On May 17, as dusk was setting over Brooklyn, around a dozen employees from Hillary Clinton’s campaign, and a consultant who worked with the Democratic National Committee, walked through the cavernous halls of the campaign’s office headquarters, which tower over Cadman Plaza’s expansive fields and the elegant federal buildings surrounding them. Through the halls, they wandered past endless posters adorned with blue “H”s bisected by red arrows and posters that proclaimed, “I’m with her.” Eventually, they settled upon an empty conference room. As the Democratic staffers took their seats, they were joined by Marc Elias, the general counsel for Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign, and given a grave warning: from that point forward, they should avoid using one single word in their e-mails.

That word, according to someone with intimate knowledge of the meeting, was one with which they were increasingly familiar: “Trump.”

...


According to reports, the D.N.C. was notified as far back as April that the organization’s servers had been compromised. Consultants from the private security firm CrowdStrike were brought in at the time, but it wasn’t until June that the hackers were kicked out of the server. In the intervening weeks, staffers were told, according to a person who works with the committee, that if anyone was going to communicate about Donald Trump over e-mail or text message, especially if those missives were even remotely contentious or disparaging, it was imperative that they do so using an application called Signal. In July, the trove of e-mails was posted to the Wikileaks Web site. (One of the most damning e-mails found in the D.N.C. archives, which focused on Sanders’s religious beliefs, was sent on May 5, several days after the intrusion was allegedly discovered, and two weeks before staffers were told to use Signal.)

Signal, staffers in the meeting were told, was “Snowden-approved.” A week after the meeting at the campaign headquarters, according to two people who have worked with the D.N.C. and the Clinton campaign, an e-mail was sent out instructing staffers where to download the app and how to use it. Shortly thereafter, the news broke that the D.N.C had been hacked. (Elias did not respond to e-mails and voicemails. A spokesman for the D.N.C. declined to comment, as did a spokesman for Hillary Clinton’s campaign.)

Trump is planning trips to urban areas — with stops at churches, charter schools and small businesses in black and Latino communities — and is developing an empowerment agenda based on the economy and education, aides said. Under consideration is an early September visit to Detroit, where retired neurosurgeon and former Republican primary rival Ben Carson would guide him on a tour of the impoverished neighborhoods where he grew up.

Trump’s team also hopes to exploit what the campaign’s internal poll of black voters nationally shows to be a potential vulnerability for Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton once voters are informed of the crime policy record of former president Bill Clinton, according to two Trump associates.

At his rallies, meanwhile, Trump has been spotlighting black supporters and making a blunt pitch to minorities. He has described blacks in sweeping and categorical language, suggesting that they are mired in poverty, living in dangerous neighborhoods and have nothing to lose by giving him a chance. He also has changed his tone on immigration by saying he would swiftly deport “the bad ones” living in the country illegally but would use the existing legal process for others — after vowing for more than a year that he would deport them all.

Presidential candidate Donald Trump said Chicago's crime problem could be solved by police "being very much tougher" than they are now, adding that during a Chicago visit he met with "very top police" and was told the problem could be stopped in a week with tough tactics.

In an interview Monday night on the Fox News show "The O'Reilly Factor," Trump reiterated his past comments about Chicago violence being "out of control" and added that the Chicago police force does not have "the right people in charge."


Fox host Bill O'Reilly asked Trump how to solve the city's crime problem, with homicides up nearly 50 percent.

"How? By being very much tougher than they are right now. They're right now not tough. I could tell you this very long and quite boring story. But when I was in Chicago, I got to meet a couple of very top police. I said, 'How do you stop this? How do you stop this? If you were put in charge — to a specific person — do you think you could stop it?' He said, 'Mr. Trump, I'd be able to stop it in one week.' And I believed him 100 percent," Trump said.




When O'Reilly asked whether the unnamed officer told him how, Trump said: "No, he wants to use tough police tactics, which is OK when you have people being killed."

But Chicago police said Tuesday that Trump has not met with top brass.

"No one in the senior command at CPD has ever met with Donald Trump or a member of his campaign," Chicago police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said.

On O'Reilly last night Donald Trump essentially said he'd continue President Obama's deportation policy, which supporters and immigration critics both agree does not slack on deportations one bit. Only Trump says he'd pursue Obama's policy "perhaps with a lot more energy."

Trump: "We’re going to obey the existing laws. Now, the existing laws are very strong ... What people don’t know is that Obama got tremendous numbers of people out of the country, Bush the same thing. Lots of people were brought out of the country with the existing laws. Well, I’m gonna do the same thing."

Please take a moment to regroup and stop laughing because this is a serious topic.

Thank you.

Newly-minted Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway tried to put the best face on it by explaining that crafting good policy takes time. “Immigration is a very complex issue and to get the solutions right, to come out with your specific plan, should not be rushed. He is taking in the wisdom of many different counselors on this issue."

When Fox's Megyn Kelly pressed Conway on whether Trump still plans to deport 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the US, she said the policy is still "basically the same. First, secure the borders and actually apply and enforce the law. Secondly, you have to deport those who have committed crimes."

Alas, this is as Trump himself was explaining, basically Obama policy: enforce the current laws and give priority to deporting those who have committed crimes and present a danger to the community.

Robert Costa Verified account
?@costareports

As I continue to make calls, I keep hearing that this was driven by Trump. He wanted to finish race on his own terms, w/ pals at his side.

Robert Costa Verified account
?@costareports

Huge rallies. Gloves off. Brutal fights with Clinton. Heavy emphasis on nationalism and populism. That's the Bannon strategy.

Bannon has convinced Trump that rest of campaign needs to be bare-knuckles brawl, w/ full-bore populism/movement politics