The Week in Washington: Trump Spouts, Rudy Raves, and November Looms
New week, same old hissy fits. On Monday, President Trump told a closed-door meeting of evangelical leaders that “this November 6 election is very much a referendum on not only me, it’s a referendum on your religion, it’s a referendum on free speech and the First Amendment. . . . It’s not a question of like or dislike, it’s a question that they will overturn everything that we’ve done and they will do it quickly and violently. And violently. There is violence.”
On Tuesday, without the merest hint of violence, the path to overturning everything the president has done suddenly became a little clearer. In a surprising upset in the Florida Democratic gubernatorial primary, the victor was Tallahassee mayor Andrew Gillum, who, if he wins in November, would be the state’s first African-American governor. His Republican opponent, Ron DeSantis, a staunch Trumpette, wasted no time before he began dog-whistling, warning the very next day on Fox that Florida should not “monkey this up” by electing Gillum—a simian reference worthy of Roseanne Barr.
More news regrading the impending midterms: On Friday, Trump promised to fill the biggest stadium in Texas with a rally to support Ted Cruz, who is running for reelection to the Senate. Lyin’ Ted, as the president used to call him (Trump once even hinted that Cruz’s father was involved in the JFK assassination), is running against the deeply progressive Beto O’Rourke, who wore a Kurt Cobain–style dress when he was in a college rock band, and whose stirring defense of football players taking a knee has gone viral. Though Texas has not had a Democratic senator since 1993, at last count the two candidates were in a statistical dead heat.
And just when you thought you can never keep the characters straight without a scorecard, here are two new names! Introducing Washington lobbyist W. Samuel Patten, who pleaded guilty Friday to acting as an unregistered foreign lobbyist, lying to the Senate Intelligence Committee, and funneling a Ukrainian oligarch’s money to Trump’s Inaugural Committee. And even weirder, meet David Fallarino, Paul Manafort’s onetime banker, who early Tuesday morning was the victim of a strange robbery at his Manhattan penthouse apartment. Ignoring the typical booty—cash, jewelry, et cetera—these burglars were only after Fallarino’s briefcase, iPad, and sneakers.
Guess who just might want to be the next attorney general? Why, it’s Trump’s new golfing buddy, South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham. Formerly a staunch defender of Attorney General Jeff Sessions, this week Graham did a backflip, stating that there was a chasm between Donald and Jeff that goes way beyond the Mueller probe: “It’s a pretty deep breach,” Graham said, then added this magnanimous offer: “Here’s what I’m suggesting: He’s not the only man in the country that can be attorney general.” It was a sudden and swift departure from the oppositional politics of Graham’s best friend, John McCain, who was laid to rest this week. When his daughter Meghan eulogized him at a service in the National Cathedral yesterday, her pointed remarks—“The America of John McCain has no need to be made great again because America was always great”—drew applause, a rare occurrence at a funeral.
But let us leave you on this holiday weekend with the recent revelation that legal eagle Rudolph Giuliani is spending late nights readying a report that, according to CNN, will include rebuttals of “everything from collusion with Russia in the 2016 election to fired national security adviser Michael Flynn to obstruction of justice in order to be prepared for what may be included in Mueller’s expected report.” What ever happened to the president’s insistence, spouted and tweeted ad nauseam, that there has been “No Collusion and No Obstruction”? Who needs reams of Rudy rebuttals if it’s all fake news?
