One more small step downward for Donald Trump, one more giant leap into the abyss for the Republican party. And they deserve it. The GOP suffers from a fatal addiction to a certain orange-tinted, hairsprayed, girdled and diapered candidate that they just can’t seem to quit. So, if it ends up killing them, they can’t say that they weren’t warned, over and over and over again.
Trump was on Fox News on Sunday telling Maria Bartiromo a great many things. He’s predicting a terrorist attack, which is something he always predicts. It’s pretty much stock material in all of his public appearances, the next terrorist attack, along with warning about the next world war, whether it’s II, III, or IV, we’ve lost track. But he did predict a changeover in top personnel at the RNC and that comment caught the eye of quite a lot of people.
"I have nothing to do with the RNC."
Now let me tell you how I'm going to make them fire the person I forced them to install so that I could pilfer their cash reserves for my legal bills.
— Meal (@mealfitforaking) February 4, 2024
Former President Trump, in a stunning public rebuke of a longtime ally, suggested on Fox News today that RNC chair Ronna McDaniel should get the boot, Axios’ Alex Thompson and Erin Doherty report.
- The RNC reported this week that it had its worst fundraising year in almost a decade last year — entering 2024 with just $8 million in cash.
Why it matters: It’s a sign of Trump flexing his muscle as the de facto head of the Republican Party, even though the soonest he could clinch the nomination is March.
- The comments also reflect growing friction between Trump and the RNC, even as McDaniel has faced criticism for publicly trying to push Nikki Haley out of the race to consolidate around Trump.
- A shakeup at the RNC would be extraordinary just five months before the Republican National Convention.
Driving the news: Trump distanced himself from McDaniel on Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures.”
- “You have to understand, I have nothing to do with the RNC, I’m separate,” Trump told host Maria Bartiromo.
- “I think she did great when she ran Michigan for me, I think she did OK initially in the RNC. I would say right now there will probably be some changes made,” Trump said when asked about McDaniel. […]
Zoom out: If Trump clinches the GOP nomination soon, the 2024 election could be the longest and most expensive election cycle in history.
- That’s after a 2020 campaign in which each side spent more than $1 billion among the campaigns and allied committees.
- The RNC got a boost in January 2024, reportedly raising $12 million.
- “The RNC is not only raising the necessary funds, but we’re making strategic investments early in battlegrounds to win up and down the ballot this fall,” RNC spokesperson Anna Kelly said.
Here’s the simple truth. If Trump was declared the party’s nominee, let’s say today (it won’t happen, but let’s just say) then he would gain the full access to the RNC’s database and fundraising apparatus. But Nikki Haley is still in the race and she says she’ll stay there through Super Tuesday. So that means that Trump can’t be crowned emperor until March.
But does Trump have until March? Because even tomorrow could be yet another horrific day for him financially. Judge Arthur Engoron will render a verdict at some point, possibly tomorrow, in the Trump Organization fraud trial. That verdict could be for $370 million — or more. That verdict, coupled with the E. Jean Carroll fine of $83.3 million, would possibly drain most, if not all, of Trump’s liquid assets. Plus, Trump and his family may be forever barred from doing business in New York State, a kind of corporate death penalty.
Trump knows he will get a lot more mileage out of all of this, sympathy wise, money wise, every which way you can go, if he’s already the Republican nominee. Then the GOP convention will just be a walk through ceremony. And it may go down that way in any event, if the RNC would decide to persuade Haley to quit.
The optics of this are bad any which way you cut it. Haley staying in the race drives Trump crazy (good) and it prevents him from getting the full support of the RNC behind him (also good.) But if the RNC moves to make him king — which Ronna McDaniel might try, for her own survival — then what will Haley do with that? Fold under? Or will she splinter the GOP even further by railing about both Trump and the Republican establishment?
There are no easy answers to any of this. This is the corner the Republicans painted themselves into, whether they saw it that way or not, back in 2016. This is the inevitable path that they embarked on. Everybody saw it but them. I well remember the headlines from 2016, all variations on Lindsey Graham’s prophecy about, “If we nominate Trump, he will destroy us and we will deserve it.” That began early on.
But somehow all of that was drowned out in the subsequent din of Trump winning and everybody going power mad.
The saga of Trump is Shakespearian in scope. Always has been. The moral of the story is that if you let power at any cost rule your life, this is where that bad decision making leads. You end up losing, bigly, over and over again.
Shakespearian?
He wrote comedies as well as tragedies, I’m betting that when this is all over, and he has lost, it will be viewed as a comedy.
Macbeth anyone?
I think ronna is a twit plain and simple. That said, I hope she flips off the mango moron and tells him to kiss her ass. She won’t because she is a groveling fool but if she did it’s be a better look for her.
We all need to do all we can to aggravate Traitor tot!
“Driving Trump crazy”? He is already there, ensconced in a palatial suite with gold plated toilets and attendants who scrub him down every morning with hoses, spray his entire body with deodorant and Old Spice, and insert his dentures. They draw lots to see who gets the short straw. And someone has to lace him into his Navy blue straight jacket. Then they shove him on stage where he rambles for 90 minutes in what actual.psychiatrists and psycho!hoists call ” word salad ” which is indicative of several mental.health issues,uncle schizophrenia and dementia.