Well, this is just pathetic.
Trump lied to his supporters (yet again) and declared his arrest was imminent on Tuesday, March 21. He did this with the hope of building up a large, intimidating group of deranged MAGA that might give a certain DA some pause over arresting him later in the week. In fact, for the past two years, Trump has promised civil unrest if anyone dares to indict him.
Trump took to his failing social media outlet, Truth Social, and in two dozen times with ALL CAPs ranting, (like a normal, healthy person does), called upon his minions to come out in force ala January 6th to protect their king.
“IT’S TIME!!!” he wrote. “WE JUST CAN’T ALLOW THIS ANYMORE. THEY’RE KILLING OUR NATION AS WE SIT BACK & WATCH. WE MUST SAVE AMERICA!PROTEST, PROTEST, PROTEST!!!”
And in another: THE FAR & AWAY LEADING REPUBLICAN CANDIDATE & FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, WILL BE ARRESTED ON TUESDAY OF NEXT WEEK. PROTEST, TAKE OUR NATION BACK!
Nothing about peaceful protesting, and nothing about respecting law enforcement, mind you. Just come out with your spears, flag poles and bear spray—just like last time. It’ll be wild; and this time, unlike last time, he will totally stand by you.
And then this happened:
It gets worse.
The New York Young Republican Club planned a big protest at 6pm tonight. Less than two dozen people showed up.
It was Trump’s worst nightmare:
It never made any sense. His core supporters out in the meth-lands don’t have the means to travel to New York City on an unspecified day just to protest, and even if they did, they saw what happened to those terrorists who raided the Capitol.
And at the end of the day, you would be doing all of this to protest a wealthy man getting sued for using campaign funds to pay hush money to a porn star and then illegally covering it up---all the while your third wife is at home sick and pregnant with your child. I know a few QAnon morons who could find ways to get mad about something like that, but the rest of us have a conscience.
Not that the GOP isn’t trying. On Fox News, they are telling their viewers that, in fact, hush money payments are quite common and very American. A right-wing television lawyer is meanwhile comparing Trump’s criminal indictment to the persecution of Nelson Mandela, which was quite a downgrade from he compared Trump to Jesus. Trump’s congressional supporters are claiming all of this is just a bookkeeping error that has gotten blown out of proportion.
Yet there will be plenty of other cases forthcoming, including the rape case with Jean Carroll, the stealing of highly classified documents, the attempt to overthrow the election in Georgia, and the incitement of an insurrection, just to name a few. The GOP is cringing having to defend all of those. My favorite thing this week is Republicans saying indictments for his criminal activity will somehow only help to get Trump elected. Yes, that tracks. That’s what really will push independents and fence-sitters over to the Trump column: criminal indictments.
In reality, this is the GOP’s worst nightmare. They desperately just want to engage in culture wars, disinformation campaigns, and pass laws to hurt marginalized communities—but instead have to constantly justify his daily shenanigans and criminal behavior. For the past two years, they’ve had to justify his insurrection and attack on our democracy. Last September, they had to defend his treason by explaining away why he needed to steal our nation’s secrets and hide them in a closet in Mar-a-Lago. Then they had to stand by him while he dined with Nazis and said our Constitution should be terminated. Now they have to support his moral failings and blatant corruption.
There is nothing they won’t defend, and no low they won’t stoop to. They have no choice, they’ve already sold their souls. It’s cowardly, it’s un-American, but most of all, it’s now completely and utterly Republican.