Kyle Pope/CJR:
Trump, the press, and the politics of pain
The national immigrant roundup that is reported to take place this weekend is a wretched, disturbing, cynical thing: a campaign event for the re-election of Donald Trump, aimed at generating a highlight reel for the fringiest edges of his base. That woman and her kids will be rendered as PR props for Team Trump, the same as red MAGA hats and chants of “Lock her up!”
It is telling that, twice now, word of an immigration crackdown has “leaked” to the press in advance. The first time, last December, it was used as a negotiating ploy with Democrats in the hope of landing on an immigration compromise suitable to Trump’s fans. The Art of the Deal as applied to unaccompanied minors. This time, with no deal at hand, the early leaks, which came on Thursday, seemed like a memo to TV assignment desks: call people in from their summer homes, prep the satellite trucks, and get ready to shuffle the story list on the A-block—bumping Jeffrey Epstein (not a good look for the administration, given the connections) and women’s soccer (ditto, since the winning World Cup team has made Trump look like a loser). If Trump knows anything at all, it’s how to play the media, and he’s well-trained at applying his expertise to the lives of immigrant families, who are now living in terror.
Peter Baker/NY Times:
Trump Fans the Flames of a Racial Fire
President Trump woke up on Sunday morning, gazed out at the nation he leads, saw the dry kindling of race relations and decided to throw a match on it. It was not the first time, nor is it likely to be the last. He has a pretty large carton of matches and a ready supply of kerosene.
His Twitter harangue goading Democratic congresswomen of color to “go back” to the country they came from, even though most of them were actually born in the United States, shocked many. But it should have surprised few who have watched the way he has governed a multicultural, multiracial country the last two and a half years.
Peter Wade/Rolling Stone:
Pence’s Detention Center Visit Exposes Depths of Trump Administration’s Cruelty
“I was not surprised by what I saw,” the vice president said. “I knew we’d see a system that was overwhelmed”
At a news conference after visiting the facility, Pence said: “That’s the overcrowding President Trump has been talking about. That’s the overwhelming of the system that some in Congress have said was a manufactured crisis. But now I think the American people can see this crisis is real.”
“I was not surprised by what I saw,” Pence added. “I knew we’d see a system that was overwhelmed.”
But Trump and Pence are the ones ensuring the system is overwhelmed by detaining asylum-seekers en masse, as Rep. Don Beyer (D-VA) said on Twitter: “[Democrats] are working to expose and stop human rights violations at the border, but everyone needs to know that Pence and Trump are making these problems much worse on purpose. They separate families and detain asylum seekers in huge numbers for political reasons. They could stop it.”
I suspect they went there for the visual. Pence wanted pics of scary men so he could use them to counter what we know about children in cages. It’s a much easier argument for them.
BBC:
New leak claims Trump scrapped Iran nuclear deal 'to spite Obama'
Donald Trump abandoned the Iran nuclear deal to spite Barack Obama, according to a leaked memo written by the UK's former ambassador in the US.
Sir Kim Darroch described the move as an act of "diplomatic vandalism", according to the Mail on Sunday.
The paper says the memo was written after the then Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson appealed to the US in 2018 to stick with the nuclear deal.
The latest leak came despite the Met Police warning against publication.
The first memos criticising President Trump's administration, which emerged a week ago, prompted a furious reaction from the US president and resulted in Sir Kim resigning from his role.
It isn’t just that cruelty is the point. Sometimes it’s just the idiocy.
As for the polls, there will be plenty of explanations about how Trump wins with 41- 43% of the vote. It is possible. It is not likely. He’s actually underperforming his job approval. He has to improve his standing with independents and/but nothing he does accomplishes that. OTOH, he does motivate people to vote. His strongly disapprove is 42%, strongly approve 32%. Those are losing numbers.
Peter Nicholas/Atlantic:
It’s a Precarious Time for Any Official in Trump’s Orbit
Alexander Acosta’s exit gratifies those who wanted him gone for his role in the Epstein plea deal. But the president’s advisers fear how more turnover reflects broader turmoil within the administration.
Relying on a string of officials holding jobs on a temporary basis, Trump is sitting atop a hollowed-out administration that is lacking in the permanent leadership needed to manage escalating foreign and domestic crises, good-government experts told me. Signs suggest the churn isn’t about to stop. Trump has been calling friends and advisers lately about National Security Adviser John Bolton, looking for their impressions of his performance and asking whether he needs to go, according to people who have been briefed on the calls and who, like others I spoke with for this story, requested anonymity to discuss private conversations. Meanwhile, Axios, among other news outlets, reported yesterday that Trump has told confidants he wants to replace Dan Coats, the director of national intelligence, with whom the president has had an uneasy relationship.
Voters don’t care about AOC v Pelosi. Eye on the prize. Trump’s take on the Squad:
Josh Kraushaar/National Journal:
It’s Not Easy Being a Red-State Democrat
Amy McGrath raised $3.5 million in her first week as a Senate candidate against Mitch McConnell. She’s quickly learning that message means a lot more than money.
There’s a lesson from one of the state’s leading Democratic politicians, state House Minority Leader Rocky Adkins. Adkins nearly scored a huge upset in the state’s gubernatorial primary, despite opposing abortion rights. Pundits viewed him as the most formidable challenger against Gov. Matt Bevin because of his culturally conservative views. That’s the message that sells in the South: economic populism and cultural traditionalism.
Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards, one of the few Democrats elected statewide in the South, is another example of the political importance of breaking from his party. He won his first campaign by touting his pro-life bona fides. By signing a bill banning abortions once a fetal heartbeat is detected, he alienated many national Democrats but improved his chances for reelection in his conservative state.
With the national Democratic Party moving further to the left and tolerating minimal dissent on these hot-button social issues, winning conservative-minded Trump states will be awfully difficult. Liberal donors despise McConnell so much that they’re willing to throw their money into Kentucky, a state that’s unlikely to elect a Democrat to federal office. The money would be much-better spent on behalf of a less-celebrated candidate in a state like North Carolina (Cal Cunningham) or Iowa (Theresa Greenfield).
McGrath is learning the hard way about these fundamental political realities. Running a House race is child’s play compared to facing the aggressive tactics of McConnell’s operation. Senate races were once determined mostly by candidate quality, but these days partisanship is a much stronger pull. She may still become a national celebrity—following in the footsteps of Beto O’Rourke and Stacey Abrams—but her odds of winning a difficult Senate race are looking a lot longer.
Here’s the other side of the political equation. We can and should run everywhere, but do it with eyes wide open. Sometimes it’s for party building. Sometimes it’s to build name recognition. Sometimes it’s just to gain experience. It’s a long game, and it needs to include Blue Dogs in certain places to gain a majority. Pick your battles carefully. Yeah, I know it‘s annoying. Hold your nose if you must. Just make sure Cal Cunningham and Theresa Greenfield get support.
In places not in the culturally conservative Deep South:
Peter M. Shane/Atlantic
Trump’s Malarkey Only Goes So Far
Even in defeat, the administration can’t stop trying to snow the public about a proposed citizenship question.
The shortest way of describing what happened with Donald Trump’s census fiasco is that mendacity met the rule of law and, for now, the rule of law won. Trump tried to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census, but the Supreme Court stopped him because the rationale his administration offered for the change was demonstrably false. The fallback plan he hinted at—of adding the question via executive order—never materialized because the president has no such authority. On Thursday, Trump gave up, though he pretended otherwise.
Unfortunately, his appearance Thursday—alongside Attorney General William Barr and a silent Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross—strongly suggests that the president and his enablers will keep trying to snow the public on this issue. Armed with an executive order mandating nothing that could not have been done from the get-go, Trump and Barr sought to camouflage their defeat with the mixture of partisan bile, self-contradiction, and half-truth from which the administration’s census policy has been concocted all along.
Trump 2020: partisan bile, self-contradiction, and half-truth. Etc.
Primary standings: