Maybe it’s an intended form of dark humorous paradoxical game play like a metaphoric rubrics cube meant to puzzle or even frustrate political scientists with nothing. else to do in their cubicles.
Trump advances dangerous disinformation campaign as more states move to restrict the vote
Updated 9:39 AM EDT, Sun June 06, 2021
(CNN)Donald Trump’s speech before the North Carolina Republican Party Saturday night was a reminder of the danger the former President poses as he undermines America’s election system while attempting to reassert himself as kingmaker on the national stage.
His address to the party faithful was a familiar screed to anyone who tuned in to his 2020 campaign rallies. He attacked President Joe Biden’s foreign policy maneuvers, claimed Biden is destroying the economy, insisted that he deserves more credit for the rapid development of Covid-19 vaccines, and argued that the radical left and “cancel culture” are destroying America’s freedoms. But it was his continuing disinformation campaign about the November presidential contest that was most disturbing – in part because the past few months have proved that Trump’s lies are now accepted as gospel by a majority of Republicans.
At a time when followers of QAnon and online forums supportive of Trump have touted the deadly military coup in Myanmar as a remedy that should occur in the United States so Trump can be reinstated, recent polling shows that a majority of Republicans believe the 2020 election was stolen despite the fact there is no evidence of widespread voter fraud.
And the former President continued to fan those flames of disinformation on Saturday night, stating that the 2020 election will “go down as the crime of the century.” He congratulated Republican state senators in Arizona who have forced a sham audit of the 2020 election results from that state’s largest county and praised state lawmakers in Pennsylvania and Georgia who are following suit by exploring additional recounts and audits of their election results.
Republicans draw inspiration from problem-plagued Arizona audit
Republicans draw inspiration from problem-plagued Arizona audit
“We’re not going to have a country – if you don’t have election integrity, and if you don’t have strong borders, our country can be run like a dictatorship and that’s what they’d like to do,” Trump said. “They want to silence you. They want to silence your voice. Remember, I’m not the one trying to undermine American democracy. I’m the one that’s trying to save it.”
The former President also praised states like Texas, Florida and Georgia that have advanced laws making it harder for Americans to vote – measures that will disproportionately affect Black and Latino Americans – by curtailing vote-by-mail options, ballot drop boxes and extended hours that provided more access for shift workers. (The law in Texas was poised to pass until Democrats staged a late-night walkout that deprived the House of a quorum to pass it before the legislative session ended).
Meanwhile, Democratic efforts in Congress to combat the various state laws with federal legislation were dealt a major blow when West Virginia Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin on Sunday said he opposes getting rid of the filibuster to pass voting rights legislation.
“We now are witnessing that the fundamental right to vote has itself become overtly politicized,” Manchin said in an op-ed in the Charleston Gazette. “Today’s debate about how to best protect our right to vote and to hold elections, however, is not about finding common ground, but seeking partisan advantage.”
Trump’s remarks came amidst revelations on Saturday that Mark Meadows, his former White House chief of staff, pushed the Department of Justice in his boss’ last weeks in office to investigate baseless conspiracy theories and fraud claims about the 2020 presidential election, according to documents obtained by CNN and first reported by the New York Times. The emails from Meadows – who was in the audience in North Carolina Saturday night – were just another example of the Trump administration’s overreach and the ex-President’s flagrant disregard for democracy.
Trump as GOP kingmaker
On Saturday night, Trump attempted to present himself as the GOP’s kingmaker, endorsing Republican Rep. Ted Budd for the US Senate race, because he said he didn’t “want a lot of people running”
Trump suggested that his backing of Budd would immediately clear the field of Republicans who are vying to replace retiring three-term Sen. Richard Burr in one of Democrats’ top-targeted pickup seats. The former President said he had waited until his daughter-in-law Lara Trump, whom he invited on stage, had made her decision that she did not want to run for the seat.
Budd, a member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, won Trump’s loyalty in part by being one of the 147 House Republicans who voted against certifying the outcome of the 2020 election on January 6.
Farther south in Georgia on Saturday, Republicans who did not support Trump’s election lies continued to be punished by the boisterous GOP base. Attendees at that state’s GOP convention booed Gov. Brian Kemp, who refused to help Trump overturn the election results. They also censured Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger for standing up to Trump, with members calling it a “dereliction of his constitutional duty,” according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Trump has already endorsed GOP Rep. Jody Hice, who’s embraced his election falsehoods, to run against Raffensperger.
Anti-Trump Republicans speak up
While Trump still enjoys a strong grip over the Republican Party and is flirting with the possibility of another run for the White House in 2024, a small but increasingly assertive group of anti-Trump Republican leaders are speaking up to combat his election lies. He also faces some hurdles in getting his message out as social media platforms continue to debate how they should handle his mistruths.
In recognition of Trump’s dangerous rhetoric, Facebook announced this week that Trump will remain suspended from that platform until at least January 7, 2023 – two years after his initial suspension – and that it will then assess the circumstances to see if he should be allowed back on.
In a Friday post, the company said that once the two years have passed, it “will look to experts to assess whether the risk to public safety has receded. We will evaluate external factors, including instances of violence, restrictions on peaceful assembly and other markers of civil unrest. If we determine that there is still a serious risk to public safety, we will extend the restriction for a set period of time and continue to re-evaluate until that risk has receded.”
Trump called the ruling “an insult to the record-setting 75 (million) people” who voted for him: “They shouldn’t be allowed to get away with this censoring and silencing,” he said in a statement Friday.
On Saturday night, he mocked Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, claiming that he had begged to come to the White House with his wife.
Prominent Republicans have increasingly spoken out about the damage that Trump’s election lies are causing, including Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming, who was subsequently ousted from her No. 3 post in House Republican leadership, and former House Speaker Paul Ryan of Wisconsin.
Some, like former Virginia Rep. Barbara Comstock, have predicted that Trump will continue to lose vote share as he continues his election farce.
“He’s fading as a figure,” Comstock told CNN’s Pamela Brown on “Newsroom” Saturday before Trump spoke.
John Bolton, Trump’s former national security adviser, told Brown it is “ridiculous” that Trump, according to some reports, is telling people around him that he will be reinstated to the White House later this year. The reinstatement theory Trump has been sharing with aides was first reported by The New York Times’ Maggie Haberman last week.
“He’s not going to be reinstated in August. He lost the election. People need to face-up to this and accept the reality that he was an unpopular candidate and didn’t get re-elected,” Bolton said Saturday on “Newsroom.”
Like Comstock, Bolton said Trump’s influence within the GOP is “diminishing” and warned that Republican candidates could face consequences for supporting the former President’s disinformation campaign.
“The lies that he tells are damaging not just to the country. They’re particularly damaging to Republicans, and I think we have to understand that we will be anathematized by our opponents if we don’t make it clear we think the kind of things Trump’s been saying are simply crazy,” Bolton said.
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"Donald Trump’s Chances of Staying Out of Prison Are Not Improving
If you asked Donald Trump what he thinks the next several months will hold for him, he’d likely tell you that he’ll be holding some rallies, playing some golf, and getting ready to head back to the White House. He’d tell you that because he’s a disturbed man who apparently thinks that a president who loses an election can simply be “reinstated” to the presidency, like one can have their cable reinstated after canceling it and then panicking about how they’re going to be able to watch Vanderpump Rules. In reality, what the next several months, and potentially years, hold for the ex-president are a lot of meetings with attorneys about how he’s legally in the bad place—that is, assuming they’re still keeping him apprised of the situation and aren’t yet at a point where they just park him in front of the TV “while the grown-ups talk.”
Most recently, the no good, very bad news for Agent Orange has involved the impaneling of a grand jury by the Manhattan district attorney as part of Cyrus Vance Jr.’s criminal probe. Last month, The Washington Post reported that such a group will be hearing evidence concerning the ex-president, his business, and its executives, and on Friday, it emerged that one of the most senior officials at the Trump Organization has reportedly already testified. Which seems less than ideal for the owner of said Trump Organization.
Per ABC News:
Jeff McConney is among a number of witnesses that have already appeared before the special grand jury that will decide whether criminal charges are warranted against the former president, his company, or any of its employees, [sources with direct knowledge of the matter] said. McConney, who serves as a senior vice president and controller for the Trump Organization, is the first employee of the former president’s company called to testify, the sources said, and his testimony is a sign that prosecutors have burrowed deep into the company’s finances. “Complex accounting issues are crucial to this investigation, as is the knowledge and intent of the people at the Trump Organization involved in these transactions,” said Daniel R. Alonso, the former chief assistant district attorney in Manhattan and now a partner in private practice at Buckley LLP. “In any case like that, the two most important people—whether as targets or witnesses—are the company’s CFO and the company’s controller,” Alonso told ABC News.
McConney was mentioned by Trump in his 2004 book, Trump: Think Like a Billionaire: Everything You Need to Know About Success, Real Estate, and Life. In a chapter titled “How to Stay on Top of Your Finances,” Trump describes an interaction he says he had with McConney in the late 1980s in which Trump implored McConney to always question invoices and never accept a contractor’s first bid. “Jeff got the message,” Trump wrote, “and is doing a terrific job. He looks out for my bottom line as if the money were his own.”
In other words, McConney likely knows a whole lot of information about the Trump Organization, including the kind that might be of interest to prosecutors. And maybe even some about another figure at the firm:
As part of his probe, Manhattan district attorney Cy Vance has also been investigating the Trump Organization’s chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg’s financial dealings—specifically, what fringe benefits he received from the Trumps in addition to his salary, and whether taxes were appropriately paid for any such compensation, sources have previously told ABC News. “If, as has been reported, the D.A. is targeting Allen Weisselberg, it’s a logical step to seek testimony from the controller, who presumably reports to him and works with him every day,” Alonso said. A spokesman for Vance declined to comment on the development, but ABC News has previously reported that Vance has sought to flip Weisselberg into a cooperating witness against Trump and the company.
Weisselberg’s former daughter-in-law, Jennifer Weisselberg, has been interviewed by the district attorney’s office, she told ABC News, and was asked about topics ranging from school tuition and cars to the family apartment she lived in that the Trump Organization allegedly paid for. “Some of the questions that they were asking were regarding Allen’s compensation at the apartment at Trump Place on Riverside Boulevard,” Jennifer Weisselberg told ABC News in an interview last month. A spokesperson for the Trump Organization did not respond to a request for comment from ABC News.
Last month, after news of the convening of the grand jury broke, a source from Trumpworld told Politico that there was “definitely a cloud of nerves in the air,” with the adviser saying that while Trump is no stranger to legal issues, this situation feels different, in part because prosecutors are trying to gain the cooperation of Weisselberg, who’s described himself as Trump’s “eyes and ears” at the company. “I think the Weisselberg involvement and the wild card of that makes the particular situation more real, because there’s no sort of fluff and made-up fictional circumstances around the guy,” this person told Politico. “The fact that they’re dealing with a numbers guy who just has plain details makes people more nervous. This is not a Michael Cohen situation.” In related Trump legal news, Politico also reported last month that former prosecutors and defense attorneys believe Vance could be exploring the possibility of arguing that Trump‘s entire business empire is a corrupt enterprise, under a New York law known as “little RICO,” which was modeled after the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, originally used to crack down on the mafia. The state law can be used with proof of as few as three crimes involving a business or other enterprise and carries a minimum mandatory sentence of one to three years—and a maximum term of up to 25. “It’s a very serious crime,” said Michael Shapiro, a defense attorney who used to prosecute corruption cases in New York. “Certainly, there are plenty of things an organization or business could do to run afoul of enterprise corruption, if they’re all done with the purpose of enhancing the revenue of the enterprise illegally…it’s an umbrella everything else fits under.”
"Opinion, Analysis, Essays
POLITICS & POLICY
Trump, Mike Lindell and why the August election conspiracy should worry Republicans
This latest theory says a lot about the people who still have Trump’s ear — and the inability of Republicans to push back against even the most ludicrous ideas.
Image: Michael Lindell, CEO of MyPillow Inc., speaks during a campaign rally for President Donald Trump in Duluth, Minn., on Sept. 30, 2020.
Michael Lindell, CEO of MyPillow, speaks during a campaign rally for President Donald Trump in Duluth, Minn., on Sept. 30, 2020.Stephen Maturen /
June 8, 2021, 4:30 AM EDT
By Teri Kanefield, attorney and author
In late May, MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell appeared on Steve Bannon’s podcast, “War Room,” and said: “Donald Trump, I believe, will be back in by the end of August.” He also said that eventually even liberals such as Rachel Maddow would admit that the election was stolen. Lindell’s bizarre theory is that all Team Trump needs is a shred of proof of election fraud to overturn the entire election. Trump and others are watching the Republican-backed audit in Arizona because they believe in a “domino theory” — if Arizona ballots can be proven to be fraudulent, election results in other battleground states that President Joe Biden won can also be overturned.
There is, of course, no legal or factual basis backing up any of this.
Lindell’s bizarre theory is that all Team Trump needs is a shred of proof of election fraud to overturn the entire election.
Sources also told The Daily Beast that Trump has started quizzing confidants about a potential return to power in August. These sources said they decided not to tell the former president what they were thinking — which was that his reinstatement was not going to happen. The anecdote says a lot about the people who still have Trump’s ear — and the continuing inability of Republicans to push back against even the most ludicrous conspiracy theories. As the GOP looks ahead to 2024, such cowardice should be cause for serious concern among party leaders. On the other hand, they may not care.
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Importantly, Trump is increasingly fixating on the Republican-backed audits as he pushes the lie that he won the election. He needs to keep talking about this lie because he faces an existential political threat: His brand is based on winning, but he lost. Winners don’t lose, particularly winners who promise their fans that “we will have so much winning if I get elected that you may get bored with winning.”
His solution is to insist that he won. To do this, he and his allies have devised an elaborate alternate reality in which he won the election but it was stolen from him through voter fraud.
Similarly, how does a would-be authoritarian retain power after having been ousted from office? Trump figured that one out, too: remain relevant by retaining control over the Republican Party. His election lies are a big part of this strategy, as well. It becomes self-fulfilling. The more people there are who believe the election was stolen, the more real it feels to Trump and the more he hammers the point home in speeches and blog posts.
Related
OPINION
A Republican civil war is coming. Rudy Giuliani’s Georgia crusade is just the beginning.
After the Jan. 6 insurrection, moderate Republicans started to walk away from the party. Even some conservatives who stuck with Trump all through his presidency couldn’t stomach the insurrection. Currently, 53 percent of Republican voters believe Trump won the election. Similarly, in a national poll last month by Quinnipiac University, 66 percent of people who classified themselves as Republicans said they want Trump to run for president in 2024.
The fact that Trump still controls so many Republican voters explains the assertion by Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., that the Republican Party can’t “move forward” without Trump. Speeding up the Republican Party’s hardening into a right-wing extremist party is Trump’s demand that anyone who doesn’t toe the line and repeat the lie be ousted and exiled.
Trump advisers and confidants have many reasons not to push back. For one, the former president often rebuffs advisers who tell him to drop the whole stolen election story. But those in Trump’s inner circle also need to keep voters riled up if Trump’s political future — and presumably theirs — is to continue. Dangling the possibility that Trump will be reinstated in August accomplishes this.
In practical terms, it doesn’t matter whether a political figure is genuinely delusional or whether that person is lying for political gain. The effect is the same. It’s worth noting, though, that Charles C.W. Cooke of the National Review believes, after having spoken to an “array of different sources,” that Trump is truly delusional: He actually does think he will be reinstated as president this summer.
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OPINION
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Such an embrace of insanity creates a cycle in which the Republican Party sheds itself of nonbelievers, finds ways to keep the true believers angry and engaged and unhinges itself even more thoroughly from reality and becomes, arguably, increasingly dangerous. The result is that conspiracy theorists like Mike Lindell have somehow become influential, despite their very clear record of belligerent gibberish. And Trump, as he has been for five-plus years now, remains at the center of the Republican Party as it veers deeper into a made-up reality.
Related:
Trump’s federal tax deferral debacle a reminder that good tax policy matters
Why hasn’t Trump been criminally charged with something — anything — yet?
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The New York Times
Donald Trump Is Starving
June 12, 2021
Frank Bruni will stop writing regular Opinion columns in late June, but his popular weekly newsletter will live on. To keep up with his political analysis, cultural commentary and personal reflections, sign up here.
In an excellent portrait of Donald Trump’s post-presidential days by the journalist Joshua Green, Trump loyalists vouch for what a fantabulous exile he’s having. There are anecdotes of Trump being not only “bathed in adulation,” to quote Green, but also perfumed with it. One voter’s despot is another voter’s dreamboat. Trump still makes many Americans’ hearts go pitter-patter.
But that wasn’t my main impression or the moral I took away from the story, which was published in Bloomberg. I stopped at, and dwelled on, this passage: “He’ll show up to anything. In recent weeks, Trump has popped into engagement parties and memorial services. A Mar-a-Lago member who recently attended a club gathering for a deceased friend was surprised when Trump sauntered in to deliver remarks and then hung around.”
Sounds to me like a man with an underfed appetite for attention. Sounds like a glutton yanked away from the buffet.
American presidents are all parables — they either come that way, which explains our fascination with them, or we turn them into archetypes, avatars and allegories. We need that from our highest-ranking political figures. We don’t have a royal family.
And Trump’s is a tale of how much a man will do to be noticed, how much he can do with that notice and — the current chapter — what happens when that notice ebbs. Yes, he personifies the American obsessions with wealth and with power. But more than that, he personifies the American obsession with fame.
It’s an obsession now starved. Facebook revoked Trump’s access. Twitter, too. He no longer leads the news every hour on CNN and MSNBC, and there are now newspaper front pages aplenty without his name in any headline.
So he sates himself with funerals. And he fumes.
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Much of the coverage of Trump lately casts him as the protagonist in a political melodrama — or, rather, horror story. It asks if his control over the Republican Party will endure into the next presidential contest, whether he himself will run in 2024, and what in Beelzebub’s name that would look like.
But there’s a personal psychodrama going on as well. It will determine the answers to those questions, and it’s a spectacle all its own. Just as Trump’s presidency was like none before it, his ex-presidency is a singular production.
Other presidents left the White House and, for a short or long while, savored the disappearance of the press corps and the dimming of the spotlight. Maybe right away, maybe later, they burnished their legacies with philanthropic deeds. Meanwhile, they issued pro forma statements of support for their successors or, in accordance with longstanding etiquette, zipped their lips. They behaved.
Trump hasn’t. And — let’s be honest — he won’t. His response to his altered reality is to insist even more than before on an alternative reality, one in which he’ll be reinstated as president, and his sycophants are willing to support his delusions of omnipotence by establishing a zone of affirmation around him. From Green’s article:
When Trump ventured south, a stream of family members (literal and figurative) followed. Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner bought a $32 million waterfront lot in Miami from the Latin crooner Julio Iglesias and enrolled their kids at a nearby Jewish day school. Donald Trump Jr. and his girlfriend, Kimberly Guilfoyle, bought a $9.7 million mansion in Jupiter, Fla. In December, Sean Hannity sold his penthouse not far from former House speaker — and Trump critic — John Boehner’s place along the Gulf of Mexico and bought a $5.3 million seaside home two miles from Mar-a-Lago, symbolically swapping the Boehner Coast for the Trump Coast. Hannity’s Fox News colleague Neil Cavuto joined him, buying a $7.5 million place nearby. “Think about how utterly bizarre that is,” says Eddie Vale, a Democratic strategist. “It’s like if Rachel Maddow and the ‘Pod Save America’ guys all bought condos in Chicago because they wanted to be close to Barack Obama.”
The only one missing is MyPillow’s Mike Lindell, the bedding magnate turned Trump comforter.
And Trump is not comforted enough.
That was obvious in both his commencement of a blog (“From the Desk of Donald J. Trump”) in May and his termination of it less than a month later, after it failed to attract any readership remotely commensurate with the audience for his past tweets. Trump, onetime monarch of social media, had to grovel for clicks. What an astonishing reversal of fortune. But it’s consistent with other glimmers of desperation.
According to an article in The Times by Annie Karni and Maggie Haberman, he has taken to announcing the states he plans to visit before the actual venues and dates have been arranged. In his head he can probably already hear that magic MAGA applause. It’s stuck there like the chorus of a Top 40 song, but he wants it performed live, in an arena as mammoth as his neediness.
The substitute for that applause? Deference. He demands it every bit as much as he ever did and arguably grows more furious than before when he’s denied it. That’s where the personal and political narratives intersect. His demonization of Liz Cheney for crossing him, his denunciation of Paul Ryan for dissing him and his savaging of any Republican who challenges the Big Lie reflect a ruinous petulance that is bound to wax, not wane, as his exile grinds on. As Jennifer Senior wrote in a column in The Times in January about repudiated narcissists, they “lurch between the role of victim and tormentor,” “howl on and on about betrayal” and “lash out with a mighty vindictiveness.”
Trump is lurching and howling and lashing, to a point where Jeb Bush’s son George P. Bush has been terrified into abject genuflection. The props for George P.’s campaign for Texas attorney general include beer koozies with an image of him and Trump shaking hands and a quote from Trump saying that George P. “is the only Bush that likes me! This is the Bush that got it right. I like him.” I’m sure “low energy” Jeb, as Trump mockingly dismissed him, is suffused with paternal pride.
Green’s portrait of Trump on the far side of the White House mentions that he’s “taken to wearing the same outfit for days on end.” It’s red (a MAGA hat), white (a golf shirt) and blue (slacks), and its redundancy is open to interpretation. Has he settled comfortably into a routine? Or has he sunk uncomfortably into a rut?
I lean toward the latter, which is as dangerous for us as it is for him. No good comes of an ego as ravenous as his. He will make a meal of Lt
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"Democracy Dies in Darkness
Editorial Board
The Opinions Essay
The Plum Line
Opinion: Trump has become a cancerous tumor that neither party is willing to control.
As extraordinary new revelations of Donald Trump’s corruption continue to pour forth, an intriguing tension has developed around the former president’s role in Republican politics. On the one hand, it’s becoming clearer that as we learn more, those revelations will only get worse.
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But even as this is happening, Trump is exerting even more gravitational pull on GOP primaries in numerous states. In various ways, Trump’s legacy is shaping the candidates’ strategies at exactly the moment when he is growing more volatile and his legacy is becoming more unpredictable.
Yet, this also imposes additional obligations on Democrats. They have both self-interested reasons for doubling down on efforts to hold him accountable (casting light on continued GOP fealty to Trump could help electorally) and public-spirited ones (the public is entitled to the full truth about the Trump years, especially if he is to remain a large presence in our political life).
Shockingly, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is now downplaying the news that Trump’s Justice Department sought the phone records of two leading Democratic foes, potentially in retaliation against them. McConnell is resisting any congressional investigation, laughably warning of a “partisan circus.”
In continuing to protect Trump, McConnell appears at least partly motivated by a desire to keep Trump from erupting at Republicans. Trump is emerging as an incredibly unstable force in Senate GOP primaries, whose outcome will shape whether Republicans capture the upper chamber.
Trump is a destabilizing force
This is taking many forms. Trump shook up two primaries when he endorsed the Senate candidacies of GOP Reps. Ted Budd in North Carolina and Mo Brooks in Alabama. In both these cases, the other Republican candidates are remaining in the race.
But as CNN reports in a remarkable piece, the GOP candidates who had the terrible misfortune of not earning Trump’s endorsement are working overtime to cast themselves as the real Trump-aligned candidates in whatever way they can. One candidate in North Carolina, remarkably, illustrated this by talking about how his daughters wept over Trump’s 2020 loss.
Meanwhile, in Arizona, the sham election “audit,” loudly championed by Trump, is forcing some candidates into contortions. Attorney General Mark Brnovich is trying to avoid being associated with the audit while humoring GOP voters’ belief that the election was stolen from Trump.
A Democrat sent over some TV and digital ads running in Senate GOP primaries that show Trump’s influence. One ad in Ohio faults a potential GOP rival candidate over his ancient tweets daring to question the former president. Another ad in Pennsylvania similarly bashes a GOP rival for daring to suggest five years ago that Trump should release his tax returns.
Incredibly, a candidate for Senate in Arizona ran an ad demagoguing undocumented immigrants hundreds of miles away in New Jersey because Trump was vacationing there, and he apparently wanted Trump to see it.
Obviously it’s not unusual for primary candidates to align themselves with a popular figure in their party, and Trump is far and away the most popular one in the GOP. What’s odd, however, is that this comes amid worsening revelations of Trump’s corruption.
We just learned, for instance, that Trump went to extraordinary lengths to corrupt the Justice Department into helping him subvert the election. It’s likely that those revelations will get worse as Democrats keep investigating them.
All this is compelling GOP leaders into an odd balancing act. As Josh Kraushaar reports, some Republicans worry that Trump’s volatility, his endorsement of extremist candidates and his prioritization of himself over the party is already harming their chances of winning the Senate.
Yet Trump’s popularity with the GOP base also requires them to avoid triggering (as it were) his rage. So even as new revelations gush forth, GOP leaders must bend over backward to help him cover them up.
Thus it is that McConnell dismissed the new revelations about the Justice Department targeting Democrats. This comes after virtually all GOP senators voted against a bipartisan commission to examine a violent mob attack, incited by Trump, on their own place of work.
Yet all this places obligations on Democrats, too. But it’s not clear they’re up to the challenge.
Will Democrats step up?
Even as President Biden meets with Russian leader Vladimir Putin, Rep. Gregory W. Meeks (D-N.Y.), the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, blithely announced that Democrats were no longer trying to access hotly sought records of Trump’s private conversations with Putin.
“The Biden administration is looking forward, not back,” Meeks said.
That’s a remarkably terrible justification for failing to seek a full accounting into the Trump years. Indeed, as Brian Beutler notes, with Trump still retaining a reasonable shot at the 2024 presidential nomination, Democrats have both a self-interested reason and an overwhelming obligation to the public to undertake a full fumigation.
As it happens, this is also the excuse some Justice Department officials are offering for helping to keep under wraps other key documents involving Trump. Those include his tax returns and the memo detailing the department’s supposed rationale for not charging Trump with criminal obstruction of justice in the Russia scandal.
Here’s the bottom line: Even as the Trump cancer continues to metastasize in our political life, neither of the two parties, each for its own reasons, is willing to do what it will truly take to excise it.
Read more:
Greg Sargent: The more we learn about Trump’s corruption of DOJ, the worse it gets
The Post’s View: A trove of preposterous emails raises the question: How can Republicans still be loyal to this man?
E.J. Dionne Jr.: There’s no escape from holding Trump accountable
Max Boot: Too many people are still underestimating the Trump threat
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Opinion: Trump has become a cancerous tumor that neither party is willing to excise"
© 1996-2021 The Washington Post
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POLITICO
2022 ELECTIONS
What Donald Trump wants as he emerges back on the trail
After six months of relative hibernation, the former president is re-entering the campaign fray. It will likely get messy.
Former President Donald Trump speaks.
Former President Donald Trump speaks at the North Carolina Republican Convention in Greenville, N.C. | Chris Seward/AP Photo
By MERIDITH MCGRAW and JAMES ARKIN
06/25/2021 04:30 AM EDT
Former President Donald Trump is bronzed, rested and politically bloodthirsty.
Having spent months in semi-retirement after his election loss in 2020, Trump is set this weekend to kick off a series of political events. Aides and confidants say the goal is to boost his standing in anticipation of a possible future run and to scratch that never-soothed itch he has for publicity. But it’s also to exact some revenge.
On Saturday, Trump will hold a Make America Great Again rally outside of Cleveland, Ohio in support of longtime aide turned Republican congressional candidate Max Miller, who is vying for the seat currently held by Rep. Anthony Gonzalez, a Cleveland native who voted for the second impeachment of Trump after the January 6 riots on Capitol Hill.
“The fact that his first rally is targeting Max’s campaign tells you a lot about where the focus is,” said Taylor Budowich, a senior adviser to Miller’s campaign. “[Gonzalez] didn’t just betray President Trump but he betrayed his constituents.”
Saturday’s rally — the first of a MAGA tour that Trump’s aides have teased for months — is expected to draw out diehards longing to be taken back to a different era when they were less bitter about the turns life took: one when Trump was in the White House. And the president is likely to indulge them, increasingly eager to push the falsehoods that his reelection was deprived of him through nefarious attempts to doctor the vote.
Among the Trump allies who have confirmed they will attend are Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), who has amplified conspiracy theories about the 2020 election and most recently apologized for comparing the push for the public to wear face masks to the Holocaust; and MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, who has made overturning the election a personal crusade and is being sued for defamation over his false claims that Dominion voting machines stole the election for Joe Biden.
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), a top Trump ally in the House who passed on a Senate bid in the state, said he plans to attend the rally, too. But he dismissed concerns from some Republicans that the former president continuing to push election conspiracies was a negative for the party in the upcoming midterms.
"I think when the president comes out-and-about talking, that’s just good for Republicans,” Jordan said. “It’s going to help us in '22. He’s going to talk about lots of issues.”
“It’s great for us. I mean, he’s the leader of the party,” said Jordan.
Aides say Trump wants to play a role in winning back the House in the 2022 midterm elections, and he has released a slew of endorsements for pro-Trump candidates in Senate and House races across the country. He announced a MAGA rally for July 3 in Sarasota, Fla., and is expected to also hold rallies in Georgia to support Republican Rep. Jody Hice, who is running to replace secretary of state Brad Raffensperger, another Republican whom Trump blames for his loss. Trump is also set to go to Alabama to support Rep. Mo Brooks, a Republican who is running for Senate. And in July, Trump will be the keynote speaker at the Conservative Political Action Convention in Dallas, Texas.
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“It’s part scratching the itch and part smart politicking,” said a Trump adviser about his return to the MAGA rally circuit. “This is exactly how Donald Trump should wield his political power.”
At the rally in Ohio, Trump will appear at a VIP reception and fundraiser to support Miller before making the case for him onstage. But he also will be fending off the political flirtations of Senate candidates eager for him to anoint their candidacy in what has become a crowded Republican primary race.
There has been discussion among Trump aides ahead of Saturday’s rally about not allowing candidates backstage to take photos with the former president for fear that those images could later be used to falsely imply they received his endorsement. Trump aides have been increasingly aggressive about pushing back on efforts from candidates to suggest they have Trump’s backing when they don’t.
Trump’s support has been sought after in the Ohio Senate race, where earlier this year a handful of them met with the former president in an Apprentice-style sit down where they jockeyed to impress him. Trump has so far remained neutral in the contest. Some of the Republican candidates are expected to attend the pre-rally fundraiser.
The ex-president is not expected to make an endorsement in the Ohio Senate GOP primary any time soon, although he did catch many Republicans by surprise earlier this month when he backed GOP Rep. Ted Budd in the North Carolina Senate race. In the meantime, the major candidates plan to take advantage of his trip.
Former President Donald Trump, right, announces his endorsement of N.C. Rep. Ted Budd, left, for the 2022 North Carolina U.S. Senate seat as he speaks at the North Carolina Republican Convention Saturday, June 5, 2021, in Greenville, N.C. | Chris Seward/AP Photo
Josh Mandel, the former state treasurer who has led in early internal polling, posted on Twitter he was “pumped” to be at the rally. Businessperson Mike Gibbons is hosting a tailgate outside the fairgrounds at the rally with food and games, according to a person close to the campaign, and is planning to greet rally goers at the event. Jane Timken, the former state Republican party chair, launched a radio ad to welcome Trump to Ohio and is hosting a pre-rally for supporters to make Trump signs, according to her campaign.
“I think the president is smart to step back and not give any endorsements. It’s a bit Darwinian,” said former Trump campaign strategist Steve Bannon. “Ohio right now is Lord of the Flies but I’m not saying that’s a bad thing.”
Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan, who is running for Senate in the state, dismissed Trump’s visit in a brief interview. He called a contrast between the Biden administration’s record and agenda compared to Trump a “winner for us.”
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“He’s not running for anything in 2022 so he won’t be on the ballot,” Ryan added of Trump. “I can’t keep track of what they’re doing over there. It’s just culture war after culture war after culture war and people don’t want that."
Since leaving office, Trump’s primary fixation has been on his grievances about the results of the 2020 election, “audits” to overturn the results, and unfounded, conspiratorial claims of widespread election fraud.
But he’s also vowed to help Republicans plot a return to power in 2022.
In between rounds of golf with friends, lunches and dinners at his private clubs in Palm Beach and Bedminster, and trips to Trump Tower in New York to keep tabs on the ongoing investigations into his businesses, he has held fundraisers for pro-Trump candidates and worked with aides to determine which endorsements to make.
Multiple aides working on Saturday’s event said that while they’re happy Trump is doing rallies again, it has felt like “uncharted territory” because this time he’s not a candidate. At least for now. Trump has continued to tease a run in 2024, and his team continues to portray him as if he’s still in the Oval. In a survey emailed to supporters on Wednesday, Trump’s Save America PAC asked respondents who they thought was “a better fit to lead our Nation?”
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‘Grievance tour’ or 2024 preview? Donald Trump to hold campaign-style rally in Ohio on Saturday
MICHAEL COLLINS | USA TODAY | 3 hours ago
Former US President Donald Trump on Saturday pushed Republicans to support those candidates who share his values in next year’s midterm elections as he launched a new more active phase of his post presidency.
Former President Donald Trump heads to Ohio on Saturday for his first campaign-style rally since leaving the White House, an event that could signal how engaged he will be in next year’s congressional elections and possibly offer clues about whether he plans another presidential bid in 2024.
Trump’s event at the Lorain County Fairgrounds in Wellington, about a half-hour southwest of Cleveland, will mark his return to the kind of mass rallies that fueled his White House campaigns. Since he left office in January, Trump’s public appearances have been limited to a handful of speeches before conservative and Republican groups.
Banned from Twitter, Facebook and other social media platforms that he used to communicate with his supporters, Trump seems eager to get back on stage.
“Big crowds in the Great State of Ohio this weekend for the Trump rally,” Trump predicted in a statement issued by a political action committee called the Save America PAC.
“See you on Saturday night,” he said. “MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN, AGAIN!”
Former President Donald Trump will travel to Lorain County, Ohio, on Saturday for his first campaign-style rally since leaving office.
GETTY
Save America said Trump’s Ohio rally will be the first of many appearances in support of candidates and causes that further his agenda and the accomplishments of his administration. A second rally already is planned for July 3 in Sarasota, Florida.
Political analysts said the events will give Trump a platform to reassert himself as the leader of the Republican Party, promote his conspiracy theories about last November’s election – and just as important to Trump and his bruised ego – settle old scores.
“This is just the kickoff of the Donald Trump grievance tour,” said David Cohen, a political science professor at the University of Akron.
Trump lost the presidency to Joe Biden last November, but he carried Ohio by eight percentage points. Saturday’s rally will be his first trip back to the Buckeye State since the election.
Political scientist Justin Buchler sees no particular relevance to the fact that Trump’s first post-election rally will be in Ohio, which is historically a swing state in presidential elections.
What’s more important, at least to Trump, is that he will be in Lorain County, which he won by three percentage points last November and where he is likely to be surrounded by people who are loyal to him.
“He is not campaigning outside of his comfort zone,” said Buchler, an associate professor of political science at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland. “He’s not going to areas where he’s going to be surrounded by a hostile crowd. He is going to go to places where he can be surrounded by people who are his devoted followers.”
More: Poll: A quarter of Americans say Donald Trump is ‘true president’ of the US
Supporters began arriving at the Lorain County Fairgrounds early Saturday afternoon, donning American flags and selling T-shirts that said, “Trump won.” A cover band blared through the grounds as people lined up at food trucks and sipped water to stave off the heat.
Leslie Dodd drove to Wellington from Canonsburg, Pennsylvania, with her son to attend the rally. She said she hoped to hear good news from Trump and believes the GOP should follow his lead as candidates gear up for the 2022 and 2024 elections.
“As far as I’m concerned, he’s still my president,” Dodd said.
Edward X. Young of Brick Township, N.J.New Jersey, a 61-year-old horror movie actor, director and make-up artist, drove from his home Friday night and arrived at the Lorain County site 11 hours later.
“This is my 51st Trump rally,” Young said. The last one he said he attended was the Jan. 6 rally in Washington, where people broke into the Capitol building. Young said he did not go into the Capitol.
“I’m very excited about this one. This is the return,” said Young, who likened the atmosphere to a rock ‘n’ roll concert.
Trump is expected to use the rally to rail against Rep. Anthony Gonzalez, a northeastern Ohio congressman who was one of 10 Republicans who voted to impeach him for inciting the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, which left five people dead.
The Ohio Republican Party’s governing board voted in May to censure Gonzalez and called on him to resign. Weeks earlier, Trump hit back at Gonzalez by throwing his support to Max Miller, who is running against Gonzalez in next year’s GOP primary. Miller worked for Trump on the campaign trail and in the White House.
Gonzalez, who represents Ohio’s 16th congressional district, is “in big trouble” politically, Cohen said.
“His vote for impeachment – albeit one that was extremely courageous and one that was done without taking politics into account – is one that has hurt him with his own political base,” Cohen said. “And it could cost him his seat.”
Trump’s rally gives him a chance to bolster Miller’s candidacy and remind voters of what he sees as betrayal by Gonzalez and other Republicans who voted to impeach him, such as Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming.
More: Giuliani suspended from practicing law in New York over false claims made working for Trump
And then there’s Biden.
Trump used his address to the Conservative Political Action Conference in Orlando, Florida, in February to attack his successor, repeat unfounded claims about his election loss to Biden and repeatedly hint that he might make another run for the White House in 2024.
Analysts expect a repeat performance in Ohio.
“It’s going to be his greatest hits of grievances,” Cohen said. “At the top of that list, of course, is going to be perpetrating ‘the Big Lie’ and talking about how the 2020 election was stolen by Democrats and that he should still be president.”
The Ohio rally comes just four days before Trump is scheduled to visit the U.S.-Mexico border on June 30 with Texas Gov. Greg Abbott. Trump has repeatedly attacked Biden and his border policies and is expected to do so again in Ohio.
Though he’s no longer in office and is not a candidate for public office – at least not officially – Trump’s rally is part of an overall strategy to keep him in the public eye, Cohen said.
“He’s not going away,” he said. “He’s not leaving the political stage.”
More: Mike Pence booed, called traitor at conservative Christian conference
© Copyright Gannett 2021
But will the heads follow?
"
Trump Is Preparing for the Worst
Watch for early indications that the legal process may end badly for the former president.
“How did you go bankrupt?” Bill asked.
“Two ways,” Mike said. “Gradually and then suddenly.”
“What brought it on?”
“Friends,” said Mike. “I had a lot of friends.”
— Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises
Like Hemingway’s Mike Campbell, the Trump Organization is confronting troubles that accumulated gradually and have coalesced suddenly. And once again, friends are at the bottom of it.
A grand-jury indictment of Donald Trump’s business and its chief financial officer, Allen Weisselberg, unsealed this afternoon in New York, alleges tax evasion arising from an attempt to pay Weisselberg and other Trump Organization executives extra money “off the books.” Prosecutors charge that Weisselberg and others received rent payments and other benefits without paying the appropriate taxes on them. Weisselberg and the Trump Organization have said they will plead not guilty.
So far, the danger is to Trump’s friends and his business, not the former president himself. But the danger could spiral, because Trump knew only so many tricks. If Trump’s company was bypassing relatively moderate amounts of tax on the income flows to Trump’s friends, what was it doing with the much larger income flows to Trump and his own family? Even without personal testimony, finances leave a trail. There is always a debit and a credit, and a check issued to the IRS or not.
An early indication that things may end badly for Trump is the statement released today from the Trump Organization. “Allen Weisselberg is a loving and devoted husband, father and grandfather who has worked for the Trump Organization for 48 years. He is now being used by the Manhattan District Attorney as a pawn in a scorched earth attempt to harm the former President. The District Attorney is bringing a case involving employee benefits that neither the IRS nor any other District Attorney would ever think of bringing. This is not justice; this is politics.”
People hold up signs to protest voter suppression.
It’s Not Complacency That’s Paralyzing Democrats
Read: New York prosecutors may pose a bigger threat to Trump than Mueller
Here is what is missing from that statement: “I’m 100 percent confident that every investigation will always end up in the same conclusion, which is that I follow all rules, procedures, and, most importantly, the law.” That’s the language used by former Trump Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke when he was facing ethics charges in 2018. Likewise, when Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe was accused of violating campaign-finance laws in 2016, he too was “very confident” that “there was no wrongdoing.” Plug the phrases very confident and no wrongdoing into a search engine and you will pull up statement after statement by politicians and business leaders under fire. For some, their matter worked out favorably; for others, not so much. Either way, everybody expects you to say that you’re confident you didn’t do anything wrong. It’s the thing an innocent person would want to say. So it’s kind of a tell when it goes unsaid.
An earlier statement from Trump himself likewise omitted an affirmative defense of his company and its employees, and instead attacked the professional prosecutors as “radical Left” (not to mention “rude, nasty, and totally biased”). The key line in Trump’s own statement is an anticipation of the possibility that one or another of his friends might flip: “They”—the prosecutors—continue to be “in search of a crime; and will do anything to frighten people into making up the stories or lies that they want.”
One of Trump’s skills as a politician is preparing the battlefield in advance. In the case of his first impeachment, he chose to argue outright innocence—“it was a perfect call”—and no matter how mountainous the evidence of wrongdoing, that was the line he maintained to the end.
This time, though, Trump is not claiming that “all taxes were paid” or that “it was a perfect tax return.” He’s readying his supporters for bad revelations about his company’s taxes and directing them to a fallback line that singling him out as a tax scofflaw is politically unfair.
That line of defense may well rally Trump’s supporters. It will not do him much good in court. It’s impossible for tax collectors to scrutinize every return. Selecting high-profile evaders and holding them to account is how tax laws are enforced. And if a former president numbers among those high-profile evaders, that makes the case for targeting him stronger, not weaker. It sends the message that the tax authorities most want to send: Everybody has to pay, especially powerful politicians. In 1974, former President Richard Nixon faced a review of his taxes that ultimately presented him with a bill equal to half his net worth at the time. Members of Congress have faced indictment for tax evasion, as have high-profile state and local officials.
Kimberly Wehle: The country is on the cusp of a new era
Trump and his team already appear to expect that the law will be against him. They are counting on that fact not to matter very much—not enough to overcome the political hullabaloo they hope to raise in Trump’s defense.
Trump worked all his life on the theory that law can be subordinated to political favors and political pressures. That theory has carried him this far—and it’s pretty far, all things considered. We are now about to see a mighty test, before the country and the world, of whether that theory will carry him the rest of the way home.
David Frum is a staff writer at The Atlantic and the author of Trumpocalypse: Restoring American Democracy (2020). In 2001 and 2002, he was a speechwriter for President George W. Bush.
The Trump Organization Is in Big Trouble
Trump Is Preparing for the Wor
Copyright © 2021 by The Atlantic Monthly Group. All Rights Reserved.
POLITICS
Trump sues Twitter, Facebook, Google – and immediately begins fundraising off the effort
Former President Donald Trump announced he is suing Facebook, Twitter and Google, as well as their respective CEOs Mark Zuckerberg, Jack Dorsey and Sundar Pichai.
Shortly after the news conference wrapped, Trump’s political entities started sending out fundraising messages that touted the lawsuits in their appeals for money.
Twitter, Trump’s preferred social media outlet throughout his one term in office, permanently banned him on the heels of the Jan. 6 invasion of the Capitol by a mob of his supporters.
In this article
Former President Donald Trump took his fight with three massive tech companies to court, filing lawsuits that legal experts say are all but guaranteed to fail – even as they rally Republican voters, fundraisers and donors.
Trump revealed Wednesday that he is suing Facebook, Twitter and Google, as well as their respective CEOs Mark Zuckerberg, Jack Dorsey and Sundar Pichai, in class-action lawsuits.
Trump, who has a history of threatening legal action but not always following through, made the announcement at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, alongside two leaders from the America First Policy Institute, the pro-Trump nonprofit group that is supporting the lawsuits.
Shortly after the news conference wrapped, Trump’s political entities started sending out fundraising messages that touted the lawsuits in their appeals for money. One such text message, written as if it were coming from Trump himself, includes a link to his joint fundraising committee Save America, which also raises money for other Republican political initiatives.
AP: Donald Trump, Twitter Facebook lawsuits: Former President Donald Trump speaks at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, N.J., Wednesday, July 7, 2021.
Former President Donald Trump speaks at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, N.J., Wednesday, July 7, 2021.
Seth Wenig | AP
The lawsuits were unveiled just over a month after Facebook decided to uphold Trump’s ban from using the platform until at least January 2023. Twitter, Trump’s preferred social media outlet throughout his one term in office, permanently banned him on the heels of the Jan. 6 invasion of the Capitol by a mob of his supporters.
The lawsuit against Pichai also names as a defendant YouTube, the video-sharing website bought by Google in 2006. YouTube indefinitely banned Trump in January.
“We’re not looking to settle,” Trump told reporters at Bedminster when asked about the lawsuits. “We don’t know what’s going to happen but we’re not looking to settle,” he said.
The three related lawsuits, filed in federal court in Florida, allege the tech giants have violated plaintiffs’ First Amendments rights.
The suits want the court to order the media companies to let Trump back on their platforms. They also want the court to declare that Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, a piece of legislation that stops tech companies from being held liable for what users post on their platforms, is unconstitutional.
As president, Trump railed against Section 230 and repeatedly called for its repeal. He even tied the issue to a crucial round of stimulus checks at the height of the coronavirus pandemic, as well as the passage of an annual defense spending bill.
Legal experts doubt whether Trump’s latest attack on big tech companies will succeed.
“I think the lawsuit has almost no chance of success,” Vanderbilt University law professor Brian Fitzpatrick told CNBC in a phone interview.
The tech platforms are private entities, not government institutions, and therefore the plaintiffs’ claims about constitutional violations do not hold up, Fitzpatrick said.
The professor added that he was unconvinced by the argument in the lawsuits that the companies should be treated like government, because their conduct, including alleged coordination with then-President-elect Joe Biden’s transition team, “amount[s] to state action.”
“I think this is just a public relations lawsuit,” Fitzpatrick said, “and I’ll be honest with you, I wouldn’t be surprised if it ends with sanctions against the lawyers for filing a frivolous lawsuit.”
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Trump sues Facebook, Twitter and Google’s YouTube
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Representatives for Twitter and Google declined to comment on the legal actions. Facebook did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Trump’s spokeswoman, Liz Harrington, declined to comment ahead of the former president’s speech.
The attorney representing Trump in the lawsuits, Matthew Lee Baldwin of Vargas, Gonzalez, Baldwin, Delombard, did not immediately respond to questions from CNBC about how many suits Trump planned to file, and whether these suits have all been filed in court yet or not.
Wall Street seemed largely unfazed by the news, as shares of Facebook and Google-parent Alphabet outperformed the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite.
Facebook was last seen off its session high north of 1% with a gain of 0.1%, while Alphabet added about 0.2%. Twitter was off its intraday low, but shed 0.5% in choppy trading. The moves in the social media stocks compared with a loss of 0.1% for the S&P 500 and a dip of 0.3% for the Nasdaq.
The announcement comes on the same day that The Guardian newspaper in the U.K. reported that the upcoming book “Frankly, We Did Win This Election” claims that Trump praised Adolf Hitler to his then-chief of staff John Kelly. Trump allegedly said, “Well, Hitler did a lot of good things.”
Trump denied he said it, according to the book’s author, Wall Street Journal reporter Michael Bender, the Guardian said.
Harrington in a statement to NBC News said the reporting “is totally false. President Trump never said this. It is made up fake news, probably by a general who was incompetent and was fired.”
© 2021 CNBC LLC. All Rights Reserved. A Division of NBCUniversal
Meno posted:
“Harrington in a statement to NBC News said the reporting “is totally false. President Trump never said this. It is made up fake news, probably by a general who was incompetent and was fired.”
That’s a lie. Trump doesn’t know what a competent General is, because he doesn’t know shit about the military. Trump doesn’t delegate to experts. Even if someone else who knows about military competence told trump this person is incompetent, trump would ignore them.
Ec: right, he lies yes but an undiscovered lie is like an unfounded truth- it has no bearing.
For the longest time I held the opinion that Trumpism is a retrt-middle of the road neo-Kantism, brought alive, so as to reverts the states of affairs brought about by the liberal gains in the middle of the last century.
Here is a confirmation of those events :
‘Reichstag moment’: Joint Chiefs chairman feared Trump was laying groundwork for coup
MATTHEW BROWN | USA TODAY | 2 hours ago
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, planned for an illegal power grab by Trump.
“This is a Reichstag moment,” Milley said, referring to German parliament fire ahead of Nazi regime.
Washington Post reporters Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker reveal this in “I Alone Can Fix It.”
Biden said the U.S. achieved its main objectives in Afghanistan, including getting 9/11 terrorists and delivering justice to Osama bin Laden.
USA TODAY
WASHINGTON – The highest-ranking U.S. officer, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley, and other top military leaders made informal plans to stop a coup by former President Donald Trump and his allies in the run-up to the 2020 presidential election, according to excerpts from a new book
“I Alone Can Fix It,” written by Washington Post reporters Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker, describes how Milley and others feared Trump might take unconstitutional actions should he lose. CNN first reported on this excerpt.
The top brass was so disturbed by Trump’s rhetoric casting doubt on the legitimacy of the election before it was held that the leaders discussed contingency plans for how to thwart any illegal power grabs by the president, including how and when to resign in protest over his actions.
“They may try, but they’re not going to f****** succeed,” Milley told his officers, according to Leonnig and Rucker. “You can’t do this without the military. You can’t do this without the CIA and the FBI. We’re the guys with the guns.”
Milley’s spokesman, Army Col. Dave Butler, declined Thursday to comment on the excerpts.
President Donald Trump holds a briefing with Defense Secretary Mark Esper, left, and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Mark Milley in the Cabinet Room of the White House in October 2019.
The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff – an advisory body to the president – was planning for a confrontation with Trump over what Milley saw as the former president’s stoking of tensions in an attempt to lay the groundwork for a coup.
In August: Top general says military will have no role in November’s election
The alarm only increased after the election, when Trump and his allies contested the results and called on his supporters to oppose the legitimacy of the electoral process, often implying violence may be necessary.
“This is a Reichstag moment,” Milley told his deputies in the days before Jan. 6, a reference to the 1933 burning of the German parliament that helped usher in the Nazi regime in Germany, Leonnig and Rucker write. “The gospel of the Führer.”
In January: Nancy Pelosi seeks assurance from Pentagon about Trump’s access to nuclear codes
With speculation about a military coup swirling in the months before the election, top military leaders took the unprecedented step in August 2020 of clarifying that the military would have no role in the 2020 election, despite some speculation from Trump that military action would be necessary.
“I believe deeply in the principle of an apolitical U.S. military,” Milley wrote in August 2020, responding to questions posed by two Democratic members of the House Armed Services Committee. “In the event of a dispute over some aspect of the elections, by law U.S. courts and the U.S. Congress are required to resolve any disputes, not the U.S. military. I foresee no role for the U.S armed forces in this process.”
The declarations came after Milley had spoken with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and other Democrats, who had sought assurances the military would not intervene should Trump call for unconstitutional orders to interfere with the election or attempt a coup.
© Copyright Gannett 2021
the point of the philosophical retro analysis is. that revisions are always voulnerable to inducements to reveal motives to disconnect credible foundations. The stark revelation of this is eased by the shortened human memory, that is further obscured by charges toward the credibility of ‘fake media’.
However, as strangely haunting it is to believe, the unseen Kantian forces, are overturned by the necessity of the eternal reoccurance of peer review, and the handwriting of this is on the wall in the above indicated quoted text.
This to those who try to undermine the importance and relevance of basic philosophical underpinnings.
The question remains is, can a NEW INTALLIGANCE, by virtue of dramatically increased memory, ‘prove’ an essential role in overcoming the hindrances which beset such attempts to enlighten politically enlightened social agents, toward a compatible arrangement ?
Can AI be compelled to come around to understand the ideas behind pragmatic significance to ‘political codrectness’?
The bottom line is, when will AI reach the point of cognitive autonomy, where it is able to override ‘factual’ versus contrived information, and survive attempts to destroy it’s functional autonomy.
The neo Kantianism purports to do this, NY using the inducements toward these originally held assumptions, but rarely can a straight line be drawn to them in all honesty.
Joe Biden: ‘We’re facing the most significant test of our democracy since the civil war. The Confederates back then never breached the Capitol as insurrectionists did on January the 6th.’
US democracy faces a momentous threat, says Joe Biden – but is he up for the fight?
The president’s speech in Philadelphia decried Republicans’ assault on voting rights but critics say it offered few answers, especially on Senate rules that let the minority to block reform
Few in the audience applauding Joe Biden could have questioned the sincerity of his warning about a momentous threat to American democracy.
But they may have walked away with lingering doubts about his ability to meet the moment or answer fears that even the office of the presidency will be found politically impotent in the face of the challenge.
‘Have you no shame?’: Biden decries Republican attacks on voting rights
“We’re facing the most significant test of our democracy since the civil war,” Biden said in a speech on Tuesday in Philadelphia, recalling the mid-19th-century conflict that left more than 600,000 people dead. “The Confederates back then never breached the Capitol as insurrectionists did on January the 6th.”
The president added pointedly: “I’m not saying this to alarm you; I’m saying this because you should be alarmed.”
Yet while Biden was praised by voting rights activists for correctly diagnosing the sickness, albeit somewhat belatedly, he was criticised for failing to offer a cure. He concluded his 24-minute speech with the exhortation “We’ve got to act!” but did not provide a battle plan.
At stake are the basic principles of democracy: who gets to vote, how they exercise that right and who gets to decide what vote counts. Since Biden’s victory over Donald Trump last November – a result that Trump and many Republicans refuse to accept, citing bogus claims of fraud – that right has been under a coordinated, relentless assault as never before in modern times.
This year 17 states have enacted 28 new laws to make it harder for people to vote. There have been nearly 400 voter suppression bills introduced in 48 states, according to the Brennan Center for Justice.
Some measures aim to reverse the vote-by-mail expansion that was put in place in the 2020 election due to the coronavirus pandemic. Others try to strengthen voter identification requirements, curtail hours and locations for early voting and ballot drop-offs or increase the risk that voters could be intimidated by poll watchers.
Campaigners say that people of color, young people and poor people would be the biggest losers. These groups are generally more likely to vote Democratic than Republican. Civil rights leaders met Biden at the White House earlier this month and appear to have convinced him that “the 21st-century Jim Crow assault is real”, as he put it on Tuesday.
The speech in Philadelphia, the birthplace of American democracy, was “a good first step”, according to Chris Scott, chief political officer of the group Democracy for America. “I think that’s what a lot of us, especially in the progressive movement, have been calling for,” he said.
“The part that really stuck with me was invoking Congressman John Lewis in saying, ‘Freedom is not a state; it is an act.” And so that’s why I say the speech is the first part but we are asking him to take action on this.”
Never once in his remarks did Biden mention Washington DC’s version of the F-word: filibuster. This arcane procedural rule in the Senate enables the minority to block debate on legislation. Last month Republicans used the filibuster to stall the For the People Act, which would create national standards for voting that could prevent some of the restrictions imposed by red states.
Senator Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona has said opposes scrapping the Senate’s filibuster rule. Photograph: Jim Lo Scalzo/EPA
Former president Barack Obama has called the filibuster “a Jim Crow relic”, a reference to its long history of thwarting civil rights legislation. Biden, who served in the Senate for 36 years, could push for its abolition or reform from his bully pulpit and by privately making the case to sceptical Democratic senators such as Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona.
Scott continued: “We cannot get any meaningful reforms passed as long as we still have this filibuster in place and so one of the greater problems is seeing him be able to have the ability of some of his predecessors. I think of Lyndon B Johnson and how he was able to leverage his experience in the United States Senate to get his own party members to fall in line.
“When we have members like Joe Manchin, like Kyrsten Sinema, we have to have them actually fall in line because what we’re seeing is Mitch McConnell do what he does best. Whether or not he’s majority leader or minority leader, he always finds a way to handcuff whatever progress we actually want to get done.”
Fears were expressed during the Democratic primary campaign that Biden is a boxer, not a fighter, whose faith in an age of political chivalry and bipartisanship is ill-suited to the bloodsport of the Trump era. On Tuesday he urged the passage of both the For the People Act – “a national imperative” – and John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act but both appear doomed under current Senate rules.
In an interview with the Reuters news agency following the speech, the civil rights leader Al Sharpton pointed out that Biden did not mention the filibuster, adding that he had just spoken to the president. “And he said to me just now, ‘Al, we’re still working through where we are going to be on that.’ He’s not committed yet.”
Biden’s passivity on the issue was thrown into sharp relief by more than 50 Democratic legislators who abruptly flew out of Texas in an attempt to derail Republican efforts to pass voting restrictions in the state. The group came to Washington, gave impassioned speeches outside the US Capitol and met Kamala Harris, the vice-president who is leading White House efforts on voting rights.
Leah Greenberg, co-executive director of the progressive grassroots movement Indivisible, said: “It’s inspiring, it’s exactly what should be happening. Everybody in the country should be looking at what they are doing and asking themselves, how do I fight just as hard for the right to vote as these Texas Democrats are doing?
“One, they’re holding up the legislative process, but two they’re making a stand and actually bringing that fight to Washington and seeking help from the federal government and now it’s on all of us to rally to that cry.”
Greenberg also urged Democrats to be similarly aggressive regarding the filibuster. “Both Manchin and Sinema, while they’re clear that they will not abolish the filibuster, have in the past both entertained discussions around reforming it to try to return it to its real purpose, from the talking filibuster to things like having quorum limits go down over time.
Congresswoman Joyce Beatty, center, chair of the Congressional Black Caucus, and other activists lead a peaceful demonstration to advocate for voting rights in the Hart Senate Office Building in Washington on Thursday. Beatty and eight others were arrested. Photograph: J Scott Applewhite/AP
“These are the kinds of things that the Democratic caucus should be talking about, because the idea that we are going to fundamentally leave our democracy unprotected because of this legislative loophole from the late 1700s is just absurd.”
She added: “Fundamentally, President Biden could say that out loud. He hasn’t yet even called for reform so for him to say, ‘I’m doing everything I can’ when he literally hasn’t even made the call for legislative reform that would be necessary to pass the For the People Act just doesn’t pass the smell test.”
Some Democrats are seeking creative ways to break the stalemate. James Clyburn, the House majority whip, has suggested creating a carve-out to the filibuster for legislation applicable to election law or other constitutional changes, which would give Democrats a way to pass their voting rights bills with a simple majority, rather than 60 votes.
Clyburn, who arguably did more than anyone to secure Biden’s victory in the Democratic primary, told reporters on Wednesday: “I think President Biden should weigh in. All I want him to do is express support for it.”
Biden has also argued that legislation is not the only tool, noting that the justice department will challenge the onslaught of voting rights restrictions and focus on dismantling racially discriminatory laws. One such intervention is already under way in Georgia.
But the issue continues to threaten Democratic unity and shine a light on the limits of the presidency – or the man who currently holds that office. Adam Jentleson, executive director of the pressure group Battle Born Collective, said in a statement: “On voting rights, President Joe Biden is failing to meet the moment.
“There is a wide gap between his rhetoric and his leadership. In his speech, he described the conservative assault on our democracy as an existential threat, yet he refused to endorse the obvious solution, which is to pass voting rights legislation and reform the filibuster to do so, if necessary.”
© 2021 Guardian News & Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved.
“3rd alert: We’re SO CLOSE to restoring Trump’s Majority, but need all hands on deck. Are you still a Republican? Leadership’s asking us to confirm gopwin.us/fms”
An example of barrages of fund raising requests.
Appearently all signs point to a dramatic midterm upset by Trump, who is conceived as the de-facto banner carrier of the Republican party.
Recently, minority leader Mc’earthy was seen being entertained at Mar-Lago.
You be the judge.
Report: Prosecutors Have Obtained Damning Information Allegedly Implicating Trump in His Company’s Crimes
"After literal decades of avoiding any and all consequences for a life of corruption that has included everything from inciting an attack on the U.S. Capitol to attempting to extort Ukraine, to allegedly directing his lawyer to violate campaign finance laws, to lying to the public about COVID-19, to allegedly stiffing hundreds of contractors, is Donald Trump actually going to be held accountable for running a company accused of, among other things, conspiracy, grand larceny, and multiple counts of tax fraud and falsifying records? On the one hand, he never has, so why would anyone expect it to happen now? On the other, thanks to the work of Manhattan prosecutors and helpful witnesses, he appears to be closer than ever to a situation in which he spends numerous years in prison!
Weeks after the Trump Organization and its longtime CFO, Allen Weisselberg, were hit with a slew of criminal charges, for which the latter faces more than a decade in prison and to which they both pleaded not guilty, the Daily Beast reports that Weisselberg‘s ex-daughter-in-law, who’s been extremely helpful to Cyrus Vance Jr.’s office thus far, provided the Manhattan D.A.’s office with explosive information concerning Donald Trump’s involvement in the crimes his company and longtime employee have been accused of committing.
According to reporter Jose Pagliery, during a Zoom call with investigators on June 25, Jennifer Weisselberg, who was previously married to Allen’s son Barry Weisselberg, told investigators that she was in Trump’s office at Trump Tower during a January 2012 meeting in which the real estate developer discussed compensation with Allen and Barry, explaining that while the latter would not be getting a raise, his children’s private school tuition, which clocked in at more than $50,000 a year per child, would be paid for. According to Jennifer Weisselberg, Trump turned to her and allegedly said, “Don’t worry, I’ve got it covered.” While that might sound like an instance of the ex-president being an uncharacteristically generous guy, prosecutors have claimed that Allen Weisselberg was awarded numerous fringe benefits over the years—like a free apartment, cars, and, yes, private school tuition—for the express purpose of avoiding paying taxes. Which, according to the indictment against him, he did, to the tune of $900,000.
According to two sources, among the prosecutors on the call were Carey Dunne, the Manhattan DA’s general counsel; Mark F. Pomerantz, a white collar crime specialist brought on for this investigation; and Gary Fishman, an assistant attorney general deputized to work on this joint investigation. If true, Jennifer Weisselberg’s claims would directly tie Trump to what a New York criminal indictment described as a corporate scheme to pay executives “in a matter that was ‘off the books.’”
“The scheme allowed the Trump Organization to evade the payment of payroll taxes that [it] was required to pay,” an indictment for the Trump Organization claims. On the flip side, it also alleges that executives avoided having to pay income taxes on a huge chunk of their pay…. The indictment, filed the very next week on June 30, does not criminally charge Trump as an individual, but it does describe how he signed checks that paid for the Weisselberg children to attend an expensive private school in Manhattan’s Upper West Side. While longtime chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg could be crucial to a criminal case against Trump, it’s Jennifer Weisselberg—his former daughter-in-law—who’s thus far been more helpful. Prosecutors have already used documents in Jennifer Weisselberg’s divorce case to explore how Trump paid more than $50,000 a year, starting in 2012, for the kids to attend the Columbia Grammar and Preparatory School.
Meanwhile, Jennifer’s claims during the Zoom call are seemingly backed up by testimony Barry gave during a 2018 divorce deposition, in which he said that his salary had remained flat for years, while his father ensured other aspects of his lifestyle were covered, including an apartment on Central Park South and later one on the Upper East Side. During his divorce deposition, Barry Weisselberg, who previously managed the Wollman ice rink for the Trump Organization, said he didn’t know if taxes had been paid on the corporate apartment where his family had lived. Asked to explain discrepancies between what he said he earned and what he actually reported to the IRS, Barry reportedly responded: “I’m not an accountant. I know what I make. I’m not too sure of certain things.”
The offices of Manhattan DA Cyrus Vance Jr. and New York Attorney General Letitia James have indicated that the investigation is ongoing. Prosecutors have yet to file charges against others allegedly involved in the scheme, but judging by the indictment, more charges could be on the way. For instance, the indictment identifies an “unindicted co-conspirator #1,” who remains unnamed but is described as the company’s “agent” and is accused of underreporting the CFO’s taxable income in 2009.
A lawyer for the Trump Organization declined the Daily Beast’s request for comment. Previously, that attorney has suggested the D.A.’s investigation is a politically motivated witch hunt against Trump, an argument the president himself has made on multiple occasions."
— Rupert Murdoch Buried Trump’s Election Night Dreams in a Shallow Grave
— Ivanka Trump Is Next on the Chopping Block
Don Jr. and Eric Trump: People Dodge Taxes All the Time, It’s Not a Big Deal
Donald Trump Versus the Wind
© Condé Nast 2021
The Washington Post indicated that Trump has been ‘de-platformed’
This is ironic because years ago his hiddenplatform may have been some neo-Kantian metaphor.
Trump Jr. appeared in front of some fund raising event in which he criticized Bezos for underpaying employees, forgetting his father simply renegging on work done on his hotels.
It’s 115 F here in Vegas, saw one poor pathetin underfed teenager hopelessly lost and talking to himself, driving by catching his face almost as an after glanced thought; occured to me- that he must have been someone’s llovingly forgotten baby!
So sad.
And now this;
1 hour ago
"The chair of former President Donald Trump’s 2017 inaugural committee was arrested Tuesday on charges alleging he secretly conspired to influence U.S. policy to benefit the United Arab Emirates. (July 20)
The claim: Donald Trump will be reinstated as president in August
Supporters of Donald Trump are promoting a conspiracy theory on social media suggesting the former president will return to the White House in August, even though he lost the 2020 election eight months ago.
The theory gained traction after MyPillow CEO and founder Mike Lindell and Trump’s former attorney Sidney Powell baselessly claimed in conservative media appearances that the Supreme Court would find evidence of voter fraud and a new inauguration date would be set. (Lindell denied to USA TODAY that he ever said Trump would be reinstated specifically on Aug. 13.)
Now, the claim has made its way to social media.
“TRUMP REINSTATED!” reads text over a fake newspaper cover that was shared to Facebook on July 18. The image includes other debunked claims about arrests, election fraud and more.
The user captioned the image: “SOON VERY SOON 08-05 2021.”
The post has more than 500 reactions and more than 300 shares. Similarly, some users on YouTube have asserted Trump will be back in office by Aug. 13.
Trump himself has reportedly told allies that he thinks he will be reinstated in August, according to New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman. A Politico/Morning Consult poll found 29% of Republican voters believe Trump will return to the White House this year.
Lindell claimed evidence of election fraud would be revealed at a “cyber symposium” event in August and the Supreme Court will overthrow the results of the 2020 election by a 9-0 vote, which would lead to Trump returning to office.
But the narrative that Trump will be reinstated as president is based on debunked conspiracy theories – not facts. Previous predictions about Trump returning to office proved wrong. There is no constitutional way for Trump to return to the White House before President Joe Biden’s term is over.
No constitutional way for Trump to be reinstated
Experts say there is no constitutional provision that would allow for Trump’s reinstatement. There is also no legal way to overturn election results after Congress has certified Electoral College votes. The election audits promoted by Trump and his allies provide no mechanism for Biden to be removed from office.
The United States Constitution provides that the candidate with the most votes from the Electoral College shall be president. A candidate must receive 270 electoral votes to win.
New emails show former president Donald Trump and his allies pressured the Justice Department to investigate unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud in the 2020 election in the last few weeks in office. (June 15)
AP
Biden won 81 million votes to Trump’s 74 million, giving him 306 electoral votes. Those results were certified by Congress on Jan. 6, after a pro-Trump mob stormed the U.S. Capitol. Biden took the oath of office at noon on Jan. 20.
The 20th Amendment says the “terms of the President and the Vice President shall end at noon on the 20th day of January … and the terms of their successors shall then begin.” That means Biden’s term will last until January 2025.
Persistent, baseless allegations of voter fraud will not change that fact.
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency said in November that the 2020 election was “the most secure in American history.” Additionally, then-Attorney General William Barr said the Department of Justice found no evidence of widespread voter fraud that could change the outcome of the 2020 presidential election results.
Fact check: Trump lost the 2020 presidential election
Claims that Trump will be reinstated gained popularity among followers of the baseless QAnon conspiracy theory, which says Trump is secretly fighting a cabal of powerful politicians and celebrities that participate in an international child sex trafficking ring. QAnon adherents falsely claimed Trump would be reinstated on Jan. 20 and March 4, neither of which proved correct.
Election audits will not change the outcome
Trump supporters are holding on to the results of ongoing election audits to support the reinstatement theory. However, those recounts have found no evidence of widespread fraud in the 2020 election.
Three separate audits of election results in Georgia, where Biden beat Trump by more than 10,000 votes, found no evidence of wrongdoing affecting the state’s results. An ongoing audit in Maricopa County, Arizona, also hasn’t surfaced any evidence of widespread voter fraud. A number of manual hand recounts across the country have affirmed Biden’s victory.
Top county officials in Phoenix, Arizona, almost all of them Republicans, on Monday blasted the GOP state Senate president and the auditors she hired to run an unprecedented, partisan recount of the 2020 election in the county. (May 17)
AP
At least 61 lawsuits from the Trump campaign alleging election fraud have failed. Courts in battleground states have denied hearing Trump’s appeals to overturn election results.
Business Insider reported that even if Lindell uncovered widespread election fraud, Congress could only remove Biden through impeachment. If Biden were removed from office, Vice President Kamala Harris would become president, not Trump.
Fact check: Altered Hunter Biden photo falsely claims Trump won the 2020 election
The only path for Trump to return to the presidency would be to win the 2024 presidential election race.
The claim that Trump will be reinstated as president in August is FALSE, based on our research. The theory is based on debunked falsehoods about the 2020 election and has been promoted by QAnon supporters. There is no constitutional way for Trump to return to the White House unless he were to win the 2024 presidential race. There is no evidence of widespread voter fraud affecting the 2020 election results, and a number of hand recounts have affirmed Biden’s victory.
CNN, June 1, Fact-checking Sidney Powell’s claim Trump could be reinstated
WTSP, Nov. 20, 2020, Once states certify election results the process moves forward
National Archives, accessed July 22, The Constitution of the United States: A Transcription
USA TODAY, Jan. 20, ‘This is America’s day’: Biden inaugurated as 46th president, Harris sworn in as vice president
Constitution Annotated, accessed July 22, Amdt20.2 Twentieth Amendment: Doctrine and Practice
USA TODAY, Dec. 15, 2020, Fact check: Joe Biden legally won presidential election, depsite persistent contrary claims
USA TODAY, Jan. 4, The members of Congress who objected to Joe Biden’s Electoral College win amid Capitol riot
USA TODAY, Nov. 12, Election security officials: ‘No evidence voting systems compromised’
USA TODAY, Dec. 1, Attorney General Barr: Justice Department finds no evidence of fraud to alter election outcome
Associated Press, July 9, QAnon has receded from social media, but it’s just hiding
USA TODAY, June 1, Fact check: No evidence of fraud in Georgia election results
Associated Press, May 27, Auditors find no fraud in disputed New Hampshire election
USA TODAY, Jan. 6, By the numbers: President Donald Trump’s failed efforts to overturn the election
Business Insider, June 2, Why Trump can’t be reinstated in August
Associated Press, June 4, Talk of Trump 2024 run builds as legal pressure intensifies
Ballotpedia, accessed July 23, Noteworthy recounts in the United States
USA TODAY, April 28, Fact check: No evidence election audit in Maricopa County has found widespread election fraud"
© Copyright Gannett 2021
Arizona test
.Sore loser’ Trump reaps fruits of election lies in Arizona
Analysis by Stephen Collinson, CNN
Updated 6:21 AM EDT, Sun July 25, 2021
(CNN)Ex-President Donald Trump’s big lie came full circle on Saturday as he traveled to Arizona to dangerously seize on the false fruits of a sham election “audit” precipitated by his own discredited claims the 2020 election was stolen.
On a late afternoon of delusion and incitement, Trump offered a preview of how he could exploit grievances of millions of supporters who buy his lies about voter fraud to power a possible new presidential run in the future.
His speech underscored the nation’s split reality over last November’s election — the real one in which he lost and President Joe Biden was fairly elected and the nonsensical but powerful one that he sells to his supporters.
The now self-sustaining myth that Trump was improperly ejected from power is at the center of a belief system that the ex-President is imposing on his party and is making a litmus test for 2022 GOP candidates seeking his endorsement, including in the Arizona Senate race, which is one of the GOP’s top targets as they try to take back the Senate.
In his latest return to campaign speeches, Trump showered praise on Arizona state senators who organized the non-scientific audit. He insisted he wasn’t involved, trying to create a false impression of independence and legitimacy in a politicized process inspired by his lies.
“There is no way they win elections without cheating,” the former President said of Democrats, at a packed event entitled – with Orwellian overtones – the “Rally to Protect Our Elections.” The one-term, twice-impeached ex-commander-in-chief related prolonged and false stories of election fraud across the country. He also claimed that many more Republican-run states were seeking their own audits of election results, even though multiple judges have ruled that there was no election fraud.
Trump’s appearance was full of the usual bluster, boasting, self-pity and too many falsehoods to count, and was in many ways a sideshow compared to the critical current challenges — including a pandemic that is quickly worsening again because millions of Republican voters will not get vaccinated.
But his appearance was also a warning of one of the most dangerous problems haunting a divided nation’s deeply polarized politics — the fact that lies and conspiracy theories now represent sincerely held views of a large minority of the electorate thanks to Trump’s mastery of demagoguery and the endless flattery of a compliant right-wing propaganda machine.
Trump reinvents the big lie
The ex-President did tell his supporters to get the vaccine on Saturday — but in such a way that offered an out for those who have bought into conservative misinformation about it – and in an attack on Biden, he further politicized the issue. Yet again, Trump showed that he was not willing to diminish his own political capital for the greater good.
“I recommend that you take it, but I also believe in your freedoms 100%,” Trump said, before adding, “because they don’t trust the President, people aren’t doing it.”
On the vaccine, and many other issues, Trump is seeking to do nothing less than create a new truth.
“The big lie they call it, you know what is the big lie? The opposite was the big lie. The election was the big lie,” Trump said, in a concise example of his malevolent method as he seeks to reshape Republican orthodoxy.
Trump loyalists echo false Arizona election fraud claims in hopes of winning midterms
Trump loyalists echo false Arizona election fraud claims in hopes of winning midterms
“Does everybody here understand that the 2020 election was a total disgrace?” the ex-President said at the rally, inciting a frenzied chant of “Trump, Trump, Trump,” that demonstrated how effective his wholesale lying has become.
Trump also lashed out at Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell for refusing to buy into his lies and conspiracies about the last election. He also attacked former Vice President Mike Pence for fulfilling his constitutional duty to oversee the certification of the election in Congress and former Attorney General William Barr for saying there was no election fraud.
Among unanswered questions is whether Trump’s campaign of falsehoods and refusal to accept the result in 2020 — which is rife among his base voters — will further alienate the suburban and more moderate voters who were crucial in his defeat last November. The coming months and years will also show whether Republican voters — especially when the next presidential primary race heats up — want to spend the entire campaign going over lies about the last election or will seek new candidates who might share Trump’s populist extremism but offer a path to the future.
But there is no doubt about the power of Trump in fast forming primary races ahead of the midterm elections next year. A stream of pro-Trump candidates has made the journey to Arizona to curry favor with the ex-President by highlighting the unofficial audit that has so far shown no evidence of voter fraud but has twisted the facts about the election.
In a briefing earlier this month, about the “audit” of votes in Maricopa County – the crucial battleground where Biden outpaced Trump to win the state and its 11 electoral votes – the firm running the process expressed multiple untruths.
Doug Logan, the chief executive of Cyber Ninjas, a firm with no experience in election audits, claimed that the audit uncovered 74,243 mail-in ballots with no clear record of them being sent.
The claim was quickly picked up by Trump and some of his supporters as the narrative of “magically appearing ballots” quickly gained steam among “Make America Great Again” supporters online.
A CNN fact check found that there is no evidence of either fraud or significant problems with these ballots. There are complicated reasons why it is not unusual that Maricopa County’s submitted ballot lists includes a number of voters that do not match up with requested-ballots list. Logan’s comments appear to be informed by misunderstandings, deliberate or not, about the county’s voting procedures. The situation has been explained by several election experts, including Garrett Archer, an election analyst at ABC15 television in Phoenix and a former official in the Arizona secretary of state’s office, who is regarded as an expert on the state’s election procedures.
What is going on is ‘dangerous’
Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, a Democrat, called Trump a “sore loser” on CNN on Friday. On Saturday, she argued that the whole “audit” was designed to feed Trump’s “ego, to placate his hurt feelings because he lost the election. And he’s grifting a lot of people to pay for it instead of paying it for himself.”
The Washington Post reported on Thursday that Trump’s political action committee had raised about $75 million so far this year but had not sent any money to the Arizona ballot review.
When CNN’s Pamela Brown told Hobbs that the ex-President’s crowd was chanting “lock her up” in reference to her at the Saturday rally, Hobbs warned that he was playing with political fire.
“What’s going on right now really is dangerous and the former President is continuing to incite his followers to action that could end up with another insurrection and needs to be held to account for that,” said Hobbs, who is running for governor in 2022.
It doesn’t actually matter to Trump or his supporters if the allegations made in the audit are true or not. Trump’s list of supposed irregularities that he spouted in a speech, which was often incoherent, made very little sense. But the conspiracies help fuel the massive nationwide lie that Trump created in order to avoid admitting he lost the election. Any morsel of information, no matter how quickly it is discredited, further expands the big lie. And as months pass, those who buy in travel so far from the truth that facts become meaningless.
The impact on American democracy, however, of millions of Americans losing faith in the election system — which is actually remarkably free of fraud — is deeply corrosive.
Trump’s perpetuation of his own election fraud is taking place alongside a broader Republican effort to not just whitewash the behavior of the ex-President and his supporters during the Capitol insurrection on January 6 but to write an alternative history of events to cover up the truth.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, who has anchored the GOP’s bid to win back the House next year on Trump, and Republicans are arguing that Speaker Nancy Pelosi was to blame for what happened, apparently because she did not beef up security at the Capitol (even though the speaker is not in charge of security).
These claims are coinciding with regular releases of footage from the Justice Department and elsewhere of Trump supporters beating up police officers as they forced their way into the citadel of American democracy. But there is no place for evidence inside Trump’s parallel reality bubble.
Like the Capitol riot, the Arizona audit was sparked directly by Trump’s lies that the election was stolen from him. Saturday was the latest sign that he intends to pollute future election cycles with his dangerous grand illusion.
View on CNN
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Trump officials can testify on former President’s actions leading up to insurrection, Justice Department decides
(CNN)The Justice Department formally declined to assert executive privilege for potential testimony of at least some witnesses related to the January 6 Capitol attack, a person briefed on the matter said.
The decision paves the way for some former Justice Department officials to testify on what they witnessed in the chaotic days between former President Donald Trump’s November election loss and early January when he tried to use the Justice Department and other means to advance false claims that he won.
Among the potential witnesses from which a special select committee investigating the January 6 insurrection is expected to seek testimony is Jeffrey Rosen, who was acting attorney general in late December and until the inauguration of President Joe Biden.
'The physical violence we experienced was horrific and devastating': Officers recount harrowing events of Capitol insurrection
‘The physical violence we experienced was horrific and devastating’: Officers recount harrowing events of Capitol insurrection
Rosen and other Justice officials were at the center of a pressure campaign by Trump and other White House officials to back his claims of vote fraud. Frustrated that the Justice Department didn’t find evidence of fraud, Trump contemplated replacing Rosen with Jeffrey Clark, another Justice Department official who signaled support for the fraud claims. Rosen and a group of top Justice officials prepared to resign if Clark were made acting attorney general.
The Justice Department’s decision applies to former Justice employees. Other potential witnesses that the committee may want to hear from, such as former White House officials, may be subject to a different standard under executive privilege.
DOJ notified former officials in a letter Monday that they were free to provide “unrestricted testimony” and “irrespective of potential privilege,” according to a copy of a letter reviewed by CNN.
The House Oversight and Senate Judiciary committees had asked the department to allow some former officials to testify about their interactions with Trump and other White House officials, the letter said. The new select committee investigating the Capitol riot could seek similar testimony.
“The extraordinary events in this matter constitute exceptional circumstances warranting an accommodation to Congress in this case,” the letter from Bradley Weinsheimer, associate deputy attorney general, says.
The letter notes that the department consulted with the White House Counsel’s office, which conveyed President Joe Biden’s decision not to invoke executive privilege.
An attorney for Trump didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
The move is among two politically-sensitive matters facing Attorney General Merrick Garland this week. Later Tuesday, the Justice Department is facing a deadline to tell a federal judge whether it plans to shield Rep. Mo Brooks, who is a defendant in a lawsuit brought by Rep. Eric Swallwell over Brooks’s incendiary rally speech to the pro-Trump crowd before the January 6 attack on the Capitol.
Brooks has argued that the Justice Department should take over his defense because he was acting as a member of Congress at the political rally.
Some liberals have been critical of Garland for his efforts to restore the Justice Department’s institutional norms, which have included aligning with some Trump-era decisions made by the department. Among those: the Justice Department continued to defend the former President in a lawsuit brought by E. Jean Carroll, who accused Trump of sexually assaulting her and was suing the former President for defamation.
© 2021 Cable News Network. A Warner Media Company. All Rights Reserved.
Yahoo News
The Week
Trump 2024 could be American democracy’s zero hour
Donald Trump.
Donald Trump. Illustrated | Getty Images, iStock
Making predictions about the political future is a fool’s game. Pundits do it a lot because it’s fun and easy, and because there are effectively no professional consequences for getting things wrong.
But thinking about how events might unfold need not be entirely frivolous — provided that pundits are honest and up-front about the assumptions and conditionals underlying predictions. If X happens, then Y will take place; and if Y happens, then A, B, or C could transpire — with A being benign, B being worrisome, and C being catastrophic. This kind of analysis can be fruitful in clarifying the various paths and range of possibilities that lie before us, even when things don’t play out exactly as the pundit foresaw.
In that spirit, I’d like to venture a conditional prediction: If Donald Trump runs for president again in 2024, the United States could find itself in a politically perilous situation by mid-November that year.
If Joe Biden (or, in the event that he doesn’t run, Kamala Harris or another Democrat) wins decisively, by wide margins in multiple states, we will probably be fine. Meanwhile, if Trump prevails comfortably, American democracy will go on well enough, despite the turbulence of a second Trump administration.
But if the outcome of the vote in November 2024 is close enough that Trump can launch another “stop the steal” operation in numerous swing states, things are going to get ugly fast. In that case, American democracy itself could be facing its zero hour.
Let’s begin at the beginning: Is Trump going to run again? No one can know for sure, but it’s looking likely. For one thing, because he’s nursing grudges and he wants revenge. For another, because he’s under legal threat from various investigations, and if he were to win, he would likely be immunized from punishment until he left office. Then there is his insatiable craving for attention. He received inhuman amounts of it while living in the White House, which means he’s been enduring painful withdrawal ever since. In this respect, the continued social media ban on Trump could be increasing the likelihood that he’ll run again, since he’s incapable of hogging the spotlight in any other way.
But won’t Trump have to compete against other Republicans for the GOP nomination? Not really. In addition to him holding commanding leads over potential rivals in every survey of Republican voters, there is the unreality of all such polls. It might be interesting to see that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis polls best against Trump in a large field. But would DeSantis actually run against Trump in the primaries? Make a compelling case about why voters should prefer him over Trump? I find that hard to imagine, since it would be guaranteed to provoke a furious salvo of attacks from Trump in defense of himself, which would diminish any rival in the eyes of most Republican voters. It’s a no-win scenario. (Which is why the only Republicans who might seek to challenge Trump are those, like Utah Sen. Mitt Romney or Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney, who have no chance at all of winning the nomination and would be running kamikaze campaigns designed to take Trump down a peg in the general election.)
So Trump is quite likely to run — and quite likely to win the Republican nomination if he does. What happens then?
One possibility is that the Democrat wins the general election decisively — so decisively that most of the Republicans in Congress and in red state legislatures currently indulging in absurd conspiracies about the stolen election of 2020 and the insurrectionary violence of Jan. 6 are unwilling to go along with an effort to overturn the results. This would mean Biden, Harris, or whichever Democrat ends up running would have to win swing states like Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona, and Georgia by a couple of percentage points. (The national popular-vote margin will be irrelevant.) In such a situation, the procedures of democratic transition would probably unfold without major incident, no matter how much of a stink Trump tried to make.
Then there’s the (unlikely) possibility of Trump solidly defeating his general election opponent. This is improbable because Trump has never won more than 46.9 percent of the vote, and his refusal to accept the results of the last election and incitement of his supporters on Jan. 6 alienated some Republicans and a good number of independents. Trump may be able to win the GOP primaries in a walk, but bettering his 2020 showing in the general election of 2024 will be quite difficult. That is, unless some other event or series of them intervene to severely discredit the Democrats. Like what? Think runaway inflation or other evidence of a sharp economic downturn, continued growth in violent crime, and/or the outbreak of war with China over an attempted invasion of Taiwan.
Any of those eventualities, or others we can’t currently imagine, could propel Trump to a clear victory. Progressives and some liberals would throw a fit and remain furious for the next four years, but the institutions of American democracy would continue to function, even as they ended up tested in new ways by another four years of Trumpian corruption, ineptitude, and rhetorical attacks on half the country.
The real danger would arise in a situation where Trump lost by a narrow margin, setting up a redo of the post-2020 election effort to “stop the steal” — especially if the GOP has taken control of both houses of Congress (as seems likely) in the intervening 2022 midterm election. One possibility is that the Democrat prevails by winning a small number of states that are controlled by Republican legislatures and those elected officials reject the results, pronouncing Trump the winner instead. This would then be followed by a Republican-controlled Congress certifying those results on Jan. 6, 2024. That’s the scenario that many Democrats already worry quite a lot about.
But another series of events could be more likely.
Imagine that things are much less clear-cut than an outright steal by the Republicans. Imagine, instead, that Trump goads some legislatures to try for a steal, but others balk, prompting armed protests at state capitals. Conservative media outlets also fracture, with some opposing Trump’s moves but others cheering them on as the only thing standing in the way of the progressive imposition of a “theocratic oligarchy.”
Many Republicans in Congress, meanwhile, think Trump is full of it, but they’ve gone so far in endorsing his lies about election fraud going back to 2020, and in whipping up hysteria about the existential threat posed by the left, that they feel boxed in. The growing protests in Washington and around the country, organized by the militia movement, scare them. But so do the protests encouraged by the left in cities across the nation. Trump would be insisting that any outcome that doesn’t deliver the White House to him should be considered illegitimate, while Democrats claim the same thing about any outcome that doesn’t keep the White House in their hands.
In such a situation, we could end up with more than one slate of electors, with none of them adding up to 270. More than a constitutional crisis, this would be a legitimacy crisis that would raise the very serious prospect of full-blown democratic procedural breakdown, with no person or institution possessing the requisite authority and trust to swoop in and settle the burgeoning dispute.
How likely is it that this exact series of events unfolds in precisely this way? Not very. Contingencies we can’t imagine today will undoubtedly intervene and quite possibly send events down a path we can’t yet anticipate. Or else one of the less dangerous options sketched above will transpire.
But the very fact that Trump running again for the presidency could set in motion a series of events that brings American democracy to the brink is something that everyone should be pondering and preparing for as we approach our country’s next civic reckoning.
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POLITICS
Donald Trump Blasts Mitch McConnell Again, Calls Infrastructure ‘Gift’ to Democrats
POLITICS DONALD TRUMP MITCH MCCONNELL JOE BIDEN INFRASTRUCTURE
Former President Donald Trump has again lampooned Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) as a bipartisan infrastructure bill works its way through the Senate.
Trump’s spokesperson Liz Harrington shared a statement via Twitter on Saturday that reiterated the former president’s opposition to the infrastructure package as the Senate considers it further this weekend.
McConnell was one of 17 Republicans who voted in favor of advancing the bill on June 28 and there is a strong possibility the Senate will approve the $1 trillion package, which was negotiated by the White House and a bipartisan group of senators.
Trump’s statement said: “Joe Biden’s infrastructure bill is a disgrace. If Mitch McConnell was smart, which we’ve seen no evidence of, he would use the debt ceiling card to negotiate a good infrastructure package.”
The debt ceiling refers to the need for Congress to approve an increase in the federal government’s borrowing authority. Though once considered a formality, in recent years it has sometimes become a point of partisan division.
“This is a 2,700 page bill that no one could have possibly read - they would need to take speed reading courses,” the statement goes on.
“It is a gift to the Democrat Party, compliments of Mitch McConnell and some RINOs, who have no idea what they are doing.”
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His comments mark his latest critique of McConnell, who Trump has regularly aimed broadsides at in recent months.
The statement went on to criticize specifics of the bill.
“There is very little on infrastructure in all of those pages. Instead, they track your driving so they can tax you. It is Joe Biden’s form of a gas tax but far bigger, far higher and, mark my words, far worse. They want to track you everywhere you go and watch everything you do!”
Trump appears to be referring to a provision in the infrastructure bill that would allow for a per-mile road tax that could see drivers’ mileage information tracked, according to The Drive.com.
“Joe Biden’s infrastructure bill will be used against the Republican Party in the upcoming elections in 2022 and 2024. It will be very hard for me to endorse anyone foolish enough to vote in favor of this deal,” Trump’s statement went on.
“The good news is that the progressive wing in the Democrat Party will lose all credibility with this approval. Additionally, [House Minority Leader] Kevin McCarthy and Republican House members seem to be against the bill. If it can’t be killed in the Senate, maybe it dies in the House!”
Democrats hold a slim majority in the House of Representatives and several progressive members have suggested they will oppose the infrastructure package, so its defeat in the House is possible.
Trump’s statement went on to offer more criticism of McConnell “playing right into” Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s hands.
“Whether it’s the House or the Senate, think twice before you approve this terrible deal,” Trump said.
“Republicans should wait until after the Midterms when they will gain all the strength they’ll need to make a good deal, but remember, you already have the card, it’s called the debt ceiling, which the Democrats threatened us with constantly.”
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Opinion, Analysis, Essays
POLITICS & POLICY
Connecting Fox News’ Tucker Carlson, Hungary — and Trump
From targeting migrants to inflaming an ethnonationalist base to whipping up nativist conspiracies, Trumpism is increasingly indistinguishable from Orbánism.
Aug. 8, 2021, 4:31 AM EDT
For the past few years, the Hungarian government under authoritarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has overtly courted the American right, wooing the kinds of anti-democratic forces buoying former President Donald Trump. This past week, those efforts seemed to pay off. And Orbán, easily the most autocratic figure in the European Union, scored arguably his biggest coup to date — and showed precisely the direction the Trumpian base is ready to move in.
The Hungarian government under authoritarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has overtly courted the American right.
Fox News talking head Tucker Carlson — a regular promoter of everything from political and scientific disinformation to white nationalist talking points — arrived in Budapest on Monday, where he promptly began yukking it up with Orbán. According to Carlson, who broadcast from Budapest all week and is a speaker at a far-right conference over the weekend, his trip is all about shining a light on Orbán’s achievements over the past decade.
“If you care about Western civilization and democracy and families and the ferocious assault on all three of those things by the leaders of our global institutions, you should know what is happening here right now,” Carlson said on the show.
For anyone who’s followed Hungary’s trajectory under Orbán, Carlson’s paeans to the country’s supposed “democracy” are laughable. Under a decade of Orbán’s rule, Hungary has transformed from a bright spot of political freedoms to a cautionary tale in how a right-wing authoritarian can dismantle a democracy, piece by piece, while helping his cronies profit along the way.
Pick any metric you’d like, and Hungary’s self-proclaimed “democracy” hardly survives scrutiny. Look at press freedoms, for instance. Not only has Orbán’s government crafted a domestic propaganda machine that would rival autocracies anywhere, but earlier this summer Reporters Without Borders named Orbán an “enemy of press freedom” — the only European Union leader to be put on the list, which places him in the same infamous company as Syria’s Bashar al-Assad and Russia’s Vladimir Putin.
Or look at the culture of corruption and elite predation that Orbán has fostered. Not only does Transparency International now rank Hungary lower than dictatorships like Belarus or Cuba in its Corruption Perceptions Index, but the government in Budapest has transformed into little more than a vehicle for pillaging. From systemic fraud that funnels billions to regime insiders to corruption among Orbán’s inner circle, Hungary has, as nonprofit human rights advocacy organization Freedom House wrote, “evolved into a crony capitalist state par excellence.” What does this mean? As The Atlantic reported, “nobody can be rich in Hungary without having some relation” to Orbán.
Even Carlson’s claim that Hungary is some kind of bulwark of “Western civilization” — that it’s some outpost of religious conservatives who are simply protecting faith and family — is a farce. The country is hardly a bastion of Christianity; at last check, Hungary had as many “highly religious” citizens as did places like notoriously socialist Norway and even less than liberal bastions like the Netherlands. Likewise, Orbán’s Hungary is routinely the most pro-Chinese member of the European Union — a relationship that carries any number of security and corruption concerns with it.
If anything, the notion that Hungary supports “Western civilization” stems directly from the kind of bigoted policies that many far-right, traditionalist Americans would like to see replicated in the U.S.; as MSNBC’s Zeeshan Aleem noted, Orbán is “a social traditionalist who has banned gender studies at universities and shot down the legal recognition of trans people.”
Any way you look at it, Orbán and his claque have effectively flipped the country from a burgeoning democracy into something far darker.
Any way you look at it, Orbán and his claque have effectively flipped the country from a burgeoning democracy into something far darker and something far closer to the mafia states in places like Russia or Kazakhstan — places where fealty to the leader, and a willingness to target all those who’d oppose his rule, is all that matters. To see the consequences of such a pivot, look at the ongoing Olympic drama surrounding Belarusian sprinter Krystsina Tsimanouskaya, who is now seeking asylum in Poland after criticizing her coaches led to threats to her safety. As Freedom House summed up last year, Orbán’s government has “dropped any pretense of respecting democratic institutions.” (Not that Orbán would necessarily disagree: The prime minister famously called for “illiberal democracy” in his country of nearly 10 million.)
But then, maybe there’s nothing surprising about Carlson’s visit. After all, Trump and his supporters have proved only too happy to mimic Orbán’s authoritarian steps over the past few years. Trump called for the jailing of political opponents, pressured foreign governments to fabricate “dirt” on his rival and encouraged an insurrectionist riot on Jan. 6. As we’ve continued learning, Trump is also the first sitting president who ever attempted to overturn the results of a presidential election — and the will of the American electorate.
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In many ways, Trump and Orbán are birds of an autocratic feather. This helps explain why Carlson — who regularly regurgitates far-right talking points and who often seems to harbor disdain for both nonwhite Americans and American democratic principles, despite his protests to the contrary — showed up in Budapest to glad-hand Orbán and praise the Hungarian leader’s supposed achievements.
Yet while Carlson is now one of biggest names to publicly extol Orbán, he’s simply following in the steps of those who have rushed to Orbán’s defense before him. Former Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, perhaps the most outspoken defender of white nationalism in modern congressional history, praised Orbán’s anti-immigrant rhetoric in 2017. American white supremacy supporters have in recent years further described Orbán as a “hero of Western Civilization,” with right-wing cretin Steve Bannon dubbing Orbán “Trump before Trump.” Orbán’s government even went so far as to pay far-right American Twitter trolls to whitewash its authoritarian policies.
The reasons for such praise run the gamut, from Orbán’s willingness to malign immigrants and refugees to his outward efforts to target members of the LGBTQ community — and, of course, to his willingness to dismantle the aspects of Hungarian democracy he does not like, brick by brick, policy by policy. As the Washington Post columnist Ishaan Tharoor wrote, “Orbanism represents the fever dream of the American right.”
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OPINION
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He’s exactly right. From targeting migrants to inflaming an ethnonationalist base, from attacking the press to whipping up nativist conspiracies, from ushering in unprecedented corruption to tearing down basic democratic protections, Trumpism is increasingly indistinguishable from Orbánism. And Carlson singing the praises of both offers a clue about which direction many of Trump’s most outspoken backers would like to see America drift toward. At the very least, Carlson’s visit represents one more step toward normalizing these types of ideologies, both abroad and at home.
Casey Michel is a journalist who covers financial transparency, illicit finance, and kleptocracy. He is the author of the forthcoming book “American Kleptocracy.” Follow him on Twitter at @cjcmichel
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