Fauci Recalls Trump’s Final Enraged Call: “That F**ker Biden”

Dr. Anthony Fauci’s  final conversation with Donald Trump was “unnerving,” according to the infectious diseases expert.

With his new book, On Call: A Doctor’s Journey in Public Service, released on Tuesday, Fauci spoke in more depth about the conversation on MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow Live Monday night, detailing how Trump, in a phone conversation, called Joe Biden “that fucker” and promised to “kick his fucking ass” in the final days before the 2020 election.

Maddow read an excerpt from the book, quoting Fauci’s narration of that call:

“Everybody wants me to fire you,” the president said to me during [a] call [that day], “but I’m not going to fire you. You have too illustrious a career, but you have to be positive. The country cannot stay locked down. You have got to give them hope.

“I like you but so many people, not only in the White House but throughout the country hate you because of what you are doing. I’m going to win this fucking election by a landslide, just wait and see. I always did things my way, and I always win no matter what all these other fucking people think. And that fucker Biden, he’s so fucking stupid. I’m going to kick his fucking ass in this election.”

Maddow asked Fauci if the conversation “unnerved you a little bit.”

“You know, it did,” Fauci replied. “It was a little incongruous because he ended it by saying take care, see you soon, something like that. I wasn’t quite sure.

“It was unnerving. Even though you’re convinced you’re doing the right thing, which I had been, you know, trying to say all along, just level with the American public, you wind up being better off to do that; it is not a pleasant thing to have the president of the United States, when you have such a great deal of respect for the presidency of the United States, for the president to get on the phone and scream at you the way he did. So that was very tough,” Fauci added.

Fauci’s new book includes many new details about how Trump dealt with Covid-19 and how he felt about Fauci. Trump would “announce that he loved me and then scream at me on the phone,” Fauci wrote. Their contentious relationship was apparent even in the early days of the pandemic, with Trump reportedly flying into a rage after hearing incorrectly reported information and attributing it to Fauci.

Fauci’s time as the public face of the government’s efforts during the pandemic, as well as Trump’s treatment of him, earned him attacks from conservatives, who spread conspiracy theories about him and attacked efforts such as lockdowns and masks. He was the target of several smears on a recent visit to Capitol Hill, with Republicans proposing getting hold of his personal emails. More new revelations from his book, along with more public appearances, will likely draw him more vitriol and attacks, despite his career in public service.

President Joe Biden will announce a new executive order Tuesday that will shield the hundreds of thousands of immigrants married to U.S. citizens from being deported—and Stephen Miller, the ghoul behind some of Donald Trump’s harshest immigration policies, just can’t handle it.

With this policy, around 490,000 people who have lived in the country for at least 10 years will become eligible to apply for “parole in place,” meaning they can remain in the United States and receive work permits, two sources told the Associated Press.

Miller took to X, formerly Twitter, on Monday to lament Biden’s reported upcoming police announcement.

“Big news: Biden to announce an unconstitutional executive amnesty for illegal aliens during a border invasion and in the aftermath of multiple gruesome raped and murders of Americans at the hands of Biden-freed illegals. This is an attack on democracy,” he wrote, likely referring to the murder of Rachel Morin last year.

With his penchant for white nationalism, Miller is no stranger to making disgusting and racist generalizations about immigrants. He readily touts actual tragedies as political talking points, hoping to drum up reactionary votes for Trump in November.

Biden’s new policy, which is yet to be confirmed by the White House, has the potential to significantly expand the legal avenues for immigration into the United States and keep families from being torn apart.

Earlier this month, Biden announced a new immigration policy to lower the number of people crossing the southern border, which has been widely criticized by Democrats, the very people he needs to support it. The new policy also adopted new language that will make it significantly easier to deport people, and harder for those who cross illegally to gain asylum.

Although many have compared Biden’s tightening on immigration restrictions to Trump’s old policies, this is not enough to satisfy Miller, who is only concerned with reelecting his former boss so he can get back to making the United States look exactly how he dreams: all white.

Donald Trump’s campaign announced the creation of a new conservative coalition  over the weekend: Black Americans for Trump. But he failed to mention that at least three of his new endorsers are on the Trump family payroll.

Dozens of prominent Black Americans appeared on the list released Saturday, from former Georgia State Representative Vernon Jones to former NFL safety Jack Brewer. But the names of three former staffers for the RNC and the Trump campaign also, curiously, found their way into the coalition. 

They include former RNC official Gina Barr (who is currently titled as the Trump campaign’s executive director of Black coalitions), Trump campaign spokesman Janiyah Thomas, and senior Trump adviser Lynne Patton—who has received more than $233,000 in “payroll” disbursements from the Trump campaign, according to data from the Federal Election Commission.

In a statement, Thomas framed the coalition’s numbers as symbolic of a growing frustration among Black Americans that they have been “left behind” by Democrats.

“While Black Americans have been left behind by Joe Biden, President Trump has prioritized the Black community,” she said in the statement. “Donald J. Trump’s coalition message to the Black community is simple: If you want to return to the policies that created rising wages, more quality jobs, stronger borders, and safer neighborhoods, then join Black Americans for Trump and vote for President Trump in November.”

Biden narrowly secured the 2020 election in large part thanks to communities of color in key swing states, including Pennsylvania and Michigan. But Biden’s campaign—which was found in a May Reuters/Ipsos poll to be leading Trump by double digits among Black Americans—wasn’t bothered by the “eleventh hour attempt.”

“Black voters sent Joe Biden and Kamala Harris to the White House in 2020, and they’re ready to make Donald Trump a two-time loser in 2024,” Biden-Harris 2024 Director of Black Media Jasmine Harris said in a press release obtained by Spectrum News.

On June 12, an estimated 60 people were abruptly laid off by the Southern Poverty Law Center. Conservatives and extremists who’ve been profiled by the SPLC quickly cheered on the news.

In a hell of a self-report, Sean Davis, founder and CEO of conservative website The Federalist praised the layoffs on X (formerly Twitter). “Your entire organization is trash, and America will be better off when it’s forced to lay off every single employee,” wrote Davis. Moms for Liberty, an SPLC-designated anti-government extremist group, boosted the SPLC Union’s criticism of the organization for hoarding donations, with MfL co-founder Tina Descovich declaring, “Everything WOKE ends up rotting.”

Far-right troll Andy Ngo, whose own follower committed a deadly mass shooting inspired by his rhetoric, praised the layoffs in stereotypically unimaginative fashion, writing, “I hope the whole lot of you goes down, & one day in the future people can read about the shameful period of American history you were involved in.” Ngo has been covered previously by SPLC’s Hatewatch and described as a far-right provocateur.

The conservative rage against SPLC is to be expected, given the group’s detailed work monitoring far-right extremist movements. Moms for Liberty, for example, was categorized by the SPLC in 2023 as an anti-government extremist group for its ongoing efforts to roll back federal protections for LGBTQ youth, praising Hitler, threatening violence, and banning books.

The layoffs instead hit projects that work to serve communities in need, shuttering the Southeast Freedom Initiative, which provides pro bono legal services to detained immigrants, and the Economic Justice Project, which works to break the cycle of poverty among the country’s most impoverished communities, among other projects, according to HuffPost.

Adding to the dark celebration by far-right groups over SPLC’s sudden shrinkage, the layoffs hit 60 unionized workers, including a union chair and five union stewards, according to a statement from the union. The layoffs came two years after the SPLC reached a collective bargaining agreement with the then-nascent union, and ate a quarter of the organization’s workforce, as part of a “restructuring effort.”

“SPLC’s decision has a catastrophic impact on the organization’s work in support of immigrants seeking justice and its mission to dismantle white supremacy, strengthen intersectional movements and advance human rights through support of educators,” the SPLC Union wrote on X (formerly Twitter). “How will today’s layoffs help us achieve our goals of fighting hate, decarcerating Black and Brown people, defending democracy, and eradicating poverty? The answer is: they won’t,” the union added.

* This piece has been corrected to clarify who was impacted by SPLC layoffs.

Judge Aileen Cannon appears to be sick and tired of nonparties attempting to intervene in Donald Trump’s classified documents trial—even though she’s the one who allowed them to do so in the first place.

The Trump-appointed judge issued a paperless order Monday, rejecting without explanation a couple dozen Republican attorneys general and their proposed brief opposing special counsel Jack Smith’s pending gag order on the former president, which they decried as “presumptively unconstitutional.”

Attorneys general representing the states of Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Florida, Idaho, Iowa, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, West Virginia, and Wyoming had all signed on to the amicus curiae. In it, they argued that the tabled gag was an affront to the First Amendment rights of everyday Americans, who have a right to hear Trump push back against legal prosecutors.

The fierce opposition arose after Smith argued for a change in Trump’s bond conditions, claiming that the presumptive Republican presidential nominee’s Truth Social posts were “grossly misleading” and “inflammatory.” Smith argued Trump’s posts put law enforcement and potential trial witnesses in legitimate danger.

“Those statements create a grossly misleading impression about the intentions and conduct of federal law enforcement agents—falsely suggesting that they were complicit in a plot to assassinate him—and expose those agents, some of whom will be witnesses at trial, to the risk of threats, violence, and harassment,” Smith said in May.

Cannon had previously scheduled an “unusual” hearing on June 21 to make time for oral arguments from the nonparties, including one focused on whether Smith’s appointment to the case is constitutional.

The rejection is one of few indications that Cannon actually intends to move forward with a trial that has been riddled with unnecessary and cumbersome delays. Trump faces 42 felony charges in the case related to willful retention of national security information, corruptly concealing documents, and conspiracy to obstruct justice.