In new interview, Biden still claims he could have beaten Trump in 2024 election

President Joe Biden insisted in an interview published Wednesday that he could have beaten President-elect Donald Trump in the 2024 election.

In a sit down with USA Today, Biden claimed that polls suggested he could have won a second term if he had not dropped out of the race amid concerns about his age following a shaky summer debate with Trump.

“It’s presumptuous to say that, but I think yes, based on the polling,” Biden told journalist Susan Page in an Oval Office interview conducted last weekend.

Biden admitted he couldn’t be sure he would have had been fit to serve effectively for another four years if he had won reelection.

“I don’t know. Who the hell knows? So far, so good,” Biden said. “But who knows what I’m going to be when I’m 86 years old?”

Biden ended his campaign in July and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris to take the Democratic baton. His historic move came amid a growing chorus from allies and critics alike demanding for him to step down following the shaky debate that put a renewed focus on his age and fitness to serve.

Public polls at the time showed Biden badly trailing Trump. Harris enjoyed a bounce in public support after she launched her campaign but eventually lost both the Electoral College and popular vote to Trump.

Some Democrats believe Biden should have put the kibosh on a run for a second term much earlier in his presidency, perhaps after the 2022 midterm elections, to clear the way for a contested presidential primary battle.

But the president insisted that he acted in the best interests of the party, starting with his decision to come out of retirement to successfully oust Trump from the White House in 2020.

—New York Daily News

Former FBI source who admitted to lying about Bidens sentenced to 6 years

LAS VEGAS — A judge ordered a six-year prison sentence for a former FBI informant who admitted to tax evasion and lying to authorities about an alleged multimillion-dollar bribery scheme involving President Joe Biden, his son and a Ukrainian energy company that became a focal point of an impeachment inquiry by congressional Republicans.

Alexander Smirnov was sentenced Wednesday morning in Los Angeles federal court after he pleaded guilty to one charge of causing a false and fictitious record in a federal investigation and three counts of tax evasion in December, according to court records.

“The Defendant is a liar and a tax cheat,” federal prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum. “In committing his crimes he betrayed the United States, a country that showed him nothing but generosity, including conferring on him the highest honor it can bestow, citizenship.”

Smirnov’s attorneys described him as “a dedicated family member and friend” who “accepts responsibility for his conduct” and was never previously arrested or charged.

Smirnov, a dual U.S. and Israeli citizen, lived in Las Vegas for two years and was arrested in Las Vegas in February. Prosecutors said he was in Los Angeles when he made his false statements.

He admitted that he falsely told the FBI that executives at Ukrainian energy company Burisma paid Biden and his son Hunter Biden $5 million each. He also admitted to not reporting over $2 million in income.

Prosecutors said Smirnov, who became an FBI source in 2010, lied “after expressing bias against (Biden) in a clear effort to influence the outcome of the Presidential election.”

—Las Vegas Review-Journal

Ex-Rep. George Santos, who turned lying into near $1 million windfall, granted sentencing delay to record podcast

Former U.S. Rep. George Santos has leveraged his criminal notoriety as a con man and serial liar into a lucrative cottage industry with a nearly million-dollar windfall.

That includes more than $400,000 in Cameo appearances and another $400,000 to participate in a documentary, according to court filings.

But the disgraced ex-congressman still says he needs more time to record enough episodes of his new podcast, “Pants on Fire with George Santos,” to pay off his forfeiture obligations, and he wants his Feb. 7 fraud sentencing delayed for six months.

Late Wednesday, Federal Court Judge Joanna Seybert granted Santos a delay — but only to April 25.

”As a one-time courtesy, this Court will grant a short adjournment on the basis that the ends of justice will be served by this continuance,” Seybert wrote in the order.

The infamous Long Island fabulist needs revenue from the podcast to pay the $205,000 in forfeiture cash that would be due a month before sentencing, his lawyers wrote in a letter to Seybert. He also owes more than $370,000 in restitution.

Federal prosecutors scoffed at that request Monday, saying they doubted the podcast could raise enough revenue to cover what he owes.

—New York Daily News

Musk takes slash-and-burn style to Europe after bolstering Trump

Having successfully worked to get his candidate elected in the U.S., Elon Musk is setting his sights on Europe.

In a series of posts on his X platform in recent weeks, the billionaire backer of Donald Trump has honed in on Germany and the U.K., criticized the respective governments, questioned laws they’ve enacted and cast doubt on their economic competence.

He’s personally insulted each country’s political leader, calling Chancellor Olaf Scholz a “fool,” Germany’s president a “tyrant” and accusing Prime Minister Keir Starmer of being “complicit in the rape of Britain.” He’s embraced misinformation and conspiracy theories, skipping over the mainstream opposition to give his backing to the far-right as champions of “political realism.”

It’s far from clear what his motivations may be in trashing relations with core U.S. allies in fellow Group of Seven nations where he has significant business interests, still less his ability to effect the change he demands.

Yet it’s a dynamic that will be given a further airing Thursday when Musk hosts a conversation on X with Alice Weidel, co-leader of Alternative for Germany, an anti-immigration, nationalist party that he’s endorsed ahead of federal elections on Feb. 23, despite it being shunned by all other political forces as extremist. The European Union has said it will monitor the event for any risks to election integrity.

Musk’s interventions have caused predictable outrage mixed with bewilderment, uniting governments with oppositions in condemnation of his tactics. But with few good options, his targets are on the back foot as they weigh how to respond to a man who can’t seem to resist posting his thoughts, however unvarnished, and who has the ear of the incoming U.S. president.

—Bloomberg News

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