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Greg Sargent Profile picture
@GregTSargent
Sep 5, 2024 • 8 tweets • 6 min read • Read on X
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It's a big deal that veteran journalist Mike Barnicle has now called out his media colleagues for failing to adequately cover Trump's visibly worsening mental state. It should spur a real discussion about how to do this, before it's too late. 1/

New piece
newrepublic.com/article/185622…
“We have a damaged, delusional, old man who might get reelected to the presidency," Mike Barnicle said on @Morning_Joe. He said the media doesn't really cover Trump's daily insanity as a window into his mental fitness for the presidency. This is right. 2/

newrepublic.com/article/185622…

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Some in the media will reject this, claiming they do cover Trump's crazier claims. But this misses the point. His mental unfitness for the presidency is *itself* the big story. It merits sustained scrutiny as a topic with its own intrinsic importance. 3/

newrepublic.com/article/185622…

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You can find some examples of reporting on Trump's mental state. But it's not remotely adequate. A lot of stuff gets overlooked entirely. Trump's deranged claims about gender at Moms for Liberty event were not adequately covered, as @mtomasky noted. 4/

newrepublic.com/article/185622…

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As @jbouie notes, the whole premise of Biden age coverage was that his mental capacity for the job is a matter of national importance. Why not apply this to Trump's addled incoherence, lack of curiosity, serial lying, and sadistic verbal abuses? 5/

newrepublic.com/article/185622…

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To imagine what real coverage of Trump's mental unfitness might look like, I took 10 real Biden age headlines and rewrote them around Trump's unfitness for the presidency.

Read them below; the effect is striking. Why don't we see saturation like this? 6/

newrepublic.com/article/185622…

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Those are real headlines about Biden's age at top news orgs, reimagined as heds about Trump's mental unfitness for the job. We should treat those Trump traits and the politics around them as *themselves* being the news.

Link to full argument below. END

newrepublic.com/article/185622…
Related, important point from @JRubinBlogger: Inadequate scrutiny of Trump's mental unfitness ends up insulating Republicans more broadly from hard questions about their continued enthusiastic support for him. Also citing @JeffreyGoldberg

washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/…

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More from @GregTSargent

Greg Sargent Profile picture
Jun 18
We keep hearing credulous pundits say MAGA is "antiwar." So how many MAGA Republicans will support the new resolution requiring Trump to get congressional authorization for war with Iran?

This resolution is important. Pay attention to it. 1/

(new piece)
newrepublic.com/article/196919…
In 2024, Trump slammed Kamala for campaigning with Liz Cheney, claiming she wants “war with every Muslim country known to mankind.” This was always a scam, and now it looks like Trump is rushing into war with Iran. This has deeply split MAGA. 2/

newrepublic.com/article/196919…Image
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"Antiwar" MAGA Republicans have the option of backing this new resolution from Thomas Massie (R) and Ro Khanna (D) requiring congressional authorization for war with Iran.

“It’s a test of whether the MAGA movement is really antiwar,” Khanna tells me. 3/

newrepublic.com/article/196919…Image
Read 6 tweets
Greg Sargent Profile picture
Jun 13
Remarkable: Vulnerable House Republicans are quietly urging Trump to refocus deportations away from noncriminal migrants and only target criminals.

With Trump admitted deportations hurt farmers, Rs know this is becoming a big problem for them. 1/

(link)
newrepublic.com/article/196817…
Six House Rs, many from vulnerable districts, sent a letter to ICE explicitly saying deporting non-criminals makes us less safe.

Strikingly, it undercuts Trump's rationale for mass deportations and reveals deep political vulnerability on the issue. 2/

newrepublic.com/article/196817…Image
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House Rs are urging a focus only on criminals AT THE EXACT MOMENT that Stephen Miller is ordering ICE to scour Home Depot parking lots for noncriminals to pad the numbers. Miller is *choosing* to divert resources away from dangerous criminals. 3/

newrepublic.com/article/196817…Image
Read 6 tweets
Greg Sargent Profile picture
Jun 11
Awful: News orgs are credulously amplifying the idea that sending troops into LA is good politics for Trump. This gives his lawless abuses of power the aura of conventional politics, obscuring how extraordinarily dangerous this moment truly is. 1/

(link)
newrepublic.com/article/196674…
Over the last few days, Trump has goaded servicemembers into booing a sitting Dem governor, called for his arrest, needlessly sent troops into an American city, and spewed wildly absurd lies about that city. This shows political weakness, not strength. 2/

newrepublic.com/article/196674…Image
We just learned that two-bit fascist Stephen Miller told ICE officials to raid Home Depot parking lots for more people to deport. To boost removal numbers, Trump and Miller are diverting resources away from serious crimes like child exploitation. 3/

newrepublic.com/article/196674…Image
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Read 9 tweets
Greg Sargent Profile picture
Jun 5
Stephen Miller is in a rage over deportation numbers he deems too low. So he's shifting huge amounts of law enforcement resources away from fighting serious crimes and into his immigration crackdown.

If voters knew about this, they'd recoil. 1/

(link)
newrepublic.com/article/196154…
Miller recently erupted at ICE officials, demanding 3,000 deportations a day. He's now redeploying thousands of agents from other agencies like Homeland Security Investigations, FBI, and DEA.

This is already hampering other crime-fighting, per NBC. 2/

newrepublic.com/article/196154…Image
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“Shifting that number of law enforcement agents from those types of agencies inevitably will mean fewer resources fighting transnational criminal organizations, drug smuggling, counter-terrorism, and child exploitation,” a former ICE official tells me. 3/

newrepublic.com/article/196154…Image
Read 8 tweets
Greg Sargent Profile picture
May 23
Unreal: To sustain his "genocide" of "white farmers" lie while meeting with the South African president, Trump used a photo of war deaths in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

I looked into this a bit more. It's worse than it first appeared. 1/

(link)
newrepublic.com/article/195699…
First, note that the printout Trump used to humiliate Ramaphosa came from a conservative blog post, which used an image from a Reuters video about DRC. Perhaps an aide Googled "white farmers" and "South Africa," found this, and gave it to Trump. 2/

newrepublic.com/article/195699…Image
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But there's something darker here. Even as Trump used this image of the dead from the DRC war to push a fake "genocide," Trump has suspended foreign aid and refugee resettlement in ways that are hurting countless humanitarian victims of that REAL war! 3/

newrepublic.com/article/195699…Image
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Read 6 tweets
Greg Sargent Profile picture
May 10
Amazing: Trump grew angry over a Biden-era program with the word "equity" in its name, so he ended it. But a key part of the program was sending money to red states to expand internet access in rural/MAGA country. Now they might not get it.

New from me:
newrepublic.com/article/195097…
Trump saw the word "equity" in the name of this Biden-era program, so naturally he decided it must be serving undeserving minorities, giving him an opening to demagogue about it.

"No more handouts based on race!" Trump raged.

Except for one thing...

newrepublic.com/article/195097…Image
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A funny thing about this saga: Many red state governments had submitted proposals in hopes of accessing this federal money. I looked at the proposals. They are in no small part about using this money to expand high speed internet into rural areas.

newrepublic.com/article/195097…Image
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Read 4 tweets

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