Castro and others argue that Trump’s alleged role in the January 6, 2021 uprising on the U.S. Capitol—in which he is accused of encouraging the demonstrators, something he has denied—precludes him from being re-elected as president.

Among the legal challenges is one brought by the liberal group Citizens For Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, which seeks to bar him from appearing on ballots in Colorado , which has 10 electoral college votes. The case is the first of its kind to be brought by a group with significant legal resources.

On Friday, District Judge Sarah B. Wallace issued the protective order , prohibiting parties in the case from making threatening or intimidating statements, based on “what we’ve seen in other cases,” an apparent allusion to Trump’s public statements about the criminal cases he faces. Castro claimed this showed the “walls are closing in” on Trump.

One of Castro’s lawsuits, brought in Florida, has already been dismissed by Judge Aileen Cannon, who was nominated to the bench by Trump in 2020 and faced scrutiny over a ruling she issued in a separate case charging Trump with mishandling classified documents.

Former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani previously told Newsweek that Castro’s attempts to have Trump disqualified were a “long shot” and amounted to a “Hail Mary” for his political opponents, as the 14th Amendment had not been used in the same manner before.

“The reasons why Castro’s efforts probably won’t succeed are that Trump hasn’t been charged with, much less convicted of, insurrection or rebellion,” he said. “A conviction is not required under the plain language of the Constitution, but it’s telling that even those prosecuting Trump don’t believe that there is enough evidence to convict him or insurrection or sedition.”

Rahmani added that if the matter were to end up at the U.S. Supreme Court , it was “unlikely” to rule against the former president, owing to its current conservative majority.

Castro is not listed in recent polls of an already packed Republican primary field, which includes candidates attracting zero percent of likely voters.