Weird Isn't The Worst Of It
There are already too many conservatives in the Democratic Party, consistently pushing the party away from progressive governance and towards the fatal embrace of corporate Big Money politics and away from popular economic solutions. The need to defeat Trump in November has put the problems inherent in this kind of movement towards neoliberalism on the back burner. Now don’t get me wrong; when conservatives see the error of their ways and adopt progressivism… welcome aboard. Unfortunately, for every Elizabeth Warren there are 10 NeverTrump conservatives trying to sneak their reactionary mindset into the not-Trump party. They’re toxic and should not be welcomed other than as voters. The idea of putting them in positions of leadership is disastrous for the Democratic Party brand and for the long-term health of the party. The idea of one fascist party and one conservative party is not in the slightest an appetizing prospect.
Yesterday, Kamala’s campaign launched “Republicans for Harris, what Zeke Miller reported will be a “campaign within a campaign,” to use “well-known Republicans to activate their networks, with a particular emphasis on primary voters who backed… Nikki Haley. The program will kick off with events this week in Arizona, North Carolina and Pennsylvania. Republicans backing Harris will also appear at rallies with the vice president and her soon-to-be-named running mate this coming week... The effort will rely heavily on Republican-to-Republican voter contact, with the belief that the best way to get a Republican to vote for Harris is to hear directly from another Republican making the same choice. Trump’s ‘extremism is toxic to the millions of Republicans who no longer believe the party of Donald Trump represents their values’ and will vote against him again in November, said Harris’ national director of Republican outreach, Austin Weatherford. He said the campaign would be ‘showing up and taking the time every single day to earn the vote of Republicans who believe in putting country over party and know that every American deserves a president who will protect their freedoms and a commander in chief who will put the best interests of the American people above their own.’”
Weatherford was Adam Kinzinger’s chief of staff and Kinzinger is also backing Kamala, as are former Govs. Bill Weld (MA), Jim Edgar (IL) and Christine Todd Whitman (NJ), former Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, former Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, and nearly two dozen former Republican members of Congress, including Joe Walsh (IL), Susan Molinari (NY), Alan Steelman (TX), Claudine Schneider (RI), Dave Emery (ME), David Trott (MI), Jack Quinn (NY), Jim Greenwood (PA), David Trott (MI), Chris Shays (CT), John LeBoutillier (NY), Tom Coleman (MS), Rod Chandler (WA), Peter Smith (VT), and Wayne Gilchrest (MD). Former Trump press secretary Stephanie Grisham is also endorsing Harris. “I might not agree with Vice President Kamala Harris on everything, but I know that she will fight for our freedom, protect our democracy and represent America with honor and dignity on the world stage,” Grisham said in a statement.
Miller emphasized that “Hundreds of thousands of registered Republicans voted in primaries for Haley even after she ended her bid for the 2024 Republican nomination and as Trump trounced her in almost every contest.” No one knows when Mar-a-Lago will be launching Democrats for Trump. Oh, I forgot... that would be No Labels.
Laura Vozzella reported that conservative former Virginia congressman Denver Riggleman has also endorsed Kamala. “I was heartbroken and horrified to see how close we came to losing our democracy on January 6, because of one man— Donald Trump,” Riggleman said in a statement released by Harris’s campaign. “I’ve seen with my own eyes how Trump’s thirst for power, revenge, and retribution is his real motivation, and that’s why I cannot stand by while he tries to destroy our country.”
Harris’s campaign rolled out Riggleman’s endorsement as part of its “Republicans for Harris” initiative, aimed at GOP members unhappy with Trump. Riggleman’s statement gave a nod to his unspecified “differences” with Harris but vouched for her intention to “protect our basic freedoms, our democratic institutions, and our standing in a challenging world.”
“I will stand with her and millions of others working to defeat Donald Trump,” he said. “Republican voters who are turned off by Trump’s misogyny, criminal behavior, and unhinged support for Project 2025 will stand with us in electing an energetic leader who will represent all of America.”
The vice president is not the first Democrat to win Riggleman’s support.
In 2022, Riggleman appeared in a TV ad urging voters to back Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-VA) as she sought reelection in the competitive 7th District. Part of his motivation, then as now, stemmed from false claims about the 2020 election.
An unrelated review by Lloyd Green of Fred Trump’s new book, All in the Family: The Trumps and How We Got This Way, sheds light on the Trump characteristics so many voters are repulsed by.
“The author,” explained Green, “is the son of the late Fred Trump Jr and a nephew of Donald Trump. Trump III thinks his uncle is a jerk, vindictive and terrified of losing, but also someone who struggles with accepting responsibility. The buck always stops elsewhere. ‘In my family that sometimes seems like the cast of a 1950s sitcom, my uncle Donald had a role of his own,’ Fred III writes. ‘He was the obnoxious one.’ No surprise there. ‘Many of his adult traits– his determination, his short fuse– first displayed themselves in his childhood.’ Over time, they festered. ‘I can’t sum up his early days in a single slogan, but I think I can do it two: I wanna do what I wanna do and also That’s not fair.’ Think of Trump’s reaction when he lost to Joe Biden in 2020, or was beaten by Ted Cruz in the 2016 Iowa caucus. You get the picture. If Trump fails to win, the system must be rigged. When The Donald was a teenager, he was banished to military school.”
Once upon a time, Steve Bannon pondered whether Trump, his former campaign and White House boss, was a racist. “He had not heard Trump use the N-word but could easily imagine him doing so,” Michael Wolff wrote in Siege, his second Trump tell-all.
Now, with fewer than 100 days until election day, Fred Trump III delivers his answer. In a fit of rage, he says, the N-word cascaded from Trump’s mouth.
In the early 1970s, someone left two gashes in the roof of Trump’s white Cadillac convertible.
“Donald was pissed,” Fred remembers. “Boy, was he pissed.”
“‘Niggers,’ I recall him saying disgustedly. ‘Look what the niggers did.’”
When The Guardian broke news of this passage, the Trump campaign issued a blanket denial.
“Completely fabricated, and total fake news of the highest order”, said Steven Cheung, a spokesperson. “Anyone who knows President Trump knows he would never use such language, and false stories like this have been thoroughly debunked.” Tell that to Bannon and Wolff.
For his part, Bannon has compared Trump’s infamous escalator ride to announce his candidacy to Triumph of the Will, the Nazi propaganda film made by Leni Riefenstahl, according to Insurgency: How Republicans Lost Their Party and Got Everything They Ever Wanted, by Jeremy Peters, a New York Times reporter.
Mary Trump would probably be similarly unimpressed by the Trump campaign’s denial. In 2020, she published Too Much and Never Enough, a bestseller about her family and her uncle. Speaking during her book tour, she said her uncle was “clearly racist.”
Fred Trump III says he never voted for his uncle. Rather, he cast ballots for Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden. “Did I want the supreme court to reverse abortion rights by overturning Roe v Wade? No.”
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