Nothing unspools Trump as much as: 1) Questions about how much money he actually has and 2) Longtime enablers in the charade - like his accountants - suddenly deciding not to play ball anymore. And, unhinged, he goes after the prosecutors - because he’s both angry and afraid.
All Trump’s got left, it seems, are personal attacks and claims of bias against the NYAG and the Manhattan DA. Nothing in this screed he just released amounts to much of an evidentiary defense one might expect from somebody ensnared in major financial fraud investigations.
And much of what Trump cites from Mazars is couched in Mazars’ own desire to essentially say: “Not a lot of GAAP here - we relied on Trump.”
Bonus point: Trump, almost 76, has spent *decades* conjuring billions of dollars of *brand value* he says adds to his wealth. But accountants don’t add intangible, squishy figures like that to net worth. Yet here’s Trump, insecure as ever about $$$, playing that old game again.
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Text messages between Fox hosts and Mark Meadows "crystallize with new specificity just how tightly Fox News and the White House were entwined during the Trump years, with many of the network’s top hosts serving as a Cable Cabinet of unofficial advisers." washingtonpost.com/politics/trump…
"The former president began embracing Sidney Powell — an attorney promoting Trump’s false claims of widespread voter fraud — and other election fabulists after seeing them on Dobbs’s show."
“These young producers who are in their mid-20s. They come out of the conservative movement, they‘ve never been in the government. They are presented with these reckless, fantastical accounts. And they believe them and put them on for ratings.”
"Those involved must be held accountable, and there is no higher priority for us at the Department of Justice," Garland said, "but a full accounting doesn't suddenly materialize."
Says DOJ has issued > 5,000 subpoenas/search warrants. Has 20,000 hours of video and 15TB of data
“We will defend our democratic institutions from attack, we will protect those who serve the public from violence...we will protect the cornerstone of our democracy—the right to every eligible citizen to cast a vote that counts."
Trump’s lawyer told a federal court that allowing Congress to subpoena financial records from former presidents and show them “to the whole world” is unfair -- overlooking that every president since Gerald Ford showed their taxes to the whole world. bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
“The more you let Congress do to a former president, the more leverage they have over a current president,” said Trump’s lawyer, Cameron Norris. “That threat would loom large over everything you’re doing.”
When you think having a low Covid case right now justifies tolerating all of the earlier hospitalizations and deaths you could have prevented when Covid was surging -- but chose not to *just to make a point.*
Ron DeSantis continues to respond to the Covid-19 crisis with political theatrics instead of constructive, rational public policy. On the absurd and dangerous things politicians do when they want to be president: bloomberg.com/opinion/articl…
"DeSantis has already tolerated an unnecessary and vicious surge in Covid-19 illnesses and deaths in Florida in the service of his ambitions, so there’s no stopping him now. But his appetites and ruthlessness shouldn’t be forgotten."
Here are the three reasons DeSantis has given for why he opposes vaccine mandates:
Members of Congress reportedly in touch with the White House and others about planning for the Jan. 6 insurrection:
- Marjorie Taylor Greene
- Paul Gosar
- Lauren Boebert
- Mo Brooks
- Madison Cawthorn
- Andy Biggs
- Louie Gohmert rollingstone.com/politics/polit…
“Gosar, who has been one of the most prominent defenders of the Jan. 6 rioters, allegedly took things a step further. Both sources say he dangled the possibility of a ‘blanket pardon’ in an unrelated ongoing investigation to encourage them to plan the protests.”
“Both sources also describe Trump’s White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows, as someone who played a major role in the conversations surrounding the protests on Jan. 6.”