On this day in 2020, Steve Bannon was arrested for defrauding donors to a campaign to build a border wall. The top Trump ally ultimately pleaded guilty to one count but served no prison time related to the case (though he did serve time for contempt of Congress). He remains a prominent pro-Trump voice.
Welcome to Thursday. It’s Swin, again. You may have heard by now that “the MyPillow Guy” Mike Lindell – one of the top financial backers of efforts to overturn Joe Biden’s 2020 election win – has refused to concede after he lost the GOP gubernatorial primary in Minnesota, despite having Donald Trump’s endorsement. In case you’re wondering how it’s going, on Wednesday afternoon Lindell texted me a link to his ‘Lindell Plan’ for privately funding a recount, telling me: “We need to get rid of the electronic voting machines and secure our elections!”
It would be easier to shrug this stuff off if it weren’t also, essentially, the animating policy position of the White House and the entire GOP today. But enough about the war on democracy at home…
In today’s ‘First Draft,’ we’ll check back in on the war abroad and how it’s going for the president of the United States (piss-poorly, for starters). Plus, we consider another truly weird day in DC, filled with bizarro Trump rants, amid worrying signs for the U.S. economy. Deep breath, and let’s read on.
Get Carter(ed)
In early May, we here at ‘First Draft’ ran a story headlined: “Is Iran Trying to ‘Jimmy Carter’ Donald Trump?” The answer was: “Yeah, probably.” Nearly four months later, the answer is starting to look a lot like: “Yes, absolutely.”
It’s been half a year since the president launched his disastrous, woefully unpopular illegal war. There is no end in sight, American voters are beyond fed up with it and its rising gas prices, and the Trump-Vance administration is still flirting with global economic apocalypse simply because the ego-addled president can’t just admit he lost a battle that he laughably claims to have “won.”
In May, we reported that U.S. government officials had “privately discussed classified intelligence assessments suggesting that the government in Tehran isn’t close to breaking, even after… months of war and a sustained economic assault… Administration officials, citing U.S. intel, have also warned that senior Iranian officials are keenly aware that if the war drags on much longer, it could further damage Trump and the Republican Party’s chances at the polls in November. ‘They know they can Carter him,’ a senior administration official familiar with the intelligence and internal deliberations says, referring to how the Iranian hostage crisis helped tank Jimmy Carter’s presidency by the time of the 1980 U.S. election.”
At the time, much of this intel had been briefed to Trump.