White House

A key piece of evidence the Trump campaign was counting on to prove voter fraud in the election just crumbled ... because the witness is recanting.

A USPS worker who recently claimed he'd overheard a supervisor in Erie, PA tell workers to backdate ballots that arrived after Nov. 3 is now taking it all back, saying he made up the whole thing ... this according to the Washington Post.

The guy's name is Richard Hopkins, and just last week many in the GOP, and beyond, were citing him as a whistleblower. He eventually signed an affidavit about his claim, which is at the crux of much of what Trump's camp has hoisted up as evidence of voter fraud in PA.

Welp, as of Tuesday WaPo says the guy copped to lying during a committee hearing with U.S. lawmakers. The House Oversight Committee tweeted the huge development ... noting it's unclear why he lied in the first place.

Keep in mind, Hopkins' false testimony set off a massive chain of events ... including some of the lawsuits Trump's brought forward, and Attorney General William Barr giving the Dept. of Justice the green light to probe any credible claims of voting irregularities.

All that ... for a lie.

We should note, the Erie Postmaster -- Rob Weisenbach -- flat-out denied the claim early, said Hopkins was full of it, and denied any backdating of ballots at his location whatsoever. He suggested Hopkins was disgruntled, as he'd recently been disciplined many times.

Hopkins' false tale isn't dying easily, though, because ... well it's 2020.

The far-right org Project Veritas claims to have recordings of the guy being intimidated by investigators into taking back his story. We'll see if that comes out, but for now President Trump's voting fraud smoking gun seems to be firing blanks.

The Lt. Gov. of Texas is dangling a very expensive carrot in hopes of finding proof of voter fraud ... but what he's really doing is motivating liars to come out of the woodwork.

Yes, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick made the crazy announcement Tuesday ... saying he "will pay up to $1 million to incentivize, encourage and reward people to come forward and report voter fraud." He says the cash will come from his campaign fund.

There is a catch ... Patrick says any whistleblowers would have to turn over evidence that leads to an arrest and conviction in order to get paid. Each person who does that will receive at least $25,000 -- so, Patrick is clearly planning to hook dozens of tipsters.

Remember ... Republicans have filed several affidavits and complaints in courts across the country alleging potential voter fraud and unfair elections, but so far, no court has reversed any election results or confirmed the allegations.

Make no mistake, Patrick is scoring points with President Trump, who still refuses to concede to President-elect Joe Biden. Patrick says he supports "Trump's efforts to identify voter fraud in the presidential election and his commitment to making sure that every legal vote is counted and every illegal vote is disqualified."

With $25k up for grabs, we're guessing Patrick will get plenty of people claiming to have the evidence he's seeking -- whether they actually have it or not.

Congressman Jim Clyburn's widely credited with saving Joe Biden's Presidential campaign, but he says Joe shouldn't thank him ... the credit goes to 2 Black women who inspired him.

The distinguished gentleman from South Carolina joined "TMZ Live" Tuesday to shed some light on his decision to throw major support behind Biden leading up to the SC primary, which proved pivotal in Joe landing the Democratic nomination.

Clyburn tells us he was already a Biden fan, but he decided to go all out for him to honor his late wife, Emily ... who passed in September 2019. The congressman says his wife absolutely loved Joe, and she made him promise her he'd commit to helping Biden get the nom.

The other Black woman who persuaded Clyburn is anonymous, but his interaction with her was so impactful ... he attributes it to his game-changing endorsement of Biden. The rest, as they say ... is history.

Of course, this all led to Biden becoming President-elect, and Rep. Clyburn seems pretty confident nothing's going to change that ... despite President Trump's efforts.

In fact, Jim seems fed up with all the Trump talk since the election, and reminds us the sitting Prez is just one individual -- one the congressman would like to see put in his place. As he's told us before, if Trump won't leave quietly ... he believes the military will make him.

Finally, on the topic of Georgia and its uber-important Senate races ... Jim has an interesting take on how they could affect Biden's presidency and the Democratic Party as a whole.

President Trump has the right to exhaust every avenue to determine if there was voter fraud in the election, but if nothing turns up, he should exit stage left ... so says the Texas GOP chairman.

Allen West joined "TMZ Live" on Tuesday and said people are getting way ahead of themselves by declaring Joe Biden the President-elect ... not while ballots are still being counted -- or recounted -- in George, Arizona and North Carolina.

West, a former U.S. Congressman and retired Lt. Col., added the voter fraud allegations in Pennsylvania -- so far, unfounded -- also have to play out in court. While West is throwing his support behind team Trump and the audit of ballots, he makes it crystal clear -- if it's ruled a fair and legal election ... Trump has to abide by that.

Obamacare was on the line Tuesday before the U.S. Supreme Court .... and not only does it seem the justices are inclined to do away with part or all of it -- although there seems to be a good chance the case will be thrown out on technical legal grounds -- there was also talk about another looming issue ... whether the federal government could impose a mandatory mask requirement.

Oral arguments kicked off Tuesday on the issue of whether the ACA's individual mandate is constitutional anymore since a Republican-held Congress removed the tax penalty in 2017. The justices had said previously that the law was grounded in Congress's ability to tax citizens, but now that there's no longer a tax penalty, some of the justices felt there was no longer a legal basis for the law. The Trump administration wants the whole law 86'd, but others say the justices could declare just the mandatory health insurance provision unconstitutional and save the rest of the ACA.

As the groundwork for that was being laid out at the beginning of the hearing, Justice Clarence Thomas raised an illuminating comparison ... asking if a proposed national mask mandate could, for instance, be challenged if there's no real threat of enforcement.

He seemed to be spit-balling, but the fact he chose to hurl that wad specifically in this context was telling, especially since Joe Biden said he would roll out a national mandate.

Back to the ACA ... Justices Kavanaugh and Alito -- both of whom tend to have strict interpretations of the constitution -- appeared to signal they thought removing the mandate and leaving the rest of law in place was something that could feasibly work.

Alito, for example, compared the mandate to a crucial part of a plane that engineers thought, at first, was necessary to fly. But, if that part gets removed once it's in the air, and if the plane continues to fly ... he asked why is it necessary to take the whole thing down? It was pretty insightful -- but time will tell if or how they actually rule on the subject.

One person who was relatively muted throughout Tuesday's proceedings -- and who didn't really show her cards much at all -- was Justice Amy Coney Barrett, the newbie of the group, and the one who could well be the deciding vote to strike the ACA down, or uphold it.

Her questions were brief, and were mostly buried in legalese ... it was hard to pick up what, if anything, she was signaling on how she felt about the merits of the case.

As this case plays out over the next few months, Justice Thomas' question of masks might be setting up another showdown over the legality of mandated mask-wearing ... something we'll definitely keep an eye out for.

Stacey Abrams is getting a round of applause from Rep. Karen Bass, who says Georgia wouldn't have gone blue for Biden without Stacey, and now she could help the Dems run the table in D.C.

The U.S. Congresswoman spoke with us Monday on "TMZ Live" and explained why the upcoming run-off elections for two U.S. Senate seats in Georgia are HUGE for her party, and more importantly ... why Abrams deserves a ton of the credit for getting it to this point.

Rep. Bass says Stacey's efforts to register hundreds of thousands in the Peach State, not only helped Biden (who won GA by a hair), but also the Democrat hopefuls looking to replace GOP incumbents.

If Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock beat out their Republican counterparts in a January runoff, the Democratic Party would have the WH, the Senate and the House -- and Biden could push through his agenda without pause.

We also talked coronavirus with the Congresswoman, and while she's happy about Pfizer's claim it has a 90% effective vaccine ... she's also cautiously optimistic.

We have POTUS, FLOTUS, SCOTUS and now ... an official title for the First Family's furry friends, DOTUS, which just became Twitter official.

Dr. Jill and President-Elect Biden set up online accounts for their 2 German Shepherds, Major and Champ, with a handle of @First_Dogs_USA. Unfortunately, some troll already snapped up @DOTUS, which is dedicated to "The Don of the U.S." -- so the Bidens settled for this.

Their bio reads, "We are the First Dogs of the USA, Champ and Major Biden,” their Twitter profile said. “You can call us #DOTUS. We love nom noms, snuggles and we can’t wait to explore the WH!”

Doesn't look like the dogs have a formal Instagram account dedicated to their White House adventures just yet ... which would be a good idea, since more people probably wanna SEE Major and Champ more so than read their canine thoughts and musings. Just a thought!

As of Monday morning, the DOTUS Twitter page has over 94k followers, and counting.

Like we told you, Major and Champ will be the first dogs in the White House since Barack Obama was there with his family's two Portuguese Waterdogs, Sunny and Bo. Not just that, but Major is the first rescue to set its paws down at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

One of President Trump's helicopters is up for grabs -- but, weirdly, he and his team don't seem to be looking for a specific price ... instead, they're putting the ball in a buyer's court.

DT currently owns three Sikorsky S76-B helicopters -- plus other private aircraft not associated with the White House -- and one of those choppers has found its way to an aerial retailer via Aero Asset, which is hawking the thing out of a hangar in New Jersey.

The funny thing ... there's no asking price, the listing just says "Make offer." So, basically, DT appears to have gone the route of Craigslist and will pretty much take what he can get!

Granted, the market value for one of these helicopters of the same year is said to be anywhere between $700k-$800k, with other estimates coming in closer between $1 mil and $2 mil for newer models. All in all, Trump probably wouldn't haul in more than $1.5M at best.

Sources confirmed to TMZ this was, in fact, Trump's Sikorsky -- which he'd been seen riding in the recent past ... including trips made during his 2016 campaign, as well as appearances for "The Apprentice" once upon a time. It even used to bear his last name along the tail.

No word on what sorta offers -- if any -- the person tapped to sell this has received thus far, but it looks like Trump's chopper here has been on sale since at least August, so quite a while. It's also got all the fixings of a typical piece of Trump property, with gold seatbelts and custom flooring and upholstered leather. Still, no one seems to have wanted to bite.

Here's hoping this is the last we'll have to hear about "fake news" for a long time -- which, ironically enough, is coming to us courtesy of President Trump's own campaign staffers.

The Trump campaign's Communications Director, Tim Murtaugh, tweeted out a photo this weekend that showed the walls of the interior of their headquarters in Arlington, VA completely plastered with copies of a newspaper front page that read, "President Gore."

The paper was supposedly the front page of the Washington Times from 2000 -- Tim was trying to show they got it wrong and called a Gore win prematurely. He wrote, "Greeting staff @TeamTrump HQ this morning, a reminder that the media doesn't select the President."

The problem ... that front page is FAKE, and the outlet actually called him out over it on Twitter -- noting the photos/headline were doctored, and NOT what they ran at the time.

Of course, somebody tracked down the actual front page TWT ran in 2000 after Election Day, and sure enough ... they actually called it for George W. Bush (which, while still premature the day after, ended up being correct in the end). In other words, actual fake news that Team Trump fell for, and taped up in their offices. Murtaugh eventually deleted his post.

It's just a testament that Trump's delusion about this election and his unfounded claims of a rigged system and voter fraud runs deep through his ranks ... which is not a good sign of what's to come.

You might've heard "Y.M.C.A." being played A LOT lately from both Dems and Republicans -- a testament that it's still got pull on both sides of the aisle ... according to the guy who wrote it.

Village People founder Victor Willis -- the cop in the group -- tells TMZ ... he just loves the fact his band's iconic earworm has seeped into the political arena this election cycle -- even if that means it was heavily kickstarted by Donald Trump at rallies.

In case you hadn't noticed, Trump was big into incorporating "Y.M.C.A." as a go-to tune during his final blitz across the country -- often dancing to it on stage, which actually got made into a 2-minute long compilation clip in sync with the song. So, yeah ... it's been revived.

Of course, on Saturday ... the song was sorta hijacked by Biden supporters in Philly who danced to it while trolling Trump supporters from across the street (who were actually playing it) ... this as Joe Biden was announced as the projected winner of the 2020 election.

On that front, Victor tells us that's A-OK too ... everyone's invited to sing it. So long as the track continues to get play -- not to mention climb back up on the charts, which it's also doing for the first time in literally decades -- he's good with anybody getting down to "Y.M.C.A.'

As we told you, Victor had already signaled it was cool for DT to use the track -- and he reiterated that here with us as well ... saying he had no plans to sue Trump or his campaign.

If anything, it sounds like Victor is grateful to Trump for resurrecting not just "Y.M.C.A" ... but also "Macho Man," another Village People classic. Alec Baldwin even sang a rendition of it on 'SNL' this weekend, so it's all Village People all the time, it seems, these days.

To Victor, that just speaks to the universality of his music -- and the message of overcoming obstacles that apply to just about any and everybody who's going through adversity.

It's pretty incredible that Alec Baldwin's Donald Trump character is not really a caricature ... because he's really like that.

Trump flew off the Twitter handle again, lashing out at voting officials in big cities, saying, "We believe these people are thieves. The big city machines are corrupt. This was a stolen election."

Trump tweeted this before heading out for his second day of golfing in a row.

Trump goes on to quote a British pollster, whom he says also called it a stolen election, adding, "it's impossible to imagine that Biden outran Obama in some of these states." Of course, a pollster from Great Britain doesn't know the mechanics of vote processing in America.

As you know by now, Trump has offered no concrete evidence of fraud and has been booted out of court. True enough ... he could probably get this before the U.S. Supreme Court, but even with the addition of Amy Coney Barrett, it's highly unlikely the Court will overturn election results. Above all else, the SCOTUS cares about its legitimacy, and by siding with Trump on flimsy to no evidence, the justices know it would result in an uprising and almost certainly court-packing.

And, there's this ... Trump has a voter fraud hotline which has been inundated with prank calls from Biden supporters. The Biden folks would call in, laughing and gloating over Trump's loss ... this according to ABC News.

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris both gave rousing speeches to an enormous crowd as they declared victory in the 2020 Presidential election.

Biden sprinted to the podium, then told the crowd his victory was clear and convincing. He was clearly messaging that Donald Trump's challenges will amount to nothing.

He then got presidential, telling the crowd he will restore respect for America around the world. He said he was heartened by the joy he's observed today all over the world.

Biden then laid out the work ahead, starting with subduing the COVID pandemic, restoring the economy, and on and on.

Kamala Harris introduced Biden. She came out to thunderous cheering and honking, to Mary J Blige's "Work It,"and began her speech by referencing the late John Lewis, who said ... "Democracy is not a state. It's an act." As Harris explained, there's no guarantee that democracy will endure ... it's all about action.

Harris took some oblique shots at Trump, saying voters chose hope, unity, decency, science and truth. But, most of what she did was inspirational, talking about her historic rise and her late mother's mantra that anything is possible.

Her most memorable line ... "I may be the first [female Veep] in this office. I will not be the last."

President Trump has broken his silence on Joe Biden's projected victory of the presidential election -- saying it's still too early to call, and vowing to fight this to the bitter end.

DT's first remarks since Biden was announced the projected winner by multiple news outlets came in the form of an official statement Saturday, rather than his usual tweet. He's got more than 240 characters-worth of complaints.

The gist of it is ... Trump believes Biden and the media are teaming up against him to have JB "falsely pose as the winner," adding they don't want "the truth to be exposed." He goes on to defiantly say this election is far from over.

Trump points out Biden has not been certified as the winner in any states, especially in contested ones like Pennsylvania, where 45 again claimed fraud and corruption in the count. He makes the obvious point ... which is that votes decide elections, not the media.

The sitting President reaffirmed his intent to start taking legal action on Monday -- insisting on having every legal vote counted. He went on to say that only a party -- like the Dems -- engaged in wrongdoing would resist observers in the count rooms, and ends his rant by asking ... "What is Biden hiding?"

Despite the fact there have been no reports of major irregularities in ANY of the states, Trump seems convinced of the opposite ... and, to this point, without any evidence.

Mailmen and women are getting a huge pat on the back for their part in helping deliver votes in this election -- and, in L.A., they're also getting sprayed down with champagne.

Check out this celebratory scene we captured Saturday in WeHo, where Biden supporters had flooded the streets and tracked down a USPS truck, which seemed more than down to get in on the happy vibes ... as folks literally bowed down to the guy behind the wheel.

Unclear if the dude was stuck at a light, or if people were blocking his path -- but either way, he was in no rush to go anywhere as Angelenos literally popped a bottle of champagne and started hosing down the exterior of his vehicle. It's insane to see ... in a good way!

We also talked to the mailman driver, and he seemed about as happy as anyone outside. You can tell as much by the way he started honking his horn upon departure.

Speaking of champagne ... there was some other guy out there handing out bottles for free ... which the West Hollywood crowd did not turn down. Yeah, they're feelin' themselves.

BTW, the praising of postal workers wasn't just confined to the West Coast -- across the country in Brooklyn, something very similar was happening out there as well ... where a mail truck was getting rained upon with cheers, as the driver reciprocated with jubilant honking.

The USPS has been through a lot in the months leading up to this election ... and yet, despite that adversity, the good men and women in the short shorts soldiered on and delivered those mail-in ballots, which clearly helped put Biden over the hill here.

It was the best of times for Joe Biden supporters, and the worst of times for Donald Trump supporters -- the latter of whom are taking to the streets to protest, as their counterparts celebrate.

While millions of people who voted for President-Elect Biden are in utter jubilation this weekend, the folks who voted for Trump are none too pleased ... and it's painting a clear picture of how divided America is today.

Take, for example, what's happening right now in front of the Arizona State Capitol in Phoenix where hundreds (if not thousands) of Trump supporters are packed in and seemingly furious at the notion he's lost.

You can see the flags out, the Uncle Sam hats on ... and the anger seeping through their pores as many chanted "U.S.A." Several Trumpers are also marching right now in protest, including in places like Austin, TX, Lansing, MI, St. Paul, MN, and elsewhere ... with many of these demonstrations taking on the moniker of "Stop the Steal," something Trump himself called for on Twitter.

So far, it looks like a lot of these protests are remaining mostly peaceful -- despite reports of counter-protesters coming out to face-off with them in some parts of the country.

With that said, we've seen photos of some folks bringing out weapons in open carry states, and of course ... cops are out and about too, standing by for any action that might pop off.

The demonstrations and celebrations perfectly illustrate just how hard the work of unification will be for the Biden administration.

For now, tensions are high and people remained riled up on both sides ... which might continue as President Trump digs in his heels for a legal war against the election results.

Joe Biden has just been declared the winner of the election, and he'll become the 46th President of the United States ... this according to CNN, NBC, Fox News and BBC ... which have all called the election.

President Trump continues to say it ain't so, but after a new batch of votes in Pennsylvania -- which brought 20 more electoral college votes -- Biden passed the 270 mark of electoral votes to be the projected winner of the 2020 presidential election.

Barack Obama tweeted his congratulations to Biden and Harris, asking Americans to give them a chance, regardless of who they voted for.

The President-Elect is already vowing to govern for all Americans ... including the more than 70 million who did NOT vote for him.

It's an historic victory, in many ways, not the least of which is Vice President-Elect Kamala Harris -- the first woman, first Black person, and first person of Asian descent to hold the second-highest elected office in America.

It appears she was out for a morning run when she got the victory news, and immediately called her running mate to celebrate.

Shortly after the announcement, CNN contributor Van Jones had an incredibly emotional reaction to the historic moment.

Biden and Harris' victory comes 4 days after Election Day, and required the painstaking counting of ballots in Georgia, Pennsylvania, Nevada and Arizona. Biden had been trailing in GA and PA until early Friday morning when both flipped from red to blue for Barack Obama's former VP.

He also held on in close races in Arizona and Nevada to give him way more electoral votes than he needed to win the presidency. Battleground states Wisconsin and Michigan were called for him earlier this week.

Worth noting, the Biden-Harris ticket managed to flip 3 states -- AZ, GA and PA -- that President Trump had won back in 2016. The writing had been on the wall for Trump all week ... as mail-in ballots were counted, the President's lead slowly shrunk before Biden overtook him.

Biden addressed the encouraging trend Thursday when he stopped just short of giving a victory speech ... but still sounded very Presidential.

Of course, so many of the state races were incredibly tight -- GA's already declared a recount and PA might be headed for one too.

Trump did win a tight battle in North Carolina, but he's up in arms about the states where he fell short and claims he's been cheated -- although, his team has yet to present evidence of that.

Despite President-elect Biden's win, the 2020 election proved to be another big failure for pollsters who predicted he'd have a relatively easy path to victory. For example, Trump handily won Florida by 3.5 points, but one leading polling site predicted Biden winning it by 2.5 points.

The polling fiasco was even worse than 2016, when polls heavily favored a win for Hillary Clinton ... and we all know how that went.

Likewise, Democrats fell way short of their predicted "blue wave" in House and Senate races. In fact, Republicans picked up at least 7 seats in the House -- practically negating the Dems' gains in 2018 -- and the GOP managed to keep control in the Senate.

President Trump -- a self-confessed bad loser -- is not taking the results well. Just before the race was projected for Biden, Trump once again tweeted defiantly.

Trump has vowed to challenge the result and take his case all the way to the Supreme Court.