Donald Trump was “in serious talks” to play the POTUS in “Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No.”

After Sarah Palin rejected playing the president of the United States in the 2015 film, Trump, 71, almost took the role, in part because of his friendship with the franchise’s hero, Ian Ziering.

“The Donald said yes,” David Latt, co-founder of The Asylum Productions, told The Hollywood Reporter in an interview released Wednesday. “He was thrilled to be asked.”

However, before shooting ever began, Trump’s real-life presidential aspirations took precedence over his onscreen leadership.

Trump’s team informed Latt and casting director Gerald Webb that the timing wasn’t quite right because Trump was “thinking about making a legitimate run for the presidency … This might not be the best time.”

The role, which included a scene where the president shoots sharks that ended up inside the White House before impaling a Great White with an American flag, instead went to one of Trump’s biggest television rivals: Mark Cuban.

The highly-publicized move didn’t sit well with the now commander-in-chief’s lawyer, Michael D. Cohen, who reportedly called Latt in a fury once the news broke.

“He basically said, ‘How dare you? Donald wanted to do this. We’re going to sue you! We’re going to shut the entire show down,'” Latt recalled.

Cohen, however, told THR that he did not recall any “angry correspondence.”</s>Two years before he was elected President of the United States, Donald Trump was just happy to be offered a fictional version of the role in 2015’s Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No.

David Latt, co-founder of Sharknado’s production company The Asylum, told The Hollywood Reporterin an article published on Tuesday, August 1,that Trump, 71, said yes to the role almost immediately after it was offered. Latt recalled: “He was thrilled to be asked.”

"We got pretty far,” says casting director Gerald Webb of Trump’s negotiations for the role, which was originally offered to Sarah Palin. "It was serious talks."

After weeks of silence, Trump’s attorney Michael D. Cohen explained that the businessman’s real-life political ambition would likely have to keep him from the hit sci-fi franchise. "Donald's thinking about making a legitimate run for the presidency, so we'll get back to you," Latt recalled Cohen explaining. "This might not be the best time.”

The role was eventually offered to Mark Cuban, a move that Latt says didn’t sit well with Trump. The two have been exchanging in an ongoing war of words surrounding Trump's presidency for months. “We immediately heard from Trump's lawyer," recalls Latt. "He basically said, 'How dare you? Donald wanted to do this. We're going to sue you! We're going to shut the entire show down!’”

The film also starred Tara Reid,David Hasselhoff, Bo Derek and Ian Ziering. According to THR, Ziering suggested Trump for the part after appearing with him on season 14 of Celebrity Apprentice.

The president has come under fire recently after he allegedly made some controversial comments to members of his Bedminster golf club. According to Golf Magazine, Trump told people that “the White House is a real dump,” although a White House spokesperson denied that the conversation ever occurred.
• Dean Unglert: ‘I Was Falling In Love’ With Rachel Lindsay When I Was Eliminated
• 'The Middle' to End After Nine Seasons, Patricia Heaton Reacts</s>Lara Trump, the wife of Eric Trump, is doing her part for the family business by hosting educational Trump-driven segments on Facebook to provide real news stressing Donald Trump’s accomplishments. Lara Trump reportedly will be telling people about the things that Donald Trump is doing that they won’t read about in the mainstream media. Lara Trump, who is pregnant with the couple’s first child plans to make weekly installments to spread the word about the things Donald Trump is doing for the country.

Just after Donald Trump took office, Eric and Lara Trump announced that they were expecting their first child, a boy. Donald Trump’s two older children, Donald Trump, Jr. and Ivanka both already have children, and so this child will join a large group of first cousins. While Eric and Donald Jr. work for Donald Trump’s businesses, Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner work alongside Donald Trump in the White House. Up until now, Lara Trump has not worked with the family, and she explains that fatigue in her first trimester had her slowing down for a time.

“I was exhausted in the beginning. It surprised me, because I’m a very active person, and until the fatigue hit, I didn’t believe it would actually happen to me. It really affected me. But I’m feeling really good now.”

But now that Lara Trump is in her last trimester, she is putting her media skills to work in order to help Donald Trump.

Recently Eric and Lara Trump have been traveling with President Donald Trump to rallies in places like Ohio and West Virginia, and Lara Trump is said to be ready to do short presentations in support of President Trump on Facebook soon. The purpose of these presentations is to share the positive stories about Donald Trump that the mainstream media isn’t sharing.

“I bet you haven’t heard about all the accomplishments the president had this week because there’s so much fake news out there.”

Lara is sharing not only the great things she claims Donald Trump is doing but also wants to talk about Trump’s financial contributions, like the fact that he is donating part of his salary to the Department of Education.

“Again, this is a president who is putting America before himself. I’m so proud of that.”

So far, Lara Trump has just teased the presentations she plans to give about Donald Trump’s achievements.

The Facebook presentations hosted by Lara Trump are said to come out of Donald Trump’s frustration at the chaos within the administration and the negative coverage of the same. Eric Trump went on to speak with Sean Hannity to say that he is frustrated that there isn’t a rush to defend his father.

“I want somebody to start fighting for him.”

Supposedly, this was the spark that led to Lara Trump’s Facebook segments. Lara Trump did introductions for the segments she calls real news.

“Want to know what President Trump did this week? Watch here for the REAL news!”

Lara Trump says that she wants to do these segments to allow Americans to have a glimpse into the week of President Donald Trump. With a Trump-Pence background, Lara Trump gives details about the things people might have missed from the prior week on “Real News.”

Ivana Trump Wants Donald To Appoint Her Czech Republic…

Eric Trump Took On Keith Olbermann And The Outcome Wasn’t Pretty…

Lara Trump then signs off until her next segment presumably next Sunday.

“Thanks for joining us, everybody. I’m Lara Trump, and that is the real news.”

Will you tune into Facebook for Lara Trump’s two-minute “Real News” segments about the achievements of Donald Trump?</s>WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump grudgingly signed into law new sanctions against Russia on Wednesday, a move Moscow said amounted to a full-scale trade war and an end to hopes for better ties with the Trump administration.

Congress overwhelmingly approved the legislation last week, passing a measure that conflicts with the Republican president’s desire to improve relations with Moscow.

Trump signed the bill behind closed doors, without the fanfare that has customarily accompanied his signing of executive orders. He criticized the measure as infringing on his powers to shape foreign policy, and said he could make “far better deals” with governments than Congress can.

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev called the sanctions tantamount to a “full-scale trade war,” adding in a Facebook post that they showed the Trump administration had demonstrated “utter powerlessness.”

“The hope that our relations with the new American administration would improve is finished,” he wrote.

Trump’s litany of concerns about the sanctions, which also affect Iran and North Korea, raised the question of how vigorously Trump will implement them regarding Russia.

“While I favor tough measures to punish and deter aggressive and destabilizing behavior by Iran, North Korea, and Russia, this legislation is significantly flawed,” Trump said in a message to lawmakers known as a signing statement. He also issued a statement for the press about the bill.

The new law allows Congress, which passed the measure to punish Russia over interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election and the annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea, to halt any effort by Trump to ease sanctions on Russia.

His hands were tied after the Republican-controlled Congress approved the legislation by such a large margin last week that any presidential veto of the bill would have been overridden.

The legislation provoked countermeasures by Russian President Vladimir Putin, who said on Sunday that the U.S. diplomatic mission in Russia must reduce its staff by 755 people. Russia is also seizing two properties near Moscow used by American diplomats.

Trump has repeatedly said he wants to improve relations with Russia. That desire has been stymied by U.S. intelligence agencies’ findings that Russia interfered to help the Republican against Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.

U.S. congressional panels and a special counsel are investigating. Moscow denies any meddling and Trump denies any collusion by his campaign.

MIXED SIGNALS ON RUSSIA

Republican House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan welcomed the signing, saying it would send “a powerful message to our adversaries that they will be held accountable.”

In his statements on the sanctions law, Trump complained about what he said was congressional infringement on the president’s constitutional power to set foreign policy, saying the law reflected congressional “preferences” rather than a legal mandate.

“It is flagging those areas where the administration sees itself as having wiggle room to underenforce the law by citing claimed constitutional concerns,” said Harold Koh, a Yale Law School professor who was a legal adviser to the State Department during the Obama administration.

FILE PHOTO: Russia's President Vladimir Putin talks to U.S. President Donald Trump during their bilateral meeting at the G20 summit in Hamburg, Germany July 7, 2017. REUTERS/Carlos Barria

The House’s top Democrat, Nancy Pelosi, said the signing statement “raises serious questions about whether his administration intends to follow the law.”

Trump said he was elected partly because of his successes in business, adding, “As President, I can make far better deals with foreign countries than Congress.”

Trump’s signing statement was the latest in a series of mixed signals from the administration on Russia.

“I feel like there’s several policies being implemented at once, and they’re not very compatible with one another. This is one more,” said Olga Oliker, a Russia expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a think tank based in Washington.

Vice President Mike Pence, touring Baltic countries adjacent to Russia, has followed a hawkish line. Pence said Trump’s signing of the legislation would show that Congress and the president were “speaking with a unified voice” on Russia.

However, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, like Trump, has been critical of the legislation.

“The action by the Congress to put these sanctions in place and the way they did, neither the president nor I were very happy about that,” Tillerson said on Tuesday.

TARGETING THE ENERGY SECTOR

The sanctions will affect a range of Russian industries and might further hurt Russia’s economy, already weakened by 2014 sanctions imposed after the annexation of Crimea.

Slideshow (3 Images)

Besides angering Moscow, the legislation has upset the European Union, which has said the new sanctions might affect its energy security and prompt it to retaliate if needed.

Several provisions of the law target the Russian energy sector, with new limits on U.S. investment in Russian companies. American companies also would be barred from participating in energy exploration projects where Russian firms have a stake of 33 percent or higher.

The legislation includes sanctions on foreign companies investing in or helping Russian energy exploration, although the president could waive those sanctions.

It would give the Trump administration the option of imposing sanctions on companies helping develop Russian export pipelines, such as the Nord Stream 2 pipeline carrying natural gas to Europe, in which German companies are involved.</s>Back when the idea of a Trump presidency was more of a punch line than a reality, The Donald himself had hopes of holding the position in a very different capacity.

According to , the former host was slated to play the role of U.S. president in back in 2015.

Franchise producer David Latt told the outlet that "The Donald said yes" to the job offer, noting, "He was thrilled to be asked."

Weeks after a contract was drawn up and sent to Trump’s attorney Michael D. Cohen, Latt recalls Cohen responding with a message that said, "Donald's thinking about making a legitimate run for the presidency, so we'll get back to you. This might not be the best time."

After receiving said message, Mark Cuban was cast in the role of the president, and Trump, you know … became the IRL president of the United States.

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Does this mean what we think it means? Did inspire Donald Trump to run for president? We’ll leave the conclusion to you.</s>Moscow: Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said the new sanctions imposed by the US are tantamount to declaring a "full-scale trade war" against Moscow and the administration demonstrated complete impotence in the most humiliating manner, the media reported.

Writing on his Facebook page on Wednesday, Medvedev said the sanctions package "ends hopes for improving our relations with the new US administration", reports the BBC.

"The sanctions regime has been codified and will remain in effect for decades unless a miracle happens."

The White House announced the signing of the Countering America`s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act at around 11 am on Wednesday, saying the legislation includes "a number of clearly unconstitutional provisions" that "purport to displace the President`s exclusive constitutional authority to recognize foreign governments, including their territorial bounds", CNN reported.

Medvedev added that he thought Trump was an "incompetent player (who) must be eliminated".

The law aims to punish Russia for its alleged meddling in the 2016 US elections, its actions in Ukraine and the annexation of the Crimean peninsula in 2014.

Moscow — which denies interfering in the US presidential election — had already retaliated last week when Congress passed the bill, by expelling 755 people from the US embassy and consulates in Russia, the BBC reported.

The legislation also imposes sanctions on Iran and North Korea.

Iran said the new sanctions violated the nuclear deal and it would respond in an "appropriate and proportional" manner, according to Isna news agency.

North Korea has so far made no public comments on the US move.

Several European nations, including Germany, are fearful of the economic consequences and European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker has warned of "unintended unilateral effects that impact the European Union`s energy security interests".</s>(REUTERS) — New sanctions on Russia which U.S. President Donald Trump has signed into law are tantamount to a “full-scale trade war”, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said on Wednesday.

Medvedev also said in a Facebook post that the sanctions showed the Trump administration was utterly powerless.

“The hope that our relations with the new American administration would improve is finished,” he wrote.</s>WASHINGTON: Dealt a striking congressional rebuke, Donald Trump grudgingly signed what he called a ``seriously flawed'' package of sanctions against Russia on Wednesday, bowing for the moment to resistance from both parties to his push for warmer ties with Moscow.Trump signed the most significant piece of legislation of his presidency with no public event. And he coupled it with a written statement, resentful in tone, that accused Congress of overstepping its constitutional bounds, impeding his ability to negotiate with foreign countries and lacking any ability to strike deals."Congress could not even negotiate a health care bill after seven years of talking,'' he said scornfully of lawmakers' recent failure to repeal "Obamacare'' as he and other Republicans have promised for years. "As president, I can make far better deals with foreign countries than Congress.''Still, he said, "despite its problems, I am signing this bill for the sake of national unity.''It was powerful evidence of the roadblock Congress has erected to Trump's efforts to reset relations with Russia at a time when federal investigators are probing Moscow's interference in the U.S. presidential election and possible collusion by the Trump campaign.The legislation is aimed at penalizing Moscow for that interference and for its military aggression in Ukraine and Syria, where the Kremlin has backed President Bashar Assad.The law also imposes new financial sanctions against Iran and North Korea Trump said the law will ``punish and deter bad behavior'' by the governments of Iran and North Korea as well as enhance existing sanctions on Moscow. But he made no secret of his distaste for what the bill does to his ability to govern.``The bill remains seriously flawed _ particularly because it encroaches on the executive branch's authority to negotiate,'' he said.Last week, the House overwhelmingly backed the bill, 419-3, and the Senate rapidly followed, 98-2. Those margins guaranteed that Congress would be able to beat back any veto attempt.Trump has repeatedly cast doubt on the conclusions of U.S. intelligence agencies that Russia meddled in the 2016 campaign with the intention of tipping the election in his favor.He's blasted the federal investigation as a "witch hunt.''Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., called the president's concerns over the bill misplaced. Vladimir Putin and his regime must pay a real price for attacking our democracy, violating human rights, occupying Crimea and destabilizing Ukraine,'' McCain said. "Going forward, I hope the president will be as vocal about Russia's aggressive behavior as he was about his concerns with this legislation.''Trump's talk of extending a hand of cooperation to Putin has been met by skeptical lawmakers looking to limit his leeway. The new measure targets Russia's energy sector as part of legislation that prevents Trump from easing sanctions on Moscow without congressional approval.Russia wasn't pleased. Putin responded on Sunday by announcing the U.S. would have to cut 755 of its embassy and consular staff in Russia. And Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said in an emotional Facebook post Wednesday that ``Trump's administration has demonstrated total impotence by surrendering its executive authority to Congress in the most humiliating way.''The congressional review section of the bill that Trump objects to was a key feature for many members of Congress.Trump will be required to send a report explaining why he wants to suspend or terminate a particular set of the sanctions on Russia. Lawmakers would then have 30 days to decide whether to allow that.Secretary of State Rex Tillerson echoed the president's sentiments that the measure poses more diplomatic hindrances than solutions.``Neither the president nor I are very happy about that,'' Tillerson said Tuesday. ``We were clear that we didn't think that was going to be helpful to our efforts, but that's the decision they made.''Sean Kane, a former official with the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control, said the Obama administration had sought similar wiggle room when negotiating Iran sanctions with lawmakers.``These issues have come up before where an administration wants flexibility in place in a deal that would potentially lift sanctions, and Congress wants to tie the administration's hands in some ways,'' said Kane, now at the law firm Hughes Hubbard & Reed.Trump said that Congress had "included a number of clearly unconstitutional provisions.''Last winter, just before Trump was sworn in, a bipartisan group of senators unveiled a bill designed to go beyond the punishments already levied against Russia by the Obama administration and to demonstrate to Trump that forcefully responding to Moscow's election interference wasn't a partisan issue.Action on Russia sanctions didn't really pick up until late May, when Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee , threw his support behind the effort. The bill underwent revisions to avoid inadvertently undercutting U.S. firms or interfering with how European allies acquire energy.Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle celebrated the passage and signing.House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., said the bill sends a ``powerful message to our adversaries that they will be held accountable for their actions.''But the House's top Democrat said Trump's statement calling the bill ``seriously flawed'' raises questions about whether his administration will follow the law. Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said the Republican-led Congress must not allow the White House to ``wriggle out of its duty to impose these sanctions for Russia's brazen assault on our democracy.''</s>U.S. President Trump awards the Medal of Honor to James McCloughan during a ceremony at the White House in Washington Thomson Reuters President Donald Trump appeared to echo Kremlin talking points Thursday morning when he tweeted that Congress was to blame for the US relationship with Russia being at an "all-time & very dangerous low."

"Our relationship with Russia is at an all-time & very dangerous low," he said. "You can thank Congress, the same people that can't even give us HCare!"

Democratic Sen. Mark Warner, the vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, responded quickly.

"Or you could thank Russian dictator Putin, who hacked US election, undermines Western alliances, invaded Ukraine & annexed Crimea," he tweeted.

Trump's tweet came a day after Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev took to Twitter to denounce the veto-proof sanctions bill that Trump was essentially handcuffed into signing on Wednesday, appearing to appeal to the president's ego by calling his administration weak and pinning the blame on Congress.

"The Trump administration has shown its total weakness by handing over executive power to Congress in the most humiliating way," Medvedev tweeted on Wednesday.

Jeremy Bash, the former chief of staff at the Defense Department and the CIA, predicted earlier this week that Trump's "bromance" with Russian President Vladimir Putin would continue even if Trump signed the sanctions bill, because Putin would know Trump was backed into a corner by Congress.

Medvedev seemed to acknowledge that on Wednesday, writing that while Trump "is not happy about the sanctions...he could not but sign the bill."

"The US establishment fully outwitted Trump," he said.

Trump is known for "punching back" when he feels slighted. He slammed China last weekend, for instance, for its reluctance to rein in North Korea. He criticized London Mayor Sadiq Khan hours after a deadly terror attack rocked the city in June. Last year, during the presidential campaign, he attacked the Gold Star parents of slain Army Cpt. Humayun Khan after they spoke out against him at the 2016 Democratic National Convention.

As of Thursday, however, Trump still had not responded to Putin's demand that 755 diplomatic workers, many of them American, be cut from the US Embassy in Moscow and from US diplomatic missions in St. Petersburg, Ekaterinburg, and Vladivostok.

The cuts would be the steepest in nearly 100 years and would go much further than President Barack Obama's decision to expel 35 Russian diplomats from the US as punishment for Russia's election interference.

Ned Price, a former CIA analyst who served as a National Security Council spokesperson and Special Assistant to President Barack Obama, called Trump's tweet on Thursday "inexplicable" and said it "does nothing more than reiterate what Moscow already knows: namely that Russia has a stalwart friend in the form of the President of the United States."

But Price noted that it was not the first time Trump "has parroted Kremlin talking points."

"He did it consistently during the campaign—actually directing his supporters to Moscow's propaganda—and has continued to do so as President," Price said on Thursday. "Moscow may well know why President Trump is so loyal, but the American people continue to be baffled — and rightly so."

Trump's attacks on Congress, meanwhile, mark a bizarre turning point in the drama unfolding between the White House and the GOP-controlled House and Senate.

That battle has escalated in recent weeks amid the Senate's failure to repeal and replace Obamacare, and Trump has criticized Republicans for failing to protect him amid the intelligence committees' probes into his campaign's contacts with Russia during the election.

"As the phony Russian Witch Hunt continues, two groups are laughing at this excuse for a lost election taking hold, Democrats and Russians!" Trump tweeted late last month. "It's very sad that Republicans, even some that were carried over the line on my back, do very little to protect their President."

A provision in the new sanctions bill requiring Trump to get congressional approval before altering or lifting sanctions on Russia has also been a major point of contention between the White House and Congress.

Trump, who has lingering doubts that Russia interfered in the 2016 election, said shortly after signing the bill into law on Wednesday that "America will not tolerate interference in our democratic process" and denounced "Russian subversion and destabilization."

But he called the legislation "seriously flawed," claiming that it "improperly encroaches on executive power, disadvantages American companies, and hurts the interests of our European allies."</s>Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev says Donald Trump’s signing legislation imposing new sanctions on Russia is declaration of a full-fledged trade war.

He says the Trump administration has demonstrated complete impotence, in the most humiliating manner, by transferring executive powers to congress.

President Trump had earlier expressed his own doubts about the legislation saying the bill remains seriously flawed because it encroaches on the executive branch’s authority to negotiate.

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President of the United States Donald Trump signs the Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act. Prime Minister of Russia Dmitry Medvedev calls it a "trade war".