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Begun, the MAGA Wars Have
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Begun, the MAGA Wars Have

Charlie Sykes
Apr 28
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You people are fantastic. As of early this morning, Bulwark readers have raised $74,000+ for World Central Kitchen. Our original goal was $5K, which we raised to $15K, and then $20K on the first day. . . .

If you want to help Chef José Andrés and his team, you can make a donation here.

Thank you.

Note: I’m taking few days off — Morning Shots will be back Monday. (But we’ll have all the podcasts . . . and they are going to be great!)

(Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Happy Thursday!

Big question today: Will he or won’t he? Reuters is skeptical: “Elon Musk probably won’t buy Twitter.”

Who knows? Stay tuned.

So let’s start with wars and rumors of wars in the entertainment wing of the GOP, congressional caucuses, and the primaries. . . .

Tucker Carlson is attacking GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy — and Elise Stefanik — for having a short-lived spasm of decency after January 6: “Those are the tape-recorded words of Congressman Kevin McCarthy, a man who in private, turns out, sounds like an MSNBC contributor.”

Twitter avatar for @AcynAcyn @Acyn
“Kevin McCarthy is a puppet of the Dem Party”

April 27th 2022

834 Retweets3,962 Likes

At the same time, Matt Gaetz is lashing out at McCarthy and his #2, Steve Scalise:

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**

Of course, the planets aligned:

Twitter avatar for @AcynAcyn @Acyn
Gaetz doesn’t seem too happy with Scalise

April 28th 2022

90 Retweets398 Likes

**

Meanwhile, shots fired between GOP senator and GOP deplorable congresstroll.

Twitter avatar for @SenThomTillisSenator Thom Tillis @SenThomTillis
Insider trading by a member of Congress is a serious betrayal of their oath, and Congressman Cawthorn owes North Carolinians an explanation. There needs to be a thorough and bipartisan inquiry into the matter by the House Ethics Committee. #ncpol

Andrew Kerr @AndrewKerrNC

NEW: Multiple government watchdog groups told @dcexaminer that Madison Cawthorn may have implicated himself in an insider trading scheme. The watchdogs said an SEC and DOJ investigation into this matter is warranted. 🧵 https://t.co/xQ8UGmL9FC

April 27th 2022

136 Retweets446 Likes

**

And in Ohio…

Twitter avatar for @jonathanvswanJonathan Swan @jonathanvswan
Interesting move: Josh Mandel’s backer, the Club for Growth, is now explicitly whacking Trump in their TV ads over his endorsement of JD Vance and even his endorsement of Mitt Romney (!) in 2012.

April 27th 2022

135 Retweets311 Likes

In today’s Bulwark, Jim Swift writes: “Vance vs. Mandel Gets Ugly”

Although there are seven candidates, only three matter now: Josh Mandel, J.D. Vance, and Mike Gibbons. And the fighting among them has gone nuclear over the past two weeks—since Donald Trump bestowed his blessing upon Vance.

**

And in Georgia…

Via NYMag: “Kemp and Perdue Get Nasty in Georgia Gubernatorial Debate.”

[Governor Brian] Kemp, who has made nastiness something of a personal brand, fired back in an uninhibited manner, calling [Trump-endorsed former senator David] Perdue a “weak leader” who blamed “everybody else for their own loss instead of themselves.” Perdue took the debate down a favorite Trump rabbit hole, alleging that there was a deal between the state and voting-rights groups over absentee-ballot signature-verification procedures. Kemp was having none of it, per the Atlanta Journal-Constitution…

“I was secretary of state for eight years and I don’t need to be lectured by someone who’s lost his last election about what the voting laws are in our state,” Kemp said.

BTW, if you are keeping score at home:

ATLANTA — A new primary election poll released by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution shows Gov. Brian Kemp is building a strong lead over former U.S. Sen. David Perdue to the earn Republican nomination for Georgia governor.

Kemp led Perdue 53%-27% in the poll, which would put Kemp above the majority-vote threshold needed to avoid a runoff.

**

But, but, but . . . as this montage from Pennsylvania makes clear, the internal fight isn’t between Trump fans and skeptics — it’s between super-Trump fans versus super-super-Trump fans.

Twitter avatar for @AccountableGOPThe Republican Accountability Project @AccountableGOP
Anyone suggesting that Trump is losing his grip on the GOP should watch these highlights from tonight's PA Republican Senate debate.

April 26th 2022

1,264 Retweets3,910 Likes

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Join us tonight!


Forgiving student loans may not be the winner Democrats think it is

Brace for a lot of blowback if Biden does forgive a huge chunk of student loans. Here is the Atlantic’s Conor Friedersdorf:

Twitter avatar for @conor64Conor Friedersdorf @conor64
If you're a party struggling to retain the votes of working class people without college degrees, it's a highly risky move to ask those people to subsidize the educations of people who mostly earn more than they do.

NYC Angry Mom @angrybklynmom

I'm genuinely wondering if the student loan relief proposal could backfire. It is destined for a poor implementation, and I suspect it won't cover all students, leading to inevitable bitterness. Not to mention those who sacrificed and paid their loans without government help.

April 27th 2022

61 Retweets428 Likes

And check out this tweet from Mitt Romney:

Twitter avatar for @MittRomneyMitt Romney @MittRomney
Desperate polls call for desperate measures: Dems consider forgiving trillions in student loans. Other bribe suggestions: Forgive auto loans? Forgive credit card debt? Forgive mortgages? And put a wealth tax on the super-rich to pay for it all. What could possibly go wrong?

April 27th 2022

1,879 Retweets17,315 Likes

Exit take: Before you comment, look up the term “moral hazard.”


Meanwhile, in Wisconsin

Via Vice News: “Trump Just Bullied the Wisconsin GOP Into Continuing Its 2020 ‘Audit.’”

Wisconsin GOP Assembly Speaker Robin Vos announced Tuesday afternoon that he’ll continue to fund the office of former state Supreme Court justice Michael Gableman even though his contract had expired and Gableman’s work appeared to be complete…

Vos’ announcement came just a day after Trump implicitly threatened to help boost Vos’ primary challenger if he didn’t keep funding Gableman’s work….

Trump’s warning was his latest successful attempt to bully Vos into pushing along the audit, which he began as a way to try to appease the pro-Trump GOP base after Vos refused to try to block the certification of the 2020 election. 

But Gableman’s “investigation” has morphed into a never-ending attempt to discredit the 2020 election. And Vos and other establishment-leaning Wisconsin GOP politicians have found out the hard way that Trump and his base will only be appeased by total capitulation.

And…

Twitter avatar for @WisVoterCraig Gilbert @WisVoter
Sen Ron Johnson still under water in new WI @MULawPoll : 36% fav 46% unfav, a net of -10, after being -12 in Feb and -6 and -7 in 2021. By this time in previous cycle, he had climbed back to neutral favorability after being under water in 2015. But hasn’t happened yet in 2022

April 27th 2022

54 Retweets195 Likes

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Quick Hits

1. Just Call Trump a Loser

Mark Leibovich has a suggestion for a “nervy Republican challenger.”

“Why on earth would we hitch our wagons again to a crybaby sore loser who lost the popular vote twice, lost the House, lost the Senate, and lost the White House, and so on?” said Barbara Comstock, a longtime political consultant and former Republican congresswoman from Virginia. “For Republicans, whether they embrace the Big Lie or not, Trump is vulnerable to having the stench of disaster on him.”

Trump’s wasn’t an ordinary election defeat, either. Some nervy Republican challenger needs to remind everyone how rare it is for an incumbent president to lose reelection, and also that Trump was perhaps the most graceless loser and insufferable whiner in presidential history—the first outgoing commander in chief in 152 years to skip his successor’s swearing-in. And that he dragged a lot of Republicans down with him.


2. Meet the not-ready-for-prime-time Republican players

Josh Kraushaar, in the National Journal:

Even as Republicans lick their chops at a favorable political environment, some of their candidates are doing everything they can to squander winnable races. From several swing-state Senate races and pivotal gubernatorial contests to important downballot races, Republicans have either already nominated candidates who aren’t ready for prime time, or are on the verge of nominating exceptionally weak candidates.


3. Trump’s Garbage Men

Amanda Carpenter in today’s Bulwark:

So McCarthy and McConnell knew that Donald Trump was bad for their party.

They knew that Trump was bad for the country.

They knew that he was to blame for Jan. 6th.

And they talked about getting rid of him.

Yet neither man publicly called on Trump to resign. Neither man voted to impeach or convict Trump. In public, they attacked the proposal for an independent Jan. 6th commission. They said they would support Trump as the 2024 nominee. And their various fundraising apparatuses are now in overdrive praising and promoting the former president.

That makes them garbage men.

Join now


Cheap Shots

Hypocrisy watch.

Twitter avatar for @anthonyLfisherAnthony L. Fisher @anthonyLfisher
Ben Shapiro: Big Tech firing people whose politics I share is corporate fascism Also Ben Shapiro: Big Tech must fire people with politics I oppose
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Image

April 26th 2022

981 Retweets5,143 Likes

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