Category: Election2024

Trump’s win means less scrutiny for shady sugar daddy Elon Musk

Posted on by Lisa Needham

Winning the 2024 election didn’t just return Donald Trump to power. It also allowed him to dodge multiple criminal cases. And while his unofficial vice president, Elon Musk, didn’t need a Trump win to stay out of jail—at least under any existing charges—the victory likely freed Musk and his companies from regulatory oversight. That’s an exceedingly lucky break for Musk, currently being scrutinized by multiple government agencies for everything from his inflated claims about self-driving Tesla cars to his SpaceX rocket launches polluting wetlands to his purchase of social media platform X—just to name a few.

To be perfectly fair, Trump’s victory means a far friendlier atmosphere for all greedy billionaires who hate regulations, not just Musk personally. But Musk is the one sitting next to Trump at Thanksgiving and the one who threw roughly $260 million at Trump’s campaign while fawning over him on X and in person.

So which pesky investigations and regulations is Musk probably free of now that his bestie is headed to the White House?

For starters, perhaps he’ll get out from under the alphabet soup of agencies looking into Tesla’s so-called full self-driving system, or FSD. Musk has promised a vision of a completely autonomous hands-free Tesla since 2013. It’s not a vision that has ever come true. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has twice required Tesla to recall FSD because of the system’s bad habit of ignoring traffic laws, including being programmed to run stop signs at slow speeds. In October, the agency opened another inquiry after the company reported four crashes, one of which killed a pedestrian, when FSD was used in low-visibility conditions like fog. 

The issue isn’t just that FSD is unsafe. It’s also that Tesla hoovered up cash by selling a product that basically doesn’t exist. Tesla owners filed a class-action lawsuit in 2022 alleging the company defrauded them by charging $15,000 for an FSD package that didn’t result in a Tesla being able to drive itself successfully. Tesla’s defense? Full self-driving is merely an aspirational goal, so a failure to provide it isn’t a deliberate fraud—just bad luck. Perhaps that’s the same excuse Tesla would have trotted out in response to the Department of Justice’s criminal investigation into whether the company committed wire fraud by deceiving consumers about FSD’s capabilities and securities fraud by deceiving investors.

Trump named former reality show star and former Congressman Sean Duffy to head the Department of Transportation, of which NHTSA is a part, and tapped one of his impeachment defense attorneys, Pam Bondi, to head the DOJ after Matt Gaetz’s nomination flamed out. There’s no reason to think either of these people will grow a spine and continue investigating “first buddy” Elon Musk or Tesla.

Trump’s election also probably gives SpaceX breathing room. Musk’s private space company, which receives literal billions in government money, hasn’t been terribly interested in following government rules.

In September, the Environmental Protection Agency fined SpaceX $148,378 for dumping industrial wastewater and pollutants into wetlands near its Texas launch site. The company paid that fine, albeit with some whining about how it was “disappointing” to pay when it disagreed with the allegations, but it’s planning on challenging the recent $633,000 fine from the Federal Aviation Administration. The regulatory agency proposed the fine after two launches in 2023 where the company allegedly didn’t get FAA approval for launch procedure changes and didn’t follow license requirements.

This isn’t SpaceX’s first run-in with the FAA. The aerospace company paid a $175,000 fine in October 2023 over not submitting required safety data to the agency before a 2022 launch of Starlink satellites. After an April 2023 launch where one of the company’s rockets blew up shortly after takeoff, sending debris over South Texas, the FAA required the agency to make dozens of changes before another launch.

Like the NHTSA, the FAA is part of the Transportation Department. Sean Duffy’s past as an airline industry lobbyist doesn’t inspire confidence that he’ll take a hard line against SpaceX.

And as far as whether the EPA will continue to pose any problems for Musk? Under Trump, that agency will be run by former GOP Rep. Lee Zeldin, whose primary qualification seems to be hating EPA regulations. He’s voted against replacing lead water pipes and cleaning up brownfields and sees his mission at the EPA as pursuing “energy dominance.” Again, not exactly someone who will bring the hammer down on Musk or his companies.

Musk is also in hot water with the Securities and Exchange Commission over the possibility he delayed disclosing his acquisition of Twitter stock in 2022. Investors must disclose when they accumulate 5% of a publicly traded company, a requirement that ostensible super-genius Musk says he misunderstood somehow. Under President Joe Biden, current SEC chair Gary Gensler has aggressively pursued enforcement efforts, a trend in no way expected to continue under whoever Trump picks.

Lightning round! Musk tried hard to violate a consent order with the Federal Trade Commission by giving “Twitter Files” writers improper access to user data, but he was thwarted by Twitter employees who actually followed the order. He’s faced numerous unfair labor practices claims and been investigated multiple times by the National Labor Relations Board, so he’s suing to have the board declared unconstitutional. He lost out on $885 million in government subsidies after the Federal Communications Commission found that Starlink, SpaceX’s satellite internet service, couldn’t meet the speed metrics for the government’s rural broadband program.

Luckily for the multibillionaire, the incoming head of the FCC is a pal of Musk’s who thinks it is “regulatory harassment” to require Starlink to meet program requirements.  

Musk will also have the advantage of helming a newly invented entity, the cringily titled Department of Government Efficiency (aka DOGE—ugh), that can put his rivals under a microscope. DOGE’s co-head, fellow tech billionaire Vivek Ramaswamy, has already said he’ll examine a government loan to Rivian, a competing electric vehicle manufacturer, calling the loan “a political shot across the bow at Elon Musk and Tesla.” Though DOGE is not an actual department—you need Congress to create one of those—and cannot slash spending directly, Musk could still suggest to Trump that government funding of fiber optic cables in rural areas be gutted. This would leave satellite services like Starlink as the only option for some rural consumers—an option either those consumers or the government would then have to pay for.

Until Trump was elected in 2016, it was impossible to imagine giving billionaires like Musk so much opportunity to use the levers of government to openly and directly benefit themselves. Now that Trump has won a second term in office, Musk is just one of many oligarchs looking forward to an extremely lucrative four years. It’s lucky for them—but terrible for the rest of us.

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Here’s how Republicans just might lose the House

Posted on by Andrew Mangan

This year, control of the House will be determined primarily by just 26 districts. And with 22 days to go until Nov. 5, neither party has a clear advantage.

Republicans took control of the House in 2022, with the slimmest of majorities—though “control” may be overstating things. Their majority has seen constant chaos, including the ouster of former Speaker Kevin McCarthy (after less than a year in leadership!), a dramatic battle to replace him, a failed impeachment of President Joe Biden, early retirements by frustrated members like Colorado Republican Ken Buck, and so much more.

All of that has given Democrats confidence that they can take back the House this year—and race ratings by The Cook Political Report, Inside Elections, and Sabato’s Crystal Ball suggest it’s possible. 

Overall, Democrats are favored in 202 districts and Republicans in 207, based on the median race rating between those three organizations. Race ratings are based on collections of polling, reporting, fundraising numbers, historical trends, and other data. The ratings generally break down into these categories: Solid Democratic or Republican, Likely Democratic or Republican, Lean Democratic or Republican, and Toss-up. (Inside Elections adds a “Tilt” rating, which lives between “Lean” and “Toss-up.” But for our purposes, that rating has been standardized to “Toss-up.”)

That means control of the House will most likely be determined by 26 toss-up districts. And the polling in them holds some glimmers of hope for Democrats—who need to pick up only four seats to take back the House—as well as a few warnings.

Here’s what you need to know. 

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Race ratings are historically accurate. Cook’s 2024 analysis of its own ratings since 1984 found that it accurately predicted upward of 90% of races for governor, House, Senate, and president. And the more confident the rating, the greater the accuracy.

The 26 toss-up districts are spread across the country. Democrats currently hold 12 of those districts and Republicans 14, meaning that the GOP has slightly more at risk. If Democrats can hold all of their current seats—a huge “if”—they would need to flip only four districts to have a majority, assuming that the three current vacancies will be filled by the party that previously held them.

But even with the high accuracy of race ratings, a couple “Lean” or even “Likely” seats could flip as well. Forty-two races are not a “Solid” seat for either party.

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Additionally, six districts are pretty likely to flip: Alabama’s 2nd, Louisiana’s 6th, New York’s 22nd, and North Carolina’s 6th, 13th, and 14th districts. These are districts where the median race rating conflicts with the party that currently holds the seat. For example, those three North Carolina seats are held by Democrats, but after the Republican state legislature passed a vicious gerrymander late last year, all three seats are now solidly Republican. 

However, Republicans’ expected gains in the Tar Heel State could be offset by potential Democratic flips in Alabama, Louisiana, and New York. Democrats are favored in the former two states due to a pair of court victories that overturned illegal gerrymanders (for this year, at least). 

In New York’s 22nd, though, incumbent Republican Brandon Williams faces off against John Mannion in a “Lean D” seat. Williams, an anti-abortion extremist who has flirted with election denialism, could prove too conservative for this swingy seat. Unfortunately, the race has seen only one poll so far, and it was fielded three months ago. It showed Mannion leading by 7 percentage points. But it was also paid for by the pro-Mannion House Majority PAC—so, grain of salt.

Williams has out-raised Mannion more than 2 to 1 as of the end of June. However, new FEC reports are due Oct. 15, so it’s possible Mannion closed the money gap since then.

Unlike Senate or presidential races, those in the House receive a lot less high-quality polling. Across 435 House races, only 131 polls have been conducted since May, according to 538’s polling database, as of Friday at 11:25 AM ET. Compare that to the Pennsylvania Senate race, which alone has seen 70 since May, or the presidential race, which has gotten 1,316 national polls in the same time period.

That being said, the polling that has come out looks promising for Democrats. There are 18 House races with two or more polls since May, excluding polls conducted on behalf of a candidate’s campaign, which are pretty unreliable. Of those 18, Democrats lead in 12, including five seats currently held by a Republican. One district, held by a Republican, shows a tie. And while Republicans lead in five races, they already hold four of those seats. 

Among these 18 races, the only Democratic incumbent polling underwater is freshman Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, in Washington’s 3rd District. And even then, it’s by only half of 1 point. The median race rating of her seat says it’s a toss-up.

In other words, this limited data suggests Democrats could pick up some seats—and, if the rest of the map holds, retake the majority. But the operative words there are “limited data” and “if the rest of the map holds.”

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The most-polled House race is Nebraska’s 2nd District, where Democrat Tony Vargas, a former state senator, leads incumbent Republican Don Bacon by an average of nearly 4 points. 

Despite Vargas’ fundraising running slightly behind Bacon’s as of June, he’s surely being boosted by this district’s importance at the top of the ticket. Nebraska splits its five electoral votes, awarding two to the statewide winner and one to the winner in each of its three districts. And because the 2nd District’s electoral vote could decide the presidential election this year, Democrats are really leaning into outreach there. (Polls show Vice President Kamala Harris with a consistent lead.) All that Democratic energy is no doubt helping Vargas.

But there are mixed results when it comes to the general congressional ballot, which measures whether survey respondents want a Democrat or Republican in Congress. 

The good news for Democrats? On July 21—the day that President Joe Biden ended his reelection bid—Republicans led Democrats on the generic ballot by 0.6 points, according to 538’s average. 

But now? Democrats lead by 1.3 points as of Friday. In fact, they’ve consistently led since Aug. 2, suggesting the lead is fairly solid. 

The bad news? Democrats’ generic-ballot advantage has slipped since Sept. 10, when they were leading by 2.7 points. And perhaps more importantly, they’re underperforming their polls at this time in 2020, when they led on the generic ballot by 6.8 points. 

While Democrats narrowly maintained control of the chamber in 2020, winning 222 seats to Republicans’ 213, House polls in that cycle heavily overestimated Democrats, according to analysis by 538’s Nathaniel Rakich. In fact, Rakich found that House polls overestimated Democrats in 10 of the past 13 cycles, though those amounts range from D+0.2 in the 2022 cycle—very accurate!—to D+6.1 in the 2020 cycle. Very not accurate! 

Put simply, if polling error this year resembles that in 2020, Republicans would almost certainly grow their House majority. And possibly by a lot.

At the same time, Democrats could very well retake the House if polls are as accurate as in 2022—or, better yet, if they’re overestimating Republicans. After all, Rakich’s analysis shows it’s happened three times since 1998. It could happen again.

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GOP held a hearing to bash Biden. Watch this Democrat turn the tables

Posted on by Walter Einenkel

GOP Rep. James Comer held a House Accountability and Oversight Committee hearing on Thursday titled, “A Legacy of Incompetence: Consequences of the Biden-Harris Administration’s Policy Failures.” The laughably biased display is the latest Republican attempt to bash President Joe Biden, tarnish Vice President Kamala Harris’ record, and bolster Donald Trump's flailing presidential campaign.

Not unlike the committee’s abject failure to find a single shred of evidence to impeach Biden, this new attempt did not go the Republican Party’s way. Instead of creating angry and aggrieved sound bites for MAGA minions to salivate over, the hearing was mostly a boring stream of conservative lies. 

Enter Democratic Rep. Gerry Connolly of Virginia, who used his time to detail the Biden administration’s many accomplishments on behalf of the American people. Connolly enlisted Skye Perryman, CEO of public policy organization Democracy Forward and the only witness the Democrats were allowed to call during the hearing, as his willing accomplice in this brief history lesson.

He began by countering the GOP claims that the Biden administration’s environmental regulations preventing energy industries from drilling for oil willy-nilly are “impeding energy production.”

Not only are Trump and Republicans lying about how superior they are when it comes to American energy production, they are lying about the Biden administration’s historic success in reaching new levels of energy independence.

Connolly moved on from there, asking Perryman about the Trump administration’s attempts to pass an infrastructure bill.

Connolly: Did they ever pass an infrastructure bill?

Perryman: They did not.

Connolly: Did President Biden pass an infrastructure bill?

Perryman: He did.

Connolly: Is it also the largest infrastructure bill in American history?

Perryman: The Biden-Harris infrastructure bill is the largest in American history.

Connolly: And pretty comprehensive, covers lots of different kinds of infrastructure. Is that correct?

Perryman: Many infrastructure and lots of investment.

The Biden administration did indeed pass an infrastructure bill with nearly zero support from the Republican Party. 

Connolly then detailed the Trump administration's failures in Afghanistan, including the rushed withdrawal timeline that Republicans now decry and blame on Biden. Trump tried to make his already terrible plan catastrophic by ordering a rapid withdrawal from Afghanistan after he lost the election in 2020. Thankfully, senior military staff did not follow through.

The GOP and Trump have also blamed Biden for Russian dictator Vladimir Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine. So Connolly walked down memory lane to recall why, unlike Biden, Trump was first impeached in 2019. We all remember how Trump tried to extort Ukraine into interfering in the 2020 election by withholding weapons for the country’s defense.

“Would it be fair to say that that development, that threat and that withholding of weapons, might be construed—if you were Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin—as a sign of weakness on the part of Ukraine and a sign that maybe the United States wasn't going to be there should something bad happen between Russia and Ukraine?” Connolly asked.

“It seems plausible,” Perryman agreed.

Finally, in light of the right wing’s frequent fearmongering over nuclear war and Iran, Connolly gave everyone watching the hearing a quick history lesson.

Connolly: Iran and nuclear weapons: Was there not an agreement that the United States actually led that involved Russia and China, Europe and Iran, to limit nuclear weapon production in Iran?

Perryman: There was a historic agreement.

Connolly: And was it working?

Perryman: Yes.

Connolly: In all respects?

Perryman: I believe so.

Connolly: Inspected by IAEA [the International Atomic Energy Agency] and the Trump administration, and certified by both.

Perryman: Yes.

Connolly: Is that correct? And what happened to that treaty?

Perryman: President Trump pulled out.

Connolly:  And has Iran been less active in producing nuclear weapons, or more?

Perryman: Iran is now a greater threat because of that failure.

Connolly: So much for efficacy. Just thought I'd revisit that revisionist history.

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Comer seems to have found a novel way to waste taxpayer money: using his position as chairman of the Accountability and Oversight Committee to nakedly campaign against the Biden-Harris administration and prop up Trump’s dogged quest to return to the White House.

If Thursday’s display was any indication, this latest effort will be about as effective as Comer’s last set of bogus hearings.

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Harris could defy history. Just 1 sitting VP has won the presidency since 1836

Posted on by Associated Press

As Vice President Kamala Harris begins her fall campaign for the White House, she can look to history and hope for better luck than others in her position who have tried the same.

Since 1836, only one sitting vice president, George H.W. Bush in 1988, has been elected to the White House. Among those who tried and failed were Richard Nixon in 1960, Hubert Humphrey in 1968 and Al Gore in 2000. All three lost in narrow elections shaped by issues ranging from war and scandal to crime and the subtleties of televised debates. But two other factors proved crucial for each vice president: whether the incumbent president was well-liked and whether the president and vice president enjoyed a productive relationship.

“You really do want those elements to come together,” says Julian Zelizer, a professor of history and public affairs at Princeton University. “If the person the vice president is working for is popular, that means people like what he’s doing and you can gain from that. And you need to have the two principals working together.”

In 1988, Bush easily defeated Democrat Michael Dukakis, the Massachusetts governor whom Republicans labeled as ineffectual and out of touch. Bush was otherwise helped by a solid economy, the easing of Cold War tensions and some rare luck for a vice president. President Ronald Reagan's approval ratings rose through much of the year after falling sharply in the wake of the 1986-87 Iran-Contra scandal, and Reagan and Bush worked well together during the campaign. Reagan openly backed his vice president, who had run against him in the 1980 primaries. He praised Bush at the Republican convention as an engaged and invaluable partner, appeared with him at a California rally and spoke at gatherings in Michigan, New Jersey and Missouri.

President George H.W. Bush

“Reagan was not a man to hold grudges,” said historian-journalist Jonathan Darman. “And Bush did a good job of navigating the complexity of their relationship while he was vice president.”

Past vice presidents who ran

When Gore ran in 2000, his advantages were similar to those enjoyed by George H.W. Bush. The economy was strong, the country was at peace and the president, Bill Clinton, had high approval ratings despite his recent impeachment over his affair with White House intern Monica Lewinsky.

Gore had worked closely with Clinton over the previous eight years, but the scandal led to enduring tensions between them. He minimized the president’s presence during the campaign and pronounced himself “my own man” during his acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention. Commentators would cite his distance from Clinton as a setback in a historically close race, decided by a margin of fewer than 1,000 votes in Florida.

“Instead of finding a way to embrace the accomplishments of the Clinton administration, Gore ran away from Clinton as fast as his legs could carry him,” Slate's Jacob Weisberg wrote soon after the election.

Like Gore, Nixon could not — or would not — capitalize on the incumbent Dwight Eisenhower's popularity. In 1960, Eisenhower was still so admired as he neared the end of his second term that Nixon's opponent, Democrat John F. Kennedy, feared the president's active support would prove critical. But Eisenhower and Nixon had a complicated relationship dating back to when Eisenhower ran eight years earlier. He had chosen Nixon as his running mate, but nearly dropped him because of the so-called Checkers scandal, in which Nixon was accused of misusing funds donated by political backers.

Nixon was more than 20 years younger than Eisenhower, the victorious World War II commander who often looked upon his vice president as a junior officer, according to Nixon biographer John A. Farrell. At the end of a summer press conference in 1960, Eisenhower was asked if he could cite Nixon's influence on any important decision. He answered, “If you give me a week, I might think of one." Meanwhile, Nixon was reluctant to have Eisenhower campaign, out of a desire to forge his own path, and, allegedly, out of concern for the 70-year-old president.

“Nixon very much wanted to be his own man,” says Farrell, whose prize-winning “Richard Nixon" was published in 2017. “He always said he was worried about Eisenhower's health, but there are also anecdotes that Eisenhower was chafing at the bit. Both could be true.”

Nixon's luck changed when he ran eight years later against Lyndon B. Johnson's vice president. No vice president was more entrapped by his predecessor than Hubert Humphrey, whose candidacy was only possible because Johnson decided not to seek reelection.

Humphrey faced challenges within the party from the anti-war candidates Eugene McCarthy and Robert F. Kennedy (who was assassinated in June 1968 after winning the California primary) and was tied to Johnson's divisive, hawkish stance.

Humphrey privately advocated a less hardline approach to the war, but Johnson intimidated him into silence and he trailed Nixon badly in many polls. Only in the fall did Humphrey diverge and call for a bombing halt with North Vietnam. The vice president rallied, but ended up losing the popular vote by less than a percentage point while falling short more decisively in the Electoral College.

“Johnson did catastrophic damage to Humphrey, in my opinion,” says Boston Globe columnist Michael Cohen, author of a book on the 1968 election, “American Carnage.”

How does Harris fare?

Like Johnson, President Joe Biden declared he wouldn’t seek a new term less than a year before Election Day, though he waited much longer in the cycle than Johnson did. Unlike Humphrey, Harris quickly consolidated Democratic support and accepted her party’s nomination at an uplifting convention that concluded without significant damage from protests, unlike the violence-marred 1968 event in the same city, Chicago.

Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris

In an AP-NORC survey conducted in July, after Biden dropped out of the race, about 4 in 10 Americans approved of his performance as president, roughly where his approval numbers have stood since the summer of 2021 and comparable to those of the Republican nominee, Donald Trump. Eisenhower, Reagan and Clinton frequently held higher approval ratings than Biden, although all served in less polarized eras.

Harris wants to succeed a president who himself served as vice president and ran for president, four years later. President Barack Obama discouraged Biden from seeking election in 2016 and waited to endorse Biden in 2020 until the crowded Democratic primary field was clear.

“Obama became an enthusiastic backer, which helped unify the party at a time when Biden’s record on race in the 1990s, including his support for the crime bill, was fueling doubts among young progressive voters,” Biden biographer Evan Osnos says. “Obama’s endorsement of Biden was about more than his candidacy; it was about his character, and that proved to be important.”

As president, Biden has worked to include Harris on his major policy calls and conversations with foreign leaders. He’s pledged to be Harris’ top campaign volunteer and to do whatever she asks of him for her election, though aides are still determining where the still-unpopular president would best be utilized. On Labor Day, Biden and Harris will appear together in Pittsburgh for a campaign event in a key swing state, Pennsylvania.

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Biden will discuss his legacy—and why Harris must continue it—in speech

Posted on by Associated Press

Even though President Joe Biden won't be on the ballot this November, voters still will be weighing his legacy.

As Vice President Kamala Harris moves to take his place as the Democratic standard-bearer, Biden’s accomplishments remain very much at risk should Republican Donald Trump prevail.

How Biden’s single term and his decision to step aside are remembered will be intertwined with Harris’ electoral success in November, particularly as the vice president runs tightly on the achievements of the Biden administration.

Biden will have an opportunity to make a case for his legacy—sweeping domestic legislation, renewal of alliances abroad, defense of democracy—on Wednesday night when he delivers an Oval Office address about his decision to bow out of the race and “what lies ahead.”

And no matter how frustrated Biden is at being pushed aside by his party — and he’s plenty upset — he has too much at stake simply to wash his hands of this election.

Biden endorsed Harris shortly after he announced Sunday that he would end his candidacy, effectively giving her a head start over would-be challengers and helping to jumpstart a candidacy focused largely on continuing his own agenda.

“If she wins, then it will be confirmation that he did the right thing to fight against the threat that is Trump, and he will be seen as a legend on behalf of democracy,” said presidential historian Lindsay Chervinsky, executive director of the George Washington Presidential Library at Mount Vernon. “If she loses, I think there will be questions about, did he step down too late? Would the Democratic Party have been more effective if he had said he was not going to run?”

Similar what-ifs play out at the end of every presidency. But Biden’s defiance in the face of questions about his fitness for office and then his late submission to his party’s crisis of confidence heighten the stakes.

The last vice president to run for the top job was Democrat Al Gore, who sought to distance himself from President Bill Clinton during the 2000 campaign after the president's affair with a White House intern and subsequent impeachment.

Harris, in contrast, has spent the better part of the last three years praising Biden’s doings—meaning any attempt to now distance herself would be difficult to explain. And she has to rely on the Biden political operation she inherited to win the election with just over 100 days to go before polls close.

Speaking to campaign staff on Monday, Harris said Biden's legacy of accomplishment "just over the last three and a half years is unmatched in modern history.”

Vice President Kamala Harris and President Joe Biden in 2021

Trump and his allies, for their part, were eager to tie Harris to Biden’s record even before the president left the race—and not in a good way.

One campaign email to supporters declared “KAMALA HARRIS IS BIDEN 2.0 – Kamala Harris owns Joe Biden’s terrible record because it is her record as well,” calling out high inflation and border policies, among other things.

Biden this week promised the staffers of his former campaign that he was still “going to be on the road” as he handed off the reins of the organization to Harris, adding, “I’m not going anywhere.”

His advisers say he intends to hold campaign events and fundraisers benefiting Harris, albeit at a far slower pace than had he remained on the ballot himself.

Harris advisers will ultimately have to decide how to deploy the president, whose popularity sagged as voters on both sides of the aisle questioned his fitness for office.

The president’s allies insist that no matter what, Biden’s place in the history books is intact.

Biden's win in 2020 "was that election that protected us from a Donald Trump presidency,” said Rep. Steven Horsford, chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus. “Yes, we have to do it again this November. But had Donald Trump been in office another four years, the damage, the destruction, the decay of our democracy would’ve gone even further.”

Matt Bennett, co-founder of the center-left think tank Third Way, predicted there will be a difference between short-term recollections of Biden and his legacy if Democrats lose in November.

“It is true that if we lose, that will cloud things for him in the near-term” because Democrats will have to confront Trump, Bennett said. “In the long term, when history judges Biden, they’ll look at him on his own terms. They will judge him for what he did or did not do as president, and they will judge him very favorably.”

Biden’s decision to end his candidacy buoyed the spirits of congressional Democrats who had been fretting that the incumbent president would drag down their prospects of retaining the Senate and retaking the House. An all-Republican Washington would threaten to do even more damage to Biden’s legacy.

Already, congressional Republicans have tried to unravel pieces of the Inflation Reduction Act, a central Biden achievement that was passed on party lines in 2022. And they could succeed next year, with a President Trump waiting to sign a repeal into law.

GOP lawmakers could also vote to reverse key federal regulations that arrived later in the Biden administration.

“If the Republicans get dual majorities, they’re going to claw back as much as they can, they’re going to undo as much as they can and not only will that be a disaster for America and the world, it’ll be really bad for the Biden legacy," Bennett said.

Biden aides point to the thus-far seamless nature of Harris’ takeover of his political apparatus as evidenced that the president has set up his vice president to successfully run on their shared record. But the ultimate test of that organization will come in November.

No one will be cheering her on more than the president.

As Biden said to Harris: “I’m watching you, kid."

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House GOP sure wasted a lot of America’s time and money on Biden

Posted on by Mark Sumner

Republicans have wasted so much: It’s not just the carloads of “Let’s Go Brandon!” merch now on its way to landfills, it’s a huge amount of time and money that is owed directly to Americans. As soon as they gained a small majority—and once they were past the first round of follies in naming a speaker—Republicans got right on their No. 1 priority.

That priority wasn’t passing legislation to help people. They've been one of the least effective Congress in history. Instead, they jumped right into the most important task of all modern Republicans: Showing their loyalty to Donald Trump by launching unfounded attacks on his opponents. 

In the House, that meant not one, not two, but three simultaneous investigations into everything Biden. A car loan, his son's private parts, anything was fodder for a mill meant to crank out a never-ending stream of Biden "scandal."

All of this is completely worthless to the country. Now it’s not even useful to Trump.

The Republican grovel fest, headed up by Reps. James Comer and Jim Jordan, was ridiculous from the outset. 

There was the fake FBI document produced by a Russian mole whose repeated claims were originally pushed in 2019 by Rudy Giuliani and were debunked almost as soon as they appeared. That hasn’t stopped Jordan from repeating these easily disproved lies and pretending to seriously investigate Biden’s actions in helping to get rid of a corrupt official. 

Meanwhile, Comer was busy trying to prove that Biden was the recipient of money from China, talking up a witness who could prove everything if Republicans could find him. Comer went after Hunter Biden for paying back a small loan when Biden wasn’t even in office. Then there was a small personal loan to his brother, also while Biden wasn’t in office. In the end, they turned on Attorney General Merrick Garland when they could find no reason to impeach Biden. 

That was the biggest problem for these Republicans: Biden hadn't done anything wrong. But that didn't stop them from crowing over every false claim as if it were proof that Biden was the godfather of the "Biden crime family." A crime family that is somehow so huge and corrupt and has netted Biden a beach home that isn’t even on the beach rather than towers full of golden targets. 

Efforts to generate support for a Biden impeachment ran out of steam last fall, so Republicans were never able to present to Trump that “see, he was impeached too!” present they were so anxious to deliver. By spring, Republicans were looking for some way to escape this whole pointless exercise.

And now ... all of it is a waste. Republicans loved to complain about how much former FBI Director Robert Mueller spent investigating Trump’s connections with Russia, but they haven’t been as quick to post how much they’ve spent investigating Biden to absolutely no purpose. 

Want to see how important it really was? Just watch how quickly Republicans drop these investigations for vital hearings over plastic straws and whether or not Harris was too tough on crime.

But, even before Biden withdrew from the election, this was already a waste. For everything they had done, House Republicans never laid a finger on Biden. Nothing stuck to Biden because it was all malarkey.

But they did show that they were completely under Trump's control so ... job well done.

RELATED STORIES:

Latest GOP conspiracy theory: Biden’s doctor is part of the ‘crime family’

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A rogue Supreme Court awaits its king

Posted on by Mark Sumner

Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts admonished liberal members of the court in his opinion that vastly expanded the idea of presidential immunity on Monday. The court’s three liberal members were only “fear mongering on the basis of extreme hypotheticals,” he wrote.

That finger-wag toward terrified, dissenting justices came only a few hours after Donald Trump signaled his desire for “televised military tribunals” that would try former Rep. Liz Cheney for treason. 

On call with Biden-Harris campaign, Rep. Dan Goldman (D-N.Y.) says SCOTUS' decision on presidential immunity means a Trump re-election isn't just the biggest threat to democracy in a generation. "It's far and away the biggest threat since the Civil War."

— Jennifer Bendery (@jbendery) July 1, 2024

In less than a week, the Supreme Court has issued a string of rulings that demolish the ability of the government to regulate safety, labor, and the environment. Effectively, they’ve made being homeless illegal and being a Trump insurrectionist perfectly fine. And now they’ve presented a vast expansion of presidential power that exceeds the greatest dreams of Richard Nixon. 

Everything that the Supreme Court has done in these rulings paves the way for Trump and his allies’ Project 2025 to complete the purge of democracy that this court has already begun. And it all makes defeating Trump infinitely more important.

There was a time when Roberts was seen as a moderating voice on the Supreme Court, as someone who was concerned about the court being accused of partisanship, and who was willing to ally with the court’s more liberal elements to keep a new conservative majority under control. But the court-watchers who made such predictions could not have been more wrong.

Despite his odes to stare decisis, Roberts has consistently voted to overturn long-standing precedent. Since gaining the support of three Trump-appointed radicals, Roberts has become a reliable member of a series of 6-3 decisions that have redefined the traditional role of the three branches of government. 

In the decision on presidential immunity, Roberts is trying to dismiss the dissents of the three remaining liberal judges as overblown, but if anything, they are a subdued response to this ruling. 

  • The ruling extends absolute immunity to anything that falls within the “‘outer perimeter’ of the President’s official responsibilities, covering actions so long as they are ‘not manifestly or palpably beyond [his] authority,’” Roberts writes.

  • In determining whether an act is official, “courts may not inquire into the President’s motives.”

  • Also, courts can’t “deem an action unofficial merely because it allegedly violates a generally applicable law.”

If you’re having trouble seeing how anyone is permitted to question any action of the president under this ruling, you’re not the only one.

As Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson writes in her dissent, “Departing from the traditional model of individual accountability, the majority has concocted something entirely different: a Presidential accountability model that creates immunity—an exemption from criminal law—applicable only to the most powerful official in our Government.” She makes it clear that the court creates a “multilayered, multifaceted threshold” that would have to be cleared to charge a president under any circumstance, meaning that “no matter how well documented or heinous the criminal act might be,” it can still be dismissed.

And when it comes to the theoretical example that was raised during oral arguments, yes, “a hypothetical President who admits to having ordered the assassinations of his political rivals or critics” or who “indisputably instigates an unsuccessful coup” still has “a fair shot at getting immunity” for those actions.

Don't tell me the conservative justices don't believe in abortion rights. They are currently trying to abort democracy in the 992nd trimester. And if they get Trump onto the throne they’ve built, the odds of ever finding America again are slim to none.

President Joe Biden may be the last remaining politician in Washington who maintains endless respect for the institutions we have inherited and the network of implicit agreements that kept our democracy patched together over two centuries. As recently as a year ago, he rejected the idea of expanding the number of justices or taking other actions to restrain a court veering dangerously away from its traditional role.

Biden needs to reconsider. The damage this court has done, in just a matter of days, is inestimable, and those horrific decisions are stacked on top of years of increasingly nonsensical rulings, including the overturning of Roe v. Wade. 

This is a highly partisan court whose primary interest is in enacting a radical MAGA agenda. It’s also a court that has repeatedly made clear that it holds itself above the law and has nothing but contempt for anyone trying to hold it accountable. Now it wants to extend that privilege to Trump.

This court must be tamed. But most of all, this court must be prevented from joining the man whose throne they have been preparing. This nation can’t survive this court and Donald Trump. 

Joe Biden is going to have to beat them both. And we’re going to have to help him.

"If Joe Biden is not elected in November, we will not have a democracy that we have known for 250 years," says Goldman, who led the first House impeachment investigation into Trump in 2019.

— Jennifer Bendery (@jbendery) July 1, 2024

VP hopeful JD Vance called Trump ‘America’s Hitler.’ What changed?

Posted on by Aldous J Pennyfarthing

If you want to be happy in your relationship, find someone who looks at you the way Sen. J.D. Vance looks at Donald Trump after 34 felony convictions, a monthslong coup plot, a deadly insurrection, multiple stolen top secret documents, and a $354 million business fraud judgment. And let’s not forget an $83 million sexual abuse/defamation judgment and endless games of “would you rather?” involving shark attacks and Joe Biden’s woke, America-destroying flotilla of Evil pleasure boats.

As we now know, Vance is among the hopefuls vying to serve as Trump’s next mewling toady/vice president/volcano sacrifice, and so he’s sticking to the Trump bandwagon like white on Mike Pence. But he wasn’t always a squealing MAGA-phone.

Of course, Vance is currently one of Trump’s staunchest defenders. He pretended to be outraged by Trump’s recent criminal conviction and is so hopelessly debauched he’s even trying to claim Donald Trump Jr. is a real boy. (He recently xweeted that Don Jr. is “one of the best people I’ve met in politics.” Which is a little like saying convicted murderer Ed Gein was a widely respected giant in the textile industry.) 

But as with many Republicans, Vance’s Trump-focused sycophancy represents a stark departure from the way he used to describe America’s Hitler. For instance, he once worried that Trump, if elected, could turn out to be “America’s Hitler.”

Well, now, as the author of “Hillbilly Elegy”—a book Trump has totally read and/or forced his Diet Coke gofer to search through for mentions of his name—seeks the inside track to the GOP VP nomination, CNN is reporting that Vance’s past criticism of Trump was even “more widespread and scathing than previously known.”

CNN:

A majority of the newly uncovered social media activity dates from the last five months of the 2016 presidential campaign. They include Vance liking a number of anti-Trump posts on Twitter, including those criticizing Trump’s immigration policies, acknowledging antisemitism from Trump supporters, questioning the integrity of voting for Trump over Clinton and even raising concerns over Trump having access to the country’s nuclear codes as president.

In February 2016, Vance liked a tweet featuring a photo of Trump, two women and O.J. Simpson with the caption, “Here is an old picture of one of USA’s most hated, villainous, douchey celebs. Also in picture: OJ Simpson.”

[...]

While promoting his memoir and appearing on news programs in 2016, Vance liked a series of tweets calling then-candidate Trump a “monster” and a “nemesis of the GOP.” He also liked a tweet acknowledging “threats and derogatory terms Trump supporters hurl at Jews.” He even liked a tweet from CNN anchor Jake Tapper criticizing Trump’s tweet about a woman’s appearance amidst then-first lady Melania Trump’s campaign against cyberbullying.

And that’s not all! According to CNN’s review, during the roiling “Access Hollywood” controversy prior to the 2016 election, Vance also liked a tweet that read, “Maybe the Central Park 5 could take out a full-page ad to condemn the coddling of thug real estate barons who commit serial sexual assault,” referring to Trump’s admission on tape that he, well, commits serial sexual assault.

In a 2016 interview with Charlie Rose, Vance was particularly blunt about Trump’s shit-flinging howler monkey of a political career: “I’m a Never Trump guy,” he said. “I never liked him.” And in another 2016 tweet, Vance simply stated, in reference to Trump, “My god what an idiot.”

So what happened? Did the scales suddenly fall from this Yale Law School graduate’s eyes, allowing him to see that, whatever Trump’s flaws, we desperately need a leader with the courage to address the twin Damoclean scimitars of killer boat batteries and whale-murdering windmills?

Of course not. Vance clearly has the smarts to know Trump is an anti-democratic disaster for this country. He just doesn’t have the courage to call it out. Which, these days, simply means he’s an elected Republican.

The adults who often restrained Trump during his first go-around have long since left the building, and his next administration would be marked by a nonstop cavalcade of Stephen Millers and J.D. Vances: a toxic mix of true believers and ass-kissers who either push Trump to be more extreme and cruel, or simply go along with any fool thing he wants to do, whether legal or not.

Trump’s past statements and actions—as well as his exhaustively documented character flaws—make it clear that he’ll accept nothing less than his VP pick’s groveling gratitude and immortal soul, so Trump’s running mate is bound to be marginally less dignified no matter what anyone says or does. But that doesn’t mean elected Republicans who clearly know better need to go along with this sham. Let Trump choose between Mike Lindell or among the small handful of other prominent Republicans who actually believe him.

In fact, every formerly democracy-believing Republican—whether they’re up for the VP slot or not—should be pushing back on Trump at every opportunity.

But that is not the case. This unblinking loyalty is a huge problem, of course, because more than any other president—or elected official, for that matter—Trump needs people around him to push back on his worst impulses. We’ve seen credible reporting that Trump wanted to nuke a hurricane; build a moat at the border with alligators in it; shoot migrants in the legs; attack Mexico and North Korea while trying to blame it on someone else; shoot Americans protesting the murder of George Floyd; and more.

Meanwhile, his fascist plans for the future—which he proudly shared during an April Time magazine interview—augur an existential American crisis. Unless we stop him.

Sadly, any remaining hopes for a Republican come-to-Jesus moment are clearly misplaced. Even Sen. Mitch McConnell, who unequivocally blamed Trump for the “disgraceful” acts that led to the deadly Jan. 6 Capitol riot, has now declared his support for the ocher hoaxer. 

The best you’ll find by way of GOP pushback these days is Sen. Lisa Murkowski essentially saying she wouldn’t attend Trump’s Thursday meeting with Republican senators because she’s maybe-probably washing her hair.

Lisa Murkowski not going to Trump meeting with GOP senators on Thursday. “I have a conflict,” she said. She’s one of the handful of GOP senators who haven’t endorsed Trump — and voted to convict him in impeachment trial after Jan. 6

— Manu Raju (@mkraju) June 11, 2024

Of course, rescuing the country from a wannabe tyrant is a heavy lift—and we’re being forced to do this shit for the second time in four years—but as Vance, et al., have made abundantly clear, we can expect no help from the Grand Old Party, because they’ve long since flushed their dignity in exchange for a seat at the incorrigible kids’ table.

So it’s up to the rest of us—i.e., Democrats, independents, and non-MAGA Republicans—to save democracy. Again.

It sure would be nice to get a helping hand from a Republican not named Liz Cheney or Adam Kinzinger for once, but as a wise old owl turd once said, you go to war with the army you have, not the army you might want. 

We’ve done this before, and we’ll do it again. Believe it. And, please, do whatever you can in your power to make it so.

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Hunter Biden is convicted, but the GOP is still big mad

Posted on by Joan McCarter

You might think that Republicans would be thrilled that there’s now a convicted felon in the Biden family, but it’s still not enough for them. From wanting to take down the rest of the “Biden crime family” to calling Hunter’s conviction a Justice Department ploy to make it look like there’s not a “two-tiered system of justice,” the GOP is still angry and thirsting for revenge for Donald Trump’s conviction on 34 felonies.

Rep. James Comer of Kentucky, who can’t stop hilariously failing to impeach President Joe Biden, kicks it off with a tweet:

🚨STATEMENT🚨 Hunter Biden’s sweetheart plea deal was smoked out after scrutiny by a federal judge. Today’s verdict is a step toward accountability but until the Department of Justice investigates everyone involved in the Bidens’ corrupt influence peddling schemes that generated…

— Rep. James Comer (@RepJamesComer) June 11, 2024

Comer’s commentary reflects the sentiments of the Trump campaign. 

“Crooked Joe Biden’s reign over the Biden Family Criminal Empire is all coming to an end on November 5th, and never again will a Biden sell government access for personal profit. As for Hunter, we wish him well in his recovery and legal affairs,” a Trump campaign spokesperson said in a statement. 

But it wasn’t long until the campaign retracted its statement and reissued it without the well wishes for Hunter.

The “Biden crime family” and demands for prosecutions are a major theme among the GOP. 

“Now, it’s time to bring Hunter and the Biden Crime Family to justice for the allegations of influence peddling,” Rep. Jeff Duncan of South Carolina tweeted.

“Hunter Biden’s firearm conviction is simply a smokescreen,” says Rep. Jim Banks of Indiana. “What I'm concerned about is how Joe, Hunter, and James Biden have been enriching themselves by trading away America's interests to our enemies.”

On the other hand, Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri is accusing the DOJ for not prosecuting Hunter hard enough. 

“Never forget DOJ tried to avoid this trial & verdict by giving Hunter a sweetheart plea deal. Until the judge exposed them,” he tweeted.

Then there’s the conspiracy theorists, like Stephen Miller, who accused the DOJ of “running election interference for Joe Biden.”

“That’s why DOJ did NOT charge Hunter with being an unregistered foreign agent (FARA) or any crime connected with foreign corruption. Why? Because all the evidence would lead back to JOE,” he tweeted.

Sen. Mike Lee of Utah, added to that, tweeting: “And yet Dems will now point to Hunter’s conviction as evidence that ‘there’s no lawfare.’” 

But Rep. Andrew Clyde of Georgia takes the cake for political paranoia: 

Hunter Biden’s guilty verdict is nothing more than the Left’s attempt to create the illusion of equal justice. Don’t fall for it.

— Rep. Andrew Clyde (@Rep_Clyde) June 11, 2024

There’s no small amount of cognitive dissonance about the rule of law in this crowd. Like Rep. Jason Smith of Missouri, who intoned that “today’s verdict is a step towards ensuring equal application of the law, regardless of one's last name.”

Except, of course, for the equal application of the law to someone named Trump. 

“The fix was in for this fake ‘trial’ - the George Soros-backed DA and a leftist judge worked to tilt the scales of justice against President Trump,” Smith tweeted. 

Then there’s the pathetic toadying for Trump from Freedom Caucus Chair Bob Good. 

“Hunter Biden is convicted of an actual crime. Donald Trump was railroaded by a political prosecutor and a biased judge,” Good tweeted. 

Trump has endorsed Good’s primary opponent. 

Yet no one in the GOP is complaining about a "rigged jury" or a “corrupt judge” in Hunter’s conviction. And neither are the Democrats.

“I've not heard a single Democrat anywhere in the country cry fraud, cry, fixed, cry, rigged, cry, kangaroo court or any of the many epithets that our colleagues have mobilized against the U.S. Department of Justice and our federal court system,” Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland said. 

Similarly, Biden has responded to the conviction with a dignified and loving statement in support of his son. 

"Jill and I love our son, and we are so proud of the man he is today,” Biden said. “So many families who have had loved ones battle addiction understand the feeling of pride seeing someone you love come out the other side and be so strong and resilient in recovery.”

As for the verdict? 

“I will accept the outcome of this case and will continue to respect the judicial process as Hunter considers an appeal,” Biden said.

Donald Trump was convicted on 34 counts of falsifying business records on May 30. What are potential voters saying about this historic news? And what is the Biden-Harris campaign doing now that the “teflon Don" is no more?

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New study finds one-third of Congress is now iffy on democracy

Posted on by Aldous J Pennyfarthing

If your doctor diagnoses you with cancer, and then in the next breath tells you it’s nothing to worry about because eventually the cancer will get tired of making new cells and decide to leave on its own, you should probably get a new doctor. Because if Donald Trump is elected president again, that doctor will be appointed head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and he’ll no longer have time for you anyway.

But—also!—cancer is bad, and expecting it to leave on its own is perhaps the most fatuous thing one can do as a human, apart from making a guy who thinks Hitler did “a lot of good things” president—again.

And yet here we are. Three and a half years removed from President Joe Biden’s victory in a free and fair election, and our country and Congress are riddled with cancer. And there’s a nonzero chance the patient—the world’s preeminent democracy—will die. 

That’s by no means a foregone conclusion, of course, but as with actual cancer, the patient is getting sicker by the day, and lots of people who know better are just standing around watching it happen. Shockingly, these people now include roughly one-third of our Congress.

As The Associated Press reports:

As Trump makes a comeback bid to return to power, Republicans in Congress have become even more likely to cast doubts on Biden’s victory or deny it was legitimate, a political turnaround that allows his false claims of fraud to linger and lays the groundwork to potentially challenge the results in 2024.

A new report released Tuesday by States United Action, a group that tracks election deniers, said nearly one-third of the lawmakers in Congress supported in some way Trump’s bid to overturn the 2020 results or otherwise cast doubt on the reliability of elections. Several more are hoping to join them, running for election this year to the House and Senate.

More specifically, States United Action found that 170 representatives and senators of the total 535 Congress members are election deniers of some kind. Meanwhile, the group determined that two new Senate candidates and 17 new House candidates fall into the same category. And the situation is even more dire if you look at the Republican National Committee, which is now in the clutches of Trump lackeys: Lara Trump, Trump’s daughter-in-law, and prominent election denier Michael Whatley. (In fact, the RNC is now explicitly asking job candidates if they believe the 2020 election was stolen. What do you suppose happens if they say no?)

While boiling frog syndrome certainly applies here—we’ve gotten so used to election denial from these scoundrels it barely registers anymore—we’re actually a bit more like humans sitting in a hot tub inhaling psychedelic toad venom like it’s strawberry Fun Dip. Because I don’t know about you, but to me the past three years feel more like a hallucination than history—though, unlike congressional Republicans, we don’t have the luxury of denying reality.

As the AP points out, it’s particularly concerning that Congress members, of all people, are abandoning democracy, considering their traditional role in upholding it: 

The issue is particularly stark for Congress given its constitutional role as the final arbiter of the validity of a presidential election. It counts the results from the Electoral College, as it set out to do on Jan. 6, 2021, a date now etched in history because of the violent assault on the U.S. Capitol by a pro-Trump mob.

Of course, as we all know, the clear threat Trump poses to democracy and the rule of law could have been dealt with immediately after Trump had exhausted his legal remedies for challenging the election results. In a healthy, well-functioning democracy, members of both major parties would have stood arm in arm in opposition to Trump’s outrageous attacks on the election. Republicans in Congress would have denounced Trump’s baseless claims from the outset, making it abundantly clear that he was not just lying but corroding the very foundations of our country.

Instead, we got Republican officials spewing nonsense like, “What is the downside for humoring him for this little bit of time? No one seriously thinks the results will change. He went golfing this weekend. It’s not like he’s plotting how to prevent Joe Biden from taking power on Jan. 20. He’s tweeting about filing some lawsuits, those lawsuits will fail, then he’ll tweet some more about how the election was stolen, and then he’ll leave.”

Ah, the classics.

Of course, scores of Republicans who might have been appalled or felt chastened by Trump’s brazen coup attempt are now basking in the beatific glow of Trump’s gooey orange id. In fact, for roughly half of Congress, fascism has become tres chic. 

This is exactly why you cut the cancer out as soon as it’s identified. Because if you don’t, you could sprout a tumor that looks unnervingly like J.D. Vance.

Perhaps reasoning that it’s better to be vice president than sew hair onto Trumpy Bears in a work camp for 18 hours a day, Republican vice president hopefuls are now auditioning for the role by telling the feral leader of a cult of personality exactly what he wants to hear.

Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida is the latest Republican to telegraph his intention to embrace Trump’s bullshit if and when the ocher abomination face-plants in November. On Sunday, he told Kristen Welker of “Meet the Press” that he wouldn’t commit to accepting the results of the 2024 election, because they could end up being “unfair.” 

Hmm, what are the chances Trump will decide the election was stolen if he loses: 100% or 110%?

Rubio joins other vice president hopefuls whose election denialism has been especially vociferous. They include Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York, who in January refused to commit to certifying the 2024 election results if they went against Trump; Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, who, when asked if he would accept the 2024 election results, said, “At the end of the day, the 47th president of the United States will be President Donald Trump”; and South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, who has refused to acknowledge that former Vice President Mike Pence did the right thing in certifying the 2024 election. (Come on now, Governor! That dog won’t hunt. And not just because you repeatedly shot it in the face.)

Of course, it’s telling how defensive they all get when asked these questions, almost as if they know they’re doing the devil’s work.

Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky knew when he excoriated Trump over his actions on Jan. 6 but refused to back a conviction in his impeachment. Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina knew when he said “count me out, enough is enough” in the immediate aftermath of Trump’s bumbling coup. Former Attorney General Bill Barr knew when he determined Trump was making up stories about the 2020 election to justify a government takeover.

And yet all three of these self-proclaimed patriots have endorsed this cancer’s return to Washington. Then again, Trump is a wildly charismatic, larger-than-life character with a smile that can light up a roomful of tiki torches.

Of course, anyone with three minutes to spare can quickly determine that Trump had always planned to claim the election was stolen if he lost. In fact, Axios reported that in the days before the election.

Behind the scenes: Trump has privately talked through this scenario in some detail in the last few weeks, describing plans to walk up to a podium on election night and declare he has won.

  • For this to happen, his allies expect he would need to either win or have commanding leads in Ohio, Florida, North Carolina, Texas, Iowa, Arizona, and Georgia.

Why it matters: Trump's team is preparing to falsely claim that mail-in ballots counted after Nov. 3—a legitimate count expected to favor Democrats—are evidence of election fraud.

Meanwhile, not a shred of credible evidence has ever surfaced to suggest the election was stolen on Biden’s behalf. Though we’ve seen lots of absurd and completely discredited “evidence”—evidence that has so far cost Fox News $787 million and Rudy “Just Say We Won” Giuliani $148 million. That should have definitely proved to all of these independent thinkers that Trump was systematically undermining global democracy so he wouldn’t feel like the colossal loser he actually is.

In other words, enough is enough. 

We were right to be alarmed by Trump’s rhetoric, and those who thought it was okay to “humor” Trump, or to fail to hold him accountable after Jan. 6 (thanks, Mitch), were disastrously wrong. If we get through this fraught period in our history, we need to repair our faith and trust in democracy, which includes calling out fascist rhetoric wherever we see it. Because this slippery dope has already brought us dangerously close to the brink.

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