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On Tuesday, Donald Trump was found liable by a jury of his peers of sexually assaulting and defaming E. Jean Carroll — stemming from an encounter in a department store dressing room in the 1990s.
Which seems like a pretty big deal! Especially when you consider that Trump is:
a) the frontrunner for the Republican nomination
b) under indictment for his role in alleged hush money payments made to a porn star
c) under investigation for attempting to overturn the 2020 election results in Georgia
d) under investigation for his retention of more than 300 classified documents after leaving the White House
e) been accused by more than two dozen women over the years of sexual misconduct
f) said late last year that “unfortunately or fortunately” stars have been allowed to do whatever they want with women for the last “million years”
That combination of factors would, you might reasonably conclude, lead to a revolt within the Republican party.
You might even expect quotes along the lines of “We can’t possibly nominate this person!” Or: “This person is unfit for the office he is seeking.” Or: “Donald Trump is the opposite of the principles that the Republican party can and should represent.”
That, um, hasn’t been the reaction.
“The jury is a joke,” said Florida Sen. Marco Rubio. “The whole case is a joke.”
“He is a fighter and I am a fighter,” said Daniel Cameron, the frontrunner for the Republican nomination in the Kentucky governor’s race, of Trump.
“They're going to do anything they can to keep him from winning. It ain't gonna work,” said Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville, who added that the verdict “makes me want to vote for him twice.”
Really? So this whole thing is just the latest conspiracy against Trump? A jury is somehow part of this elaborate scheme now? And it’s all designed to keep Trump from winning again?
While this reaction defies belief, it’s also not terribly surprising. There’s a chunk of Republican voters (and Republican politicians) who believe that Trump is the forever victim of some sort of vast conspiracy perpetrated by the Deep State. To this crowd, everything that happens to Trump is further evidence of the lengths haters will go to target him.
That group exists and will continue to exist. And, even if Trump did shoot someone in the middle of Fifth Avenue, they would still be for him.
What does stun me though is how little we have heard in the wake of his conviction from the men and women who want to actually beat Trump for the Republican nomination.
This, from the Washington Post, is telling:
“In contrast to the almost uniform support for Trump in response to his indictment in a hush-money scheme, which was unsealed last month (Trump pleaded not guilty to 34 felony counts), several of Trump’s current and prospective GOP rivals were quiet on the verdict on Tuesday.
Silence is now the gold standard! They were so appalled by Trump’s behavior that they said nothing! Whoa!
I mean…
When Trump’s main rivals for the nomination did speak, they defended — yes, defended! — the former president.
“I would tell you, in my 4½ years serving alongside the president, I never heard or witnessed behavior of that nature,” former Vice President Mike Pence said.
Well then!
Ask yourself this: If Republicans trying to beat Trump for the Republican presidential nomination won’t speak out against him in the wake of a jury’s ruling on sexual assault, when, exactly, will they?
This graphic accurately sums up the current Republican plan to defeat Trump:
Like, WHAT?!?!
What, exactly, is the strategy here?
If I had to guess I would say that the likes of Pence, Nikki Haley, Tim Scott and Ron DeSantis are operating under the assumption that Trump will eventually blow himself up. Or that Republican voters will reach some sort of tipping point with him — and, once it’s reached, they will begin looking for alternatives.
“It has a cumulative effect,” Sen. John Thune, the Senate’s second-ranking Republican, told the Washington Post of Trump’s conviction. “People are going to have to decide whether they want to deal with all the drama.”
But, here’s the thing: We already know that that is purely wishful thinking.
Remember how Trump insulting veterans — including John McCain — was going to be the end of his campaign?
Or his assertion that Ted Cruz’s father was involved in the JFK assassination?
Or the “Access Hollywood” tape?
Or a hundred other moments — big and small — over the last 8 years that were predicted, in the moment, as THE THING that would finally bring Trump down?
None of them did. Not one.
And yet, it appears as though the Republican field — sans longshots/no shots like Chris Christie and Asa Hutchinson — seems entirely content to re-run the 2016 campaign in hopes of a different outcome. Which, well, insanity.
That’s a mistake. A huge one. The only way around Donald Trump is directly through him. If you believe either a) you would be a better nominee or b) Trump would significantly lessen the party’s chances of winning next November, you have to make that case — aggressively and often — to voters. Starting, like, yesterday.
That NONE of the major competitors for the nomination was willing — in the immediate aftermath of the former president being found liable on sexual assault charges — to criticize Trump suggests, to me, they don’t get what it is going to take to beat him. And they likely never will.
At this point, if the man has a heart attack the diehard supporters would claim McDonald's was part of the deep state conspiracy against him.
“Over the course of my over 25 years of experience in the courtroom, I have seen firsthand how a cavalier and arrogant contempt for the rule of law can backfire,” he said. “The jury verdict should be treated with seriousness and is another example of the indefensible behavior of Donald Trump.”
That’s from Asa Hutchinson. So, credit where it’s due.
I changed my registration to Republican in order to vote against Elise Stefanik in primary. Hutchinson now has my vote if he avoids coming out holding a huge WMD like Nikki Haley recently did. She was in the running but has been pretty quisling forever.
Liz Cheney probably has my vote if she gets in. Or she gets a write-in if Hutch fails me.