Maybe cooler heads prevailed and convinced Donald Trump that the optics of having a gripe session at Mar-a-Lago, where he sat on the pity pot and cried about having the election stolen from him, were not good, when the rest of the country would be watching a prayer service commemorating the deaths of those who died in the insurrection January 6.
In all events, something moved him to cancel the Thursday press conference. Here’s the statement he put out, blaming somebody else as usual.
This is vintage Trump, the pure, unadulterated bullshit which only he can cobble together.
The press conference was originally intended as counter programming to the prayer service, as stated. So either somebody convinced him this was a really bad idea, or perhaps the news that broke earlier today about Sean Hannity being approached by the January 6 Committee is having some influence. Or, alternatively, maybe he doesn’t want to answer questions about being subpoenaed by the New York Attorney General’s office.
Who knows? This is Trumpty Dumpty we’re talking about. Anything goes.
Here’s a third theory: he was never going to do it. Breaking his word is as pathological as his lying. Just issuing the threat to make the fear and loathing junkies freak would have been enough. All in all, he’s out of good options.
I think there’s a fourth theory: He scheduled it on impulse as a Fuck You and then he thought about it later. As his “ghost writer” Tony Schwartz said, he can’t control his impulses. He has no filters.
Another theory: he found that there would be minimal media coverage. The big networks wouldn’t cover it, just Newsmax and OANN. Maybe Fox.
Unless I’m mistaken about the timing, the cancellation happened after the letter from the Jan. 6 Committee to Hannity was released.
Despite people at the WH including Wannabe Princess Ivanka urging him to go on TV and simply tell the rioters to disperse and go home he was having himself a merry old time watching the carnage. (Yes, I use that word deliberately) I also rather suspect that he didn’t appreciate staffers or even daughter dearest interrupting the good time he was having and let them know it. If you think about it that way, it’s possible that the messages from Hannity and the other assholes at Fox were never passed along to Trump, and he’s only now becoming aware of their feelings that day.
And he is PISSED!
I have no doubt Trump’s initial reaction was betrayal from some of his closest media allies. (“Somebody, PLEASE call Hannity!” Remember that moment?) That THEY were watching in horror and realized A) The insurrection was probably going to fail despite their efforts up to that point to stoke it, and B) the optics and reaction coming in from around the world were worse than they ever imagined in their wildest “What if it doesn’t work?” fears leading up to the attack on the Capitol.
About that first part…The failure after the breach of the Capitol to capture (and even kill) any Congress Critters at all is probably what kept Trump from issuing the Martial Law declaration, which might have been the signal to those who had weapons stashed across the river to have them brought over the bridge. And for Erik Prince’s special team (who surely had some serious stuff very close at hand) to kick things into high gear. All the questions being posed on the air and not by only American news outlets about where the fuck was the National Guard also played a role, and things simply went on too long and a lot of heroes inside the Capitol bought enough time that Trump chickened out on the Martial Law declaration. Ergo the whole thing was going to fail and those Fox folks were shitting their britches. Hell, Ruppert Murdoch (or his son Lachlan at least) was probably screaming at them to get in touch with Trump to call the whole thing off!
Now their pleadings (some of them – there’s probably more) but even worse some of the shit they said behind the scenes to help set up Jan. 6 are out there now. And Trump himself, if he didn’t know that day (or since) now knows they were BEGGING him to call the whole thing off. Seeing this stuff reported, and knowing how many people now know (and fearing what’s yet to be reported) had to have been a simultaneous gut-punch and kick in the nuts for Trump. Enough to knock him off his game, and being impulsive he probably decided to fall back and regroup for a couple of days.
I got two bucks that says we WILL hear something from him Thursday. Not the event he planned but he won’t be able to take not having any of the spotlight shining his way. He’ll figure out some way to stomp shit into what should be a solemn day of remembrance.
They probably told him that the prayer service would get higher ratings and rather than be embarrassed, he decided to take his ball and go home.
His “press releases” always look like they were written by a child.
He always has to throw in his stupid nicknames.
I swear, I have seen more eloquent writing from elementary school kids.