the DON JONES INDEX…

 

 

GAINS POSTED in GREEN

LOSSES POSTED in RED

 

  3/13/23…    14,983.57

    3/6/23…    15,055.33

   6/27/13…    15,000.00

 

(THE DOW JONES INDEX:  3/13/23...31,909.64; 3/6/23...33,390.97; 6/27/13… 15,000.00)

 

LESSON for March 13, 2023 – “THE IVORY POACHERS”

 

Back in 2012, years before their father ran for president, photos surfaced of Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump's hunting trip to Zimbabwe.

Photos released by the safari company at the time, which were later published on TMZ and elsewhere, showed the brothers posing next to various dead animals that were killed as part of their hunt. Donald Trump Jr. was 34 years old at the time, and Eric Trump was 28.

The Trump brothers were not pictured with any dead lions in but Donald Trump Jr. was pictured next to a dead elephant while holding its severed tail.  Wielding a dead elephant’s tail to shake at one’s foes has been a traditional sign of masculinity among Africans.  But the money... that is in the tusks – which is to say, the ivory fashioned into jewelry for fashionable women and into piano keys to be tickled by Liberace’s heirs.

Don’s daddy don’t hunt… except for Hunter Bidens… but he did lift a ban on importing sport-hunted trophies of elephants from certain African countries, just over three months after appearing to pause a first attempt to do so amid public uproar. In a memo dated March 1, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said that in place of the Obama-era blanket ban, the agency will consider importation permits "on a case-by-case basis."

Biden subsequently reversed the reversal, citing the near extinction of the beasts.

 

And now the Grand Ol’ Party’s elephant is under fire from all quarters and the businessmen and souvenir hunters are warring fiercely for tail and trunk and tusks... tho’ not the meat, despite Junior’s affirmation that he eats what he kills... that was allegedly given to the natives.  Red meat for the red mob.

And declared candidate Dad and the undeclared Fuhrer of Florida, Ron deSantis are today’s hunters with the biggest guns and the most devious of blinds from which to snipe at one another – twenty months before the Twenty Twenty Four election.  Lesser ivory poachers are also giving chase... a woman, a from-India Indian and even, on the Democratic front, a psychic.

And the fun’s only begun.

 

Over the past weekend, the former President decamped from his blind, taking a safari to Maryland to rally the porters and gun-bearers and pack animals at the Conservative Political Action Committee safarireast.  (See Attachment One, Wiki)

Team deSantis, for his part, laid claim to the enemy’s stronghold... surrounding Djonald UnDefended’s Mar-a-Lago redoubt somewhat as the Russian army of conscripts, convicts and war criminals have been laying siege to the desolate and depopulated city of Bakhmut in Ukraine although, in place of the hypersonic missiles, tanks and from-Iran drones the combatants have been sniping at each other with pithy words and sharp, pointed insinuations.  His dark Gubernatorial majesty’s still-undeclared insurgency gathered at the Breakers to break bones and  celebrate themselves with pomp and (Mike Pompeo) and appeal to the billionaires and mere mortal hundred-millionaires that circumstances dictated a new (and, according to rival poacher Nikki Haley, younger) alternative.  (Wiki on CFG Attachment Two)

Team Trump’s retreat for a glamorous weekend transpired in the overwhelmingly Democratic wasteland of Oxon, Maryland... somewhat between Washington and Baltimore... where was held the neo-CPAC gathering of the MAGAfaithful, their grievances over stolen elections and their merch.  It was a loud and messy spectacle, streamed and cabled for spectators of at least modest means; just the ticket for sensation-seeking Don Joneses wondering how to pass the gloomy hours between the close of the football season and last night’s Oscars and, for the connoisseurs of the strange and the sanctimonious slammers alike, it did not disappoint.

 

@newsweek preview: Share on LinkedIn  and add peanuts

(See an unedited transcript of The Donald’s lengthy, lugubrious and often livid discourse as Attachment A... a repetition, punctuated by outbursts from sore media losers wraps up as B)

 

The barbarians surrounding the gates of Mar-a-Lago, on the other hand, were quiet and suspicious and seeking a surfeit of security, for their Woodstock was the seldom seen but notorious  homeless but hallowed conclave of the Club for Growth... in English, a pride of proud, rich Republicans descending upon luxry premises here and there every year, most willing to shed a few shekels for the ears (if not the tails) of obsequious politicians seeking their favor.  It’s not that rich people suddenly despise The Exile; it’s just that, after the 2022 debacle when the herd of elephants blundered into the blinds of the ivory poachers with their long guns, their subpoenas and dark whisperings of Hunter Biden in the jungle.

No CFG transcripts from Saint Ron’s Appeal to Go Fund Me have yet been posted, but a few barbed shafts (See Attachment Four)

 

The hunting and the poaching occurred under terms of grievous political ambience – hot Uke and impending nuke war, a flailing economy (that would become failing over the following weekend, at least in the key tech and banking sectors), environment and transporation meltdowns, aggressive Chinese and Russian advances and a domestic divide that has engendered terrorism and calls for a New Confederacy.

Initiated last November, the Trump Twenty Four movement has had a fairly slow start, but is beginning to rev up (as recent Rev transcriptors noted.)

           

Certainly within the candidate’s base... his family, of course, (both subpoenaed and not yet), the loyalists, denialists and denied and strange persons emitting wild theories flying about like drunken parakeets.

One of many (see the Rolling Stone top ten below) came from the forever-giving Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who blamed President Joe for the fentanyl deaths of two young men. “Listen to this mother, who lost two children to fentanyl poisoning, tell the truth about both of her son’s murders because of the Biden administrations refusal to secure our border and stop the Cartel’s from murdering Americans everyday by Chinese fentanyl,” she tweeted.

The only problem is that the two men died while Trump was in office in 2020.

The Conservative Political Action Committee... now being called TPAC (the Trump Political Action Committee) by some of the dark and disgruntled angels fluttering ‘round Saint Ron... was conceived as a partisan gathering of nonpartisan conservatives of the Reagan stripe, now sneeringly refered to RINOs by the true believers.

In advance of the really big... maybe... shew, USA Today predicted that “thousands of political activists, pundits, elected officials and public intellectuals (would) gather under palm trees in Orlando” (more accurately, it was the CFG, at the Breakers in Palm Beach... CPAC forsaking their usual haunting grounds of the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center in Maryland, across the river from the nation’s capital for the historic, if rather dingy or, perhaps “jinky” (the iconic hotel remaining shuttered amid the coronavirus pandemic.

The convention’s move from its longtime home, however, has not diminished its significance for the political right.  Joining their hero’s deSanctification of Ron and Joe jihad would be, as USA predicted, “nine sitting senators; two governors; 36 members of the U.S. House— including House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy — and various high-profile conservative media personalities and activists.”

They got closer to the truthiness with that... McCarthy did attend – but last year.  After promising to attend, he pivoted to CFG instead.

Conspicuous in their absence besides the Florida Governor and his mob were anti-Semitic rapper Young Pharaoh, unholy alt-right pedophile Milo Yiannopoulos, holy but unhanged Mike Pence and a garble and gabble of “disloyal” MAGA2020 backers who have since saw the light (and the midterm results).

One putative problem pedophile not disinvited... in fact, honored by the former President as another victim of Democrat’c thuggery and witch-hunting was the American Conservative Union (ACU), thus nominal CPAC Chair Matt Schlapp, accused of

Supplementing Trump’s defiant shoutout to his fellow victim, ACU board members posted...

“We have seen the most recent egregious attack by the Daily Beast on ACU Chairman Matt Schlapp. We have both known Matt and his wife, Mercedes, for decades. We know Matt Schlapp's heart and his character. And we believe this latest attempt at character assassination is false.”  (CPAC home, Attachment Six)

 

The gathering had run into trouble of late, not only because of the Democratic stampede (well... they did hold the Senate by one vote, after being predicted to lose between five and ten seats) but on account of the travails and transgressions of Schlapp and the boycotts of MAGAtraitors like DeSantis and Pence, but not Haley who tried to have it both ways, claiming and proclaiming at CPAC to a chorus of boos exceeded only by the hostile clamor arising whenever Volodomyr Zelenskyy was mentioned.

In turn, “Trump was the only major 2024 hopeful not invited to the group’s Palm Beach donor retreat” (CNN March 3nd, Attachment Seven) and the network unearthed “some” Republicans who linked the defections to the Schlapp suit by a Republican strategist who was working for Herschel Walker’s Senate campaign (a male) who alleged that Schlapp sexually assaulted him and is suing the Chairman and his wife for more than $9 million. Schlapp has denied the claims.

“It’s a scandal,” one Republican operative who has worked on several presidential campaigns told CNN. “If you are thinking about running for president and you’re not Donald Trump, you can’t afford a misstep. You can’t afford to be linked to a scandal.”

When it was reported last month that Trump was not invited to the Club for Growth summit, the former president fired back, slamming the group as “an assemblage of political misfits, globalists, and losers” and as “Club for NO Growth” on his Truth Social account.

He found his quantum of solace among loyalists... “a slate of prominent election deniers and close allies of Trump, including defeated Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake, MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon,” and also more semi-mainstream talking heads like Ted (Cruz) and    

The Washington Examiner’s David Freddoso reported that CFG countered with a roster of Republican limelighters as follows... (Attachment Eight)

Sen. Cruz (R-TX)

Ted, the WashXanuber said, “serves as the ranking member on the Senate Commerce Committee. He was a presidential candidate in 2016 but does not appear likely to run in 2024.” Cruz spoke before the conference Thursday afternoon, suggesting that Dr. Anthony Fauci should be thrown in jail for "lying under oath."

Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH)

“Jordan serves as the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. He spoke Thursday morning about his vision for the Judiciary Committee's various investigations into the "Trump-Russia collusion hoax," the COVID-19 pandemic, and the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop.

Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH)

“Vance won his seat in 2022, defeating Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH), and serves on the Senate Banking and Commerce committees. He ripped into Attorney General Merrick Garland, saying "he needs to go" while on a panel with Cruz on Thursday afternoon.

Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL)

“Scott won his seat in 2018 and is up for reelection in 2024. He unsuccessfully challenged Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) for the Senate leadership position following the 2022 elections. Scott defended his challenge to McConnell in his Thursday afternoon  speech, saying he would "like to apologize to absolutely nobody."  Annnd... he’s the rogue elephant who proposed that America balance its budget by cutting or eliminating Social Security and Medicare, a proposal even other Republicans couldn’t stomach (whether out of empathy or political retaliation) – DJI    


Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA)

The Notorious MTG “serves on the House Homeland Security and Oversight committees, in addition to being on the House select committee on the coronavirus pandemic. She spoke Friday morning, defending herself against attacks by Democrats on her bill that would outlaw transgender surgeries for those under the age of 18. Greene also whipped up boos for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, saying he “wants our sons and daughters to go die in Ukraine."

Former University of Kentucky swimmer Riley Gaines

“Gaines, a 12-time NCAA All-American swimmer for the University of Kentucky, has been an outspoken advocate against biological men competing in women's sports after having to compete against transgender swimmer Lia Thomas in 2022. She blasted the "systemic eradication of women" at the conference Friday morning.”

Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL)

“Gaetz serves on the House Armed Services and Judiciary committees. He was known for being one of the lead "never Kevin" congressmen who held up the House speaker vote in January. Gaetz called for the "weaponized" FBI and DOJ to be abolished during a speech Friday morning.”

Rep. James Comer (R-KY)

“Comer serves as the chairman of the House Oversight Committee. Under his leadership, the Oversight Committee is looking into the Justice Department's investigations, including into President Joe Biden's son Hunter. Comer also serves on the House Education and Labor Committee and the House Agriculture Committee. He spoke Friday morning.”

Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL)

“Donalds serves on the House Oversight, Budget, and Small Business committees. He addressed the conference on Friday afternoon.”

Presidential candidate Nikki Haley

“Haley is one of three GOP presidential candidates speaking at CPAC. She served as governor of South Carolina from 2011 to 2017 and later as ambassador to the United Nations under President Donald Trump from 2017 until 2018. She addressed the conference on  Friday afternoon by attempting to court voters who are "tired of losing" in a subtle dig at fellow presidential candidate Trump.”

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo

“Pompeo served as a congressman from Kansas from 2011 until 2017, when he became director of the CIA and later secretary of state under Trump. He is widely seen as a contender for the GOP presidential nomination in 2024 but has not stated whether he will run. Pompeo spoke to attendees Friday afternoon, issuing a stark warning about a "crisis within conservativism" amid a recent string of losses.”

Presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy

“Ramaswamy is the second Republican presidential candidate speaking at CPAC. He is an entrepreneur and author known for the books Woke, Inc. and Nation of Victims. Ramaswamy (countering MTG) a spoke Friday afternoon, countering calls for a "national divorce," and calling instead for a "national revival."

Former Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake

“Lake was the 2022 Republican nominee for governor in Arizona but lost to Democrat Katie Hobbs in a tight race. She spoke at the Ronald Reagan Dinner on Friday evening, leaning into Trump and claims that the election she lost was stolen.”

Former Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard

“Gabbard served in Congress from 2013 to 2021 as a Democrat but announced she was leaving the party in 2022 to go independent. She is scheduled to speak at 1:45 p.m. on Saturday.”

Former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro

“Bolsonaro served as president of Brazil from 2019 until the end of 2022. He lost his reelection bid to leftist Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and left the country for the United States in December 2022. He is scheduled to speak at 2:05 p.m. on Saturday.

...and, finally...


Former President Donald Trump

“Trump is the third GOP presidential candidate speaking at CPAC and will be the final speaker of the conference. He served as president from 2017 until 2021, losing his reelection bid to President Joe Biden in 2020. Trump announced in November 2022 he would be seeking a second term as president in 2024. He is scheduled to speak at 5:25 p.m. on Saturday.”

 Other notable speakers include Sens. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), Eric Schmitt (R-MO), and John Kennedy (R-LA), Virginia GOP Lt. Gov. Winsome Sears, Reps. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) and Jason Smith (R-MO), and commentator Candace Owens.

These, prior to Djonald UnChained made what CNN called “false claims about Biden, Zelensky, the FBI and The Children” during Saturday’s mid-CPAC autopsy.  (See March 4th, Attachment Nine)

Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio uttered two false claims about President Joe Biden. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia repeated a debunked claim about Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama used two inaccurate statistics as he lamented the state of the country. Former Trump White House official Steve Bannon repeated his regular lie about the 2020 election having been stolen from Trump, this time baselesly blaming Fox for Trump’s defeat.

“Rep. Kat Cammack of Florida incorrectly said a former Obama administration official had encouraged people to harass Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Rep. Ralph Norman of South Carolina inaccurately claimed Biden had laughed at a grieving mother and inaccurately insinuated that the FBI tipped off the media to its search of former President Donald Trump’s Florida residence. Two other speakers, Rep. Scott Perry of Pennsylvania and former Trump administration official Sebastian Gorka, inflated the number of deaths from fentanyl.”

And that’s not all, CNN said, ticking off their fact check of “13 false claims from the conference,” as of Saturday.  (See full texts as Attachment Nine, above)

Facts First: MTG on Zelensky... Greene’s claim is false. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky didn’t say he wants American sons and daughters to fight or die for Ukraine.

Facts First: Bannon on Fox...  This is nonsense. On election night in 2020, Fox accurately projected that Biden had won the state of Arizona. This projection did not change the outcome of the election; all of the votes are counted regardless of what media outlets have projected, and the counting showed that Biden won Arizona, and the election, fair and square.

Facts First: Jordan on Deportations... Jordan inaccurately described the 100-day deportation pause that Biden attempted to impose immediately after he took office on January 20, 2021. The policy did not say the US wouldn’t deport “anyone who comes.” It explicitly did not apply to anyone who arrived in the country after the end of October 2020, meaning people who arrived under the Biden administration or in the last months of the Trump administration could still be deported.

Facts First: Rep. Ralph Norman (R-SC) on the FBI “raid” at Trump’s mansion... Norman’s narrative is false. The FBI did not tip off the media to its search of Mar-a-Lago; CNN reported the next day that the search “happened so quietly, so secretly, that it wasn’t caught on camera at all.” Rather, media outlets belatedly sent cameras to Mar-a-Lago because Peter Schorsch, publisher of the website Florida Politics, learned of the search from non-FBI sources and tweeted about it either after it was over or as it was just concluding, and because Trump himself made a public statement less than 20 minutes later confirming that a search had occurred.

Facts First: Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Al) on two-parent households.  Tuberville’s claim that half of American children don’t have two parents is incorrect. Official figures from the Census Bureau show that, in 2021, about 70% of US children under the age of 18 lived with two parents and about 65% lived with two married parents.

... and on “woke education” –

Facts First: This is false. While many Americans do struggle with reading, there is no basis for the claim that “half” of high school graduates can’t read a basic document like a diploma. “Mr. Tuberville does not know what he’s talking about at all,” said Patricia Edwards, a Michigan State University professor of language and literacy who is a past president of the International Literacy Association and the Literacy Research Association.

Facts First: Jordan again, claiming that Biden States stood in front of Independence Hall, (and) “called half the country fascists.”  This is not true. Biden did not denounce even close to “half the country” in this 2022 speech at Independence Hall in Philadelphia. He made clear that he was speaking about a minority of Republicans.

Facts First: Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa) on gas stoves and electric vehicles... This is nonsense. The federal government has not told people that they can’t buy a gas stove or must buy an electric vehicle.

Facts First: Norman (above) also claimed that Biden had just laughed at a mother who lost two sons to fentanyl...  Norman’s claim is false. Biden did not laugh at the mother who lost her sons to fentanyl, the anti-abortion activist Rebecca Kiessling; in a somber tone, he called her “a poor mother who lost two kids to fentanyl.” Rather, he proceeded to laugh about how Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene had baselessly blamed the Biden administration for the young men’s deaths even though the tragedy happened in mid-2020, during the Trump administration.

Facts First: Rep. Kat Commack (R-Fl) on harassment of SCOTUS Justice Brett Kavanaugh.  This story is false. The witness Cammack questioned in this February exchange at the subcommittee, former Obama administration deputy assistant attorney general Elliot Williams, did not encourage people to harass Kavanaugh. In fact, it’s not even true that Cammack accused him at the February hearing of having encouraged people to harass Kavanaugh.

Facts First: Sen. John F. Kennedy (R-La) calling the economy better when Trump was “in charge”... This is inaccurate in two ways. First, the economic numbers for the full “four years” of Trump’s tenure are much worse than these numbers Kennedy cited; Kennedy was actually referring to Trump’s first three years while ignoring the fourth, which was marred by the Covid-19 pandemic. Second, there weren’t “8 million new jobs” created even in Trump’s first three years.

Facts First: Daughter-in-law Lara Trump’s claim about February 2020 having “the lowest unemployment in American history” (was) false. The unemployment rate was 3.5% at the time – tied for the lowest since 1969, but not the all-time lowest on record, which was 2.5% in 1953. And while Lara Trump didn’t make an explicit claim about unemployment under Biden, it’s not true that things are worse today on this measure; again, the most recent unemployment rate, 3.4% for January 2023, (3.6% now) is better than the rate at the time of CPAC’s 2020 conference or at any other time during Donald Trump’s presidency.

Facts First: Sebastian Gorka, a former Trump administration official, and Perry (above) blamed “Biden’s open border” for 110,000 fentanyl deaths... It’s not true that there are more than 100,000 fentanyl deaths per year. That is the total number of deaths from all drug overdoses in the US; there were 106,699 such deaths in 2021. But the number of overdose deaths involving synthetic opioids other than methadone, primarily fentanyl, is smaller – 70,601 in 2021.

CNN also stated that there were 91,799 “troubling” total overdose deaths and that fentanyl smugglers largely use legal ports of entry as opposed to migrants “sneaking” across the border.

 

CNN did not check, nor could they, Ol’ 45’s allegation that “I am your retribution.”  (Guardian U.K., March Fourth, among other references... See Attachment Ten)

“Donald Trump turned back the clock to the darkest elements of his presidency on Saturday,” wrote liberal GUKster David Smith, “with a fiery address that showed the threat to American democracy is far from over,” after a “lackluster: start to his campaign and, “watched by Brazil’s far-right former president Jair Bolsonaro,” returned to “the authoritarian language that characterised his political rise seven years ago.”

Opinion polls dredged up by GUK suggest that Trump’s grip on the party is slipping in the wake of the 6 January 2021 insurrection and a disappointing midterm performance. “But he continues to rule supreme at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), billed as the biggest annual gathering of grassroots conservatives.”

It wasn’t, but the enthusiasm index spiked Saturday night.  “I didn’t know this was a rally, Matt,” Trump said at one point to beleavuered and besmirched CPAC impresario Matt Schlapp. “It really is a rally.”

As the crowd erupted in cheers and chants of “Four more years!”, Trump cast the upcoming election in Manichean terms, returning to his us-versus-them rhetoric of old... these being, in GUK-speak...

Demolishing the “deep state”...

Expelling the “war mongers” (Putin haters)...

Driving out the globalists...

Casting out the communists...

And torching the enemies of America... “villains and scoundrels” one and all...

The “political class that hates our country”

The Democrats

The fake news media (Fox now included)

The Rino “freaks, neocons, globalists, open border zealots and fools”...

Karl Rove...

Jeb Bush (but not “W”?)...

Hate!  Hate!  Hate!  Kill!  Kill!  Kill!  MAGA!  MAGA!  MAGA!

(Djonald UnCivil has apparently divorced his Lady Magaga... just as MTG proposes a “divorce” between the red and blue states like... you know... 1861, but messier.)

He also made what the Brits called an “unlikely” boast: “Before I arrive in the Oval Office, I will have the disastrous war between Russia and Ukraine ended... I know what to say.”

“And you’re going to have world war three, by the way. We’re going to have world war three if something doesn’t happen fast. I am the only candidate who can make this promise: I will prevent world war three.”

“We have no choice,” he said in a startling contrast to Biden’s pleas for unity, warning “this is the final battle”.

 

And The Fox, apparently, is also divorced from Team Trump – at least for the primary season.

 

Well, now that they have to appear fair and balanced, they modestly compared the before-the-fire ambience of CPAC and the CFG, while calling both “cattle calls”.

When asked why Trump was not invited, Club for Growth President David McIntosh told Fox News (Attachment Eleven) that "what we decided we wanted our members and donors to do is…. They know Trump, and they know his record. They like his record as president, but they’re not sure he can win. So they’re going to take a look and this will be an opportunity for the candidates to present themselves."

McIntosh and the Club, the Fox said, have had an “up and down” relationship with Trump. They opposed Trump as he ran for the White House in 2016 before embracing him as an ally. Last cycle, Trump and the Club teamed up in some high-profile GOP primaries but clashed over combustible Senate nomination battles in Alabama, Ohio and Pennsylvania.

McIntosh did hold out an olive branch... perhaps poisoned, perhaps not... telling Fox that "the Club would certainly support him (Trump) if he’s the nominee for the party. He has a good record as a former president. We want to make sure he can win. And if he ends up being the nominee, we’ll try to help him win because a Biden presidency for four more years would be a disaster."

Across the Palm Beach, Florida neighborhood from a temporarily vacant Mar-a-Lago, Governor Ron deSantis reiterated passages from his “woke is dead” Bible, hawked his new book and pushed through new congressional maps which suppress the minority vote by eliminating two African American voting districts.

NPR, post CFG (March 6th, Attachment Twelve) acknowledged The Saint as “one of the leading candidates” who “rivals and sometimes surpasses former President Donald Trump” in the Paleolithic polls twenty months from Twenty Twenty Four.

Their thumbnail biography... heavy on the “nails” as befits an icon of the liberal media... acknowledged his breakthrough 2022 re-election during a time of crisis for Republicans with even the MAGAmob rallying to his “Don’t Say Gay” and “Florida is where woke goes to die” tropes and distancing himself from Rick Scott’s anti-Social Security and Medicare messages – preferring to lull senior voters into yawning “Long live Sleep” before fading off to count sheep.

Former Congressman David Jolly, from the Tampa area, now remembers DeSantis as part of the then-MAGAless House Freedom Caucus, then focused on cutting government spending. "At the time," Jolly says, "I described them as the shutdown caucus..." remembering Ronnie’s “commitment to fundraising and the raw political hunger of moving beyond the House."

DeSantis, a Yale and Harvard-educated lawyer who served in the Navy, spent three terms in Congress before running for governor. His frequent appearances on Fox News drew the attention of President Trump who endorsed him. DeSantis embraced the endorsement and ran a now-famous ad narrated by his wife as he read to his children from Trump's book, Art of the Deal.

Another now-Congressman Aaron Bean has nothing but praise for how the governor responded to the pandemic. "He went against the grain," Bean says. "You can't say Florida now without saying the 'Free State of Florida' because Governor DeSantis has led the way."

An enemy of masking, vaxxing and social distancing... who, as President, might well stack the DOJ to indict, prosecute and lock up Dr. Fauci and other denialists of plague denialism... the Guv’nor has few friends among the medical profession.  Bill Hanage, an associate professor of epidemiology at Harvard's T.H. Chan School of Public Health, says DeSantis “politicized the public health crisis.” which led to an increase of deaths in Florida from COVID. "If you compare it with California, New York, Massachusetts and the United Kingdom," Hanage told NPR, using data from Johns Hopkins University, Florida is "the only one to have more deaths since vaccines were available, than before. The only one of them."

DeSantis dismissed the criticism by saying Florida voters looked at his record on COVID in November and gave him a resounding vote of confidence. "Not only did we win re-election," he boasts, "we won with the highest percentage of the vote that any Republican Governor candidate has in the history of the state of Florida."

“That's true, if you leave out the Reconstruction era,” NPR snarked... or the voters that died during this term of office.

Saint Ron has also drawn both bouquets and brickbats for his War on Disney (See Attachment 35 below), some even urging The Mouse to move and emigrate to another clime.

But maybe there will be an equal im-migration... a nice immigration, being composed of cold Americans who vote and mostly (except for the bewildered and forlorn techies) find jobs.

Jolly (above) says that, for DeSantis, there's a more fundamental question. True, his nearly 20-point win in Florida came in a midterm election in which most of the country turned away from the Republican Party and many of the conservative policies DeSantis has promoted. But now Jolly says, "The test for Ron DeSantis will be, is he really that skilled and that good of an evangelist to convince the country to follow the direction he took Florida?"

Can he flip, for example, California?

DeSantis' supporters have a slogan, "Make America Florida." Next year, voters across the country may get a chance to decide if that's something that they want.

Especially the ones living in and around Lake Tahoe or the San Bernardino mountains.

While Trump is “easily the most recognizable name at this year's conference,” Axios (Attachment Thirteen) soft-pedaled the absence of Saint Ron and House Speaker Kevin Mac from CPAC.

(Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell fell down at a fundraising dinner in the Waldorf Astoria hotel in Washington, D.C.; bumped his head, broke a rib and so, therefore, avoided having to face the wrath of either faction or either leading candidate.

Mitchy survived what might well have been a Dadaist pratfall (or a strategic one).  There were gaffes, more physical and intellectual pratfalls and outrageous whoppers at CPAC – Rolling Stone selected its top ten (Attachment Fourteen) and the adventures of Schlapp… in Brazil, like George Santos’, of all places… (Attachment Fifteen) provided fresh meat for not only the Stoners but for a cornucopia of TV, stand-up and online comedians.

 

Most prominent Republican lawmakers at CPAC didn’t bring up what GUK, predictably, termed Trump’s big lie.  (Attachment Sixteen).  Instead they largely chose not to repeat his common talking point that rampant voter fraud cost him his re-election.

Given the predictability of the two warrior chiefs at CPAC and CFG, some of the media... partisans to one side or the other, neither or, also hedging their bets, both shone a spotlight on some of the supporting cast at the two conferences.

Some embraced the spotlight and shone.  Others ran like roaches when the kitchen light’s turned on.

CPAC security even stomped on one ugly bug... Nick Fuentes, the antisemitic white nationalist provocateur who dined with former President Donald Trump last year, was "removed" from the premises Schlapp told NBC on Friday (Attachment Seventeen)

“We are pleased that our conference welcomes a wide array of conservative perspectives from people of different backgrounds, but we are concerned about the rise in antisemitic rhetoric (or Jew hatred) in our country and around the globe, whether it be in the corridors of power and academia or through the online rantings of bigots like Fuentes,” Schlapp said.

Fuentes responded to the statement in a post on the social media site Telegram, where he appeared... appeared?... to mock Schlapp's legal troubles, saying, "Ah yes we all know CPAC is reserved for sexual gropers."

His dinner partner, Ye — who also has a history of making antisemitic remarks, if not groping strange men — said in a Twitter video after the feast that “Trump is really impressed with Nick Fuentes.”

Trump has since said he didn’t know Fuentes or his background when they dined together. 

Also evicted 3 rats and 12 spiders... five buzzards were allowed to stay when they were recognized as  members in good standing of the donor class.

If the size of the CPACrowd was smaller than expected... always a trigger for Trumpian rage... an aide speaking to Axios (Attachment Eighteen) wished away the discrepancy by explaining that it was their enthusiasm... not their numbers... that was paramount.  "Trump has completely remade the party since he’s become president... (H)e realized there’s a difference between what grassroots activists thought and what Bush Republicans in Washington, D.C., were trying to enact."

Still, the Boston Globe described the conference as “in turmoil”... largely over the great, gray, gay, gaseous vapors swirling round the Gaylord Convention Center on the banks of the Potomac (and some elephants’ memories of November, 2022.)

The reduced, but enthusiastic mob cheered their hero, nonetheless, craned their neck to view Steve Bannon podcasting from the premises, snapped selfies of a fake Oval Office to cement the denial of 2020 and gobbled mountains of merch at The MAGA Mall booth.  (Attachment Nineteen)

“Any Trump competitor will have to appease this crowd, which has already shaped the party’s rhetoric and priorities far outside this convention center and is unwilling to go down without a fight,” condluced the Globe, whether political or (as is quite possible at the 2024 convention, if not wholly probable) physical.

“Anybody else that’s running,” said Representative Byron Donalds of Florida after Team MAGA booed Haley and Pompeo off the stage, “you better figure out a way to contend with that.”

The only apparent survivor of the bloodbath was Mike Lindell, the MyPillow founder who has become one of the country’s most prominent election deniers, handed out fliers for his latest project, an entity called the “Election Crime Bureau.”

“I’m here at CPAC for one reason and one reason only, and that is to educate people,” Lindell said, calling for the end of vote tabulation machines and early voting, and lambasting DeSantis as a “Trojan horse.”

“This is almost like grassroots, a new party forming … call it the party of common sense,” Lindell added. “That’s the Donald Trump party, too, by the way.”

Disappointed dissenters quickly ran for their lives from the warriors and the weather.  “It’s become the Donald Trump political action conference,” said Michael Biundo, a New Hampshire-based Republican strategist who left Washington early to get ahead of a winter storm aimed at his home state.

But Beth Veneto of Quincy, outside Boston, selling gingerbread cookies depicting Trump, intricately decorated with yellow frosting hair and glittery stars, told the Globe that: “I’m glad the other people are jumping into the race, but ginger Donald all the way,” Veneto said. “We’re going to make sure our cookie country doesn’t crumble.”

Perhaps she hasn’t yet processed the news that the Number One Girl Scout cookie of the year is “Raspberry Rally” – as in Red Tide Ron, down in Florida.

Speaking of thing edible, a hyperthusiastic Don Junior punctuated his CPAC speech with a remark that the old RINOs at National Review found offensive (Attachment Twenty)... castigating Pennsylvania’s stroked and depressed John Fetterman as “a vegetable” who’d be better off as a supermarket bag boy.

“As far as I am concerned,” declared Wesley J. Smith, “it belongs in the same category of unacceptable terminology as the N-word.

Fetterman might well be incapable of performing the work of a United States senator. That’s a legitimate issue, as is the senator’s hiding of his previous episodes of depression during the campaign.

But the matter can be discussed quite thoroughly without slinging slurs at people who have mental challenges and disrespecting people who are cognitively disabled, as his “bag guy at a . . . grocery store” snidery did. We are all equal. The people with special needs who bag our groceries have more class than Trump Jr. ever will.”

Noted... but not all the people who bag groceries at supermarkets have “special needs.”  A lot of them only need more money than the company pays them.  But don’t expect either The Saint or The Donald to get into that.

But if chastising a cripple was politically incorrect, MTG’s subseqnent denunciation of Volodomyr Zelenskyy and the Ukrainian freedom fighters (and implied support for Putin’s war) was off the charts, the charts off the table, the table overturned and the Buckley Boys on the side of America’s better angels.

“A crowd at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) booed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in absentia on Friday,” wrote NR correspondent Brittany Bernstein (Attachment Twenty One) after Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R., Ga.) misleadingly claimed he “wants our sons and daughters to go die in Ukraine.”

Zelensky’s full quote read: “If it happens so that Ukraine, due to various opinions and weakening, depleting of assistance, loses, Russia is going to enter Baltic states, NATO member states, and then the U.S. will have to send their sons and daughters exactly the same way as we are sending, their sons and daughters to war.”

“They will have to fight. Because it’s NATO that we’re talking about, and they will be dying, God forbid, because it’s a horrible thing,” the Ukrainian president said.

Putin’s war, we have previously noted, has been sanctioned by Kyrill... the Patriarch of Russian Orthodoxy who adheres to the Old Testament orthodoxy who numbers gays along with the enemies of God... fornicators, idolators, bacon-eaters and infidels (a changing cast of villains as now includes Jews, as well as members of Christian sects that offend the spectator and so must be put to death per Deuteronomy 20:17.

Pute-symp Michael Knowles of the Daily Wire sparked alarm on Saturday with his anti-trans oratory.

“Transgenderism must be eradicated from public life entirely,” he said.

John Knefel of Media Matters called it “eliminationist, genocidal rhetoric”.

Adam Vary of Variety urged people to “pay attention. This is genocidal. That is not hyperbole or alarmist; this rhetoric is calling for the eradication of a group of people for who they are”.  (Independent U.K., Attachment Twenty Two)

As we noted when noting the Kyrill/Putin bromance... the invasion of Ukraine was“all about the gays.”

And also, all about those... uh... dusky people?

The Independents asked conservatives at CPAC what ‘woke’ means. Their replies were revealing...

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, the potential Republican presidential candidate, has repeatedly said that his state is where “woke goes to die”. Mr. DeSantis did not attend the Conservative Political Action Conference just outside Washington this week. But plenty of others focused on “wokeness”.

Former president Donald Trump has talked about generals being too “woke”.

Presidential hopeful Nikki Haley said that “I’m running for president to renew an America that’s proud and strong, not weak and woke.” Senator Tommy Tuberville of Alabama held a talk on the first full day of the conference entitled “Sacking the Woke Playbook”.

Black Americans largely adopted the term “woke” going back as late as the 1940s as a phrase meant to be aware of racism around them and became a staple of African American Vernacular English (AAVE). But plenty of activists at CPAC had a different definition...

Marie Rogerson, an executive director of program development at Moms for Liberty said Mr DeSantis’s war on the concept of “woke” was necessary to help the state thrive.

“Killing ‘woke’ means, it’s like a garden, you’re getting rid of the weeds so that the things you actually want to grow, can,” she said.

Ms. Rogerson also said people did not need to use the word “woke” to discuss racism... it could be a major problem, it could be a minor problem. I don’t think it’s necessary to say ‘stay woke’ to be concerned about any racism that exists in America. Woke means more than just racism.”

“‘Woke’ to me means that you are basing your reality off of fiction and your feelings rather than actual facts,” Angelo Veltri, northeast regional director for Young Americans for Liberty, told The Independent. “‘Woke’ is more of the sense of like, if you feel a certain way, then you must be true, and they typically adhere to their truths rather than the truth as a whole. And it’s leading toward this woke postmodernism in a sense. Woke communism, where they’re trying to take over based on people’s feelings rather than actual factual evidence.”

Trump, at CPAC, floated a policy to wipe out “woke” as well as certain other psychologies and pathologies of dissent.

Former President Donald Trump promised attendees at an ultra-conservative gathering Saturday night that he would use a second term in the White House to implement an authoritarian vision for policing crime that would include deploying the National Guard into US cities with high crime rates.

“I will send in the National Guard until law and order is restored.”  (Time, March 4th, Attachment Twenty Three)

“Frankly the federal government should take over control and management of Washington, D.C.,” Trump said, adding at one point, “I wouldn’t even call the mayor.”

Without evidence, Trump claimed that, as President, he ordered the clearing out of homeless encampments in Washington, DC. He also bemoaned how his chairman of the joint chiefs of staff Gen. Mark Milley objected to Trump’s June 2020 order for National Guard forces to use tear gas and rubber bullets to push out racial justice protestors from Lafayette Park in front of the White House so Trump could stage a photo op with a bible in front of St. John’s Episcopal Church. “He didn’t like me holding up a bible in front of a church,” Trump said about Milley.

“The sinister forces trying to kill America have done everything they can to stop me, to silence you, and to turn this nation into a socialist dumping ground for criminals, junkies, Marxists, thugs, radicals and dangerous refugees that no other country wants,” Trump said.

 

And his were not even the most extreme alt-alt-right proposals at the outskirts of CPAC.

Rep. Paul Sherrell, R-Sparta, suggested adding hanging by tree as a method of execution during discussion this week in Nashville over a bill concerning capital punishment.  (Capitol TN.gov, Attachment Twenty Four)

Warned by lesser and lefter alt-righters that he might be damaging the cause, Sherrell recanted... sort of.

"My exaggerated comments were intended to convey my belief that for the cruelest and most heinous crimes, a just society requires the death penalty in kind," Sherrell said. "Although a victim's family cannot be restored when an execution is carried out, a lesser punishment undermines the value we place on protecting life."

Racial and eccleastical cardsharps were quick to pounce.

"A bill calling to expand the death penalty by firing squad, and even lynching, is deplorable, immoral and takes us back to the dark days of Jim Crow," said Rev. Dr. Kevin Riggs, pastor of Franklin Community Church. "I'm appalled by the words of Representative Sherrell. Suggesting firing squads and lynchings is unconscionable.

There were other ghouls rushin’ in... even while CPAC was CPACting along over the weekend.

The glaring absence of many prominent Republicans this year marks a dramatic change from 2015, the year before the last competitive GOP presidential primary, when CPAC’s schedule included nearly all of the major candidates, Jeb Bush among them, the Associated Press compared and contrasted.  (Attachment Twenty Five)

“If you’re Ron DeSantis, what’s the strategic reason for you to go to a place that’s pretty well on the record as just being a Trump fan club?” said Ross Hemminger, a former press secretary and former deputy communications director for the ACU.

“You just look at it and you think, ‘Oh wow.’ CPAC used to be such a big deal and now it’s this,” Hemminger said. “The goal used to be setting the conservative agenda. The goal now is: It doesn’t matter how nutty you have to be, you just have to get Donald Trump’s attention and make him know that you are willing to make a fool of yourself for him so that you can stay in his good graces.”

But, to idolize heroes, one most have a clear and prescient picture of the enemies.

And the best Team Trump could do... according to the Guardian U.K. was... the drag queens.  (Attachment Twenty Five)

One joke going round, about the suspected Chinese spy balloon’s preferred pronouns; claimed that Democrats believe there are “millions” of genders – engendering a menacing call for “transgenderism” to be “eradicated” (Guardian U.K. Attachment Twenty Six) which prefaced Djonald UnCircumsized’s pledge to ban the “chemical castration and sexual mutilization [sic]” of children.

Republican senator John F, Kennedy (not the ghost, come back and Gabbarded, but the one fromf Louisiana), said “liberals” believe that children “should be able to change their gender at recess” and “hyperventilate on their yoga mats if you use the wrong pronoun”. The remarks elicited peals of laughter from the audience.

“People like Marjorie Taylor Greene will not be satisfied until every LGBTQ person is forced into the shadows,” said Geoff Wetrosky, campaign director for the Human Rights Campaign, an LGBTQ advocacy group.  So far this year, anti-trans legislation has been proposed in 39 states, including 112 measures that focus on medical care restriction and 82 that pertain to education-related issues, according to the website Track Trans Legislation.

It’s a strategy that seeks rile up their base, seeking to capitalize on the conservative “parental rights” movement which, according to Angelo Carusone, president and chief executive of Media Matters for America, emerged in opposition to pandemic-era school polices requiring remote-learning and mask-wearing but quickly shifted to target classroom instruction related to race, sexual orientation and gender identity as well as transgender students’ bathroom use and sports participation.

On a CPAC panel dedicated to the issue, a former college athlete who competed against a transgender swimmer warned that there was an effort under way on the left to “fully eradicate women”.

A male panelist joked about “transitioning” into his female co-panelist, Chaya Raichik, who runs “Libs of TikTok”, an anti-LGBTQ social media account. Another lamented that students in China are taught calculus while American students learn that there are “72 genders”.

The homophobic strategy... not to mention some originally on the roster of CPACandidates took hits from the “left” (aka the RINO Republican right) and the extreme hyper-right when Schlapp’s "groping" of a male staffer for Herschel Walker's Senate campaign floated to the surface of the Unwoke River like a bloated mobster in October. (People.com, Attachment Twenty Seven).  Many now-Djonald DisLoyalists decamped and flocked instead to an event held by Club for Growth or stayed home, presumably doing their knitting or other gay stuff.  And Vox noted not only the canine replacement of Fox with the Chinese religious movement Falun Gong, but also other desertions from The Exile’s Fourth Estate... instead of Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson, there were major media presences from the Epoch Times and New Tang Dynasty (NTD) TV, which are both, also, affiliated with Falun Gong.  (Attachment Twenty Eight)

Fence-sitters like Haley did not fare well... the former Governor and U.N. Secretary was chased from the ballroom by chants of “Trump, Trump, Trump” and “we love Trump” from attendees more interested in signed copies of Sean Spicer’s children’s book, The Parrots Go Bananas at the merch table or take selfies with Gorka, Mike (My Pillow) Lindell or promoter of the Pizzagate conspiracy theory Jack Posobiec.

Vox’s Ben Jacob, sniffed “a sense of slow and steady decay creeping through the event”, but at least acknowledged that the attendees, “those who have probably spent, at minimum, hundreds of dollars on a ticket and traveled from across the country to attend” were with Trump.

Out in the Promised Land, the Romney Land... Utah... Brigham Tomco of Deseret.com also noted the desertion of some of Team Trump’s stalwarts, and a few potential rivals.  “A conference that was once a critical stop for Republican presidential candidates” now seemed dominated by merch. MAGA and supporters of former President Donald Trump, who headlined the event.  (Attachment Twenty Nine)

Reiterating the cast of characters who did attend, Tomco allowed more space to Mike Pompeo, and even to another bi-conferencial seeker, Vivek Ramaswamy, an entrepreneur and “anti-woke” activist who announced his presidential bid at the end of February and, at least, was not heckled by the jeckled and jacked-up Trump pull-toys. 

“You get national unity in this country by embracing the extremism, the radicalism, of the ideals that set this nation into motion 250 years ago,” Ramaswamy said, clearly enjoying his fifteen seconds (if not minutes) of importancy.

Ignoring the Ramasami, Steve Bannon did take a few potshots at the pompous Pompeo (who had proclaimed: “We can’t become the left, following celebrity leaders with their own brand of identity politics, those with fragile egos who refuse to acknowledge reality,”)  Steve-O: “Donald J. Trump is not simply a leader of a political party. He is not a politician. He is the leader of the most powerful political movement in American history.”

And then, the Fearless (and somewhat narcissisticly disgruntled) Leader declared that “...for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution.” 

Which begs the question: if Trump does lose the nomination... whether to deSanctimonious or some other odious defector... might he not – just for the retribution of it (and the fun) – start his own breakaway party and party down all through the fall of 2024 until Ol’ White Joe’s re-election?

Or... as a USA Today preview piece noted two like-minded instances of insurrection, implying, perhaps, a retributive termination of a weird and violent trilogy... could the invitation of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, “whose supporters stormed government buildings to protest his loss in that country's president election last year, reminiscent of the pro-Trump insurrection of Jan. 6, 2021” been a dog-whistle to the few, the proud and the psychotics?  (Attachment Thirty)

 

But still, there were the RINOs, too, among the elephants... old fogeys with disgruntlements and grievances at the Trump-led faction of the G.O.P. and a key constituency of the conservative faithful... the National Review complaining in its preview issue that one issue (in the other sense) was conspicuous in its absence from the CPAC agenda... “abortion!”  (March 1st, Attachment Thirty One)

What makes this especially disappointing is that sanctity-of-life issues were exceptionally salient this past year,” said salty NR commentator Michael New, who resuscitated an old grievance from the Trumpless 2022 confab.

“In March 2022, many pro-lifers thought there was a very good chance that the U.S. Supreme Court was about to overturn Roe v. Wade.  However,” New recalled, “no panel at the 2022 CPAC was dedicated to sanctity-of-life issues, citing a Twitter thread by pro-life activist Alison Centofante on this topic which went viral.

“During an interview,” New noted, “CPAC chairman Matt Schlapp dismissed the concerns of Centofante and other pro-lifers”, saying: “Everything is prolife that we talk about.” Schlapp later called into a gathering of pro-life leaders to mend fences. However, there was no public commitment to organizing a pro-life panel at a subsequent CPAC.”

Whether the exclusion was perhaps a gesture of “retributive” payback to Michael UnHanged or an augur of MattSlap’s private distraction by other matters, CPAC, dissing “the culture of life” has, opined the NR... not unlike its previous condemnation of the former President for his 2022 midterm miseries, failed again.

One of the ivory poachers of NR’s hegemony among right-wing elephantine internal and external organs, the hybrid-ly named Washington Examiner leaped into the gap with a tried and true Republican ripost... a poke at President Joe and donkey-boys who not only failed to launch with the announcement of the candidacy of Marianne Williamson, but countered the ivorious CPAC convention and CFG counter-convention with a competing Biden speech “at the House Democratic Caucus Issues Conference in Baltimore, Maryland, ahead of the release of the administration's federal budget proposal.  (Attachment Thirty Two) wherin, the Xaminer spake: “Republicans are expected to use the debt ceiling negotiations to exact concessions from Biden in exchange for votes.”

Sic simper un-fi to the Shutdown Caucus!

 

On Sunday after words took flight, the New Republic’s Laura Jedeed (Attachment Thirty Three) bemoaned the “sad, desolate scenes of CPAC”.

At what had once been the most famous annual gathering of America's conservatives, the chairs are empty, the energy is low— “(a)n attendee yawns, amongst a sea of empty chairs, following a speech by Donald Trump Jr.” and “the Potomac Ballroom looks grim.”

The New Republican Laura, reminding you that she is more or less enduring, as opposed to celebrating her fourth CPAC... “a bi-yearly gathering of conservative groupies, donors, political operators, long-shot candidates, and packs of teenage boys in crisp suits who wander the hallways in packs and talk to no one else...” a bacchanale and an indoctrination, a “ComiCon for politics nerds.”

“The vibes are off,” jaded Jadeed snarked shortly before noon, as CPAC organizer Matt Schlapp admits: “There’s a lot of chatter in the media over who’s here or not here.”   Jadeed need not add that a healthy slice of the bad vibes and chatter are attributable to Schlapp himself who had promised to to “go a little bit Hungarian” on the press this year (perhaps an homage to last year’s foreign celebrity Victor Orban, perhaps an appeal to the faithful to attack, kill and slice up the wicked left-wing media mob for goulash) except that he’s already been Beasted, the crowd seems too blasé, too tired to do much more than gripe about the “mistake” about moving CPAC back to Washington D.C. from Orlando (even with its transgender Disney mice and M&Ms) and hopeless old tropes (Hunter’s laptop, Chinese balloons, mask mandates, the war, the drugs, the inflation, the plague) troop to the fore once again to sigh and surrender.  Even Steve Bannon can finger no more mortal peril than that Fox on the run.

With Djonald still to appear, Jadeed predicts an ugly, probably crowded, primary season – calling Republicans “a flock without a shepherd” or, this DJI contends, an elephant whose ivory has been sawed off by the wildlife protectors to prevent it from being poached.

No leader. No galvanizing cause. No hope. No wonder these seats are empty.”

But wait!

Look down there... look south and follow the migrating words.  Look to Florida, where the King of the Castle holds court.

While Trump makes ready to address the people in two hours, (and while DeSantis, who possesses degrees from both Harvard and Yale, hobnobs with the political elite), history bids us look away from the CPAC stage where, as lovely Laura declares,  President of Concerned Women for America Penny Nance is getting Biblical. “The Old Gods, Ba’al and Moloch, the god [sic] of death, are moving in,” she says. “We are seeing it now and it’s Satanic.”

Look away, History asks, from those luxurious, but also rather proletarian environs of the Gaylord Convention Center, where the jittery jawyers at New York Magazine presumably assigned the graveyard shift are coining a new viral voice for the Old Trump/New MAGA-populist Right (or, perhaps its epitash)... “janky”.

Presumably a grafting of “junky” (in the garbagian, not the opiod sense) and “swanky” (as in the deserted rooms of the Gaylord ... a sort of diamond dumpster of a conference, if you will – in what the sober, nose-holding Yankees (well, plenty of their correspondents and more of their advertisers domicile in New England, just a short train hop, skip and jump away) contemptuously compared to a mall full of empty stores... the New Yorkers like Ben Jacobs contrasted the proletarian, populist environs to the genuinely swanky (and warm) shores of Mar-a-Lago (rather, the Breakers three miles away) where Governor de Santis is bowing and wowing the billionaire brethren of the donor class: the Floridians, Wall Streeters and the rest stuck on (and living it up in) their Billionaire Island club.

Yes, the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) was once a marquee event on the political calendar where Republicans seeking the favor of the party’s conservative base would attempt to woo a crowd of right-wing activists and diehards,” the New Yorkers look back in regret, if not anger.  (See Attachment  Thirty Four)

In 2015, the last time there was a competitive Republican presidential primary, a dozen candidates showed up, representing all wings of the party from Chris Christie to Ted Cruz. And they weren’t the only ones there, it was a marquee event for the entire right-wing ecosystem with seemingly every group represented.

The decline, Jacobs contends, began once the event began turning into a virtual proxy for Donald Trump and Trumpism. “It wasn’t just that the halls were packed with attendees in red MAGA hats and wearing t-shirts proclaiming “Trump won” or “Let’s Go Brandon.” It was that the crowd was often indistinguishable from one at a Trump event” sneered the New Yorkers.

“It felt like the continuation of CPAC’s slow spiral from a can’t-miss conservative confluence to an increasingly shabby Trump-con that seems smaller and smaller each year. The cycle feeds itself, just like the once popular mall that attracts fewer customers as stores close, causing more and more stores to close, drawing even fewer customers. And it seems like the exact same demographic of people who only go to a struggling mall to get in their daily steps are the same ones still converging at CPAC to celebrate Trump.

“The Orange Julius may be gone,” Jacobs potted the Stormy-deluged former Gothamite with more New Yorkisms, “but there’s still plenty of kiosks peddling the Orange Donald.”

 

Speaking of potted things... meats, cannabis oilies, geraniums or what have you... DeSantis, in a closed-door speech to donors Thursday, sought to cement himself as the governor who will go places other Republicans will not as he accused fellow GOP leaders of sitting back in the cultural fights “like potted plants,” according to audio of his remarks obtained by CNN.

“I’m going on offense,” DeSantis said at a retreat hosted by the conservative Club for Growth. “Some of these Republicans, they just sit back like potted plants, and they let the media define the terms of the debate. They let the left define the terms of debate. They take all this incoming, because they’re not making anything happen. And I said, ‘That’s not what we’re doing.’”

David McIntosh, the Club’s president who introduced DeSantis at The Breakers Palm Beach resort, told CNN that the governor “gave a great speech that was well received.” The 40-minute address received multiple rounds of applause (March 3rd, Attachment Thirty Five)... no doubt enhanced by the candidate’s contention that he would not 'mess with Social Security,' as Democrats and Trump slammed his past support for privatization – but, rather, “step out and fight back.” It’s a theme, the cable giant’s Alayna Treene and Steve Contorno asserted, that DeSantis “leans into” in his new book,”The Courage to Be Free,” which he released on Tuesday and has spent the week promoting on Fox News and in events throughout Florida.

A source familiar with DeSantis’ remarks told CNN that the governor showed up late to Thursday’s event and immediately left after his speech without talking to anyone. CNN previously reported that GOP donors have expressed frustration that DeSantis rarely lingers at gatherings, and the Guv’ has earned a reputation for ducking out of events with guests still waiting for a photo. DeSantis hosted his own donor gathering in Palm Beach last weekend that was aimed at addressing those concerns.

In his speech before the traditionally business-friendly audience, DeSantis also defended his strong-arming of corporations (i.e. the Mouse Factory and Wall Street), and criticized American CEOs as being “just weak” for giving into “woke mobs” that push environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) policies, among other “leftist” issues.

“I think these companies should just stay out of this stuff. I don’t think it’s good for our economy,” the governor said. “I don’t think it’s good for society to have every decision that’s made in politics have corporate America weighing in.”

Although, like CPAC, formerly aligned with Trump, the Club for Growth claimed to host this event to give "new talent" the opportunity to showcase those who support the ideas the club backs, including limited government and free markets, and for these speakers to share their vision of "where America should go, or what America would need," said McIntosh.

"We wanted to show all of the different talent that was in the Republican Party, thinking about running or being speculated about running," McIntosh told Mar-a-Lago martyr’s hometown Palm Beach Post on Saturday (Attachment Thirty Six).

“Polls tend to remain close between the two Florida Republicans,” the PBP contended.  In a Yahoo News/YouGov poll of potential Republican presidential nominees taken in early February, DeSantis was leading Trump by 4 percentage points. But a more recent YahooNews poll conducted toward the end of February showed Trump leading by 8 percentage points.

In addition to his Club for Growth speech last week, DeSantis spoke at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in California on Sunday, promoting his new book, fully titled: "The Courage To Be Free: Florida’s Blueprint For America’s Revival." (Ingrid Jacques in USA Today’s March 7th issue, Attachment Thirty Seven)

“It could also read like a blueprint for his 2024 campaign,” gushed fangirl Jacques. During his speech, he advocated how Florida is pro-business and pro-freedom and how it’s “where woke goes to die,” which has become a common refrain for the governor. 

It’s noteworthy, Ingrid added, that a “tired” Trump used similar verbiage Saturday in his CPAC speech when he said, The era of woke and weaponized government is over.

Trump is likely sees Ronny deSanctimonious as his biggest competition, so he’ll likely “continue to copy some of DeSantis’ messaging.” (USA Today)  And vice versa, as the ivory poachers continue traipsing through the 2024 jungle – stealing taglines from one another and backing up, bumping backs like a couple of low-rent slapstick comedians.

“It’s refreshing to see Republicans like DeSantis who aren’t afraid of Trump,” the janky Jacques wrapped, “and are showing it’s possible to succeed without pledging fealty to the MAGA doctrine.”

Hastening away from the gloomy Potomac, Trump quickly followed the ravens back south to meet with a group of Nevada State GOP officials at his Mar-a-Lago club even as some reported the Governor to be cleaning his clock; a meeting which was his first direct outreach to party leaders of the early primary state,

The dinner (CBS, March 4th, Attachment Thirty Eight) was the latest example of the Trump campaign's aggressive outreach to state and local party officials in the early primary states like Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and beyond.

Team Trump will be likely devoting a considerable of brain matter to the question of the DeSantis/Disney wars as originated back in January when Ron signed a bill to take control of municipal services and development for the special “self-governing zone” encompassing the Mouse House East.  (See NPR, Attachment Thirty Nine)

The move “deals a major blow to the company's ability to operate with autonomy,” NPR contends, the Governor saying that the special district surrounding Disney World “has enabled the park to unfairly skirt local rules and building codes.”

But DeSantis critics say the bill smells like retaliation for a growing feud between Disney and the governor, which hit a tipping point last year when Disney "crossed the line" by opposing an education bill that restricts classroom discussion around gender identity and sexual orientation.

The creation of the self-governing zone, known as Reedy Creek Improvement District, was instrumental to Disney's decision to build its theme park near Orlando in the 1960s, according to WMFE reporter Amy Green.

The zone sits on nearly 25,000 acres, sandwiched between Orange and Osceola counties. Once a remote and rural area, the Reedy Creek Improvement District received electricity, water, roads and police thanks to Disney's investments.

The company donated to DeSantis during the 2020 election cycle. In 2021, the governor's staff reportedly worked with Disney to give it an exemption from a law designed to crack down on big tech companies.

But the relationship between the two started to sour that same year after Disney took a stricter stance on preventing the spread of COVID-19, mandating its workers show proof of vaccination and its theme park guests continue to wear face coverings.

At the same time, Disney was increasingly drawing criticism from conservatives for making changes to its parks and films to increase inclusivity. Disney World closed Splash Mountain, for example, after a petition accusing it of "stereotypical racist tropes" gained 21,000 signatures.

DeSantis, who has been fighting what he calls "woke indoctrination," said the company "crossed the line" when Disney CEO Bob Chapek said he'd support the repeal of Florida's Parental Rights in Education Act, known by its critics as the "Don't Say Gay" bill.

DeSantis immediately turned Chapek's statement into a fundraising point inciting former MSNBC host Keith Olbermann to argue that the easiest solution to push back against Gov. Ron would be to move Disney World to another state... bringing howls of outrage and ridicult from The Fox  (March 2, Attachment Forty One)

"This isn't difficult. Move all the irreplaceable items out of the current DisneyWorld. Rebuild in the Carolinas or Puerto Rico. Then invite RonDeSantis to Disney's Orlando facility and burn the place down while he watches," Olbermann tweeted.

Social media users pounced on the tweet for returning to the suggestion that Disney could simply move its massive multi-billion operation to another state. 

Right-wingers pounced..."Don't threaten me with a good time," Washington Examiner executive editor Seth Mandel joking while conservative Twitter personality Noam Blum added, "Is there a compound German word that means ‘solutions to complex problems that sound like a teenager proposed them after getting high at a campfire?’"

Even alleged neutrals like Washington Post columnist Megan McArdle explained, "I actually looked into this possibility (minus the arson) and concluded that there simply aren't a lot of good substitutes for Disneyworld. Land is more expensive, construction is more expensive, and finding a place on the mainland with good weather and big plots of land is hard." 

Radio host Royce Lopez remarked, "Puerto Rico can't even keep their building standing when there's a strong wind do you really think Keith that they could handle a multi-billion dollar theme park industrial complex? Also all the New Yorkers moved to Florida so there's already enough Puerto Ricans at Disney now."

DeSantis doubled down, appointing Ron Peri, an Orlando-based former pastor and the CEO of The Gathering – a Christian ministry focused on outreach to men – as one of five people who will now oversee the Reedy Creek Improvement District, the government body that has given Disney unique powers in Central Florida for more than half a century.

Peri has called homosexuality “evil” and shared what CNN (March 3, Attachment Forty Two) called a “baseless conspiracy theory that tap water could be making more people gay.”

“So why are there homosexuals today? There are any number of reasons, you know, that are given. Some would say the increase in estrogen in our societies. You know, there’s estrogen in the water from birth control pills. They can’t get it out,” Peri baselessly said in a January 2022 Zoom discussion, later put on YouTube. “The level of testosterone in men broadly in America has declined by 50 points in the past 10 years. You know, and so, maybe that’s a part of it.”

“But the big part I would suggest to you, based upon what it’s saying here, is the removal of constraint,” he continued. “So our society provided the constraint. And so, which is the responsibility of a society to constrain people from doing evil? Well, you remove the constraints, and then evil occurs.”

 

While DeSantis was eradicating the Mouse, Trump’s own problems with rival gay terminator Michael Knowles were only multiplying.

The turncoat National Review (March 10th, Attachment Forty Three) reported on another panel discussion of transgenderism – notable for the concurrence of one of the panelists... despite the likelihood that it would help Trump mobilize the base in his ivory wars with the RINOs – even as it inspired a sense of fear and loathing in the now-swelling majority of LBBTQ sympathizers or, at least, Joneses tired of the hate.

“There’s only so long that this phenomenon can continue,” said panelist “Mike” (a different Mike than Knowles), and “it’s time for a swift, decisive intervention of common sense. This stuff has no business being in public schools. . . . There’s a bias in American society towards allowing people to live in their self-delusions. Right? But this one is harmful enough that I think it’s totally appropriate for Michael Knowles and everyone else to long for the end of it.”

And the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (March 9th, Attachment Forty Four) enhanced the already-swollen hypocritical issue of CPAC chair Matt Schlapp... reporting on the coming forth of Carlton Huffman, a North Carolina resident and longtime Republican operative who worked as a staffer last year for Walker’s failed U.S. Senate bid.  He had additionally sought anonymity, but when the alternative was losing his $9 million in damages from a Virginia court, he came out and sang.

And he sang, and he sang and he sang, sang, sang!

In the lawsuit, Huffman accused Schlapp of fondling his “genital area in a sustained fashion” on Oct. 19 as he drove the official from a late-night stop at Manuel’s Tavern to his hotel near Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport.

“It’s to my shame that I didn’t say anything,” Huffman previously told the AJC. “I wish I had said, ‘What the hell — stop!’ "

He admitted to bar-crawling with Schlapp on October 19th when they drove to Manuel’s Tavern, a Midtown Atlanta watering hole known as a popular haunt for Democratic politicos.

He said around 10 p.m. the outing turned more uncomfortable, as Schlapp’s leg “was in almost constant contact” with his leg, according to the complaint. Schlapp also repeatedly asked the aide why he wouldn’t look at him, the lawsuit said.

On the drive back to Schlapp’s hotel, a Hilton Garden Inn near the airport, the aide said Schlapp reached over and fondled his crotch for at least 5 seconds.

Nine million for five seconds?  Sweet!

But not for CPAC, nor The Donald.

 

The liberals, of course, see Trump’s “iceberg” as a slow and slovenly American “Titanic” with a sad band playing sad songs on deck as it heads straight for an electoral shipwreck.

After brushing off CPAC as “loserville”, the Daily Kos... that day being March 7th, Attachment Forty Five... vaguely allowed that some of the former President’s new initiative might be... uh... dangerous?  Or that the alternative might be a quiet elephant calf like Adam Kinzinger as opposed to the raging bully Ron and his newfound BFF Putin?”

But the predominant tone of Kosmania was not the Republican slide into corporate fascism, just that Ol’ 45 was just old and tired and sad... maybe even worthy of pity, given the “comically abysmal” showing of Donald Trump's hand-picked midterm candidates... as President Joe.

 

"It’s all loserville over there at CPAC," quipped one-time GOP rising star Barbara Comstock, a former congresswoman who was swept out of her northern Virginia district in the anti-Trump wave of 2018.

“So while Trump was disparaging old-guard fiscal conservatives and neocons as "freaks" and "fools," some of those so-called freaks and fools were openly embracing Democrats.

“It turns out that once you let the toothpaste out of the tube, so to speak, demagoguery and bigotry and all that, some people like it. It’s hard to get it back,” longtime conservative, neocon, and never-Trumper Bill Kristol joshed and joked with Kozman Kerry Eleveld. “You can’t just give them a lecture.”

“We need to defeat the Trump Republicans. And if that means being with the Democrats for a while, that’s fine,” Kristol added. In fact, Kristol went so far as to imagine a Democratic 2024 ticket of Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Rep. Abigail Spanberger of Virginia. “That’s fine with me,” he said.

Not gonna happen.

 

And, as opposed to the slapstick denialism of the Kos, the staid Old Leftist Guardian U.K. warned the dipsy, dizzy Colonials about DeSantis... and this on March 10th; three days before Ron dropped his Putin Bomb. 

Americans’ Constitution, their lives, their... to use the trope of burglars and bums everywhere... rights are in danger, and it’s not just the mealy-mouthed mopery of students caught cheating on their homework with some newfangled AI app.

GUKlady Margaret Sullivan, envisioned the fascism envisioned by The Saint may well exceeding that of The Sinner in numerality, intensity and a degree of un-Trumpish competence.

Rights out the alt-right window, like... “for women whose abortion rights already are being dangerously curtailed”, for “gay and transgender students who are already being treated as lower life forms,” for “voting rights and press rights” and even for books themselves.  (Attachment Forty Six)

Cue in “Fahrenheit 451”.

“DeSantis rules by an authoritarian playbook,” wrote Miami Herald columnist Fabiola Santiago, despite the Orwellian title of the governor’s book, “The Courage to Be Free” which would probably escape the pyres.

“When DeSantis signed into law new restrictions on voting rights, he did so in a room where local reporters were shut out,” complained GUK – who might also have noted the press blackout at CFG.  “Fox News, however, got special access,” their reward for poaching the ivory eggs from Trump’s henhouse.

In another blast of Orwellian doublespeak, cited by Sullivan, the law promises “election integrity” while actually making it harder to vote by mail and greatly limiting the use of drop boxes. “No surprise: those rules have the harshest impact on voters of color and those with disabilities.”

GUK called out the timid and vapid American press for “letting DeSantis play at will on his favorite field of divisive social issues” as opposed to “delving into the substance of that record, including the kitchen-table economic issues that have nothing to do with performative anti-woke nonsense,” but did poach CNBC’s recitation of the Guv’nor’s boast...

“You ain’t seen nothing yet!”

 

And, then, from the horror to the farce, the Daily Beast analyzed the Trump-DeSantis smackdown as has been “simmering for months,” and determined that its most coherent explanation was “a Super Bowl tweet.”  (Attachment Forty Seven)

Alex Bruesewitz, a 25-year-old Trump-aligned GOP consultant, dug up by the Beast, had started a flame war with the DeSantis influencerverse when he tweeted an old photo appearing to show Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis drinking with 18-year-old high school girls during his teaching stint at the Darlington School in Georgia as a 23-year-old.

In a since-deleted tweet,” the Beast reported, “right-wing pundit and Army Green Beret veteran Jim Hanson defended the governor, arguing that “partying with 18-year-old hotties” made him like DeSantis more.”

Why not... it was very Trumpy!

Encountering Hanson and DeSantisworld pundit John Cardillo at CPAC, “(p)revious online grudges quickly resurfaced, including Bruesewitz tweeting photos of the Florida governor’s footwear to speculate that DeSantis has been using thicker boots to appear taller.

 “You want a picture of his boots?” Hanson said at the beginning of a video from the tussle. “Do you understand what a Cuban boot is?”

“It’s weird, dude,” Cardillo then interjected. “He doesn't know what boots are, we found that out.”

It gets weirder.  “Inside Trump's inner circle, those close to the former president have poked fun at a photo of DeSantis wearing tall white rubber boots while touring the damage left by Hurricane Ian last year” as opposed to Trump, who wore what said inner circle concluded to be “working men's footwear” during his trip to sniff the vapors in East Palestine, Ohio.

“Donald Trump had work boots on. DeSantis had Dallas Cowboy cheerleader boots on,” a source close to Trump bragged to The Beast.

This latest CPAC “boots are made for walkin’” flare-up indicates just how personal the feelings are between the two sides’ foot soldiers.

As that “longtime GOP strategist” said: “What a dumpster fire!”

 

 

“You gotta have friends,” another song goes and Trump, fortunately, still has a few friends as will be there and here and everywhere all at once for him.  Some of these inhabit the Epoch Times apocalyptic journal where, on March 9th, they interviewed Joseph Verderber and his brother, John: “flag-waving patriots at CPAC.”

Joseph is a New Yorker who had been apolitical for his entire adult life until tragedy struck. His nephew, Joseph L. Verderber, 24, died of a fentanyl overdose in 2016.

“Then Verderber saw how adamant Trump was about stopping the drug from flowing from China and Mexico into the United States. That prompted Verderber to get involved in politics,” said the E.T. (Attachment Forty Eight)  “Now he’s all in.” And he’s fighting especially hard for Trump because “this current regime has a wide open border,” potentially leading to more fentanyl deaths.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, would probably make a good president someday, Verderber conceded. But “now is not the right time” for DeSantis or anyone else who is inexperienced with the inner workings of “the D.C. Swamp,” Verderber said.

The CPAC straw poll reflected that same type of confidence in Trump, with 62 percent of the votes cast for him, trouncing DeSantis, who drew 20 percent.

E.T. also backed up Trump’s assertion that the One Six was a garden party, not a hanging party.

“Although some people did smash windows and confront police at the U.S. Capitol, most people were peaceful at the massive protest against irregularities in the 2020 presidential election.”

Stephanie Liu, a Chinese-American supporting Trump’s campaign against the ChiComs told The Epoch Times at CPAC that she strongly objects to U.S. citizens being held without bail.

“This is un-American,” she said. “How can America have political prisoners?”

Liu, of New York, is part of a group that for months has held a nightly vigil outside the jail, singing patriotic songs to lift the prisoners’ spirits.

And, about 35 people from that group are now chipping in about $100 apiece per month to rent a home where relatives of the prisoners and other supporters can stay for free, she said.

“We are people who take action.”

One action taker profiled by E.T. was 24-year-old Patrycja Brylska, who immigrated to the United States from Poland when she was 13.

“I love Trump for so many reasons,” she said. “I think the most important thing for people to consider is his policies… I truly believe he is the only president I have seen that has actually loved America so much that he was willing to sacrifice everything that he has in order to bring comfort to this country, to the American people.”

Brylska grew up in Florida, and she likes DeSantis. But, for her, there’s no comparison.

“DeSantis is an amazing governor with amazing policies,” she said. “But the only person who can run this country effectively, and fix all the bad things happening, in my opinion, is Donald Trump.”

 

And the Exile has another friend, this one not without power and prestige of his own.

Former GOP superstar Newt Gingrich hailed Trump’s “surprisingly powerful” CPAC Speech on his March 9th gingrich360.com mouth organ, urging Americans to “read the transcript as it was delivered.” (Attachment Forty Nine)  President Trump’s staying power as a national leader “is better understood by seeing the details of his approach.”

Said and done... we’re presenting it twice below... once a stand-alone, once with a few fact checks from CNN (probably one of those turncoats or tyrants or Marxists that he, like DeSantis, so despise).

Trump’s legacy of accomplishments, fingered, named and numbered by Newt include...

   1.   A capacity to recognize dozens of people and ad lib specific references to people in the audience; in which capacity Gingrich puts him second to only (of all people!) Bill Clinton...

   2.   Changing the direction of American politics and government “more than any other president since Franklin Delano Roosevelt” and, Newt adds, for the better.  “On topic after topic, he made the unthinkable into the debatable – and then the doable.”  Some of these topics were...

          a.  taking on China,

          b.  insisting that NATO meet its obligations,

          c.  revising our agreements with Mexico and Canada,

          d. controlling the border, and

          e.  fighting the swamp

   3.   His handling of the Taliban – and the “methodical steps he was taking to end the Afghanistan war with dignity, honor, and safety” – in contrast to the disastrous Joe Biden-Mark Milley incompetence.  Keeping oil prices low “so that Vladimir Putin could not afford to invade Ukraine.”

The specificity, clarity, and power of Trump’s commitments (at CPAC) were stunning. He vowed to “obliterate the deep state”, settle Russia’s war against Ukraine, greatly increase funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and deport illegals who commit crimes and are involved in criminal gangs.

“We will pick them up, and we will throw them out of our country,” Trump promised, “and there will be no questions asked. It will be my policy to take down the cartels just as I took down the ISIS caliphate.”

And he will wage his version of holy war against domestic terror, treachery and trade inequities, to wit...

          f.  “I will direct the Department of Justice to go after Marxist prosecutors’ offices to make them pay for their illegal, race-based enforcement of the law,”

          g.  “I will revoke Joe Biden’s crazy executive order installing Marxist Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Czars in every federal agency, and I will immediately terminate all staffers hired to implement this horrible agenda,”

          h.  “I will fight for parents’ rights… including universal school choice, and the direct election of school principals by the parents…

          i.  “I will revoke every Biden policy promoting the chemical castration and sexual mutilation of our youth — and ask Congress to send me a bill prohibiting child sexual mutilation in all 50 states…

          j.  “I will revoke China’s Most Favored Nation trade status. I will implement a four-year plan to phase out all Chinese imports of essential goods and gain total independence from China...        

          k.  “And I will hold China financially accountable for unleashing the China Virus upon the world.”

   4.   “More than any candidate since President Ronald Reagan, Trump has begun to vividly describe a better, more dynamic, and more exciting future:

          “It is not enough just to stop the forces tearing America down. I want once again to build America up… Our objective will be a quantum leap in the American standard of living, especially for our young people. As I announced yesterday, we will hold a competition to build new Freedom Cities on the frontier to give countless Americans a new shot at home ownership and the American Dream.”

 

Calling his CPAC speech “the tip of an iceberg” (as opposed to the steamship it sunk) and denying that President Trump “will be worn down by the left, various Justice Department assaults, the continued bias of the elite media, and the ranting of the Never Trumpers,” Newt cited polls, such as the Emerson survey, showing Djonald UnStoppable far, far in front.

And that was before Guv’nor Ron went even further than Trump’s vague Ukraine War “solution” by linking arms with Rad Vlad Putin and all but kowtowing his post-conquest plans to extend his dominion into former satellites, beginning with Moldova and marching on to Poland, Hungary (where he already has friends), the Baltics and then NATO.

Finally, we thank the American Conservative’s Micah Meadowcoft’s analysis of what augurs to be a sixteen month duel (or dumpster fire) for the nomination... perhaps followed by an even more toxic three month as the survivor moves on to face President Joe (health permitting) or perhaps Marianne Williamson.

“That’s why I’m standing before you. Because we are going to finish what we started,” Meadowcroft quoted Trump  while calling CPAC “a much diminished affair this year”, (March 8th, Attachment Fifty) but also acknodging that “...if it is a pettier kingdom than it once was, Donald Trump remains its sovereign.”

“In 2016, I declared I am your voice. Today, I add I am your warrior, I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution.” Much has been made of this line in particular, a new “American carnage” synecdoche for the speech as a whole. And it should be, for to those not blinkered by the conventions and norms of professional politics, “I am your retribution” is a reminder of what made Trump a special candidate from the start. 

Excerpting the “nice” (if also “dark”... for his numerous enemies like the “RINOs and globalists”) portions of the near-two-hour speech, the AC fairly adjudicated the enthusiasm of the base and the determination of the candidate to “Make America Great Again” again.  Lacking paper towels, he threw out promises like a t-shirt cannon... promises to peaceniks, to veterans (but, like DeSantis now, not Ukrainians)... he’d rein in China, extract (or extort) more money from NATO, ignore the nuclear propiferation “sideshow”, stop the illegal aliens with backpacks of fentanyl from violating our borders, take down the cartels, smash the “false idols of the free trade fanatics”, take a “quantum leap” and build new freedom cities on (an unnamed) “frontier”, rename our schools and boulevards not after communists, but after great American patriots, get rid of bad and ugly buildings and return to the magnificent classical style of Western civilization.

It sounds almost like a campaign speech by one of those pharaohs who, being able to feed the masses but fearing “idle hands” sent the Egyptians and their slaves to building the Pyramids.

Trump promised to support a new baby boom to repopulate America with Americans (presumably not foreign immigrants unless they possess certain skills, or money) and positively bleated: “Oh, you men are so lucky out there. You’re so lucky. You are so lucky, men.

“Our country will shine, thrive, and prosper like never before. All of this is within our reach, but only if we have the courage to complete the job, gut the deep state, reclaim our democracy, and banish the tyrants and Marxists into political exile forever.”

 

If it was a dark speech, it is only because we live in dark times. Who can pretend now that they are certain their children will inherit a safer, more prosperous America than they did? There were thirty years of excess, America standing tall alone, detached from limits and reality, and now the bill is coming due. “If those opposing us succeed, our once beautiful USA will be a failed country that no one will even recognize. A lawless, open borders, crime-ridden, filthy, communist nightmare.” Is he wrong?

 

Ask, also, will the ultimate loser goes quietly into the Florida swamp with the gators and skeeters or bolt, revolt and start a “Party of Me” which, while having little chances of victory, will perhaps so delight President Joe that he’ll have to be careful not to fall over like Mitchy and break a hip.

 

 

March 6th  – 12th  , 2023

 

 

Monday, March 6, 2023

Dow:  33,431.94

 

 

The Week begins as the last one ended, and began and the one before: massive rain and snowstorms in the West causing mudslides, avalanches and roofs (rooves) to collapse; freezing temperatures in the Midwest and above normal highs in the east that also bring tornadoes.  And the usual spate of weekend murders... 8 shot and two killed at Georgia house party, 4 shot, 3 die in Illinois.  And the same old transit problems... bird strike causes Southwest flight to make emergency landing in Cuba and two planes “touch” on Boton tarmac while the NTSB promises to look into Norfolk Southern’s “culture”.  (Is it trans-portation... sounds like Billy Porter’s limousine?)

   Riots break out at Cop City, Atlanta where, after a protester is killed, mobs throw Molotov cocktails and fight the cops with dozens of arrests and injuries.

   Finishing up their rival CPAC and CFG showcases, Donald Trump and Ron deSantis move on to their next move... raising money and making promises to punish hated Americans and foreigners (the Chinese in Trump’s case, he still loves Putin) all the way down to the gay M&Ms.

  Bad Americans: landlord hikes rent $400 on 80 year old who has to go back to work as a janitor to prevent eviction.  Good Americans: students at his school start Go Fund Me page to pay his rent increase.

 

 

 

Tuesday, March 7, 2023

Dow:  32,856.46

 

 

 

 

 

President Joe pivots, now says he will deport migrant families back to from where they came. 

Mexico’s Gulf Cartel kidnaps four Americans in Matamoros (“kill the Moors”), excutes two, other two are rescued from a shack and ambulanced back to America with multiple gunshot wounds.  Police, secret agents and angry Yanquis like Lindsey Graham talk of new invasion, conquest, coup and crackdown.

   Planes, trains and automobiles still making headlines:

   Madman stabber fails to open passenger doors and crash flight after proclaiming “I’m taking over this plane” asserting that he’s the son of Dracula and attacking crew and passengers with a spoon.  Psychologists say he has “issues”.  Ordinary airline brawl breaks out between ordinary passengers in Dallas.  No fatalities in either, but four are killed when two planes crash near Tampa.  Regulators take a dim view of Jet Blue/ Spirit merger...

   Another Norfolk Southern trainwreck kills conductor in Cleveland.  More derailments follow in West Virginia, North Carolina and Alabama.

   Tesla cuts prices as gas becomes more expensive again. 

   Congress, facing brutal budget battle upcoming, passes legislation to impose stiff penalties for anybody who “taunts” a police K-9.  No more “bad dog you!” on the streets of the Republic.

 

 

 

Wednesday, March 2, 2023

Dow:  32,797.78

 

 

 

 

 

 

It’s National Women’s Day.  Two women profiled after taking over management of the Miami Marlines.  Five more sue Texas for the “no medical exemption” clauses in its new anti-abortion bill.  And a “sort of”... 15 year old celebrity transgender model hits the runway for her first show.  The parents say they are so proud.  (Ron deSantis vows payback.)

   Parents of school shooter not so proud... in fact, they are arrested for letting their li’l devil have access to a gun and just being bad parents.  Legal scholars swarm... asking if arresting bad parents is judicial overreach and, if so, will a deluge of prosecutions follow?

   Beekeeper are fighting the incurable “American Foul” disease after its smell.  The recent die-off imperils crop pollination and supplies of hunny... the keepers call in medical experts to help devise a vaccine for the queens.  (Again, deSantis fumes!)

 

 

 

Thursday, March 9, 2023

Dow:  32,254.86

 

 

 

 

 

 

Big Macs on the warpath... McCarthy releases 44 hours of edited (possibly doctored?) video of the One Six “peaceful tourists” to Tucker Carlson.  McConnell says that the documents are a “whitewash” and then falls down... real doctors are treating him for a head injury.  Meanwhile, the dogged One Six prosecutors celebrate a landmark: 1,000 arrests.  (Another landmark: 100 mass killings in 2023, to date.)

   Russia fires 80 missiles (including hypersonics) and Iranian drones at various Ukrainian cities, including Kyev, Lvov on the Polish border and the dangerous Zap nuclear station, killing civilians and blowing up power plants to make them freeze in the dark.  Russians boast they now own half of the rubble of Bahkmut.  Military experts here are optimistic, saying use of the drones and hypersonics mean that Putin is running out of conventional missiles.  Ukes are less optimistic.

   Congress investigates Covid after the fact; wants to punish China for either their accidental or deliberate release of weaponised Manimal hybrid virus... FBI and Trump plague czar Dr. Redfield are on board but four other agencies are not, nor is Governor, soon Presidential Candidate Ronny D who comes out as a mask and vaxxing denialist and Fauci-hater.  The regulators are also going after killer cops in Louisville and Memphis, as well as the makers of Sunny D... “the drink kids love”... for marketing their new vodka-infused varieties.

 

 

 

Friday, March 10, 2023

Dow:  31,909.64

 

 

 

President Joe unveils his new budget.  Republicans, including the Big Macs from their hospital bed and Tucker Shack are not on board, nor is the Dow.

   Coincidentally (or not) the Silicon Valley Bank becomes the first failure since 2008 due to being overextended on tech start-ups that didn’t.  The stock market crashes too, and more rumoured bad banks on the way despite good jobs report that, nonetheless raises up the unemployment rate to 3.6%.

   The weather turns lethal... dozens of snowbound Californians found dead of cold, hunger or other means (carbon monoxide, snow collapsing homes, snow shoveling heart attacks) with more still to come.

  Disgruntled Jehovah’s Witness shoots up services in Hamburg, Germany.  Six die, many more injured.  But in an American cold case, killer of Kristen Smart is convicted, and George Santos’ Brazilian boyfriend rats out the mentor who taught him credit card fraud.

 

 

Saturday, March 11, 2023

Dow:  (Closed)

 

Depositors line up in California to try and get their money out in a scene like “It’s a Wonderful Life”.  The government says that insured deposits up to $250,000 will be covered, but the rich and businesses are likely S.O.O.L.  Lawyers begin swarming.

   Three more women go missing in Mexico amidst guns, gangs, drugs and cartel wars.  Warnings are issued to Spring Breakers to party elsewhere.

   In a likely critical SCOTUS case when appeals are over, a Texas man is arrested for providing abortion pills to a friend on a vigilante bust and lawsuit.  More lawyers gather.  And two Alaskan volcanoes erupt... lawyers and everybody else leave the vicinity.

 

 

 

Sunday, March 12, 2023

Dow:  (Closed) 

 

 

It’s OSCAR night.  Also the fourth birthday of COVID... nobody’s throwing the poor baby a party... as well as the start of Daylight Savings Time.

   Perhaps channeling Will Smith, former VP Mike Pence smites and slaps his old boss Djonald, declaring in his Pencian way, that the ex-President “endangered his family” at the Capitol riot (in addition to urging the mob to hang him).  For his part, Trump is pandering and preening at CPAC while his Number One Rival, Governor Ron UnDeclared begs for money at the Club for Growth (See Lesson) and promises America that “...we roll out and we execute.”  Who?  (Wrongfully convicted Sheldon Thomas freed after 18 years after being framed by policemen “with grudges.”

  In weather and environmental news, the Oscar-calibre California floods are now called “super soakers” and the Red Tide is back in Florida... not Republican candidates but the killer algae that leaves thousands of dead fish on the beaches in and around St. Petersburg.  In the far north, aside from the volcanoes, there are now ecologists and economists clashing over the Arctic pipeline that will lower fuel prices but uglify a formerly pristine National Park.

 

Banks go bust, Dow goes down.  Dow goes down, Don goes down.

 

 

THE DON JONES INDEX

 

CHART of CATEGORIES w/VALUE ADDED to EQUAL BASELINE of 15,000

(REFLECTING… approximately… DOW JONES INDEX of June 27, 2013)

 

See a further explanation of categories here

 

ECONOMIC INDICES (60%)

CATEGORY

VALUE

BASE

RESULTS

SCORE

OUR SOURCES and COMMENTS

 

INCOME

(24%)

6/17/13 & 1/1/22

LAST

CHANGE

NEXT

SOURCE

 

Wages (hrly. per cap)

9%

1350 points

1/9/23

+1.24%

3/23

1,434.03

1,434.03

https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/wages   28.61

 

Median Inc. (yearly)

4%

600

2/20/23

+0.25%

3/6/23

601.04

602.54

http://www.usdebtclock.org/   35,742 751

 

Unempl. (BLS – in mi)

4%

600

1/2/23

+5.56%

3/23

670.92

633.65

http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000000   3.4 3.6

 

Official (DC – in mi)

2%

300

2/20/23

-0.16%

3/6/23

277.10

277.55

http://www.usdebtclock.org/      5,542 533

 

Unofficl. (DC – in mi)

2%

300

2/20/23

-0.16%

3/6/23

266.96

267.38

http://www.usdebtclock.org/    11,993 971 952

 

Workforce Particip.

   Number

   Percent

2%

300

2/20/23

 

+0.35%                  +0.008%

3/6/23

301.17

301.19

In 160,872 929 979 Out 100,266 277 286 Total: 261,265

 

http://www.usdebtclock.org/  61.61

 

WP %  (ycharts)*

1%

150

1/9/23

+0.16%

3/23

150.95

150.95

https://ycharts.com/indicators/labor_force_participation_rate  62.40 .50

 

 

 

OUTGO

15%

 

 

 

 

Total Inflation

7%

1050

2/20/23

+0.5%

3/23

998.57

998.57

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm      -0.5

 

Food

2%

300

2/20/23

+0.5%

3/23

279.90

279.90

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm     +0.5

 

Gasoline

2%

300

2/20/23

+2.4%

3/23

245.67

245.67

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm     +2.4

 

Medical Costs

2%

300

2/20/23

-0.7%

3/23

292.85

292.85

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm      -0.7

 

Shelter

2%

300

2/20/23

+0.7%

3/23

283.33

283.33

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm     +0.7

 

 

WEALTH

6%

 

 

 

 

Dow Jones Index

2%

300

2/20/23

-4.44%

3/6/23

280.91

258.45

https://www.wsj.com/market-data/quotes/index/   32,816.92 33,390.97 31,909.64

 

Home (Sales)

(Valuation)

1%

1%

150

150

1/16/23

-0.50%              -2.15%

3/23

126.40

273.56

125.77

267.55

https://www.nar.realtor/research-and-statistics

Sales (M):  4.02 4.00 Valuations (K):  366.9 359.0

 

Debt (Personal)

2%

300

2/20/23

+0.07%

3/6/23

279.36

279.16

http://www.usdebtclock.org/    72,796 858 911

 

 

 

 

NATIONAL

(10%)

 

 

 

 

Revenue (trilns.)

2%

300

2/20/23

+0.03%

3/6/23

384.14

384.29

debtclock.org/       4,610.6 0.918

 

Expenditures (tr.)

2%

300

2/20/23

+0.041%

3/6/23

341.31

341.17

debtclock.org/       6,019 021

 

National Debt tr.)

3%

450

2/20/23

+0.041%

3/6/23

427.15

426.97

http://www.usdebtclock.org/    31,596 609

(The debt ceiling was 31.4)

 

Aggregate Debt (tr.)

3%

450

2/20/23

+0.095%

3/6/23

423.10

422.70

http://www.usdebtclock.org/    94,466 556

 

 

 

 

GLOBAL

(5%)

 

 

 

 

Foreign Debt (tr.)

2%

300

2/20/23

+0.19%

3/6/23

346.33

346.67

http://www.usdebtclock.org/   7,239 232

 

Exports (in billions)

1%

150

2/20/23

+2.92%

3/23

159.29

163.94

https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/current/index.html  250.2 257.5

 

Imports (bl.)

1%

150

2/20/23

+2.52%

3/23

169.81

165.54

https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/current/index.html  317.6 325.8

 

Trade Deficit (bl.)

1%

150

2/20/23

+1.32%

3/23

304.78

300.76

https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/current/index.html  67.4 68.3

 

SOCIAL INDICES  (40%)

 

ACTS of MAN

12%

 

 

 

World Affairs

3%

450

2/20/23

   -0.3%

3/6/23

450.38

449,03

Deep freeze and fuel shortage drives Brits to warming centers with no end of fruit & vegetable shortage in sight.  Old French strikers occupy the Louvre to protest raising retirement age to... 64!  More strikes in Germany.  China-brokered Iran/Saudi peace deal gives Israel the jitters.

 

Terrorism

2%

300

2/20/23

   +0.1%

3/6/23

290.39

290.68

Mexican cartel mixup kills Americans seeking cheap cosmetic surgery and then (see below).  Police fire back at Atlanta’s Cop City rioters with stun guns and gas.  Intelligencers admit Ukraine “probably” sabotaged NordStrem pipeline.  Poland steps in, will supply old Soviet era MIG fighter jets to Ukes.

 

Politics

3%

450

2/20/23

   +0.3%

3/6/23

470.19

471.60

Trump/DeSantis showdown (see above) inspires fun, money and conversation.  Tulsi Gabbard switches to GOP but President Joe still gets a primary challenger: Marianne Williamson.

 

Economics

3%

450

2/20/23

    -0.8%

3/6/23

435.70

432.21

Fed ponders interest rate hike as jobs are up for all but tech and financial companies; Facebook, Apple, Amazon.  Coincidentally, SVB serving Silicon Valley techies goes bust and unemployment rises.  Never fear… online employment scammers enjoy early spring: up 23% and BP doubles its CEO compensation.  Frontier Air gives bonuses to execs, raises fees on passengers.

 

Crime

1%

150

2/20/23

    -0.2%

3/6/23

269.19

268.65

Senate votes to block DC crime bill.  Criminals don’t care....  Food stamp cutoffs prompt online scams.  Dropout Jehovah’s Witness kills six in Germany.  Lovelorn stalker in Washington State kills podcaster, her husband and himself.

 

ACTS of GOD

(6%)

 

 

 

 

 

Environment/Weather

3%

450

2/20/23

    -0.5%

3/6/23

426.82

424.69

“Freddy” in Africa, celebrating record for longest lived cyclone (aka hurricane) ever.  In America... especially the California high country... don’t ask, don’t tell.

 

Disasters

3%

450

2/20/23

+0.3%

3/6/23

439.16

440.48

Heroic Vikings’ receiver K. J. Jackson rescues man from burning car in Texas.  (No fool he... Minnesota in winter is not fun.) Four survive crash of medical copter in North Carolina.

 

LIFESTYLE/JUSTICE INDEX

(15%)

 

 

 

 

 

Science, Tech, Educ.

4%

600

2/20/23

 -0.1%

3/6/23

626.62

625.99

Four Space X astronauts return to Earth after months of ISS low gravity.  But Japan’s new generation flagship of rockets to Mars goes off course, explodes.

 

Equality (econ/social)

4%

600

2/20/23

  nc

3/6/23

611.79

611.79

Victoria’s Secret will bring back its runway shows after four years of hiatus, just in time for Intl. Women’s Day.

 

Health

4%

600

2/20/23

 -0.2%

3/6/23

472.99

472.04

Uber-healthy Keto diet said to cause heart attacks.  Popular telemedicines like Ozempic trend up, shortages ensue as do anti-asthma drugs like Albuterol.  DeSantis calls plague a hoax as the official ends May 31st (despite 23 million still having imaginary long COVID),

 

Freedom and Justice

3%

450

2/20/23

 +0.1%

3/6/23

459.93

460.39

Gulf cartel turns over five of its soldiers who mistakenly killed two American medical tourists hoping to ease pressure.  Police arrest New Hampshire politician for shooting at snowplow drivers Whisperers whisper that Trump will be indicted for the Stormy affair.  Can she do a daytime talk show with Monica?

 

 

MISCELLANEOUS and TRANSIENT INDEX

 

 

(7%)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cultural incidents

3%

450

2/20/23

  +0.2%

3/6/23

482.66

483.62

“Creed Three” knocks out Ant Man Two and Cocaine Bear One  to gross a $100 mil. and revive sagging theatres. March Madness brackets set.  Oscars So Yellow rips up the red carpet, replaces it with a “champagne” (not the other yellow) rug in anticipation of awards,

RIP: Gary Rossington (“Lynrd Skynrd”), KC wide receiver Otis Taylor and former Vikings coach Bud Grant, Peterson Zah, chief chief of the Navaho Nation and actor and acquitted killer Robert Blake.

 

Misc. incidents

4%

450

2/20/23

  +0.2%

3/6/23

473.08

474.03

Royal thingies Archie and Lilibet are officially allowed to be called Prince and Princess.  Apple introduces a classical music app.  Police in Maine cancel a vegan’s LOVETOFU license plate as might have other implications

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Don Jones Index for the week of March 5th through March 12th, 2023 was DOWN 71.76 points

 

The Don Jones Index is sponsored by the Coalition for a New Consensus: retired Congressman and Independent Presidential candidate Jack “Catfish” Parnell, Chairman; Brian Doohan, Administrator.  The CNC denies, emphatically, allegations that the organization, as well as any of its officers (including former Congressman Parnell, environmentalist/America-Firster Austin Tillerman and cosmetics CEO Rayna Finch) and references to Parnell’s works, “Entropy and Renaissance” and “The Coming Kill-Off” are fictitious or, at best, mere pawns in the web-serial “Black Helicopters” – and promise swift, effective legal action against parties promulgating this and/or other such slanders.

Comments, complaints, donations (especially SUPERPAC donations) always welcome at feedme@generisis.com or: speak@donjonesindex.com.

 

 

 

ATTACHMENT ONE – From wiki

CONSERVATIVE POLITICAL ACTION CONFERENCE (CPAC)

(see website for charts and graphs)

 

The Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC/ˈsiːpæk/ SEE-pak) is an annual political conference attended by conservative activists and elected officials from across the United States and beyond. CPAC is hosted by the American Conservative Union (ACU).[1] The first CPAC took place in 1974.

The same name and acronym has been used for conferences in other countries.

 

HISTORY

1974[edit]

The conference was founded in 1974 by the American Conservative Union and Young Americans for Freedom as a small gathering of dedicated conservatives.[2][3][4] Ronald Reagan gave the inaugural keynote speech at CPAC in 1974.[5] The presidential hopeful used it to share his vision for the country—"A Shining City Upon A Hill," words borrowed from John Winthrop.[6]

2010–2017[edit]

The 2010 CPAC featured co-sponsorship for the first time from GOProud, a gay conservative group. GoProud is credited in the media for initiating talks with ACU to invite Donald Trump to speak at CPAC 2011.[7] The 2011 CPAC speech Trump gave, is credited for helping kick-start his political career within the Republican Party.[8][9][10] Christopher R. Barron, co-founder of GOProud who would later not only endorse Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, but also launch LGBT for Trump, said he "would love to see Mr. Trump run for president".

In 2014, CPAC extended an invitation to American Atheists, which was immediately withdrawn on the same day due to controversial statements by AA's president David Silverman, who declared his group was going to "enlighten conservatives" and that "the Christian right should be threatened by us".[11] The 2015 CPAC featured Jamila Bey who became the first atheist activist to address CPAC's annual meeting.[12]

The 2016 CPAC featured co-sponsorship for the first time from the Log Cabin Republicans.[13] In December 2016, CPAC extended an invitation to conservative blogger Milo Yiannopoulos to speak at the event, despite his history of controversial views on feminism, racial minorities, and transgender issues. The invitation was canceled when the Reagan Battalion re-posted a video of 2016 and 2015 YouTube videos[14] in which Yiannopoulos is heard making comments defending sexual relationships between adult men and 13-year-old boys, citing his own sexual experiences at that age with a Catholic priest.[15]

Richard Spencer, a figurehead of the alt-right and a white supremacist, entered the lobby of the Gaylord National Hotel on February 23, 2017 in an attempt to access CPAC. Organizers of the conference ejected him from the hotel as soon as his presence was discovered, citing his "repugnant [views which] ... have absolutely nothing to do with conservatism or what we do here" as cause for rejecting his admission to CPAC.[16] ACU's Executive Director Dan Schneider castigated Spencer and the alt-right in a main-stage speech, calling them "garden-variety, left-wing fascists," and saying that the alt-right "despises everything [conservatives] believe in".[17][18] Media members across the political spectrum condemned the intrusion as yet another attempt by groups like the alt-right to conceal their extremist views within a legitimate philosophy. Opinion columns in The New York Times, and articles in Mother Jones and Rolling Stone voiced concern about the 2017 interview of ex-Trump Adviser Steve Bannon and ex-Trump Chief of Staff Reince Priebus with ACU Chairman Matt Schlapp, advocating for the American Right to reject the tenets of the alt-right (e.g. homophobia, xenophobia, sexism, racism, etc.).[19][20][21]

2019[edit]

The 2019 Conservative Political Action Conference was held at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center in Oxon Hill, Maryland, from February 27 to March 2, 2019. The event was headlined by President Trump, with many additional speakers. Themes throughout the conference were fighting against socialism; criminal justice reform; China; and criticizing Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and the Green New Deal.[citation needed]

2020–2021[edit]

In 2020, CPAC hosted its main event in the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic despite the public health risks. On Saturday, March 7, 2020, ACU confirmed that an attendee at the 2020 CPAC later tested positive for COVID-19. Senator Ted Cruz, Representatives Matt GaetzPaul GosarDoug Collins, and Mark Meadows had direct contact with the unnamed carrier, and announced their self-quarantine.[22][23]

In 2021, CPAC hosted its main event live during the COVID-19 pandemic. The previous customary venue for CPAC, (Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center) in National Harbor, Maryland was subject to public health restrictions in Maryland, issued by Republican governor Larry Hogan, which restricted gathering sizes to a maximum of 10, to curb the spread of the disease.[24][25]

As a result, the conference was relocated to Orlando, Florida,[25] which had removed all prior pandemic-related limits on gathering sizes.[26] The event was still subject to Orlando mandatory mask-wearing rules. Notwithstanding those restrictions, numerous attendees chose to not wear masks during the event, despite frequent announcements by the event's organizers and hotel staff, requesting attendees to comply with the local mask-wearing mandate.[27] Florida Governor Ron DeSantis characterized the state's resistance to pandemic gathering-size limits as comporting with the state's status as "an oasis of freedom."[27] The conference's theme, "America Uncancelled", sought to highlight alleged attempts by social media companies, the Democratic Party, U.S. universities and progressive organizations to censor conservatives' public expression of their political views. The conference's main event was a closing address by former U.S. president Donald Trump, his first public address and political speech since leaving office. Trump spent significant portions of the speech criticizing his successor, Joe Biden. The speech received significant media coverage in anticipation of Trump's announcement of his post-presidential political activity.

A second 2021 conference was held in Dallas from July 9 to 11 at the Hilton Anatole hotel.[28] The theme of the conference was immigration policy and border security, in the context of the ongoing migrant crisis at the U.S. Southern Border.

 

2022[edit]

 

CPAC Florida 2022

The 2022 conference was held on February 24 to 27 in Orlando, Florida.[29] Speakers included Trump, Florida governor Ron DeSantis, and former Democratic congresswoman and presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard.[30]

As in 2021, a second conference was held in Dallas, Texas from August 4 to 6. Speakers included Trump, Arizona Republican Gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake, and many congressional representatives.

As part of one of the 2022 break-out sessions, the CPAC displayed a banner across their main stage with the phrase "We are all domestic terrorists."[31][32][33][34][35]

2023[edit]

CPAC returned to National Harbor, Maryland for their 2023 conference. Major speakers at the winter event included Donald J. Trump, Steve Bannon, US House members Marjorie Taylor Greene, Matt Gaetz and Lauren Boebert, presidential candidate Nikki Haley, and Donald Trump Jr.[36] Attendance was thinner than at previous conferences, with the main ballroom often half-full during speeches, though Trump drew a capacity crowd.[37][38] He said he would not withdraw from the 2024 presidential race if he was indicted as a result of federal and state investigations underway.[39] CNN fact checker Daniel Dale found that Trump "made some of his most thoroughly dishonest speeches" at the conference.[40] Trump said, in part:

In 2016, I declared: I am your voice. Today, I add: I am your warrior. I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed: I am your retribution.[41]

Also during the conference political commentator Michael Knowles called for the elimination of "transgenderism," arguing that those who identify as transgender are "laboring a delusion, and we need to correct that delusion." Knowles further stated that "there can be no middle way in dealing with transgenderism," and that "for the good of society, transgenderism must be eradicated from public life entirely."[42] Knowles' comments were criticized by several political media figures, including civil rights attorney Alejandra Caraballo, describing them as genocidal.[43] Knowles demanded that The Daily Beast retract a headline stating that he was calling for the eradication of the "transgender community".[44]

Presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy later alleged that a political consultant with ties to CPAC had offered to rig the straw poll in his favor in exchange for $100,000+, which Ramaswamy declined.[45]

The annual CPAC straw poll vote traditionally serves as a barometer for the feelings of the conservative movement. During the conference, attendees are encouraged to fill out a survey that asks questions on a variety of issues. The questions regarding the most popular possible presidential candidates are the most widely reported. One component of CPAC is evaluating conservative candidates for president, and the straw poll serves generally to quantify conservative opinion.

 

Year

Straw poll winner

% of votes

Second place

% of votes

Eventual Republican nominee

1974–75

Polling irregular?[citation needed]

Gerald Ford (1976)

1976

Ronald Reagan[46]

77.2

George Wallace

14.6

1977–79

Polling irregular?[citation needed]

Ronald Reagan (1980)

1980

Ronald Reagan[47]

n/a

n/a

n/a

1981–83

Not held (Ronald Reagan's nomination presumptive)[47]

Ronald Reagan (1984)

1984

Ronald Reagan[47]

n/a

n/a

n/a

1985

Not held[47]

George H. W. Bush (1988)

1986

Jack Kemp[48][49]

n/a

George H. W. Bush

n/a

1987

Jack Kemp[50]

68

Pat Buchanan

9

1988

Not held[47]

1989–91

Not held (George H. W. Bush's nomination presumptive)[47]

George H. W. Bush (1992)

1992

Pat Buchanan[51]

?

?

?

1993

Jack Kemp[52]

n/a

n/a

n/a

Bob Dole (1996)

1994

Not held[47]

1995

Phil Gramm[53]

40

Bob Dole

12

1996

Bob Dole[54]

26

Pat Buchanan

24

1997

Not held[47]

George W. Bush (2000)

1998

Steve Forbes[55]

23

George W. Bush

10

1999

Gary Bauer[56][57]

28

George W. Bush

24

2000

George W. Bush[58]

42

Alan Keyes

23

2001–04

Not held (George W. Bush's nomination presumptive)[59]

George W. Bush (2004)

2005

Rudy Giuliani[60]

19

Condoleezza Rice

18

John McCain (2008)

2006

George Allen[61]

22

John McCain

20

2007

Mitt Romney[61]

21

Rudy Giuliani

17

2008

Mitt Romney[61]

35

John McCain

34

2009

Mitt Romney[61][62]

20

Bobby Jindal

14

Mitt Romney (2012)

2010

Ron Paul[61][63]

31

Mitt Romney

22

2011

Ron Paul[64]

30

Mitt Romney

23

2012

Mitt Romney[65]

38

Rick Santorum

31

2013

Rand Paul[66]

25

Marco Rubio

23

Donald Trump (2016)

2014

Rand Paul[67]

31

Ted Cruz

11

2015

Rand Paul

26

Scott Walker

21

2016

Ted Cruz

40

Marco Rubio

30

2017–18

Not held (Donald Trump's nomination presumptive)[68]

Donald Trump (2020)

2019

Donald Trump[69][70]

82

Mitt Romney

6

2020

Not held (Donald Trump's nomination presumptive)[71]

2021 (1)

Donald Trump[72]

55

Ron DeSantis

21

TBD (2024)

2021 (2)

Donald Trump[73]

70

Ron DeSantis

21

2022 (1)

Donald Trump[74]

59

Ron DeSantis

28

2022 (2)

Donald Trump

69

Ron DeSantis

24

2023

Donald Trump

62

Ron DeSantis

20

 

Overall, former U.S. President Donald Trump holds the record of winning more CPAC straw polls than any other individual, with six (as of March 2023). Mitt Romney follows with four, and Ronald Reagan, Jack Kemp and Rand Paul follow with three wins each, followed by Ron Paul with two wins. Of these five, the Pauls are the only two to win more than one straw poll, yet never appear on a Republican presidential ticket in any election (although Ron Paul did receive one Electoral College vote in 2016).[75] Despite his former popularity, Romney was not invited from CPAC in 2020 because of his vote to hear additional witnesses in the first impeachment trial of Donald Trump[76] and was also not invited to the 2021 CPAC after having voted to convict Trump on one count in his second impeachment trial.[77] CPAC's chairman had said he could not ensure Romney's "physical safety" at the 2020 CPAC conference.[78]

Foreign CPACs[edit]

 

Australia[edit]

Australia's first CPAC was held in August 2019, with guest speakers including former prime minister Tony AbbottBrexit campaign leader Nigel Farage, former Breitbart News editor-in-chief Raheem Kassam and NSW One Nation leader Mark Latham. Liberal Senator Amanda Stoker and Craig Kelly MP were at the event. There were calls for Kassam to be banned from coming into the country before the event.[79][80]

The second conference was held in November 2020.[81] Canadian alt-right YouTuber Lauren Southern was initially scheduled to appear, but her invitation was rescinded by the organizers.[82]

The 2022 conference was held in Sydney on October 1. Attendees included Tony Abbott, Eric AbetzKatherine Deves, Nigel Farage, Jacinta Price and Amanda Stoker.[83]

Brazil[edit]

The first CPAC in Brazil took place on 11–12 October 2019, in the city of São Paulo, attended by leading American conservatives including ACU chairman Matt Schlapp and his wife Mercedes Schlapp, Utah senator Mike Lee, Fox News specialist Walid Phares, as well as Brazilian figures including President Jair Bolsonaro's son Eduardo Bolsonaro, the Minister of Foreign Affairs Ernesto Araújo, and the Prince Imperial of Brazil Bertrand Maria José de Orléans e Bragança and others.[84][85]

The ACU Foundation announced that the event would take place annually in Brazil from 2019.[86][87]

In September 2021, Jason Miller, a former senior adviser to Donald Trump, and other American right-wing media personalities in his traveling party, were detained and questioned for three hours at Brasília International Airport following participation in the 2021 CPAC Brazil Conference. The investigation was part of an inquiry by Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes into misinformation allegedly perpetuated by the administration of President Jair Bolsonaro. Miller had praised Bolsonaro’s supporters as "proud patriots" and claimed they had been deplatformed and shadow banned by Brazilian authorities.[88] Miller continued to advise Jair Bolsonaro after his October 2022 election defeat, meeting with the president's son, Eduardo Bolsonaro, in November 2022, as protests and election challenges continued.[89]

Hungary[edit]

A conservative conference billed by the organizers as CPAC Hungary was held on May 19–20, 2022 in BudapestHungary.[90][91][92] Speakers included Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, Spain's Vox party leader Santiago AbascalEduardo Bolsonaro, right-wing US commentator Candace OwensErnst Roets the Deputy CEO of AfriForum,[93] and former US White House chief of staff Mark Meadows,[94] as well as far-right US conspiracy theorist Jack Posobiec and Hungarian journalist Zsolt Bayer.[95] According to The Guardian, Bayer has previously "called Jews 'stinking excrement', referred to Roma as 'animals' and used racial epithets to describe Black people".[95]

Japan[edit]

The first international CPAC was hosted in Tokyo on December 16–17, 2017 by the Japanese Conservative Union (JCU) in conjunction with the American Conservative Union (ACU).[96] JCU and ACU have continued to co-host J-CPACs every year since. Participants have included notable lawmakers and conservatives from the U.S., Japan, and around the world. They include ACU chairman Matt Schlapp and executive director Dan Schneider, White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, U.S. Representatives Bruce Westerman, and Paul Gosar, Fmr. METI Minister Akira Amari, Fmr. Defense Minister Gen Nakatani, Fmr. Defense Minister Tomomi Inada, Fmr. Taiwanese Finance Minister and WTO ambassador Ching-Chang Wen [zh], journalist Sara Carter, then-SEC commissioner Michael Piwowar, Asia expert and commentator Gordon G. Chang, to name just a few. Hong Kong localist activist Andy Chan Ho-tin attended Japanese CPAC 2019 by video after he was arrested in Hong Kong on his way to Tokyo to make a live appearance.[97]

Mexico[edit]

The first CPAC in Mexico (CPAC México) took place on November 18–19, 2022 at a Westin hotel in Santa Fe, Mexico City. Speakers included former Trump White House advisor Steve Bannon, American anti-abortion activist Abby JohnsonEduardo Bolsonaro, Argentinian presidential candidate Javier Milei, former Chilean presidential candidate José Antonio Kast, and Juan Iván Peña Neder, the President of the Mexican Republicans.[98] It was organized by Mexican anti-abortion activist Eduardo Verástegui.[99][98] At the start of the conference, a group of anti-fascist protesters wearing Che Guevara shirts and waving red hammer and sickle flags showed up at the hotel; Matt Schlapp dubbed the protest "CPAC Derangement Syndrome".[98]

South Korea[edit]

The first CPAC in South Korea (KCPAC) took place between 3 October 2019, in the city of Seoul. They include ACU chairman Matt Schlapp and executive director Dan Schneider, Fmr. acting United States Attorney General Matthew Whitaker, Fmr. Deputy National Security Advisor of the United States K. T. McFarland, Asia expert and commentator Gordon G. Chang, Fox News host Jeanine Pirro, Founder of the New Institute Andrew Crilly, Fox News Contributor Sara A. Carter, Professor of law at Handong International Law School Eric Enlow, Professor emeritus at Yonsei University Kim Dong-gil, Fmr. public security prosecutor Koh Young-ju, Co-Chairperson KCPAC Annie M. H. Chan, Fmr. Prime minister of South Korea Hwang Kyo-ahn, Liberty Korea Party members of the National Assembly Kim Jin-tae and Chun Hee-kyung and Min Kyung-wook, Director of the International Strategic Research Institute Kim Jung-min, Director of Korea Institute for Crisis Management Analysis Huh Nam-sung, Fmr. Director of Korea Institute for National Unification Kim Tae-woo, Founder and former Chief of Pennmike Chung Kyu-jae, Lawyer Chae Myung-sung, Leader of Dawn of Liberty Party Park Kyul, Leader of Truth Forum Kim Eun-koo.[100]

References[edit]

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43.         ^ Hawkinson, Katie (March 4, 2023). "Michael Knowles Says Transgenderism Must Be 'Eradicated' at CPAC"The Daily Beast. Retrieved March 5, 2023.

44.         ^ McClure, Kelly (March 4, 2023). "CPAC speaker says, "Transgenderism must be eradicated," while claiming it doesn't exist". Salon. Retrieved March 6, 2023.

45.         ^ McGraw, Meridith (March 6, 2023). "Vivek Ramaswamy says he received an offer to buy his way into the CPAC straw poll". Politico.

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51.         ^ Johnson, Eliana. "Alt-right influence casts cloud over CPAC". POLITICO. Retrieved February 2, 2020.

52.         ^ "Republican Right Wing Gathers To Bash Clinton, Look to 1996 Conservatives meet in record numbers to find that there is life – and echoes of past unity – after the presidency". The Christian Science Monitor. February 22, 1993. ISSN 0882-7729.

53.         ^ "Archive Search Results". nl.newsbank.com.

54.         ^ Salant, Jonathan D. (March 2015). "Christie places in the back of the pack in CPAC straw poll". nj.com. Advance Local Media, LLC. Retrieved March 14, 2020.

55.         ^ Hallow, Ralph Z. "Forbes tops Bush in presidential straw poll of conservatives". The Washington Post – via nl.newsbank.com.

56.         ^ Neal, Terry M. (January 31, 1999). "Bauer Planning Steps for Presidential Bid". The Washington Post. Washington DC. p. A2. Retrieved November 6, 2010.

57.         ^ "Conservative activist Bauer runs for president". Life Advocate. Retrieved March 8, 2015.

58.         ^ "Bush wins conservative poll; Forbes supporters impressed; Governor wins 42 percent, Keyes second at 23 percent". The Washington Post. January 23, 2000. Retrieved November 6, 2010.

59.         ^ "Romney wins The Washington Times/CPAC Straw Poll in 2012". The Washington Times. Retrieved February 2, 2020.

60.         ^ "Bracing for the worst". The Washington Times. February 23, 2005. Retrieved March 8, 2015.

61.         Jump up to:a b c d e Danielle Kurtzleben (February 11, 2011). "CPAC Straw Poll Not Predictive of Eventual Nominee". U.S. News & World Report. Retrieved March 17, 2013.

62.         ^ Sam Stein (March 31, 2009). "Romney Wins CPAC Poll, Palin Tied For Third". Huffington Post. Retrieved March 17, 2013.

63.         ^ Shepard, Brenda; Murray, Mark (February 21, 2010). "Ron Paul wins CPAC straw poll". NBC News. Retrieved March 17, 2013.

64.         ^ Falcone, Michael (February 12, 2011). "Ron Paul Wins 2011 CPAC Straw Poll, Sarah Palin Finishes a Distant 9th Place". ABC News. Retrieved March 17, 2013.

65.         ^ Lederman, Josh (February 12, 2012). "Santorum suggests Romney rigged CPAC straw poll victory". The Hill. Retrieved March 17, 2013.

66.         ^ Sherfinski, David; Dinan, Stephen (March 16, 2013). "Rand Paul wins The Washington Times-CPAC 2013 Straw Poll". Washington Times. Retrieved March 17, 2013.

67.         ^ Hohmann, James (March 8, 2014). "A Rand Paul rout in CPAC straw poll". Politico. Retrieved October 9, 2014.

68.         ^ Gonyea, Don (February 22, 2017). "What Is CPAC? A Room That Didn't Always Love Trump, But Owes Him A Lot". listen.sdpb.org. Retrieved February 2, 2020.

69.         ^ Sherfinski, David; Dinan, Stephen (March 2, 2019). "CPAC straw poll: Biden biggest threat to Trump".

70.         ^ CPAC 2019 Straw Pollarchived from the original on December 12, 2021, retrieved February 2, 2020

71.         ^ CPAC Attendee Survey February 29, 2020.

72.         ^ Coleman, Justine (February 28, 2021). "Trump wins CPAC straw poll with 55 percent"The Hill. Retrieved February 28, 2021.

73.         ^ "Trump wins the CPAC straw poll as attendees clamor for him to run again". CNN. July 11, 2021.

74.         ^ Caputo, Marc; Allen, Jonathan (February 27, 2022). "Trump wins CPAC straw poll, revs up campaign speculation amid Biden polling collapse".

75.         ^ Patrick Svitek (January 9, 2017). "Rogue Texas elector explains decision to back Ron Paul". The Texas Tribune.

76.         ^ Choi, Matthew (January 31, 2020). "Romney not welcome at CPAC after impeachment witness vote"Politico. Retrieved January 31, 2020.

77.         ^ "Here Are Some of the Top Republicans Not Attending CPAC This Year". Bloomberg.com. February 25, 2021. Retrieved February 26, 2021.

78.         ^ "CPAC chairman says he would fear for Mitt Romney's 'physical safety' at conference". The Washington Post. 2020.

79.         ^ "Labor wants right-wing 'bigot' banned from Australia ahead of conservative conference". SBS News. Retrieved September 10, 2019.

80.         ^ Doran, political reporter Matthew (July 31, 2019). "Right-wing provocateur who wanted female politician's legs 'taped shut' on his way to Australia". ABC News. Retrieved September 10, 2019.

81.         ^ McGowan, Michael (November 4, 2020). "Australian rightwing conference a mix of triumphalism and despair on day of US election"The Guardian. Retrieved December 8, 2020.

82.         ^ Hutchinson, Samantha; Brook, Stephen (October 1, 2020). "Alt-right activist Lauren Southern dumped from Conservative conference"The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved November 23, 2020.

83.         ^ Butler, Josh (October 1, 2022). "'Socialism sucks' stickers on display as CPAC Australia stokes fears of Indigenous voice". The Guardian. Retrieved October 7, 2022.

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85.         ^ "ACU Foundation Events". ACU Foundation. Retrieved August 14, 2019.

86.         ^ Jair Bolsonaro [@jairbolsonaro] (August 14, 2019). "-É com grande satisfação que após meses de trabalho anunciamos que o maior evento conservador do mundo, CPAC, será realizado pela 1ª vez no Brasil. Em breve divulgaremos grandes nomes da direita mundial que se farão presentes em São Paulo nos dias 11 e 12/OUT. Sigam: @cpacbrasil" (Tweet) – via Twitter.

87.         ^ "Eduardo Bolsonaro tenta trazer ao Brasil maior evento conservador do mundo" (in Portuguese). Poder 360. May 18, 2019.

88.         ^ Sonmez, Felicia; McCoy, Terrence (September 7, 2021). "Former Trump adviser Jason Miller briefly detained in Brazil as political tumult grips country"The Washington Post. Archived from the original on September 8, 2021. Retrieved September 8, 2021.

89.         ^ Dwoskin, Elizabeth; Sá Pessoa, Gabriela (November 23, 2022). "Trump aides Bannon, Miller advising the Bolsonaros on next steps". Washington Post. Archived from the original on November 27, 2022. Retrieved November 28, 2022.

90.         ^ "Budapest to Host CPAC Hungary Conference in March". Hungarytoday.hu. January 26, 2022. Retrieved February 15, 2022.

91.         ^ "Budapest to Host the Largest American Conservative Conference". Hungarianconservative.com. October 13, 2021. Retrieved February 15, 2022.

92.         ^ Garamvolgyi, Flora; Walker, Shaun (February 11, 2022). "Viktor Orbán invites Trump to Hungary to boost re-election campaign"The Guardian. Retrieved February 15, 2022.

93.         ^ "Ernst Roets at CPAC Hungary 2022 – Don't be derailed by the Keepers of the Script"YouTube.

94.         ^ Garamvolgyi, Flora (May 20, 2022). "Viktor Orbán tells CPAC the path to power is to 'have your own media'". The Guardian. Retrieved May 21, 2022.

95.         Jump up to:a b Garamvolgyi, Flora; Borger, Julian (May 21, 2022). "Trump shares CPAC Hungary platform with notorious racist and antisemite"The Guardian. Retrieved May 22, 2022.

96.         ^ "American Conservative Union announces 'Japanese CPAC' in Tokyo". Washington Examiner. November 17, 2017.

97.         ^ Fordham, Evie (September 6, 2019). "Conservatives visit Hong Kong activist arrested on his way to CPAC in Japan". FOXBusiness.

98.         Jump up to:a b c Tomson, Danielle (November 23, 2022). "CPAC México wants to unite a fractured international far-right"Coda Media. Retrieved November 24, 2022.

99.         ^ O'Boyle, Brendan (November 19, 2022). "At CPAC Mexico, 'orphaned' right tries to build home as region tacks left"Reuters. Retrieved November 24, 2022.

100.    ^ "KCPAC 2019 | KCPAC". cpackorea.com. Retrieved May 19, 2021.

 

ATTACHMENT TWO – From wiki

THE CLUB FOR GROWTH

The Club for Growth is a 501(c)(4)[1] conservative[2] organization active in the United States, with an agenda focused on tax cuts and other economic policy issues.[3][4]

Club for Growth's largest funders are Billionaire Jeff Yass and Billionaire Richard Uihlein.[4] The club has two political arms: an affiliated traditional political action committee, called the Club for Growth PAC, and Club for Growth Action, an independent-expenditure only committee or Super-PAC.[5]

According to its website, the Club for Growth's policy goals include cutting income tax rates, repealing the estate tax, supporting limited government and a balanced budget amendment, entitlement reform (including Social Security reformMedicare and Medicaid reform), free tradetort reformschool choice, and deregulation.[6]

In 2003 through 2004, the Club for Growth was the largest single funder for Republican House and Senate candidates, outside of the Republican Party itself [7]

The group has opposed government action to curb greenhouse gas emissions and called on President Trump to exit the Paris Climate Agreement.[8]

The Club for Growth PAC endorses and raises money for candidates who meet its standards for fiscal conservatism. According to Politico, "The Club for Growth is the pre-eminent institution promoting Republican adherence to a free-market, free-trade, anti-regulation agenda."[9]

The Guardian described the group as "one of the biggest backers" of Republicans who voted to overturn the results of the 2020 United States presidential election, having spent around $20 million on their campaigns in 2018 and 2020.[4]

History[edit]

The Club for Growth was founded in 1999 by Stephen MooreThomas L. Rhodes, and Richard Gilder.[10] Moore served as the first president of the Club from 1999 until December 2004, when board members voted to remove Moore as president.[11] In 2003 through 2004, the Club for Growth was the largest single fund-raiser for Republican House and Senate candidates, outside of the Republican Party itself, raising nearly $22 million.[12]

Future Pennsylvania United States Senator Pat Toomey served as president from 2005 until his resignation in April 2009. Former Indiana Congressman Chris Chocola succeeded Toomey. Chocola served as president through December 2014. He remains a member of the Club's board. Former Indiana Congressman David McIntosh was named president in January 2015.[13]

On September 19, 2005, the Federal Election Commission (FEC) filed suit against the Club for Growth alleging violations of the Federal Election Campaign Act for failing to register as a political action committee in the 20002002, and 2004 congressional elections.[14] In September 2007, the Citizens Club for Growth (the Club for Growth changed its name) and the FEC agreed to settle the lawsuit.[15] According to their joint filing, Citizens Club for Growth said "that it operated under the good faith belief that it had not triggered political committee status ... [and] [f]or the purposes of this settlement, and in order to avoid protracted litigation costs, without admitting or denying each specific basis for the [FEC's] conclusions," Citizens Club for Growth no longer contested the alleged violations and agreed to pay $350,000 in civil penalties.[16][non-primary source needed]

According to the Associated Press, the settlement was one of "a series of actions by the FEC to penalize independent political groups that spent money to influence elections but did not register as political committees. The groups, called 527 organizations for the section of the IRS code ... , played a significant role in the 2004 congressional and presidential elections by raising unlimited amounts of money from labor groups, corporations and wealthy individuals."[15] On June 25, 2012, U.S. District Court Judge Robert L. Wilkins issued an order stating that the FEC "is FORMALLY REPRIMANDED as a sanction for violating explicitly clear orders" (emphasis in original text) regarding confidentiality in the 2007 settlement agreement."[17][non-primary source needed]

In 2010, the Club's political arms spent about $8.6 million directly on candidates and bundled another $6 million from Club members, directing those funds to candidates.[18] In 2012, according to OpenSecrets, Club members donated at least $4 million, and the Club's political arms spent nearly $18 million on elections.[19]

In 2013, the Club for Growth super PAC's donors included Peter Thiel, an early backer of Facebook and a co-founder of PayPal, who gave $2 million; Virginia James ($1.2 million); John W. Childs ($1.1 million), chairman and founder of the Boston-based private equity firm J.W. Childs AssociatesRobert D. Arnott ($750,000), the chairman and chief executive of California-based Research Affiliates; Robert Mercer, the co-chief executive of Renaissance Technologies and part-owner of Cambridge Analytica, gave $600,000; and hedge fund manager Paul Singer gave $100,000.[20]

The Club for Growth's super PAC, which historically has been most active in Republican primary elections, spent more in general elections in the 2018 cycle than it ever had before. This trend was expected to continue into 2020.[21] Club for Growth president David McIntosh described the Club's evolution, saying "We want to be the political arm of the conservative movement—inside the Republican Party."[22]

In June 2020, The Hill wrote that the Club was "flexing its financial muscle this year, doling out millions of dollars to conservative congressional candidates and outspending most other outside groups as it looks to help the GOP keep control of the Senate and improve Republican chances in the House." The Club for Growth raised $55 million in 2020, "making 2020 its most lucrative cycle yet." The Club, which said it planned to spend at least $35 million in the 2020 election cycle, outspent most other groups not affiliated with presidential candidates.[23] According to a Guardian analysis, the organization was one of the biggest backers of the Republican lawmakers who tried to overturn the 2020 US election results. It spent $20m to support its campaigns in 2018 and 2020. One of the largest donors was Jeffrey Yass who in 2020 donated $20.7m to the Club.[24]

Mission[edit]

Founder Stephen Moore has said, "We want to be seen as the tax cut enforcer in the [Republican] party."[25] Unlike many other political action committees, the Club for Growth's PAC regularly participates in funding candidates for primary elections.[18] The Club focuses more on open seats than on challenging sitting Republicans, but it has helped to unseat a number of incumbent Republicans.[11][26] The Club for Growth has established a vetting process for potential candidates that involves one or more interviews, research on the race and the candidate's record, and a poll conducted to establish whether the candidate has a viable chance for victory.[27] Each election cycle, the Club's PAC endorses candidates and encourages donors to support the endorsed candidates.[11] Promoting a more conservative agenda, the Club is known for targeting "establishment" Republican candidates.[18]

Issue advocacy[edit]

2003[edit]

In 2003, the original Club for Growth strongly opposed the Medicare prescription drug benefit proposal.[28] The Club for Growth strongly supported the Bush tax cuts of 2003 and ran television ads against two Republicans who voiced opposition to the tax cuts. According to The New York Times, "Last spring, [Club for Growth president Steve] Moore attacked two Republican Senators who were resisting the latest tax cut: George Voinovich of Ohio and Olympia Snowe of Maine. He ran ads in each of their states in which he compared them with the French president, Jacques ChiracKarl Rove, President Bush's political advisor, stated that the ads were "stupid" and "counterproductive".[29]

2005[edit]

In 2005, Pat Toomey became president and the Club for Growth created a congressional scorecard. The Club's first key vote alert was an amendment sponsored by a Democrat. Representative Earl Blumenauer offered an amendment to an agricultural appropriations bill that would have reduced the sugar program by 6 percent. The Club for Growth supported the amendment, which failed, 146–280.[30][31]

The Club fought to support the Dominican Republic–Central America Free Trade Agreement in 2005, running print advertisements in local Beltway publications in the Washington, DC area. According to Roll Call, "Former Rep. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), president of the Club for Growth, a CAFTA supporter, said his group continued running advertisements before the Congressional vote."[32]

The Club opposed the 2005 highway bill.[33] President Bush threatened to veto the bill but did sign it. The Christian Science Monitor quoted David Keating saying, "For fiscal conservatives, it's frustrating to watch ... He's beginning to lose all credibility with these veto threats."[34] According to The Washington Post, "The Club for Growth, a conservative group that funds like-minded candidates for Congress, has turned the highway legislation into a bumper sticker for the GOP's fiscal failings.[35]

Keating said to the Chicago Sun-Times, "It is a pork-laden bill."[36] The Christian Science Monitor reported Toomey saying,

"This is a defining moment. The Republican Party came to power in 1995 by advocating limited government. But in the last four to five years, there has been no evidence that the Republican officials in the federal government have any remaining commitment to this vital principle."[37]

During the debate on the highway bill, the Club supported an amendment by Tom Coburn that would defund the noted Gravina Island Bridge, from Ketchikan to the island in Southeast Alaska.

Following the Supreme Court's Kelo v. City of New London decision, the Club gained an appropriations amendment by Scott Garrett to prohibit funds in the bill from being used to enforce the Court's decision. The amendment passed, 231–189.[38] The Club for Growth PAC highlighted this vote when it targeted Joe Schwarz, a House Republican who it helped defeat in 2006, claiming he was too liberal.[39]

2006[edit]

In the spring of 2006, the Club opposed the 527 Reform Act, which curtailed spending by such political organizations. It led a coalition of center-right groups in sending letters to Congress to support its position.[40] The House passed the 527 Reform Act by a margin of 218–209, but the Senate did not consider the legislation.[41]

The Club for Growth supported various amendments to cut earmarks in the budget, such as "dairy education" and a "wine initiative."[42] The Club included assessment of sponsorship of the card check bill in its scorecard. If lawmakers co-sponsored the bill, they were docked points in the rating system.[43]

2007[edit]

The Club for Growth issued a new scorecard in 2007 that highlighted how House members voted on several amendments that defunded earmarks. Sixteen congressmen scored a perfect 100% on the so-called "RePORK Card", voting for all 50 anti-pork amendments. They were all Republicans. Conversely, 105 congressmen (81 Democrats and 24 Republicans) scored a 0%, voting against every single amendment. In 2007, the Club also scored against House bills that increased the minimum wage, implemented card check, and sought caps on CEO pay.[44] In the Senate, the Club scored against bills that increased the minimum wage, passage of the farm bill, and the SCHIP healthcare plan.[45]

In 2007, the Club for Growth opposed protectionist policies against China. Senators Chuck Schumer of New York and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina had proposed a bill to apply large tariffs on Chinese imports if that country did not increase the value of its currency. In response, the Club sponsored a petition of 1,028 economists who stated their opposition to protectionist policies against China. The list of economists included Nobel Laureates Finn KydlandEdward PrescottThomas Schelling, and Vernon Smith. The petition played off a similar petition that was also signed by 1,028 economists in 1930 that opposed the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act.[46]

2008–09[edit]

In 2008 and 2009, the Club for Growth opposed the $787 billion stimulus billCash for Clunkerscap and trade legislation, the Wall Street bailout, the auto bailout, the Affordable Care Act and the bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.[47]

After Barack Obama was elected president in November 2008, Club President Pat Toomey penned an op-ed that included the results of a poll commissioned by the Club: "A poll commissioned by the Club for Growth in 12 swing congressional districts over the past weekend shows that the voters who made the difference in this election still prefer less government—lower taxes, less spending and less regulation—to Obama's economic liberalism. Turns out, Americans didn't vote for Dems because they support their redistributionist agenda, but because they are fed up with the GOPers in office. This was a classic 'throw the bums out' election, rather than an embrace of the policy views of those who will replace them."[48]

In 2009, the Club produced another "RePORK Card". This time there were 22 House members with a 100% score: 1 Democrat and 21 Republicans. At the bottom, 211 House members received a 0% score: 202 Democrats and 9 Republicans.[49]

2010[edit]

The Club for Growth launched its Repeal It! campaign in 2010 in an attempt to help build public support for undoing the Affordable Care Act. In 2010, more than 400 federal lawmakers and candidates signed the Repeal It! pledge, including more than 40 of the incoming freshman class of congressmen and senators.[50]

The Club for Growth advocated the discharge petition, a proposal that would have forced a House vote on repealing the Affordable Care Act. At the time, Keith Olbermann said: "The petition, which would need 218 signatures to force House Speaker Pelosi to put the repeal bill up for a vote, went largely ignored. As Talking Points Memo reports, on Monday it had only 30 signatures. That is until the right wing group Club For Growth e-mailed its members, explaining Mr. [Steve] King's discharge petition will be considered as a key vote on the club's annual Congressional scorecard. That scorecard is considered one of the gold standards of conservative rankings. That and the Spanish Inquisition. So by Tuesday, the petition had 22 more signatures."[51]

2011–12[edit]

The Club was involved in the debate over the debt ceiling that took place in August 2011. The Club endorsed and strongly supported "Cut Cap and Balance" and ran issue ads urging Republicans to "show some spine" on maintaining the debt ceiling.[52]

The Club opposed the re-authorization of the Export-Import Bank.[53] The Club also took a strong position against Republicans voting for tax increases during the debate over the so-called "fiscal cliff". The Club opposed the "Plan B" tax increase proposed by John Boehner and also opposed the final deal.[54]

2013[edit]

In September 2013, Club for Growth made voting on the Continuing Appropriations Resolution a key vote, announcing it track how representatives voted on the bill and make that part of their congressional scorecard.[55] The group urged representatives to vote yes, particularly with defunding ObamaCare in mind.[55]

The Club for Growth opposed the Ryan-Murray Budget deal.[56] It also opposed the 2013 farm bill, which failed for the first time in the bill's 40-year history.[57][58][59]

2014[edit]

The Club's PAC spent $3.1 million ($2.4 million on independent expenditures and $700,000 on ads) or nearly half of the $7.8 million which it spent in 2014 on Chris McDaniel's effort to defeat Thad Cochran in the United States Senate Republican primary election in Mississippi, 2014.[13]

2015[edit]

From April through June 2015, the Club for Growth spent $1 million on television ads in nine congressional districts, urging the members of Congress in those districts to oppose re-authorization of the Export-Import Bank (Ex-Im Bank). Additional advertisements were announced in two districts in Utah, but were cancelled when the members declared their opposition to the Ex-Im Bank.[60] In addition, the Club for Growth announced a key vote against re-authorization of the Ex-Im Bank.[61]

The Club for Growth produced a series of policy papers on the positions taken by major Republican presidential candidates on the government's role in economic growth. The eleven papers examined the records and remarks of the candidates on issues such as tax reform, government spending, entitlement reform, and free trade.[62] The Club concluded that Senators Ted CruzRand Paul, and Marco Rubio were the most likely candidates to enact pro-growth policies if elected president.[63]

In October 2015, the Club for Growth announced a key vote against the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015, saying that it would include a $1.5 trillion in the debt ceiling and a $112 billion increase in federal spending.[64]

Climate change[edit]

The Club for Growth has opposed government action to curb greenhouse gas emissions. In 2009, the Club for Growth pressured Republican politicians not to support a cap-and-trade bill, which the group viewed as being "extremely harmful to the economy."[65] In 2011, the group issued a white paper criticizing presidential candidate Mitt Romney's regulatory record as Massachusetts governor, including his support of global warming policies.[66] In 2017, the group called on President Trump to exit the Paris Agreement.[8]

Internal Revenue Service[edit]

The Club for Growth opposes efforts to fund the Internal Revenue Service. In 2021, the Club for Growth claimed that efforts to fund the IRS were intended to aggressively pursue conservatives and that it was one of the "vicious tactics of the radical socialist left".[67]

Congressional scorecard[edit]

Since 2005, the Club for Growth has produced an annual congressional scorecard. Each member of Congress receives a score on a scale of 0 to 100. The Club for Growth awards a Defender of Economic Freedom award to members of Congress who receive a 90% above on the annual scorecard and have a lifetime score of at least 90%.[68] The New York Times described the Club's release of its annual scorecard as "set upon by Republicans like the Oscar nominations list by Hollywood, with everyone dying to know who ranks where, especially in election years".[69]

The Club's 2015 congressional scorecard was based on 29 House votes and 25 Senate votes. Mike Lee was the only U.S. Senator to receive a perfect score. Ben Sasse was ranked second among U.S. Senators, followed by Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz. On the U.S. House side, John RatcliffeTim Huelskamp, and Scott DesJarlais received perfect scores.[70]

The Club for Growth Foundation's 2017 Congressional Scorecard was released in February 2018. Andy Biggs, a Republican from Arizona, was the only member of the U.S. House to receive a 100% rating. A total of 29 members of the U.S. House received a score of at least 90%. In the U.S. Senate, Jeff FlakePat Toomey, and James Lankford scored 100%, while four other senators scored at least 90%.[71]

The Club for Growth's 2018 Congressional Scorecard awarded twenty members of the U.S. House and five U.S. Senators scores of at least 90%. Four U.S. Senators (Jeff FlakeMike LeeRand Paul, and Pat Toomey) and three U.S. Representatives (Justin AmashAndy Biggs, and Paul Gosar) received perfect scores. Susan Collins received the lowest score among Republican senators while Brian Fitzpatrick and Christopher Smith were the lowest scoring Republican members of the U.S. House.[72]

Club for Growth PAC[edit]

2004[edit]

In 2004, the Club for Growth's PAC endorsed and supported U.S. Representative Pat Toomey, who challenged incumbent Senator Arlen Specter in the Republican primary in Pennsylvania. The PAC was reported to have collected contributions totaling over $934,000 for Toomey. It also spent $1 million on its own independent television advertising campaign on Toomey's behalf.[73] Specter, who had the support of President Bush, the RNC, and Sen. Rick Santorum, defeated Toomey by a narrow margin of 51–49%. Afterward Toomey accepted the position as President of the Club for Growth, where he served until April 2009.

2006[edit]

The original Club's PAC supported the electoral bids of freshmen U.S. Congressman Adrian Smith (R-NE), Doug Lamborn[74] (R-CO), Bill Sali[75] (R-ID), and Tim Walberg[76] (R-MI), who all were elected. Congressional Quarterly wrote that Smith's views did not differ greatly from those of his primary election rivals, but the endorsement of the Club for Growth's PAC "gave him the imprimatur of the most fiscally conservative candidate, and it helped boost him to the top of the campaign fundraising competition."[77]

In the 2006 primaries, the Club's PAC recommended to its donors that they support incumbent Democratic Congressman Henry Cuellar (D-TX), the first time the Club's PAC recommended support for a Democrat. Cuellar won the primary race against former Congressman Ciro Rodriguez.[11] The Club's PAC endorsed four candidates for U.S. Senate, including Mike Bouchard in Michigan, Mike McGavick in Washington, Michael Steele in Maryland, and Stephen Laffey in Rhode Island, who did not win.[11]

Support by the Club's PAC was not a guarantee of success: its candidate Sharron Angle was defeated in the Republican primary in Nevada's 2nd congressional district, although it spent more than $1 million on her campaign.[78] The Club's PAC also supported primary campaigns of Phil Krinkie in Minnesota and Kevin Calvey in Oklahoma, who lost, as did incumbent congressman Chris Chocola in Indiana,[18] John Gard in Wisconsin, and Rick O'Donnell in Colorado.[79]

The Club's PAC supported the reelection of Steve Chabot in Ohio.

Candidate

Race

Primary

General

Outcome

Adrian Smith

Nebraska's 3rd congressional district

39%

55%[80]

Win

Doug Lamborn

Colorado's 5th congressional district

27%[81]

59%

Win

Bill Sali

Idaho's 1st congressional district

26%[82]

50%

Win

Tim Walberg

Michigan's 7th congressional district

53%[83]

50%[83]

Win

Henry Cuellar

Texas's 28th congressional district

53%

68%[84]

Win

Mike Bouchard

United States Senate election in Michigan, 2006

60%

41%[85]

Loss

Mike McGavick

United States Senate election in Washington, 2006

86%[86]

40%[87]

Loss

Michael Steele

United States Senate election in Maryland, 2006

87%[88]

44%[89]

Loss

Sharron Angle

Nevada's 2nd congressional district election, 2006

35%[90]

Loss

Phil Krinkie

Minnesota's 6th congressional district

Loss

Kevin Calvey

Oklahoma's 5th congressional district

10%[91]

Loss

Chris Chocola

Indiana's 2nd congressional district

70%

46%[92]

Loss

John Gard

Wisconsin's 8th congressional district

Unopposed

49%[93]

Loss

Rick O'Donnell

Colorado's 7th congressional district

Unopposed

42%

Loss

Steve Chabot

Ohio's 1st congressional district

Unopposed

52%[94]

Win

Stephen Laffey

United States Senate election in Rhode Island, 2006

46%

Loss

Jon Kyl[95]

United States Senate election in Arizona, 2006

Unopposed

53%

Win

George Allen

United States Senate election in Virginia, 2006

Unopposed

49%

Loss

John B. T. Campbell III[96]

California's 48th congressional district

Unopposed

60%

Win

Jim Jordan[97]

Ohio's 4th congressional district

50%

60%

Win

Ralph Norman[98]

South Carolina's 5th congressional district

Unopposed

43%

Loss

David McSweeney[99]

Illinois's 8th congressional district

43%

44%

Loss

2007[edit]

The Club's PAC endorsed state senator Steve Buehrer in the special election for Ohio's 5th congressional district to replace the deceased Rep. Paul Gillmor.[100] Buehrer however was defeated by Bob Latta, the son of former Rep. Del Latta, in the Republican primary in November 2007 by a 44% to 40% margin.

The Club's PAC endorsed Paul Jost, the chairman of the Virginia chapter of the Club for Growth, in the contest to replace deceased Rep. Jo Ann Davis in Virginia's 1st congressional district.[101] In the nominating convention, Jost was defeated by state delegate Rob Wittman.

2008[edit]

In Maryland's 1st congressional district, the Club's PAC endorsed state senator Andrew P. Harris against nine term incumbent Wayne Gilchrest. In the February 12 primary, Harris surged to a strong 44% to 32% victory. Gilchrest became the second incumbent Republican to be defeated by a candidate supported by the Club. The first was Rep. Joe Schwarz in Michigan in 2006.[26] Harris was, however, unable to win the general election.

In Georgia's 10th congressional district, the Club's PAC endorsed incumbent Paul Broun who defeated state representative Barry Fleming 71% to 29% in the July 15, 2008, primary election. Broun's victory surprised many political observers.[102]

In Arizona's 5th congressional district, the Club's PAC endorsed former Maricopa County Treasurer David Schweikert, who narrowly defeated former candidate Susan Bitter-Smith by a margin of 30% to 28%; there were three other candidates.[103] He did not win the general election.

During the 2008 Republican presidential primaries, the Club's PAC was critical of Mike Huckabee, attacking him as the "tax-increasing liberal governor of Arkansas".[104] Huckabee, in turn, referred to the Club for Growth as the "Club for Greed".[105]

Candidate

Race

Primary

General

Outcome

Paul Broun[102]

Georgia's 10th congressional district

71%

61%

Win

Charlie Ross

Mississippi's 3rd congressional district

43%

-

Loss

Matt Shaner

Pennsylvania's 5th congressional district

17%

-

Loss

Harri Anne Smith

Alabama's 2nd congressional district

46%

-

Loss

Bob Onder

Missouri's 9th congressional district

29%

-

Loss

Sean Parnell

Alaska's at-large congressional district

45%

-

Loss

Steve Scalise

Louisiana's 1st congressional district

58%

75%

Win

Woody Jenkins

Louisiana's 6th congressional district

61%

46%

Loss

John Shadegg

Arizona's 4th congressional district

Unopposed

54%

Win

Scott Garrett

New Jersey's 5th congressional district

Unopposed

56%

Win

Doug Lamborn

Colorado's 5th congressional district

45%

60%

Win

Michele Bachmann

Minnesota's 6th congressional district

85%

46%

Win

Pete Olson

Texas's 22nd congressional district

69%

53%

Win

Mike Coffman

Colorado's 6th congressional district

40%

61%

Win

Tom McClintock[106]

California's 4th congressional district

53%

50%

Win

Saxby Chambliss

United States Senate election in Georgia, 2008

Unopposed

58%

Win

John E. Sununu

United States Senate election in New Hampshire, 2008

89%

43%

Loss

Bob Schaffer

United States Senate election in Colorado, 2008

Unopposed

43%

Loss

Steve Pearce

United States Senate election in New Mexico, 2008

51%

39%

Loss

Andrew P. Harris[107]

Maryland's 1st congressional district

43%

48%

Loss

Tim Walberg[108][109]

Michigan's 7th congressional district

Unopposed

46%

Loss

Tom Feeney

Florida's 24th congressional district

76%

41%

Loss

Dean Andal

California's 11th congressional district

Dean Andal

45%

Loss

David Schweikert

Arizona's 5th congressional district

30%

44%

Loss

Chris Hackett

Pennsylvania's 10th congressional district

51%

44%

Loss

Paul Jost

Virginia's 1st congressional district

Loss

Steve Buehrer

Ohio's 5th congressional district

40%

-

Loss

2009[edit]

The Club's PAC endorsed in the special election in New York's 23rd congressional district the Conservative Party of New York candidate, Doug Hoffman instead of Republican candidate Dede Scozzafava. With the Club pouring money into Hoffman's campaign, Scozzafava realized that she could not win and withdrew from the race the Sunday before the November 3 special election, endorsing the Democratic candidate Bill Owens.[110] Owens won the election in a district where portions had not had a Democratic congressman since the 19th century.[111]

2010[edit]

Of the 26 general election candidates endorsed by Club for Growth in 2010, 20 won election.[112] The following chart lists candidates endorsed by the Club:[113]

Candidate

Race

Primary

General

Outcome

David Schweikert

Arizona's 5th congressional district

37%

52%

Win

Tom Coburn

United States Senate election in Oklahoma, 2010

90%[114]

71%[115]

Win

Tom Graves

Georgia's 9th congressional district

55%

Unopposed

Win

Mike Lee

United States Senate election in Utah, 2010

51%

62%

Win

Ron Johnson

United States Senate election in Wisconsin, 2010

85%

52%

Win

Sharron Angle

United States Senate election in Nevada, 2010

40%

45%

Loss

Rand Paul

United States Senate election in Kentucky, 2010

59%

56%

Win

Marco Rubio

United States Senate election in Florida, 2010

84%

48%

Win

Ken Buck

United States Senate election in Colorado, 2010

52%

46%

Loss

Joe Miller

United States Senate election in Alaska, 2010

51%

35%

Loss

Pat Toomey

United States Senate election in Pennsylvania, 2010

82%

51%

Win

Tim Huelskamp

Kansas's 1st congressional district

34%

74%

Win

Mike Pompeo

Kansas's 4th congressional district

39%

59%

Win

Jeff Duncan

South Carolina's 3rd congressional district

51%

62%

Win

Tim Scott

South Carolina's 1st congressional district

68%

65%

Win

Justin Amash

Michigan's 3rd congressional district

40%

60%

Win

Mick Mulvaney

South Carolina's 5th congressional district

Unopposed

55%

Win

Todd Young

Indiana's 9th congressional district

34%

52%

Win

Stephen Fincher

Tennessee's 8th congressional district

48%

59%

Win

Tim Griffin

Arkansas's 2nd congressional district

61%

58%

Win

David Harmer

California's 11th congressional district

36%

48%

Loss

Jesse Kelly

Arizona's 8th congressional district

48%

47%

Loss

Nan Hayworth

New York's 19th congressional district

69%

53%

Win

Keith Rothfus

Pennsylvania's 4th congressional district

66%

49%

Loss

Andrew P. Harris

Maryland's 1st congressional district

67%

55%

Win

Jim DeMint

United States Senate election in South Carolina, 2010

83%

62%

Win

Doug Hoffman[116]

New York's 23rd congressional district

46%

Loss

Kevin Calvey[117]

Oklahoma's 5th congressional district

34%

-

Loss

Robin Smith[118]

Tennessee's 3rd congressional district

28%

-

Loss

2012[edit]

In 2012, the Club for Growth PAC endorsed eighteen congressional candidates, nine of whom won their elections:[119]

Candidate

Race

Primary

General

Outcome

Richard Mourdock[120]

United States Senate election in Indiana, 2012

61%

44%

Loss

Josh Mandel[121]

United States Senate election in Ohio, 2012

63%

45%

Loss

Connie Mack IV[122]

United States Senate election in Florida, 2012

59%

42%

Loss

Ted Cruz[123]

United States Senate election in Texas, 2012

57%

56%

Win

Jeff Flake[120]

United States Senate election in Arizona, 2012

69%

49%

Win

Thomas Massie[124]

Kentucky's 4th congressional district

45%

62%

Win

Steve King[125]

Iowa's 4th congressional district

Unopposed

52%

Win

Ron DeSantis[126]

Florida's 6th congressional district

38%

57%

Win

Kevin Cramer[127]

North Dakota's At-large congressional district

54%

54%

Win

Tom Cotton[128]

Arkansas's 4th congressional district

57%

59%

Win

Mark Neumann[123]

United States Senate election in Wisconsin, 2012

22%

-

Loss

Carl Wimmer[129]

Utah's 4th congressional district

Loss

Don Stenberg[130]

United States Senate election in Nebraska, 2012

18%

-

Loss

Matt Salmon[131]

Arizona's 5th congressional district

51%

64%

Win

Scott Keadle[132]

North Carolina's 8th congressional district

36%

Loss

David M. McIntosh[133]

Indiana's 5th congressional district

28%

Loss

Ron Gould

Arizona's 4th congressional district

31%

Loss

Keith Rothfus[134]

Pennsylvania's 12th congressional district

Unopposed

52%

Win

2014[edit]

Candidate

Race

Primary

Runoff

General

Outcome

Justin Amash[135]

Michigan's 3rd congressional district

Win[136]

Win

Win

Ben Sasse[135]

United States Senate election in Nebraska, 2014

Win[137]

Win

Win

Chris McDaniel[135]

United States Senate election in Mississippi, 2014

Went to runoff election[138][139]

Loss

Loss

Tom Cotton[135]

United States Senate election in Arkansas, 2014

Unopposed[140]

Win

Win

Bryan Smith[135]

Idaho's 2nd congressional district

Loss[141]

Loss

Dan Sullivan[142]

United States Senate election in Alaska, 2014

Win[143]

Win

Win

John Ratcliffe[144]

Texas's 4th congressional district

Went to runoff election[145]

Win

Win

Win

Chad Mathis[146]

Alabama's 6th congressional district

Loss[147]

Loss

Barry Loudermilk

Georgia's 11th congressional district

Went to runoff election[148]

Win

Win

Win

Bob Johnson

Georgia's 1st congressional district

Went to runoff election[149][150]

Loss

Loss

Mike Pompeo[151]

Kansas's 4th congressional district

Win[152]

Win

Win

Gary Palmer[153]

Alabama's 6th congressional district

Went to runoff election[154]

Win

Win

Win

Marilinda Garcia[155]

New Hampshire's 2nd congressional district

Win[156]

Loss

Loss

2016[edit]

U.S. presidential election[edit]

With regard to the 2016 Republican presidential primary candidates, the Club for Growth was critical of Mike HuckabeeChris ChristieJohn KasichBen CarsonCarly Fiorina, and Donald Trump.[157][158][159][160][161] In August 2015, Club for Growth President David McIntosh said that Marco RubioRand Paul, and Ted Cruz are "the real deal candidates, the gold standard of the race," and that while questions remained, Jeb Bush and Scott Walker showed some pro-growth stances.[162]

In August 2015, the Club for Growth PAC announced it would formally support presidential candidates for the first time, saying the group would bundle donations for Cruz, Rubio, Walker, Bush, and Paul. Club for Growth President David McIntosh said "Five candidates are at the forefront of the Republican presidential field on issues of economic freedom, and the Club for Growth PAC is standing with them to help them stand out from the rest."[163] In October 2015, McIntosh said Cruz and Rubio were "the gold standard" of Republican presidential candidates.[164]

The Club for Growth's Super PAC, Club for Growth Action, was particularly critical of Trump's candidacy, announcing a $1 million Iowa advertising buy against his campaign in September 2015. The Club for Growth Action was the first third-party group to spend significant sums against Donald Trump.[165] The Club for Growth announced a $1.5 million advertising buy in Florida in March 2016. The group's advertisements highlighted Trump's support for liberal policies, such as a single-payer health insurance system and tax increases.[166][167][168][169]

In March 2016, Politico reported that the Club for Growth PAC planned to deny congressional endorsements to any candidates who endorsed Donald Trump's presidential bid before the nomination was actually clinched. The Club's PAC noted that the warning did not apply to those who endorsed Trump after the May 3, 2016, Indiana primary.[170][171] Also in March 2016, the Club for Growth PAC endorsed Ted Cruz for president. The Club for Growth PAC had never previously endorsed in a presidential race. According to Club for Growth head David McIntosh, "This year is different because there is a vast gulf between the two leading Republican candidates on matters of economic liberty. Their records make clear that Ted Cruz is a consistent conservative who will fight to shrink the federal footprint, while Donald Trump would seek to remake government in his desired image."[172]

U.S. congressional elections[edit]

In North Carolina's 2nd congressional district, Club for Growth Action opposed incumbent Renee Ellmers without endorsing a specific candidate. She was defeated in the primary.[173]

Candidate

Race

Primary

Primary runoff

General

General runoff

Outcome

Ron Johnson[174]

United States Senate election in Wisconsin, 2016

Win

Win

Win

Mike Lee[174]

United States Senate election in Utah, 2016

Win

Win

Win

Rand Paul

United States Senate election in Kentucky, 2016

Win

Win

Win

Tim Scott[174]

United States Senate election in South Carolina, 2016

Win

Win

Win

Pat Toomey[174]

United States Senate election in Pennsylvania, 2016

Win

Win

Win

Marco Rubio

United States Senate election in Florida, 2016

Win

Win

Win

Ron DeSantis

Florida's 6th congressional district

Win

Win

Win

Marlin Stutzman[175]

United States Senate election in Indiana, 2016

Loss[176]

Loss

Warren Davidson[177]

Ohio's 8th congressional district

Win[178]

Win[179]

Win

Jim Banks[180]

Indiana's 3rd congressional district

Win[181]

Win

Win

Kyle McCarter[182]

Illinois's 15th congressional district

Loss[183]

Loss

Mary Thomas[184]

Florida's 2nd congressional district

Loss

Loss

John Fleming[185]

United States Senate election in Louisiana, 2016

Loss

Loss

Mike Crane[186]

Georgia's 3rd congressional district

Went to runoff election[187]

Loss

Loss

Ted Budd[188]

North Carolina's 13th congressional district

Win[189]

Win

Win

Rod Blum

Iowa's 1st congressional district

Win

Win

Win

Scott Garrett

New Jersey's 5th congressional district

Win

Loss

Loss

Tim Huelskamp

Kansas's 1st congressional district

Loss

Loss

Andy Biggs[190]

Arizona's 5th congressional district

Win

Win

Win

Paul Gosar[191]

Arizona's 4th congressional district

Win

Win

Win

Mike Johnson[192]

Louisiana's 4th congressional district

Went to runoff

Win

Win

2017[edit]

The Club for Growth endorsed Bob Gray to represent Tom Price's district after he left to lead the United States Department of Health and Human Services. The group reportedly also bought $250,000 of airtime on Atlanta cable against early Republican front-runner Karen Handel.[193][194] The special election took place on April 18, 2017, with Republican Karen Handel defeating Gray and winning a run-off election on June 20, 2017, against Democrat Jon Ossoff.

The organization endorsed Ralph Norman in the Republican primary to replace Mick Mulvaney in South Carolina's 5th congressional district. Norman won the primary and went on to defeat Archie Parnell in the general election.[195] The organization also endorsed Christopher Herrod's candidacy in the special election to replace Jason Chaffetz.[196]

2018[edit]

The Club for Growth PAC endorsed Ohio State Treasurer Josh Mandel in his bid to unseat incumbent Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown in the 2018 United States Senate election in Ohio. Mandel dropped out of the race in January 2018.[197]

Candidate

Race

Primary

Primary runoff

General

Matt Rosendale[198]

United States Senate election in Montana, 2018

Win

Loss

Van Taylor[199]

Texas's 3rd congressional district

Win

Win

Kevin Nicholson[200]

United States Senate election in Wisconsin, 2018

Loss

Marsha Blackburn

United States Senate election in Tennessee, 2018

Win

Win

Mark Green

Tennessee's 7th congressional district

Uncontested

Win

Josh Hawley

United States Senate election in Missouri, 2018

Win

Win

Denver Riggleman

Virginia's 5th congressional district

Win

Win

Russ Fulcher[201]

Idaho's 1st congressional district

Win

Win

Chip Roy

Texas's 21st congressional district

Went to runoff election

Win

Win

Rick Saccone

Pennsylvania's 18th congressional district

Win

Loss

Dino Rossi

Washington's 8th congressional district

Win

Loss

Ron Wright

Texas's 6th congressional district

Went to runoff election

Win

Win

Andy Coleman

Oklahoma's 1st congressional district

Loss

Mark Harris

North Carolina's 9th congressional district

Win

New election called (see 2019 North Carolina's 9th congressional district special election)

Michael Cloud

Texas's 27th congressional district

Went to runoff election

Win

Win

Scott Perry

Pennsylvania's 10th congressional district

Uncontested

Win

Ted Budd

North Carolina's 13th congressional district

Uncontested

Win

Bunni Pounds

Texas's 5th congressional district

Went to runoff election

Loss

Greg Steube

Florida's 17th congressional district

Win

Win

Josh Kimbrell

South Carolina's 4th congressional district

Loss

Lee Bright

South Carolina's 4th congressional district

Went to runoff election

Loss

Ted Cruz

United States Senate election in Texas, 2018

Win

Win

Rick Scott

United States Senate election in Florida, 2018

Win

Win

Dave Brat

Virginia's 7th congressional district

Win

Loss

Ross Spano

Florida's 15th congressional district

Win

Win

Steve Chabot

Ohio's 1st congressional district

Win

Win

2019[edit]

In the 2019 special election in North Carolina's 9th congressional district, the Club for Growth endorsed state senator Dan Bishop in the 10-candidate Republican primary field.[202] Bishop advanced from the primary and defeated Democrat Dan McCready in the general special election on September 10, 2019.[203]

In the 2019 special election in Pennsylvania's 12th congressional district, the Club for Growth endorsed Fred Keller, who advanced to the general election.[204] Keller won the general special election held on May 21, 2019.[205]

In the 2019 special election in North Carolina's 3rd congressional district, the Club for Growth endorsed Celeste Cairns in the 17-person Republican primary field. Cairns did not advance to the run-off primary.[206]

2020[edit]

Club for Growth supported the re-election campaign of President Donald Trump.[207]

Candidate

Race

Primary

Primary runoff

General

Ben Sasse[208]

2020 United States Senate election in Nebraska

Win

Win

Chip Roy[208]

Texas's 21st congressional district

Uncontested

Win

Scott Perry[208]

Pennsylvania's 10th congressional district

Uncontested

Win

Ted Budd[208]

North Carolina's 13th congressional district

Uncontested

Win

Steve Chabot[208]

Ohio's 1st congressional district

Uncontested

Win

David Schweikert[208]

Arizona's 6th congressional district

Uncontested

Win

Matt Rosendale[209]

Montana's at-large congressional district

Win

Win

Bill Hightower[210]

Alabama's 1st congressional district

Advanced to runoff

Loss

Nancy Mace[211]

South Carolina's 1st congressional district

Win

Win

Nick Freitas[212]

Virginia's 7th congressional district

Win

Loss

Eric Brakey[213]

Maine's 2nd congressional district

Loss

Jeanne Ives[214]

Illinois's 6th congressional district

Win

Loss

Cynthia Lummis[215]

2020 United States Senate election in Wyoming

Win

Win

Chris Ekstrom[216]

Texas's 13th congressional district

Loss

Thomas Massie

Kentucky's 4th congressional district

Win

Win

Chris Putnam[217]

Texas's 12th congressional district

Loss

Tom Tiffany[218]

Wisconsin's 7th congressional district

Win

Win

Rich McCormick[219]

Georgia's 7th congressional district

Win

Loss

Tommy Tuberville[220]

2020 United States Senate election in Alabama

Advanced to runoff

Win

Win

Barry Moore

Alabama's 2nd congressional district

Advanced to runoff

Win

Win

Victoria Spartz

Indiana's 5th congressional district

Win

Win

Steve Daines[221]

2020 United States Senate election in Montana

Win

Win

Mike Garcia

California's 25th congressional district

Win

Win

Matt Gurtler[222]

Georgia's 9th congressional district

Advanced to runoff

Loss

Ronny Jackson[223]

Texas's 13th congressional district

Advanced to runoff

Win

Win

Shane Hernandez

Michigan's 10th congressional district

Loss

Ross Spano

Florida's 15th congressional district

Loss

Byron Donalds[224]

Florida's 19th congressional district

Win

Win

Timothy Hill[225]

Tennessee's 1st congressional district

Loss

2023[edit]

The 2023 closed-donor event was attended by presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis, and held the same weekend as the annual CPAC conference, which headlined Donald Trump. Nikki Haley and Vivek Ramaswamy planned to attend both.[226]

References[edit]

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121.                ^ Koff, Stephen (June 28, 2011). "Josh Mandel gets another national endorsement for U.S. Senate". Plain Dealer. Retrieved January 22, 2013.

122.                ^ Powers, Scott (August 22, 2012). "Club For Growth endorses Connie Mack in senate race". Orlando Sentinel. Archived from the original on August 27, 2012. Retrieved January 22, 2013.

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138.                ^ Burns, Alexander (June 4, 2014). "Thad Cochran, Chris McDaniel barrel toward runoff". Retrieved June 10, 2014.

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141.                ^ Parti, Tarini (May 21, 2014). "Idaho's Mike Simpson beats Club for Growth-backed Bryan Smith". Politico. Retrieved May 22, 2014.

142.                ^ Joseph, Cameron. "Club for Growth picks Sullivan for Alaska Senate". The Hill. Retrieved March 20, 2014.

143.                ^ "2014 U.S. Senate Results". Election Central. Politico. Retrieved August 20, 2014.

144.                ^ O'Keefe, Ed (March 25, 2014). "Ralph Hall challenger John Ratcliffe picks up endorsements from Club for Growth, Madison Project". The Washington Post. Retrieved March 25, 2014.

145.                ^ "Texas – Summary Vote Results". Associated Press. Retrieved June 2, 2014.

146.                ^ Stinson, Jim (May 1, 2014). "Club for Growth endorses Chad Mathis in GOP primary for Congressional District 6". AL.com. Retrieved May 7, 2014.

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149.                ^ "Georgia Election Results". Associated Press. Retrieved June 27, 2014.

150.                ^ Howard, Marcus (July 22, 2014). "Buddy Carter wins 1st Congressional District Republican runoff". Savannah Morning News. Archived from the original on July 25, 2014. Retrieved July 24, 2014.

151.                ^ Seitz, Blake (May 20, 2014). "Former Rep. Todd Tiahrt sets off GOP primary fight in Kansas with challenge to Mike Pompeo". Washington Examiner. Retrieved June 2, 2014.

152.                ^ "Kansas–Summary Vote Results". Associated Press. Retrieved August 6, 2014.

153.                ^ Underwood, Madison (June 11, 2014). "Club for Growth endorses Gary Palmer in 6th District runoff". AL.com. Retrieved June 27, 2014.

154.                ^ Cahn, Emily (July 15, 2014). "Alabama Runoff Results: Gary Palmer Wins Republican Nomination". Roll Call. Retrieved July 16, 2014.

155.                ^ Livingston, Abby (June 20, 2014). "Club for Growth Backs New Hampshire House Candidate". Roll Call. Retrieved June 27, 2014.

156.                ^ "Primary 2014: Wins In Hand For Brown, Havenstein, Garcia, Guinta". New Hampshire Public Radio. September 9, 2014. Retrieved September 9, 2014.

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158.                ^ Camia, Catalina (May 5, 2015). "Club for Growth hits Mike Huckabee on taxes in new ad". USA Today. Retrieved July 6, 2015.

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165.                ^ Epstein, Reid (March 2, 2016). "Super PACS Launch Anti-Trump Ads in Florida, Illinois and Michigan". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved March 3, 2016.

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185.                ^ Boyd, Kevin (April 19, 2016). "John Fleming Lands Major Conservative Endorsement In The U.S. Senate Race". The Hayride. Retrieved May 2, 2016.

186.                ^ Bluestein, Greg (April 22, 2016). "Top Georgia Democrat: 2017 will be the start of a Medicaid expansion". The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Retrieved May 2, 2016.

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190.                ^ Sachtleben, Doug (July 13, 2016). "Club for Growth PAC Endorses Andy Biggs (AZ-05)". Club for Growth. Retrieved August 1, 2016.

191.                ^ Bade, Rachael (August 26, 2016). "Establishment frets: Freedom Caucus and Club for Growth in cahoots". Politico. Retrieved September 1, 2016.

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198.                ^ Pathé, Simone (July 31, 2017). "Republican Matt Rosendale Challenging Montana's Jon Tester". Roll Call. Retrieved August 4, 2017.

199.                ^ Svitek, Patrick (August 23, 2017). "GOP state Sen. Van Taylor of Plano makes congressional run official". Texas Tribune. Retrieved September 5, 2017.

200.                ^ Bowden, John (August 15, 2017). "Club for Growth endorses Nicholson in Wisconsin GOP primary". The Hill. Retrieved September 5, 2017.

201.                ^ "Club for Growth endorses Fulcher in Idaho congressional race". Seattle Times. Associated Press. November 27, 2017. Retrieved December 7, 2017.

202.                ^ Morrill, Jim (April 21, 2019). "Bishop wins endorsement that could mean more outside money in the 9th District primary". The Charlotte Observer. Retrieved May 2, 2019.

203.                ^ Morrill, Jim (May 14, 2019). "Republican Dan Bishop wins NC District 9 GOP primary to face Democrat Dan McCready". The Charlotte Observer. Retrieved June 4, 2019.

204.                ^ Mutnik, Ally (April 11, 2019). "Club for Growth PAC Endorses Fred Keller". National Journal. Retrieved May 2, 2019.

205.                ^ Beague, John (June 1, 2019). "Pennsylvania Real-Time News Fred Keller to become 12th District's congressman Monday, replacing Tom Marino". Penn Live. Retrieved June 4, 2019.

206.                ^ Pathe, Simone (April 17, 2019). "Club for Growth backs a woman in 17-person North Carolina primary". Roll Call. Retrieved May 2, 2019.

207.                ^ "Club for Growth takes aim at impeachment backers Cheney, Anthony Gonzalez". POLITICO.

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209.                ^ Brufke, Juliegrace (June 17, 2019). "Republican who lost Montana Senate bid to run for House next year". The Hill. Retrieved June 25, 2019.

210.                ^ Moseley, Brandon (August 6, 2019). "Elections Club for Growth PAC Endorses Bill Hightower". Alabama Political Reporter. Retrieved August 7, 2019.

211.                ^ "South Carolina First District Race: Nancy Mace Gets National Endorsement". FIT News. November 4, 2019. Retrieved November 4, 2019.

212.                ^ Portnoy, Jenna (December 2, 2019). "Va. Del. Nicholas J. Freitas joins Republican race to challenge U.S. Rep. Abigail Spanberger". The Washington Post. Retrieved December 3, 2019.

213.                ^ Burns, Christopher (September 17, 2019). "Eric Brakey officially announces 2020 bid for Maine's 2nd District seat". WGME. Retrieved October 4, 2019.

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215.                ^ Reynolds, Nick (January 17, 2020). "Flirting with a Senate run, Foster Friess to kick off 'listening tour' of Wyoming". Casper Star Tribune. Retrieved February 7, 2020.

216.                ^ Warren, Thomas (January 13, 2020). "Club For Growth Endorses Ekstrom for Congress". Amarillo Pioneer. Retrieved February 7, 2020.

217.                ^ Isenstadt, Alex (January 23, 2020). "Club for Growth works to defeat House GOP incumbent". Politico. Retrieved February 7, 2020.

218.                ^ Kowles, Naomi (February 6, 2020). "Outside spending, campaign fundraising narrowly separates GOP 7th Congressional candidates". WSAW. Retrieved February 7, 2020.

219.                ^ Galloway, Jim (February 25, 2020). "The Jolt: The Kelly Loeffler-Doug Collins fight is dialed up to 11". The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Retrieved March 4, 2020.

220.                ^ Arkin, James (March 16, 2020). "endorses Tuberville in Alabama". Politico. Retrieved April 1, 2020.

221.                ^ Montellaro, Zach (April 8, 2020). "Milwaukee's long lines could be a warning ahead of November". Politico. Retrieved May 4, 2020.

222.                ^ "Political Insider". The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. April 20, 2020. Retrieved May 4, 2020.

223.                ^ Svitek, Patrick (May 25, 2020). "Influential conservative group endorses Ronny Jackson over Josh Winegarner in runoff for U.S. Rep. Mac Thornberry's seat". Texas Tribune. Retrieved May 26, 2020.

224.                ^ Ogles, Jacob (June 10, 2020). "Club For Growth backs Byron Donalds in CD 19". Florida Politics. Retrieved July 8, 2020.

225.                ^ "Club for Growth endorses Timothy Hill for Congress". WJHL. July 7, 2020. Retrieved July 8, 2020.

226.                ^ Jedeed, Laura; Otten, Tori; Otten, Tori; Jedeed, Laura; Jedeed, Laura; Strauss, Daniel; Strauss, Daniel; Jedeed, Laura; Jedeed, Laura (March 4, 2023). "The Sad, Desolate Scenes of CPAC 2023". The New Republic. ISSN 0028-6583. Retrieved March 5, 2023.

 

 

ATTACHMENT THREE – From attach speech

@See last attachment  peanuts

 

ATTACHMENT FOUR –

No transcript of Saint Ron’s roughly half hour appeal to the moneylenders at the temple of CFG has appeared as yet... perhaps owing to the blackout on all media save for the former MAGA, now NeverTrumper Fox... but leaks here and there from sources too wealthy to worry about retaliation paint a portrait of a man seriously interested in running for President.  So check these...

https://www.rev.com/blog/transcripts/desantis-delivers-fiery-second-term-inaugural-address-transcript

https://wusfnews.wusf.usf.edu/politics-issues/2023-03-07/transcript-read-the-full-text-of-ron-desantis-state-of-the-state-address

 

 

ATTACHMENT FIVE - From USA Today

WHAT IS CPAC? A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE CONSERVATIVE MOVEMENT’S MOST INFLUENTIAL GATHERING

By Matthew Brown

 

Starting Thursday, thousands of political activists, pundits, elected officials and public intellectuals will gather under palm trees in Orlando for an annual gathering of the conservative movement.

Exclusive: Defeated and impeached, Trump still commands the loyalty of the GOP's voters

More: Donald Trump to speak at CPAC in first major public appearance since leaving office

The Conservative Political Action Conference, better known as CPAC, will for the first time not take place in the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center in Maryland, across the river from the nation’s capital. The iconic hotel remains shuttered amid the coronavirus pandemic.

The convention’s move from its longtime home, however, has not diminished its significance for the political right. Former President Donald Trump, a frequent CPAC speaker, will make his first major post-presidential appearance at the event, where he is expected to heavily criticize his successor, President Joe Biden.

Other right-wing icons will be present, including nine sitting senators; two governors; 36 members of the U.S. House— including House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy — and various high-profile conservative media personalities and activists.

CPAC and the rise of Reagan

Founded in 1974, CPAC has served as a barometer for the conservative movement. The American Conservative Union, which hosts the conference, was instrumental in reshaping a right-wing political coalition in the aftermath of the Watergate scandal.

'What happened must never happen again': Rep. Liz Cheney, a top House Republican, again hits Trump over Capitol riots

'Colossal' breakdown: FBI warning not fully shared before Capitol riot; police lacked training, gear

That year, California Gov. Ronald Reagan gave the conference’s keynote address. The resulting “New Right,” partly formed at CPAC, later took command of the Republican Party and helped elect him as president, ushering in an impassioned conservative era.

The event has since become a meeting ground for various strains of the conservative movement, allowing the coalition to prioritize goals and form a coherent political identity in contrast to American liberalism.

Most of the conference consists of topical breakout sessions, activist training, major speeches from conservative leaders and sponsored parties. CPAC also conducts an annual “straw poll,” which surveys attendees on a range of issues, including who they’d prefer as the Republican nominee for president. The exercise doesn’t often identify the eventual nominee but does give insights into the thinking of Republican activists.

'We just fear': Rep. Adam Kinzinger frets over GOP's future

More: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to lower flags to half-staff in honor of conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh

CPAC and controversy

The conference has never been without controversy. Recent reports that former Vice President Mike Pence would not speak at the conference due to ongoing tensions with Trump caused an uproar in conservative circles. A speaker was also disinvited from CPAC just this week for frequent anti-Semitic comments.

In years past, conservative pundit Milo Yiannopoulos was canceled from speaking at the event after comments surfaced that accused him of supporting pedophilia. CPAC has also run into controversies by inviting to the event gay and atheist conservatives who ran afoul of the dominant opinions on the right.

Republican lawmakers have long understood the conference to be a key path to the conservative grassroots, who are often integral to winning higher office.

More: Pelosi scoffs at 'cowardly' Senate Republicans

Pastor: Georgia GOP bills target Black vote

Activists at CPAC can sometimes be harbingers for what's to come in conservative politics. In addition to serving as Reagan’s first major national platform, then-Texas Gov. George W. Bush was warmly welcomed at the convention during a period that saw neoconservative intellectuals and Christian conservatives as ascendant.

After Democrats swept Congress in 2006, and Barack Obama ascended to the presidency in 2008, the conservative tea party movement made itself known at CPAC in 2010, presaging the energy on the right that would sweep Republicans into Congress that fall.

          'These are ready for use”: Rep. Lauren Boebert defends her gun display Zoom background

That period also saw conflicts at CPAC between more traditional conservatives who opposed the Obama administration and activists promoting the "birther" conspiracy theory that Obama was born in another country.

Donald Trump, who helped spread the conspiracy theory, was a CPAC speaker in 2013, 2014 and 2015, before announcing his presidential run in the summer of 2015.

In 2016, CPAC attendees were bitterly divided between conservative activists skeptical of Trump and the future president’s ardent supporters. The straw poll of activists that year found Ted Cruz was the preferred nominee for conference-goers.

Trump has since consolidated support in the Republican Party and broader American right-of-center. He received standing ovations at each of his speeches at the conference during his presidency and remains the center of conservative politics in the United States.

In 2020, CPAC was squarely centered on combatting “socialism” on the American left, a message that Republicans carried into the 2020 elections, further underscoring the conference’s role as a nexus for the national conservative mood.

Much of the conference’s 2021 agenda focuses on addressing different issues important to cultural conservatives, including fighting “cancel culture” and fighting alleged in traditional media and online, as well as combatting the Biden administration and Democrats in Congress.

          Paleologos on the Poll: Move over Fox News, Trump voters are shifting toward Newsmax, OANN

The former president, who still commands solid and fervent support from Republican voters, is expected to declare himself the frontrunner for the 2024 Republican nomination, according to Axios.

"Trump effectively is the Republican Party," Trump senior adviser Jason Miller told the news site.

"The only chasm is between Beltway insiders and grassroots Republicans around the country. When you attack President Trump, you're attacking the Republican grassroots," Miller emphasized. CPAC will likely put the union between Trump and his most loyal followers on full display.

 

ATTACHMENT SIX - From CPAC HOME

NEWS & RELEASES

 

Speaker Charles McCall’s Leadership on Education Policy Will Mean New Opportunities for Oklahoma Students; CPAC Applauds Introduction of Education Choice Reform Package

FEBRUARY 16, 2023

 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: February 16, 2023 Alexandria, VA —This morning, Speaker of the Oklahoma House of ...

CPAC URGES DIRECTV TO REINSTATE NEWSMAX

FEBRUARY 16, 2023

Today, CPAC announced they have sent a letter to the Chief Executives of DirecTV and AT&T, urging DirecTV to reinstate Newsmax on its platform.

Virginia Rises in National Conservative Rankings

FEBRUARY 10, 2023

The CPAC Foundation conducts an annual, in-depth analysis to rate all 8,000 lawmakers in America, revealing their positions on a wide variety of issues directly affecting our communities and families.

Coalition Against Socialized Medicine Statement on President Biden’s 2023 State of the Union Address

FEBRUARY 8, 2023

The Coalition Against Socialized Medicine (CASM) was established to address the increasing public policy threats to America’s market-oriented healthcare system and government sponsored programs such as Medicare.

Statement from ACU Board Members Charlie Gerow & Carolyn Meadows

JANUARY 6, 2023

We have seen the most recent egregious attack by the Daily Beast on ACU Chairman Matt Schlapp. We have both known Matt and his wife, Mercedes, for decades. We know Matt Schlapp's heart and his character. And we believe this latest attempt at character assassination is false.

CPAC Chairman joins Varney & Co. to discuss the Speaker of the House selection

JANUARY 4, 2023

CPAC Chairman joins Varney & Co. to discuss the selection of the Speaker of the House.

 

ATTACHMENT SEVEN - From CNN

DUELING CPAC AND CLUB FOR GROWTH EVENTS HIGHLIGHT DIVIDE WITHIN GOP AHEAD OF 2024

By Kate Sullivan, Veronica Stracqualursi and Kristen Holmes, Published 7:07 AM EST, Thu March 2, 2023

 

Two dueling high-profile Republican gatherings this week – one featuring former President Donald Trump and the other Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis – showcase the deepening divide within the GOP as it barrels toward its 2024 nominating process.

Trump is scheduled to headline the Conservative Political Action Conference in Maryland this week along with several conservative stars who have pushed election conspiracy theories and are closely allied with the former president. Meanwhile, DeSantis, who is expected to launch his own 2024 bid later this year, will skip the annual conference and is instead expected to be the main draw at the conservative group Club for Growth’s private donor retreat in Florida this weekend.

Club for Growth, an anti-tax group at odds with Trump, is one of the biggest outside spenders in Republican politics. Trump was the only major 2024 hopeful not invited to the group’s Palm Beach donor retreat, which is expected to be attended by several potential 2024 Republican candidates who have opted not to attend CPAC.

Club for Growth plowed $2 million into DeSantis’ reelection campaign for governor last cycle, according to Florida campaign filings. As the group focuses on DeSantis, it is also weighing launching a large-scale effort to boost an alternative to Trump in four early voting states, according to a source familiar with the discussions. A Club official said the organization was “exploring a number of different strategies,” but had nothing to announce yet.

Former Vice President Mike Pence, Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem and New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu are not on the schedule at CPAC but are expected to attend Club for Growth’s event. All but Sununu have previously spoken at prior gatherings of CPAC, which has long been considered an essential stop for any potential presidential candidate working to build conservative support.

Some Republicans linked the lackluster lineup at CPAC to recent allegations against Matt Schlapp, the president of the American Conservative Union, which puts on CPAC. A Republican strategist who was working for Herschel Walker’s Senate campaign alleged that Schlapp sexually assaulted him and is suing Schlapp and his wife for more than $9 million. Schlapp has denied the claims.

“It’s a scandal,” one Republican operative who has worked on several presidential campaigns told CNN. “If you are thinking about running for president and you’re not Donald Trump, you can’t afford a misstep. You can’t afford to be linked to a scandal.”

There will be some crossover at the dueling events, including Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley, who will fly to Florida after speaking at CPAC on Friday, according to a Haley spokesman. GOP 2024 candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, an entrepreneur seen as a longshot to win the nomination, will also speak at both, per a source familiar with the planning. Republican Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas and Rick Scott of Florida, who have both said they’re focused on their Senate reelections when asked about 2024, will also attend both CPAC and the Florida retreat.

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin were invited to the Club for Growth retreat but are unable to attend, according to a source familiar with the planning. The Virginia state legislature concluded its session over the weekend but failed to reach an agreement on the state budget. Pompeo is scheduled to speak at CPAC, but Youngkin is not.

The rest of CPAC’s lineup features a slate of prominent election deniers and close allies of Trump, including defeated Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake, MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, as well as Trump family members Donald Trump Jr. and Lara Trump.

“It’s clear that the leftist media is on a search and destroy mission against CPAC, its leadership, and the conservative movement,” Megan Powers Small, a CPAC spokesperson, said. “We could fill many more days of programming with all of the people who have requested to speak. Any suggestion to the contrary is disingenuous.”

Club for Growth and Trump sparred during last year’s primaries as they backed different candidates in key states holding Senate primaries, including Ohio. When it was reported last month that Trump was not invited to the Club for Growth summit, the former president slammed the group as “an assemblage of political misfits, globalists, and losers” and as “Club for NO Growth” on his Truth Social account.

 

ATTACHMENT EIGHT - From the WashXaminer

VIRGINIA REPUBLICANS GIVE TRUMP AN EDGE, BUT ONLY DESANTIS AND YOUNGKIN LEAD BIDEN

By: David Freddoso

 

The ESG attack on energy becomes personal

By: Paul Tice

Belarus throws a Nobel winner in prison

By: Eugene Chudnovsky

The Conservative Political Action Conference returns to the Washington, D.C., area for the first time since 2020 and will feature several prominent conservative politicians and figures.

CPAC 2023 started on Wednesday and will run through Saturday, with speeches and panels scheduled throughout the four-day conference. Here are some of the notable people set to take the stage.

'BEGINNING OF THE END': MOST LIKELY 2024 GOP HOPEFULS SNUB CPAC'S DC RETURN

Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH)

Jordan serves as the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. He spoke Thursday morning about his vision for the Judiciary Committee's various investigations into the "Trump-Russia collusion hoax," the COVID-19 pandemic, and the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX)

Cruz serves as the ranking member on the Senate Commerce Committee. He was a presidential candidate in 2016 but does not appear likely to run in 2024. Cruz spoke before the conference Thursday afternoon, suggesting that Dr. Anthony Fauci should be thrown in jail for "lying under oath."

Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH)

Vance won his seat in 2022, defeating Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH), and serves on the Senate Banking and Commerce committees. He ripped into Attorney General Merrick Garland, saying "he needs to go" while on a panel with Cruz on Thursday afternoon.

Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL)

Scott won his seat in 2018 and is up for reelection in 2024. He unsuccessfully challenged Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) for the Senate leadership position following the 2022 elections. Scott defended his challenge to McConnell in his speech Thursday afternoon, saying he would "like to apologize to absolutely nobody."


Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA)

Greene serves on the House Homeland Security and Oversight committees, in addition to being on the House select committee on the coronavirus pandemic. She spoke Friday morning, defending herself against attacks by Democrats on her bill that would outlaw transgender surgeries for those under the age of 18. Greene also whipped up boos for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, saying he “wants our sons and daughters to go die in Ukraine."

Former University of Kentucky swimmer Riley Gaines

Gaines, a 12-time NCAA All-American swimmer for the University of Kentucky, has been an outspoken advocate against biological men competing in women's sports after having to compete against transgender swimmer Lia Thomas in 2022. She blasted the "systemic eradication of women" at the conference Friday morning.

Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL)

Gaetz serves on the House Armed Services and Judiciary committees. He was known for being one of the lead "never Kevin" congressmen who held up the House speaker vote in January. Gaetz called for the "weaponized" FBI and DOJ to be abolished during a speech Friday morning.

Rep. James Comer (R-KY)

Comer serves as the chairman of the House Oversight Committee. Under his leadership, the Oversight Committee is looking into the Justice Department's investigations, including into President Joe Biden's son Hunter. Comer also serves on the House Education and Labor Committee and the House Agriculture Committee. He spoke Friday morning.

Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL)

Donalds serves on the House Oversight, Budget, and Small Business committees. He addressed the conference on Friday afternoon.


Presidential candidate Nikki Haley

Haley is one of three GOP presidential candidates speaking at CPAC. She served as governor of South Carolina from 2011 to 2017 and later as ambassador to the United Nations under President Donald Trump from 2017 until 2018. She addressed the conference Friday afternoon by attempting to court voters who are "tired of losing" in a subtle dig at fellow presidential candidate Trump.

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo

Pompeo served as a congressman from Kansas from 2011 until 2017, when he became director of the CIA and later secretary of state under Trump. He is widely seen as a contender for the GOP presidential nomination in 2024 but has not stated whether he will run. Pompeo spoke to attendees Friday afternoon, issuing a stark warning about a "crisis within conservativism" amid a recent string of losses.

Presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy

Ramaswamy is the second Republican presidential candidate speaking at CPAC. He is an entrepreneur and author known for the books Woke, Inc. and Nation of Victims. Ramaswamy spoke Friday afternoon, countering calls for a "national divorce," and calling instead for a "national revival."

Former Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake

Lake was the 2022 Republican nominee for governor in Arizona but lost to Democrat Katie Hobbs in a tight race. She spoke at the Ronald Reagan Dinner on Friday evening, leaning into Trump and claims that the election she lost was stolen.

Former Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard

Gabbard served in Congress from 2013 to 2021 as a Democrat but announced she was leaving the party in 2022 to go independent. She is scheduled to speak at 1:45 p.m. on Saturday.

Former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro

Bolsonaro served as president of Brazil from 2019 until the end of 2022. He lost his reelection bid to leftist Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and left the country for the United States in December 2022. He is scheduled to speak at 2:05 p.m. on Saturday.


Former President Donald Trump

Trump is the third GOP presidential candidate speaking at CPAC and will be the final speaker of the conference. He served as president from 2017 until 2021, losing his reelection bid to President Joe Biden in 2020. Trump announced in November 2022 he would be seeking a second term as president in 2024. He is scheduled to speak at 5:25 p.m. on Saturday.

Other notable speakers include Sens. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), Eric Schmitt (R-MO), and John Kennedy (R-LA), Virginia GOP Lt. Gov. Winsome Sears, Reps. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) and Jason Smith (R-MO), and commentator Candace Owens.

Notable conservative figures not attending the conference include Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) and former Vice President Mike Pence. DeSantis last attended CPAC in 2022, and Pence last attended the conference in 2020.

 

ATTACHMENT 9 - FROM CNN

FACT CHECK: REPUBLICANS AT CPAC MAKE FALSE CLAIMS ABOUT BIDEN, ZELENSKY, THE FBI AND CHILDREN

By Daniel Dale, Published 6:02 AM EST, Sat March 4, 2023

 

The Conservative Political Action Conference is underway in Maryland. And the members of Congress, former government officials and conservative personalities who spoke at the conference on Thursday and Friday made false claims about a variety of topics.

Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio uttered two false claims about President Joe Biden. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia repeated a debunked claim about Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama used two inaccurate statistics as he lamented the state of the country. Former Trump White House official Steve Bannon repeated his regular lie about the 2020 election having been stolen from Trump, this time baselesly blaming Fox for Trump’s defeat.

Rep. Kat Cammack of Florida incorrectly said a former Obama administration official had encouraged people to harass Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Rep. Ralph Norman of South Carolina inaccurately claimed Biden had laughed at a grieving mother and inaccurately insinuated that the FBI tipped off the media to its search of former President Donald Trump’s Florida residence. Two other speakers, Rep. Scott Perry of Pennsylvania and former Trump administration official Sebastian Gorka, inflated the number of deaths from fentanyl.

And that’s not all. Here is a fact check of 13 false claims from the conference, which continues on Saturday.

Zelensky’s remark about American ‘sons and daughters’

Marjorie Taylor Greene said the Republican Party has a duty to protect children. Listing supposed threats to children, she said, “Now whether it’s like Zelensky saying he wants our sons and daughters to go die in Ukraine…” Later in her speech, she said, “I will look at a camera and directly tell Zelensky: you’d better leave your hands off of our sons and daughters, because they’re not dying over there.”

Facts First: Greene’s claim is false. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky didn’t say he wants American sons and daughters to fight or die for Ukraine. The false claim, which was debunked by CNN and others earlier in the week, is based on a viral video that clipped Zelensky’s comments out of context.

In reality, Zelensky predicted at a press conference in late February that if Ukraine loses the war against Russia because it does not receive sufficient support from elsewhere, Russia will proceed to enter North Atlantic Treaty Organization member countries in the Baltics (a region made up of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia) that the US will be obligated to send troops to defend. Under the treaty that governs NATO, an attack on one member is considered an attack on all. Ukraine is not a NATO member, and Zelensky didn’t say Americans should fight there.

Greene is one of the people who shared the out-of-context video on Twitter this week. You can read a full fact-check, with Zelensky’s complete quote, here.

Fox and the 2020 election

Right-wing commentator and former Trump White House chief strategist Steve Bannon criticized right-wing cable channel Fox at length for, he argued, being insufficiently supportive of Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign. Among other things, Bannon claimed that, on the night of the election in November 2020, “Fox News illegitimately called it for the opposition and not Donald J. Trump, of which our nation has never recovered.” Later, he said Trump is running again after “having it stolen, in broad daylight, of which they [Fox] participate in.”

Facts FirstThis is nonsense. On election night in 2020, Fox accurately projected that Biden had won the state of Arizona. This projection did not change the outcome of the election; all of the votes are counted regardless of what media outlets have projected, and the counting showed that Biden won Arizona, and the election, fair and square. The 2020 election was not “stolen” from Trump.

Fox, like other major media outlets, did not project that Biden had won the presidency until four days later. Fox personalities went on to repeatedly promote lies that the election was stolen from Trump – even as they privately dismissed and mocked these false claims, according to court filings from a voting technology company that is suing Fox for defamation.

Biden’s attempted deportation pause

Rep. Jim Jordan claimed that Biden, “on day one,” made “three key changes” to immigration policy. Jordan said one of those changes was this: “We’re not going to deport anyone who come.” He proceeded to argue that people knowing “we’re not going to get deported” was a reason they decided to migrate to the US under Biden.

First: Jordan inaccurately described the 100-day deportation pause that Biden attempted to impose immediately after he took office on January 20, 2021. The policy did not say the US wouldn’t deport “anyone who comes.” It explicitly did not apply to anyone who arrived in the country after the end of October 2020, meaning people who arrived under the Biden administration or in the last months of the Trump administration could still be deported.

Biden did say during the 2020 Democratic primary that “no one, no one will be deported at all” in his first 100 days as president. But Jordan claimed that this was the policy Biden actually implemented on his first day in office; Biden’s actual first-day policy was considerably narrower.

Biden’s attempted 100-day pause also did not apply to people who engaged in or were suspected of terrorism or espionage, were seen to pose a national security risk, had waived their right to remain in the US, or whom the acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement determined the law required to be removed.

The pause was supposed to be in effect while the Department of Homeland Security conducted a review of immigration enforcement practices, but it was blocked by a federal judge shortly after it was announced.

The media and the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago

Rep. Ralph Norman strongly suggested the FBI had tipped off the media to its August search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home and resort in Florida for government documents in the former president’s possession – while concealing its subsequent document searches of properties connected to Biden.

Norman said: “When I saw the raid at Mar-a-Lago – you know, the cameras, the FBI – and compare that to when they found Biden’s, all of the documents he had, where was the media, where was the FBI? They kept it quiet early on, didn’t let it out. The job of the next president is going to be getting rid of the insiders that are undermining this government, and you’ve gotta clean house.”

Facts FirstNorman’s narrative is false. The FBI did not tip off the media to its search of Mar-a-Lago; CNN reported the next day that the search “happened so quietly, so secretly, that it wasn’t caught on camera at all.” Rather, media outlets belatedly sent cameras to Mar-a-Lago because Peter Schorsch, publisher of the website Florida Politics, learned of the search from non-FBI sources and tweeted about it either after it was over or as it was just concluding, and because Trump himself made a public statement less than 20 minutes later confirming that a search had occurred. Schorsch told CNN on Thursday: “I can, unequivocally, state that the FBI was not one of my two sources which alerted me to the raid.”

Brian Stelter, then CNN’s chief media correspondent, wrote in his article the day after the search: “By the time local TV news cameras showed up outside the club, there was almost nothing to see. Websites used file photos of the Florida resort since there were no dramatic shots of the search.”

It’s true that the public didn’t find out until late January about the FBI’s November search of Biden’s former think tank office in Washington, which was conducted with the consent of Biden’s legal team. But the belated presence of journalists at Mar-a-Lago on the day of the Trump search in August is not evidence of a double standard.

And it’s worth noting that media cameras were on the scene when Biden’s beach home in Delaware was searched by the FBI in February. News outlets had set up a media “pool” to make sure any search there was recorded.

Two-parent households

Sen. Tommy Tuberville, a former college and high school football coach, said, “Going into thousands of kids’ homes and talking to parents every year recruiting, half the kids in this country – I’m not talking about race, I’m just talking about – half the kids in this country have one or no parent. And it’s because of the attack on faith. People are losing faith because, for some reason, because the attack [on] God.”

Facts First: Tuberville’s claim that half of American children don’t have two parents is incorrect. Official figures from the Census Bureau show that, in 2021, about 70% of US children under the age of 18 lived with two parents and about 65% lived with two married parents.

About 22% of children lived with only a mother, about 5% with only a father, and about 3% with no parent. But the Census Bureau has explained that even children who are listed as living with only one parent may have a second parent; children are listed as living with only one parent if, for example, one parent is deployed overseas with the military or if their divorced parents share custody of them.

It is true that the percentage of US children living in households with two parents has been declining for decades. Still, Tuberville’s statistic significantly exaggerated the current situation. His spokesperson told CNN on Thursday that the senator was speaking “anecdotally” from his personal experience meeting with families as a football coach.

The literacy of high school graduates

Tuberville claimed that today’s children are being “indoctrinated” in schools by “woke” ideology and critical race theory. He then said, “We don’t teach reading, writing and arithmetic anymore. You know, half the kids in this country, when they graduate – think about this: half the kids in this country, when they graduate, can’t read their diploma.”

Facts First: This is false. While many Americans do struggle with reading, there is no basis for the claim that “half” of high school graduates can’t read a basic document like a diploma. “Mr. Tuberville does not know what he’s talking about at all,” said Patricia Edwards, a Michigan State University professor of language and literacy who is a past president of the International Literacy Association and the Literacy Research Association. Edwards said there is “no evidence” to support Tuberville’s claim. She also said that people who can’t read at all are highly unlikely to finish high school and that “sometimes politicians embellish information.”

Tuberville could have accurately said that a significant number of American teenagers and adults have reading trouble, though there is no apparent basis for connecting these struggles with supposed “woke” indoctrination. The organization ProLiteracy pointed CNN to 2017 data that found 23% of Americans age 16 to 65 have “low” literacy skills in English. That’s not “half,” as ProLiteracy pointed out, and it includes people who didn’t graduate from high school and people who are able to read basic text but struggle with more complex literacy tasks.

The Tuberville spokesperson said the senator was speaking informally after having been briefed on other statistics about Americans’ struggles with reading, like a report that half of adults can’t read a book written at an eighth-grade level.

Biden’s speech on threats to democracy

Rep. Jim Jordan claimed of Biden: “The president of the United States stood in front of Independence Hall, called half the country fascists.”

Facts FirstThis is not true. Biden did not denounce even close to “half the country” in this 2022 speech at Independence Hall in Philadelphia. He made clear that he was speaking about a minority of Republicans.

In the speech, in which he never used the word “fascists,” Biden warned that “MAGA Republicans” like Trump are “extreme,” “do not respect the Constitution” and “do not believe in the rule of law.” But he also emphasized that “not every Republican, not even the majority of Republicans, are MAGA Republicans.” In other words, he made clear that he was talking about far less than half of Americans.

Trump earned fewer than 75 million votes in 2020 in a country of more than 258 million adults, so even a hypothetical criticism of every single Trump voter would not amount to criticism of “half the country.”

The Biden administration, gas stoves and electric vehicles

Rep. Scott Perry claimed that “average citizens need to just at some point be willing to acknowledge and accept that every single facet of the federal government is weaponized against every single one of us.” Perry said moments later, “The government doesn’t have the right to tell you that you can’t buy a gas stove but that you must buy an electric vehicle.”

Facts First: This is nonsense. The federal government has not told people that they can’t buy a gas stove or must buy an electric vehicle.

The Biden administration has tried to encourage and incentivize the adoption of electric vehicles, but it has not tried to forbid the manufacture or purchase of traditional vehicles with internal combustion engines. Biden has set a goal of electric vehicles making up half of all new vehicles sold in the US by 2030.

There was a January controversy about a Biden appointee to the United States Consumer Product Safety Commission, Richard Trumka Jr., saying that gas stoves pose a “hidden hazard,” as they emit air pollutants, and that “any option is on the table. Products that can’t be made safe can be banned.” But the commission as a whole has not shown support for a ban, and White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said at a January press briefing: “The president does not support banning gas stoves. And the Consumer Product Safety Commission, which is independent, is not banning gas stoves.”

Biden’s laugh

Rep. Ralph Norman claimed that Biden had just laughed at a mother who lost two sons to fentanyl.

“I don’t know whether y’all saw, I just saw it this morning: Biden laughing at the mother who had two sons – to die, and he’s basically laughing and saying the fentanyl came from the previous administration. Who cares where it came from? The fact is it’s here,” Norman said.

Facts First: Norman’s claim is false. Biden did not laugh at the mother who lost her sons to fentanyl, the anti-abortion activist Rebecca Kiessling; in a somber tone, he called her “a poor mother who lost two kids to fentanyl.” Rather, he proceeded to laugh about how Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene had baselessly blamed the Biden administration for the young men’s deaths even though the tragedy happened in mid-2020, during the Trump administration. You can watch the video of Biden’s remarks here.

Kiessling has demanded an apology from Biden. She is entitled to her criticism of Biden’s remarks and his chuckle – but the video clearly shows Norman was wrong when he claimed Biden was “laughing at the mother.”

An exchange about Justice Brett Kavanaugh

Rep. Kat Cammack told a story about the first hearing of the new Republican-led House select subcommittee on the supposed “weaponization” of the federal government. Cammack claimed she had asked a Democratic witness at this February hearing about his “incredibly vitriolic” Twitter feed in which, she claimed, he not only repeatedly criticized Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh but even went “so far as to encourage people to harass this Supreme Court justice.”

Facts First: This story is false. The witness Cammack questioned in this February exchange at the subcommittee, former Obama administration deputy assistant attorney general Elliot Williams, did not encourage people to harass Kavanaugh. In fact, it’s not even true that Cammack accused him at the February hearing of having encouraged people to harass Kavanaugh. Rather, at the hearing, she merely claimed that Williams had tweeted numerous critical tweets about Kavanaugh but had been “unusually quiet” on Twitter after an alleged assassination attempt against the justice. Clearly, not tweeting about the incident is not the same thing as encouraging harassment.

Williams, now a CNN legal analyst (he appeared at the subcommittee hearing in his personal capacity), said in a Thursday email that he had “no idea” what Cammack was looking at on his innocuous Twitter feed. He said: “I used to prosecute violent crimes, and clerked for two federal judges. Any suggestion that I’ve ever encouraged harassment of anyone – and particularly any official of the United States – is insulting and not based in reality.”

Cammack’s spokesperson responded helpfully on Thursday to CNN’s initial queries about the story Cammack told at CPAC, explaining that she was referring to her February exchange with Williams. But the spokesperson stopped responding after CNN asked if Cammack was accurately describing this exchange with Williams and if they had any evidence of Williams actually having encouraged the harassment of Kavanaugh.

The Trump-era economy

Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana boasted about the state of the country “when Republicans were in charge.” Among other claims about Trump’s tenure, he said that “in four years,” Republicans “delivered 3.5% unemployment” and “created 8 million new jobs.”

Facts First: This is inaccurate in two ways. First, the economic numbers for the full “four years” of Trump’s tenure are much worse than these numbers Kennedy cited; Kennedy was actually referring to Trump’s first three years while ignoring the fourth, which was marred by the Covid-19 pandemic. Second, there weren’t “8 million new jobs” created even in Trump’s first three years.

Kennedy could have correctly said there was a 3.5% unemployment rate after three years of the Trump administration, but not after four. The unemployment rate skyrocketed early in Trump’s fourth year, on account of the pandemic, before coming down again, and it was 6.3% when Trump left office in early 2021. (It fell to 3.4% this January under Biden, better than in any month under Trump.)

And while the economy added about 6.7 million jobs under Trump before the pandemic-related crash of March and April 2020, that’s not the “8 million jobs” Kennedy claimed – and the economy ended up shedding millions of jobs in Trump’s fourth year. Over the full four years of Trump’s tenure, the economy netted a loss of about 2.7 million jobs.

Unemployment under Trump

Lara Trump, Donald Trump’s daughter-in-law and an adviser to his 2020 campaign, claimed that the last time a CPAC crowd was gathered at this venue in Maryland, in February 2020, “We had the lowest unemployment in American history.” After making other boasts about Donald Trump’s presidency, she said, “But how quickly it all changed.” She added, “Under Joe Biden, America is crumbling.”

Facts First: Lara Trump’s claim about February 2020 having “the lowest unemployment in American history” is false. The unemployment rate was 3.5% at the time – tied for the lowest since 1969, but not the all-time lowest on record, which was 2.5% in 1953. And while Lara Trump didn’t make an explicit claim about unemployment under Biden, it’s not true that things are worse today on this measure; again, the most recent unemployment rate, 3.4% for January 2023, is better than the rate at the time of CPAC’s 2020 conference or at any other time during Donald Trump’s presidency.

Fentanyl deaths

Multiple speakers at CPAC decried the high number of fentanyl overdose deaths. But some of the speakers inflated that number while attacking Biden’s immigration policy.

Sebastian Gorka, a former Trump administration official, claimed that “in the last 12 months in America, deaths by fentanyl poisoning totaled 110,000 Americans.” He blamed “Biden’s open border” for these deaths.

Rep. Scott Perry claimed: “Meanwhile over on this side of the border, where there isn’t anybody, they’re running this fentanyl in; it’s killing 100,000 Americans – over 100,000 Americans – a year.”

Facts FirstIt’s not true that there are more than 100,000 fentanyl deaths per year. That is the total number of deaths from all drug overdoses in the US; there were 106,699 such deaths in 2021. But the number of overdose deaths involving synthetic opioids other than methadone, primarily fentanyl, is smaller – 70,601 in 2021.

Fentanyl-related overdoses are clearly a major problem for the country and by far the biggest single contributor to the broader overdose problem. Nonetheless, claims of “110,000” and “over 100,000” fentanyl deaths per year are significant exaggerations. And while the number of overdose deaths and fentanyl-related deaths increased under Biden in 2021, it was also troubling under Trump in 2020 – 91,799 total overdose deaths and 56,516 for synthetic opioids other than methadone.

It’s also worth noting that fentanyl is largely smuggled in by US citizens through legal ports of entry rather than by migrants sneaking past other parts of the border. Contrary to frequent Republican claims, the border is not “open”; border officers have seized thousands of pounds of fentanyl under Biden.

 

ATTACHMENT TENFrom the Fox

DESANTIS, TRUMP, HEADLINE COMPETING CLUB FOR GROWTH AND CPAC 2024 GOP PRESIDENTIAL CATTLE CALLS

Club for Growth wanted to look at non-Trump candidates, while Trump has dominated CPAC's annual straw poll for years

By Paul Steinhauser 

 

PALM BEACH, Fla. – The two presumed front-runners of the 2024 GOP primary field are headlining competing conservative political events this week as the race to the White House picks up.

Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, speaking in front of 120 of the top donors in the GOP, showcased that his conservative victories in the past four years in Florida have turned the one-time general election battleground "into the nation’s leading red state."

DeSantis, who pundits widely expect to launch a White House bid later this year but who currently remains on the 2024 sidelines, kicked off a three-day donor retreat Thursday evening hosted by the politically influential, fiscally conservative group the Club for Growth at an exclusive beachfront resort in this upper crust seaside community. 

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Florida’s governor was the first of a handful actual and potential Republican presidential contenders to make the case to the crowd of potential financial backers.

Also speaking at the confab is former Vice President Mike Pence; former ambassador and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley; Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina; New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu; and entrepreneur, author and conservative commentator Vivek Ramaswamy.

However, former President Trump, who launched his third White House run in November and who lives a few miles south of The Breakers resort where the Club for Growth retreat is being held, was not invited.

Instead, Trump will headline Saturday’s closing session of the Conservative Political Action Conference, better known as CPAC, which is the oldest and largest annual national gathering of conservative activists and leaders. Trump’s speech will come soon after the release of the much-anticipated CPAC 2024 GOP presidential nomination straw poll, which the former president has dominated the past two years. Haley and Ramaswamy — who have both launched campaigns — speak at CPAC on Friday, as does former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who is seriously mulling a 2024 run.

          WHAT TED CRUZ SAID AT THIS YEAR'S CPAC

"The donors and the members and the voters are all looking for the same thing — a strong candidate who can run for president and win back the White House," Club for Growth president David McIntosh told Fox News.

When asked why Trump was not invited, McIntosh said, "what we decided we wanted our members and donors to do is…. They know Trump, and they know his record. They like his record as president, but they’re not sure he can win. So they’re going to take a look and this will be an opportunity for the candidates to present themselves."

McIntosh and the Club have had an up and down relationship with Trump. They opposed Trump as he ran for the White House in 2016 before embracing him as an ally. Last cycle, Trump and the Club teamed up in some high-profile GOP primaries but clashed over combustible Senate nomination battles in Alabama, Ohio and Pennsylvania.

In recent weeks, Trump has pummeled McIntosh and the Club, referring to them as "The Club for NO Growth," claiming they are "an assemblage of political misfits, globalists, and losers," and saying he did not need their support.

"Except when they worked with me, their track record is awful. They need new "Leadership," Trump said in a social media post this week.

McIntosh, responding, told Fox News "I don’t take things personally" and touted that the "Club for Growth is the strongest political organization electing conservatives."

"I supported his agenda when he was in the White House. We want to be able to win in 2024, and we’re going to continue to be the biggest conservative super PAC and be out there supporting great champions," he emphasized.

          2024 SIGNAL? DESANTIS HEADING TO IOWA NEXT WEEK

One of the likely contenders the anti-tax organization is taking a hard look at is DeSantis. In November, just before Trump launched his 2024 presidential bid, the Club released a poll suggesting DeSantis topping the former president by double digits.

McIntosh, who introduced DeSantis on Thursday night, said following the Florida governor’s address to the crowd said "I think everybody here hopes that he’ll be a candidate in 2024 and from the reaction, I think he got the message there are a lot of people in the audience who would love to see him run."

McIntosh said the Club may end up backing a candidate as next year’s nominating calendar nears, "but at this point everybody wants to see how the race develops, who does well, and make that decision later."

He estimated that the Club will end up potentially spending eight-figures in the GOP presidential primaries, adding "we’ll put together a budget that has maximum impact in Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, to help make sure we’ve got a great nominee."

If Trump, who’s currently the front-runner in the early 2024 polls, ends up winning the Republican presidential nomination, McIntosh said "the Club would certainly support him if he’s the nominee for the party. He has a good record as a former president. We want to make sure he can win. And if he ends up being the nominee, we’ll try to help him win because a Biden presidency for four more years would be a disaster."

 

ATTACHMENT ELEVEN – From Guardian UK

‘I AM YOUR RETRIBUTION’: TRUMP RULES SUPREME AT CPAC AS HE RELAUNCHES BID FOR WHITE HOUSE

Former president claims Biden is leading America into ‘oblivion’ and that he could end the war between Russia and Ukraine

David Smith in Oxon Hill, Maryland  Sat 4 Mar 2023 20.52 EST

 

Donald Trump turned back the clock to the darkest elements of his presidency on Saturday with a fiery address that showed the threat to American democracy is far from over.

After a lacklustre start to his campaign, Trump appeared to launch his White House bid in earnest with a vintage display of demagoguery that framed the 2024 election as “the final battle” for America.

The former president, wearing dark suit, white shirt and trademark red tie, also declared war on his own Republican party to the delight of ardent fans in the crowd chanting “Trump! Trump! Trump!” and “USA! USA! USA!”

 

Opinion polls suggest that Trump’s grip on the party is slipping in the wake of the 6 January 2021, insurrection and a disappointing midterm performance. But he continues to rule supreme at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), billed as the biggest annual gathering of grassroots conservatives.

Feeding off the energy of a crowd that wore “Make America great again” (Maga) caps, and watched by Brazil’s far-right former president Jair Bolsonaro, Trump returned to the authoritarian language that characterised his political rise seven years ago.

“In 2016, I declared: I am your voice,” he said, speaking for just over 100 minutes from a bright blue and red stage in a cavernous ballroom at the closing speech of the CPAC event in Maryland. “Today, I add: I am your warrior. I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed: I am your retribution,” he said.

Trump left office in disgrace after two impeachments and a failed attempt to overturn his defeat by Joe Biden in the 2020 election, culminating in a deadly riot at the US Capitol. He faces an array of criminal investigations yet announced another run for president last November at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.

The subdued launch failed to deter rival Republicans rivals such as Nikki Haley, former ambassador to the UN, who has thrown her hat in the ring. Florida governor Ron DeSantis, seen as the most serious threat to Trump, opted out of CPAC and is instead meeting potential backers in California.

The mood at CPAC, held at a convention centre at the National Harbor in Maryland, was sluggish for much of the week but on Saturday night the 45th president drew by far the biggest and noisiest crowd. “I didn’t know this was a rally, Matt,” Trump said at one point to CPAC impresario Matt Schlapp. “It really is a rally.”

Perhaps stung by critics who say Trump has lost the swagger of his first campaign, Trump seemed determined to tap into supporters’ nostalgia and make the case that, together, they could rekindle the old magic. “For seven years you and I have been engaged in an epic struggle to rescue our country from the people who hate it and want to absolutely destroy it,” he said.

“We are going to finish what we started. We started something that was a miracle. We’re going to complete the mission, we’re going to see this battle through to ultimate victory. We’re going to make America great again.”

As the crowd erupted in cheers and chants of “Four more years!”, Trump cast the upcoming election in Manichean terms, returning to his us-versus-them rhetoric of old.

“With you at my side, we will demolish the deep state. We will expel the war mongers... We will drive out the globalists. We will cast out the communists. We will throw off the political class that hates our country … We will beat the Democrats. We will rout the fake news media. We will expose and appropriately deal with the Rinos [Republicans in name only]. We will evict Joe Biden from the White House. And we will liberate America from these villains and scoundrels once and for all,” he said.

 

Trump then sent a warning to the party that he has shaped in his own image in an effort to crush dissent. “We had a Republican party that was ruled by freaks, neocons, globalists, open border zealots and fools but we are never going back to the party of Paul Ryan, Karl Rove and Jeb Bush.”

In a zigzagging speech, Trump avoided references to DeSantis but repeatedly turned his fire on Biden. “This is the most dangerous time in our country’s history, and Joe Biden is leading us into oblivion,” he said.

Trump insisted that Russia’s Vladimir Putin decided to invade Ukraine because of the US’s botched withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021. “And you’re going to have world war three, by the way. We’re going to have world war three if something doesn’t happen fast. I am the only candidate who can make this promise: I will prevent world war three.”

He made the unlikely boast: “Before I arrive in the Oval Office, I will have the disastrous war between Russia and Ukraine ended... I know what to say.”

Trump threw red meat to the base: additional border wall construction and a massive increase in border patrols to stop the flow of illegal drugs, one day voting with paper ballots, a crackdown on trans rights and gender affirmation surgeries. He repeated his false claim that he won the 2020 election “by a lot” when in fact Biden beat him by 7m votes.

But before a cult-like crowd, Saturday’s event was a warning against Democratic complacency, an indicator that Trump is down but not out and that, just as in 2016, history could take a perilous turn. “We have no choice,” he said in a startling contrast to Biden’s pleas for unity, warning “this is the final battle”.

He concluded: “If we don’t do this, our country will be lost forever.”

 

ATTACHMENT TWELVE - From NPR

EYEING A RUN FOR PRESIDENT, RON DESANTIS WANTS TO 'MAKE AMERICA FLORIDA' 

March 6, 2023   6:00 AM ET

 

MIAMI — He hasn't yet entered the contest for the Republican presidential nomination, but even so, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is one of the leading candidates.

In polls of possible nominees, he rivals and sometimes surpasses former President Donald Trump. DeSantis has just released a new book that highlights his pugnacious style and hardline stance on issues ranging from education to public health. It picks up from his first term as Florida governor when he became well-known nationally through his frequent appearances on Fox News.

November's election was disappointing for Republicans in many states. But not in Florida, where Gov. DeSantis won reelection by nearly 20 points. At his victory celebration, supporters cheered as he pledged to continue his campaign against ideas, policies and laws he derides as "woke."

Florida Gov. DeSantis takes aim at what he sees as indoctrination in schools

"We fight the woke in the schools, he said. "We fight the woke in the corporations. We will never, ever surrender to the woke mob. Florida is where woke goes to die!"

'Florida is where woke goes to die'    Long live Sleep! - DJI

As governor, DeSantis has waded forcefully into the culture wars. In his first term, following national demonstrations around the police killing of George Floyd, he signed a law criminalizing even some peaceful protests. Later, his "Stop Woke Act" restricted what schools and businesses can say about race. A "Parental Rights in Education Act," dubbed "Don't Say Gay" by opponents, limits how teachers discuss sexual orientation and gender identity.

He's taken aim at programs promoting diversity, equity and inclusion in the schools. He's signed a law banning abortions after 15 weeks. And he pushed through new congressional maps that eliminated two African American voting districts. Many of these measures are now held up by legal challenges in the courts.

It's a different DeSantis than the one David Jolly got to know when both served as U.S. House members in Washington. Jolly, a former Republican congressman from the Tampa area, says DeSantis was part of the House Freedom Caucus, a group focused on cutting government spending. "At the time," Jolly says, "I described them as the shutdown caucus."

DeSantis and other members used government shutdowns to push for policy changes and spending reductions, even moving unsuccessfully to depose John Boehner as House speaker. Jolly says the most impressive thing about DeSantis were the connections he made as a freshman congressman with some of the nation's top Republican donors. Jolly says, "It's always been a question to me: how he did it. And I believe it was just the commitment to fundraising and the raw political hunger of moving beyond the House."

Critics say Florida aims to rewrite history by rejecting African American studies

DeSantis, a Yale- and Harvard-educated lawyer who served in the Navy, spent three terms in Congress before running for governor. His frequent appearances on Fox News drew the attention of President Trump who endorsed him. DeSantis embraced the endorsement and ran a now-famous ad narrated by his wife as he reads to his children from Trump's book, Art of the Deal.

Moving from Congress to the Florida Governor's Mansion

In 2018, he was narrowly elected governor, defeating Democrat Andrew Gillum by less than a half percentage point. Two years later, after Trump was defeated, DeSantis rarely mentioned the former president's name anymore and refused to join the chorus of supporters who falsely maintained the election was stolen.

Jolly says DeSantis used Trump to build his name recognition but after being elected, he moved on. Jolly compares DeSantis to Hall of Fame hockey player Wayne Gretzky who famously said, "I skate to where the puck is going." Jolly says of DeSantis, "He saw it was going to be Donald Trump's party and he skated to Donald Trump very quickly."

DeSantis' rise to national prominence got a boost with the arrival of the COVID pandemic. In the first months, he largely followed guidance from the Trump White House and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He shut down Florida's beaches, bars and nightclubs. Schools were closed.

Boosting national prominence during COVID

When the vaccine became available, he championed it in almost daily news conferences and in a live broadcast where a 94-year-old World War II veteran received his shot on Fox News.

But shortly after that appearance, in February 2021, DeSantis' approach to COVID began to change. He'd already ordered all schools reopened for in-class instruction. He soon signed laws banning face mask and vaccine mandates by businesses and government.

Republican Aaron Bean served in Florida's Senate under DeSantis and is now a member of Congress. He has nothing but praise for how the governor responded to the pandemic. "He went against the grain," Bean says. "You can't say Florida now without saying the 'Free State of Florida' because Governor DeSantis has led the way."

With his hiring of a new surgeon general, Dr. Joseph Ladapo, DeSantis completed his transition from vaccine proponent to vaccine skeptic. He endorsed recommendations by Ladapo that healthy children under 18 not be vaccinated. Ladapo and DeSantis have also said men age 18 to 39 shouldn't receive the mRNA vaccine. Nationally recognized public health experts say that recommendation is wrong and based on a faulty analysis.

 

Florida's Governor Lifts All COVID-19 Restrictions On Businesses Statewide

Bill Hanage, an associate professor of epidemiology at Harvard's T.H. Chan School of Public Health, says DeSantis politicized the public health crisis. His policies, Hanage believes, led to an increase of deaths in Florida from COVID. "If you compare it with California, New York, Massachusetts and the United Kingdom," Hanage says Florida is "the only one to have more deaths since vaccines were available, than before. The only one of them."

In analyzing data compiled by Johns Hopkins University, Hanage found that in Florida, 60% of the total deaths occurred after vaccines were available. In the other places, the number of deaths after vaccines became available are 40% of the total or less.

DeSantis dismisses the criticism, saying Florida voters looked at his record on COVID in November and gave him a resounding vote of confidence. "Not only did we win re-election," he boasts, "we won with the highest percentage of the vote that any Republican Governor candidate has in the history of the state of Florida." That's true, if you leave out the Reconstruction era.

Jumping into local issues

As governor, DeSantis has extended his authority beyond state agencies and laws into local matters — exerting control over school boardscounty health policies, even businesses that hold drag shows. To the delight of supporters, he's quick to attack any who challenge him, from the media to the state's largest employers. After Disney's CEO said he'd work to overturn a law, DeSantis signed a bill ending Disney World's self-governing status in Florida.

How (and why) Gov. Ron DeSantis took control over Disney World's special district

How social-emotional learning became a target for Ron DeSantis and conservatives

With his efforts to control even local policies, he's left behind the commitment to limited government he once had as a member of the Freedom Caucus. Former Congressman David Jolly says, it's a lesson he took from Donald Trump. Jolly says, "What Donald Trump brought to the party was to really crush that orthodoxy of small government and instead say the ends justify the means. And so, whatever it takes to achieve conservative results."

It doesn't matter if it takes big government, Jolly says. To DeSantis, it doesn't even matter if courts have said it's unconstitutional.

Last year, with an eye to federal law and Florida's constitution, lawmakers drew up new maps for the state's 28 Congressional districts. DeSantis didn't like the result and demanded lawmakers draw new maps that ended up eliminating two districts that favored Black voters.

"I was completely dumbfounded, blind-sided"

Democratic state Sen. Geraldine Thompson, an African American lawmaker from Orlando, says, "I was completely dumbfounded, blind-sided." It was the first time anyone could recall a governor in Florida taking control of redistricting.

Republican legislative leaders pushed through the governor's maps and they were immediately challenged in court as unconstitutional partisan gerrymanders. But the maps remained in place for November's election, and helped Florida Republicans pick up four additional seats in Congress.

Thompson says DeSantis' motivation in targeting black voters is clear. "I think he has an interest in making sure that only certain individuals vote. And that those people are people who are supportive of his agenda," she says. "And then making it difficult for anyone who does not support his agenda, making it difficult for them to vote."

Florida lawmakers let DeSantis draw a congressional map after he vetoed the last one

DeSantis doesn't shy away from battles involving race. He's banned Critical Race Theory from the schools even though it's a subject not found in Kindergarten through 12th grade curricula. He also drew national headlines when his education commissioner said he'd prohibit the use of an AP African American studies course in Florida.

Congressman Aaron Bean says those policies aren't intended to target groups, but instead stand up for conservative principles. Bean doesn't expect DeSantis to soften his hardline stance in a campaign for president. "I believe that should he go to the next level, which I think he will," Bean says, "he will push forward an America-first agenda, a common-sense agenda, a freedom agenda."  A white supremacy agenda

There are lots of questions surrounding a DeSantis run for the presidency. Among them, how will he handle intense scrutiny from the media and attacks from other candidates, notably Donald Trump? DeSantis hasn't responded to repeated interview requests from NPR. Up to now, he's mostly avoided interviews with mainstream media, preferring instead friendly appearances on Fox News and other conservative outlets.

David Jolly says, for DeSantis, there's a more fundamental question. His nearly 20-point win in Florida came in a midterm election in which most of the country turned away from the Republican Party and many of the conservative policies DeSantis has promoted. Jolly says, "The test for Ron DeSantis will be, is he really that skilled and that good of an evangelist to convince the country to follow the direction he took Florida?"

DeSantis' supporters have a slogan, "Make America Florida." Next year, voters across the country may get a chance to decide if that's something that they want.

 

ATTACHMENT THIRTEEN - From Axios

DESANTIS, MCCARTHY AMONG GOP LEADERS MISSING FROM CPAC LINEUP

By Sareen Habeshian  Updated Mar 1, 2023 

 

Many Republican lawmakers will not attend the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) this week, paving the way for former President Trump to make an impact among some of his staunchest supporters.

Why it matters: Trumpeasily the most recognizable name at this year's conference, is returning to CPAC while in the midst of his third presidential campaign. Other believed frontrunners for the GOP 2024 presidential ticket — like Florida Governor Ron DeSantis — are not attending the conference.

 

ATTACHMENT FOURTEEN – From Rolling Stone

THE 10 MOST RIDICULOUS CPAC EVENTS

The year's biggest gathering of conservative thought leaders is taking on everything from Don Lemon, to Chinese balloons, to the "Biden Crime Family"

BY RYAN BORT   MARCH 3, 2023

 

THE CONSERVATIVE POLITICAL Action Conference is taking place this week at the Gaylord National Resort and Convention Center in National Harbor, Maryland. CPAC is the year’s most biggest gathering of conservative thought leaders, serving as a kind of Coachella for misinformation, bigotry, religious zealotry, and veneration of a twice-impeached president who lost the 2020 election. The 2023 edition will feature speeches from likes of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, Donald Trump, and others, although big names like Ron DeSantis, Mike Pence, and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy are skipping the conference, creating questions about its relevance.

Not helping matters is that CPAC’s chairman, Matt Schlapp, has been accused of groping a male Herschel Walker staffer’s crotch. Nevertheless, Schlapp has been front-and-center all week, hosting a panel of his own and presiding over a slate of events with titles that seems like they were spit out by A.I. Here’s a selection of some of the most ridiculous ones on the schedule:

THE CHAIRMAN WILL SERVE YOU NOW

Starring: Matt Schlapp, CPAC Chairman; Jim Jordan, Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee

Maybe not the best choice of words considering the chairman in question was recently accused of groping a dude’s crotch.

PARENTS WITH PITCHFORKS

Starring: Mercedes Schlapp, Co-Host CPAC Now; Ian Prior, Senior Adviser at America First Legal; Winsome Sears, Virginia Lieutenant Governor

The false idea that public schools are indoctrinating students to hate America might be the biggest plank of the right’s culture war. “When they started going after our babies, that was the biggest mistake they ever made,” failed Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake said recently in a typical appeal. “The most dangerous place in nature is between a mama bear and her cub and the Left is right there and we’re gonna rip them to shreds.”

Driving this fervor is another false idea: that Attorney General Merrick Garland directed the Justice Department to criminalize parents who voice concerns with school boards and school administrators. Garland explained what actually happened during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing earlier this week, explaining to a confused Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) that the directive only pertained to “violence and threats of violence” and made a special point to highlight that “vigorous public debate” is protected speech.

No one is denying that conservative parents have a constitutional right to be upset that schools are teaching kids the truth about America’s history with racism, but yes, it will be a problem if they do, literally, pick up pitchforks.

NO DOMINUS VOBISCUM FBI

Starring: Katie Pavlich, Townhall Editor, Fox News Contributor; Kat Cammack, Congresswoman; Harriet Hageman, Congresswoman

“No dominus vobiscum” is Latin for the “the Lord is not with you.” Why didn’t CPAC just say that in English? Probably because conservatives seem to think invoking Latin lends a biblical sense of gravitas to whatever they’re saying. Also see: Elon Musk writing “Vox Populi, Vox Dei” — the voice of the people is the voice of God — to justify using Twitter polls to make major policy decisions. It’s only applied when convenient, however. Musk is still around despite Twitter users agreeing in December that he should step down as CEO.

DON LEMON IS PAST HIS PRIMETIME

Starring: Larry O’Connor, The Host of O’Connor & Company and O’Connor Tonight; Kurt Schlichter, Senior Columnist at Townhall; L. Brent Bozell III, Founder and President of Media Research Center; Chaya Raichik, Creator of Libs of TikTok

NO CHINESE BALLOON ABOVE TENNESSEE

Starring: Sara Carter, Host of the Sara Carter Show; Marsha Blackburn, U.S. Senator

Why not?

THE BIDEN CRIME FAMILY

Starring: Bob Beauprez, Fmr. Congressman and CPAC Board Member; James Comer, Chairman House Oversight Committee, Congressman; Mollie Hemingway, Editor in Chief of the Federalist

House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer speaking on a panel titled “The Biden Crime Family” tells you all you need to know about the seriousness of the congressional investigation into Biden’s family that Comer is currently leading.

OPEN BORDERS KILL

Starring: Sara Carter, Host, Sara Carter Show; Sean Reyes, Utah Attorney General; Rosi Orozco, Fmr. Deputy Legislature of the Mexican Congress; Brandon Judd, Border Patrol Union President

Short of Mexico detaching itself from America and floating to the other side of the world, there’s nothing that will stop conservatives from attacking Democrats over the situation at the border. It’s an intractable issue that has spanned administrations — but, to them, President Biden is solely to blame.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene blamed him earlier this week for the fentanyl deaths of two young men. “Listen to this mother, who lost two children to fentanyl poisoning, tell the truth about both of her son’s murders because of the Biden administrations refusal to secure our border and stop the Cartel’s from murdering Americans everyday by Chinese fentanyl,” she tweeted.

The only problem is that the two men died while Trump was in office in 2020.

FINISH THE WALL, BUILD THE DOME

Starring: Eric Bolling, Host of Eric Bolling The Balance; Stephen Miller, America First Legal; Wesley Hunt, Congressman; Dave Yost, Ohio Attorney General

Speaking of closing off America from the rest of the world, here’s a panel about not only finishing the border wall, but “building a dome” — ostensibly a reference to comments Trump made in January about building “an impenetrable dome” to protect America from nuclear attacks. One would like to think Trump was speaking metaphorically, but it’s hard to be sure considering he reportedly wanted to nuke hurricanes and wondered if China was shooting America with a “hurricane gun.”

 

ATTACHMENT FIFTEEN – Also from Rolling Stone

NO TOUCHING… MATT SCHLAPP SUED FOR $9.4 MILLION AFTER ALLEGEDLY GROPING MAN’S CROTCH

The CPAC chief made unsolicited sexual contact with a Herschel Walker aide in Georgia, who is now suing the conservative activist

BY NIKKI MCCANN RAMIREZ   JANUARY 17, 2023

 

A FORMER CAMPAIGN staffer to Georgia Senate candidate Herschel Walker is seeking almost $9.4 million in damages in a lawsuit alleging that CPAC Chair Matt Schlapp groped him non-consensually in October. The suit alleges that Schlapp defamed him and committed sexual battery against the staffer when he “reached in between [his] legs and fondled” him in a “sustained and unwanted and unsolicited” manner.

According to a report from The New York Times, the suit also names Mercedes Schlapp, Schlapp’s wife and a former Trump White House communications adviser. The staffer, who has chosen not to reveal his identity in the lawsuit due to privacy and safety concerns, alleges that Mrs. Schlapp attempted to “impugn” his character in her response to the allegations against her husband, calling him a “troubled individual,” and alleged he had been dismissed from the campaign after lying on his resume in a group chat with neighbors.

Timothy Hyland, an attorney representing the accuser, told the Times that “this suit aims to make Mr. Schlapp, and those who lie for him, accountable for their actions and statements.” On top of the $3.85 million sought against Schapp for assault, the staffer seeks 1.85 million from both Schlapps for defamation, and $1.85 for the alleged conspiracy between the pair.

Schlapp responded to the suit through his lawyer, calling the complaint “false” and threatening to counter-sue. A lawyer representing Mrs. Schlapp accused the staffer of working in coordination with The Daily Beast “to attack and harm the Schlapp family.”

The Daily Beast was the first to report on the accusation. The incident reportedly took place on Oct. 19, in the staffer’s car after he offered to drop Schlapp off at his hotel following an invitation from Schlapp to meet for drinks in Washington D.C.. Schlapp reportedly attempted to invite the staffer to his hotel room. “It was a public space, and I was thinking that he got the hint. I did not want to embarrass him,” the staffer, who is reportedly in his late 30s, said. “But it escalated.”

“He reached in between my legs and fondled me,” the staffer previously told NBC News, adding to The Daily Beast that the touching was “sustained and unwanted and unsolicited.” “To my shame, I did not say ‘no’ or ‘stop,’” the staffers said in a video he recorded shortly after the incident that he shared with both The Daily Beast and NBC News.

The staffer reportedly contacted the Walker campaign the next morning. He told The Daily Beast that a senior aide was “immediately horrified” and pulled him off the assignment. “I did want to say I was uncomfortable with what happened last night,” the staffer reportedly texted Schlapp. “The campaign does have a driver who is available to get you to Macon and back to the airport.” Schlapp then tried to call the staffer repeatedly, ultimately texting that he’d appreciate it if the staffer could “see it in your heart” to call him by the end of the day, according to The Daily Beast. The staffer never did, and has not had any additional contact with Schlapp.

 

ATTACHMENT SIXTEEN – From GUK
HOW TRUMP’S BIG LIE PLAYED OUT ON THE CPAC STAGE

Most speakers focused on issues other than election integrity, but prominent election deniers were still given top billing

Kira Lerner  Mon 6 Mar 2023 06.00 EST

 

In the exhibit hall, vendors displayed various styles of hats declaring “Trump won” and attendees referred to former president Donald Trump as the rightful winner of the 2020 election.

But on the event stage, most prominent Republican lawmakers at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) didn’t bring up Trump’s big lie. Instead they largely chose not to repeat his common talking point that rampant voter fraud cost him his re-election.

 

CPAC this year was seen as a crucial barometer of the likely contours of the 2024 fight. In that regard the majority of conservatives here aligned themselves closely with the former president. But they also chose not to relitigate the 2020 election and looked ahead to the 2024 contest, repeatedly calling Trump the former and future president.

Attendees said they noticed the absence of a talking point that has in the past, including at last year’s CPAC, been pervasive.

“There’s a lot of gaps in the topic list,” said Suzzanne Monk, a DC resident who donned a Maga hat and a T-shirt reading: “Don’t blame me, I voted for Trump.” “The election integrity issues are kind of soft. We could be hitting a lot harder.”

While most speakers focused on issues other than election integrity, prominent election deniers were still given top billing. Kari Lake, a former TV news anchor who unsuccessfully ran for Arizona governor in 2022 and who continues to challenge both the results of her own election and the 2020 presidential election, was the keynote speaker at Friday night’s Ronald Reagan dinner.

Though Lake didn’t bring up claims that Trump’s election was stolen, she dedicated many minutes to describing how her own election last November was rigged.

“They stole that election,” she said, referring to Democrats. “The crime was committed in broad daylight on November 8. They sabotaged election day.”

She claimed that Democrats “had to pump in hundreds of thousands of phony ballots” and specifically jammed tabulators in Republican precincts to cause long lines at the polls.

“I will not stand by and let these bastards get away with it,” she said.

The big lie also snuck its way into other mainstage speeches in small mentions and asides.

Kimberly Guilfoyle, former Trump adviser and fiancee to Donald Trump Jr, declared that conservatives must “never let another election be stolen in this country”. Steve Bannon called out Fox News for “illegitimately calling” the race in November 2020 against Trump.

In the event hallways, Bannon interviewed conspiracy theorist Mike Lindell, who was promoting an “election crime bureau”. Bannon said that some conservatives view election denialism as a losing issue, to which Lindell replied: “If you give it up, you lose your country.”

On Saturday, Hogan Gidley, former press secretary under Trump and now vice-chair of the America First Policy Institute’s Center for Election Integrity, moderated a panel called They Stole it From Us Legally, which he said would focus on how to “make it easy to vote but hard to cheat”.

Abe Hamadeh, an election denier who lost the race for Arizona attorney general in November, claimed that incompetence cost him the election.

“What happened on election day is a disgrace to democracy,” he said, calling out what he said were major issues in Maricopa county. “But it ain’t over yet.”

Hamadeh, like Lake, has challenged his loss in court and continues to claim that voters were disfranchised. “We need to make sure that there’s competency and people are held accountable,” he said.

On the same panel, former Republican representative Lee Zeldin said that if Democrats are going to “ballot harvest”, conservatives need to lean in and do the same.

“We’ve got to get out there and ballot harvest the heck out of the next election and they’re going to want to change that policy,” Gidley said, agreeing with Zeldin.

Ahead of the panel on Saturday, Monk lamented that too many CPAC discussions focused on topics not as relevant to the conservative audience. “Look, I’m opposed to big tech censorship too, but I don’t think that’s the most pressing issue facing conservatives right now and I think the topics we’re listening to right now demonstrate kind of a soft pedaling rather than where I think these attendees are,” she said.

Monk said she thinks Matt Schlapp, the chairman of CPAC who was recently accused of sexual misconduct by a Republican campaign staffer, “might be a little off the pulse”.

“Long before Donald Trump and the 2020 election, we’ve had election integrity issues,” she added. “It’s very hard to prosecute election fraud, so we need to start. We need to fix that before we have elections.”

But others were less concerned about the readiness to move on from 2020. “I’m not the type of person who thinks it was, per se, stolen,” said Orlando resident Luis Marrero.

 

ATTACHMENT SEVENTEEN – From NBC

WHITE NATIONALIST NICK FUENTES IS 'REMOVED' FROM CPAC, CHAIR OF ULTRACONSERVATIVE CONFERENCE SAYS

"His hateful racist rhetoric and actions are not consistent with the mission of CPAC,” Matt Schlapp said of Fuentes' removal.

By Vaughn Hillyard and Dareh Gregorian March 3, 2023, 3:18 PM EST

 

Nick Fuentes, the antisemitic white nationalist provocateur who dined with former President Donald Trump last year, was "removed" from the premises of the Conservative Political Action Conference in Maryland, the chair of the group that stages the event said Friday.

“We removed Nick Fuentes from his attempt to attend our conference. His hateful racist rhetoric and actions are not consistent with the mission of CPAC," Matt Schlapp said in a statement posted on Instagram.

“We are pleased that our conference welcomes a wide array of conservative perspectives from people of different backgrounds, but we are concerned about the rise in antisemitic rhetoric (or Jew hatred) in our country and around the globe, whether it be in the corridors of power and academia or through the online rantings of bigots like Fuentes,” Schlapp said.

Fuentes responded to the statement in a post on the social media site Telegram, where he appeared to mock Schlapp's legal troubles, saying, "Ah yes we all know CPAC is reserved for sexual gropers."

In January, Schlapp was sued for sexual misconduct by a Republican operative who claims Schlapp "fondled" him. Schlapp's attorney has called those allegations "false."

Fuentes said in another post Thursday night that he'd just gotten himself "kicked out of CPAC." In another post around that time, he wrote, "Most cancelled man in America."

Fuentes made headlines last November when he was brought to a dinner with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago estate by Ye, the rapper formerly known as Kanye West.

Ye — who also has a history of making antisemitic remarks — said in a Twitter video the next day that “Trump is really impressed with Nick Fuentes.”

Trump has since said he didn’t know Fuentes or his background when they dined together. 

ALSO EVICTED 3 RATS AND 12 SPIDERS, FIVE BUZZARDS WERE ALLOWED TO STAY – DJI

 

ATTACHMENT EIGHTEEN – From Axios

SCOOP: TRUMP TO BLAST BUSH REPUBLICANS AT CPAC

By Josh Kraushaar

 

Former President Trump plans to draw a sharp ideological contrast between his MAGA movement and Bush-era Republicans in his speech at CPAC on Saturday — and will urge GOP voters to finish the job of remaking the party by backing him for president.

Why it matters: The CPAC conference, now dominated by the MAGA movement, offers Trump a home-field advantage. He first spoke there in 2011, where he previewed many of the populist themes that fueled his 2016 campaign.

·         Trump's keynote address, scheduled for 5:30 p.m. ET Saturday, is expected to last about 90 minutes.

·         "The issues that brought Trump to the fore in 2016 are still with us," one Trump aide told Axios. "These issues have never left. He’s going to remind people of the bigger picture. There’s a longer struggle here — in terms of finishing the job."

Zoom in: Trump's finish the job rhetoric is somewhat reminiscent of President Biden's message in his State of the Union speech last month, in which he called on lawmakers to "finish the job" of rebuilding the economy and unifying the country.

·         Trump's approach is provocative for a former president accused of inspiring an insurrection aimed at overturning the results of an election he lost.

Crowds during the first three days of CPAC — at a massive convention complex in National Harbor, Md., just outside Washington — reflected the divide Trump fosters among Republicans.

·         They're smaller than in the past — but heavily pro-Trump..

What they're saying: "Trump has completely remade the party since he’s become president," another Trump aide told Axios. "He realized there’s a difference between what grassroots activists thought and what Bush Republicans in Washington, D.C., were trying to enact."

Between the lines: In coming days, Trump plans to step up his attacks on Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, widely viewed as his biggest threat to the Republican nomination. But Trump's CPAC speech isn't likely to go after any specific presidential opponents, aides say.

·         The speech will blast establishment GOP leaders, including former House Speaker Paul Ryan.

·         Even as a former president, Trump remains eager to portray himself as a political outsider against the establishment of both political parties.

Go deeper: He's expected to take shots at Republican hawks as "warmongers," and say that support for additional aid to Ukraine threatens a third World War.

·         Trump's former Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, and his UN ambassador, Nikki Haley, both spoke at CPAC this week and offered more traditional, hawkish Republican messages.

The bottom line: Trump's strategy underscores the generational issues that will be at play in the 2024 election.

·         Trump, 76, and Biden, 80, have vastly different politics but essentially are calling on voters to remember what they've done — even as polls indicate many voters in both parties are hungry for new leaders.

 

ATTACHMENT NINETEEN – From the Boston Globe

AT CPAC, ELECTION DENIERS THRIVE AND THE TRUMP TRAIN CHUGS AHEAD

By Jess Bidgood Globe Staff, Updated March 3, 2023, 7:50 p.m.

 

OXON HILL, Md. — Jack Hachmeister surveyed all the “Make America Great Again” and “Trump won” hats on sale at the Conservative Political Action Conference and did something unusual: He bought two celebrating Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.

“In Florida, the support we see for him is crazy,” said Hachmeister, a 20-year-old University of South Florida student, as he paid $40 to Ronald Solomon, owner of The MAGA Mall booth.

But Hachmeister was an outlier in this crowd, according to Solomon, who said he sells 15 Trump hats for every DeSantis hat. And if Solomon’s own Trump cap wasn’t enough of a reminder to Hachmeister of who really reigns supreme here, his refrain was.

 “Have a MAGA day, son!” Solomon said.

The conference, best known as CPAC, is unfolding on the banks of the Potomac River at a delicate moment for Republican politics. Presidential candidates not named Donald Trump are kicking the tires on nascent campaigns of their own, while well-heeled donors and party leaders openly muse about leaving their standard bearer behind after he lost the White House and dragged the party down in the midterms.

Republicans are increasingly talking about ‘electability’ of their candidates ahead of 2024Trump’s former team of rivals returns to challenge him‘The one Republican Trump can’t touch.’ Sununu eyes presidential run.

Even the conference itself is in turmoil after its chairman, Matt Schlapp, was accused of sexual misconduct by a fellow Republican — a charge he denies — and some sponsors, including Fox’s streaming service, aren’t here this year. Once a must-stop for Republicans of all stripes due to its popularity among activists and donors alike, the convention has shrunk to a smaller crowd of true believers.

For this weekend, the Gaylord Convention Center is the House that Trump Built, with the former president scheduled to speak Saturday evening. His dug-in supporters reminded would-be challengers of the depth of their allegiance, while election deniers and MAGA stars basked in the glow of the base’s devotion. No one seemed to care that party leaders House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell did not bother to show up. In fact, some preferred they stay away.

 “Party leaders — they’re all babies,” said Suzanne Webb, a Trump devotee who went to Mar-a-Lago in December and recently became a Republican precinct president in her hometown of Glendale, Ariz. “They’re trying to get us to say that we’re not going to be for Trump. At this point, it would be very hard” for any such effort to succeed.

Fans posed for photos in a fake Oval Office staged as if Trump were still president, complete with photographs of him with his wife, Lady Melania Trump, and a name plate reading “Trump was right.” His allies were treated like royalty. Steve Bannon, the far-right podcaster, often brought foot traffic in the hallway to a halt as attendees craned to watch him interview right-wing personalities such as former Trump aide Ric Grenell. Admirers flocked to recently failed candidates such as Kari Lake of Arizona and Sarah Palin. Others squeezed into selfies with Kimberly Guilfoyle, the fiancee of Donald Trump Jr., and posed children for photos with Representative Matt Gaetz of Florida.

“Anybody who tells you that President Trump isn’t still the head of the conservative and Republican Party isn’t paying attention to the evidence in from of them,” said Guilfoyle.

It’s not clear if the convention is just a Mar-a-Lago on the Potomac or an indication of Trump’s broader hold on the party. Several recent polls show him leading DeSantis, currently viewed as his strongest potential rival.

Regardless, any Trump competitor will have to appease this crowd, which has already shaped the party’s rhetoric and priorities far outside this convention center and is unwilling to go down without a fight.

“The 45th president has a major influence on our party, a major leader in our party. Every polling number I’ve seen suggests that 35 percent of our party votes for him in a heartbeat, and doesn’t even flinch,” said Representative Byron Donalds of Florida, a featured speaker here. “Anybody else that’s running — you better figure out a way to contend with that.”

Some candidates made a go of it. Nikki Haley, the former UN ambassador under Trump, addressed a half-full ballroom that golf-clapped politely at lines that only a few weeks ago had drawn huge roars when she launched her own presidential campaign in Charleston, S.C.

“Take it from me, the first minority female governor in history, America is not a racist country,” Haley declared from the podium. After she posed for selfies with attendees in the hallway following her speech, a woman in an American-flag patterned headband started a chat of, “Trump! Trump! Trump!”

One person, seeing the commotion, excitedly asked a friend if the crowd response was for Representative Anna Paulina Luna, a Trump-endorsed Republican from Florida, then turned away in disappointment when he realized it was Haley.

A little while later on stage came former secretary of state Mike Pompeo, another former Trump Cabinet member who appears to be positioning to run for president.

 

“We can’t become the left, following celebrity leaders with their own brand of identity politics, those with fragile egos who refuse to acknowledge reality,” Pompeo said, but his thinly veiled shot at Trump drew little reaction from the crowd.

Indeed, the refusal to acknowledge reality — that Trump lost the 2020 election — thrives here. Mike Lindell, the MyPillow founder who has become one of the country’s most prominent election deniers, handed out fliers for his latest project, an entity called the “Election Crime Bureau.”

“I’m here at CPAC for one reason and one reason only, and that is to educate people,” Lindell said, calling for the end of vote tabulation machines and early voting, and lambasting DeSantis as a “Trojan horse.”

“This is almost like grassroots, a new party forming … call it the party of common sense,” Lindell added. “That’s the Donald Trump party, too, by the way.”

Nearby, Sherronna Bishop, a former campaign manager for Representative Lauren Boebert who is closely aligned with the election-denying Colorado election official Tina Peters, was wearing an “Election Crime Bureau” hat. She said Lindell, Trump, and Lake, who has challenged her loss in court, represent the future of the country.

“Kari Lake symbolizes, ‘I’m not quitting,’” Bishop said, then complained about Republican Pennsylvania Senate candidate Mehmet Oz conceding his midterm race last fall. “Dr. Oz didn’t lose. Instead of holding the line, these politicians keep caving.”

 

Some longtime attendees of the conference were disappointed by its Trump tunnel vision, and cautioned that Trump’s strong showing here said little about his power over the rest of the party.

“It’s become the Donald Trump political action conference,” said Michael Biundo, a New Hampshire-based Republican strategist who left Washington early to get ahead of a winter storm aimed at his home state. “I don’t think an event like this has any correlation to the broader electorate or the party in general.”

And there were some signs of the GOP’s overall reticence to embrace Trump. Many of the lawmakers present declined to endorse him on the spot, including Donalds and even hard-core Trump ally Scott Perry of Pennsylvania.

“I’m focused on saving the Republic right now,” Perry said in response to whether he planned to support Trump in 2024. “I’m focused on saving the Republic from the left.”

Back in the exhibition hall, where Beth Veneto of Quincy, Mass., was selling gingerbread cookies depicting Trump, intricately decorated with yellow frosting hair and glittery stars.

“I’m glad the other people are jumping into the race, but ginger Donald all the way,” Veneto said. “We’re going to make sure our cookie country doesn’t crumble.”  Raspberry rally

Jess Bidgood can be reached at Jess.Bidgood@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @jessbidgood.

 

 

ATTACHMENT TWENTY – From  the National Review

SHAME ON TRUMP JR. FOR CALLING FETTERMAN A ‘VEGETABLE’

By WESLEY J. SMITH March 3, 2023 2:26 PM

 

It was wrong when people called Terri Schiavo a “vegetable,” and it is wrong when Donald Trump Jr. wields the same slur against Senator John Fetterman at CPAC. He said:

I’m the one that’s willing to say this stuff because someone has to because it’s insane. What’s actually going on, right? When I said, like, I don’t know, it’s sort of weird that Pennsylvania managed to elect a vegetable. They criticize me as being ableist. I didn’t know what that was . . . I’d love for John Fetterman to have like, good gainful employment. Maybe he could be like a bag guy at a like a grocery store.”

That rhetoric — even at a red-meat political event — is completely unacceptable and viciously cruel. The sole intent of that dehumanizing epithet is to demean, diminish, and denigrate the moral value of the person against whom it is wielded. As far as I am concerned, it belongs in the same category of unacceptable terminology as the N-word.

Yes, I know that Trump Jr.’s point was that Fetterman might be incapable of performing the work of a United States senator. That’s a legitimate issue, as is the senator’s hiding of his previous episodes of depression during the campaign.

But the matter can be discussed quite thoroughly without slinging slurs at people who have mental challenges and disrespecting people who are cognitively disabled, as his “bag guy at a . . . grocery store” snidery did. We are all equal. The people with special needs who bag our groceries have more class than Trump Jr. ever will.

 

ATTACHMENT TWENTY ONE  From  the National Review

MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE CLAIMS ZELENSKY ‘WANTS OUR SONS AND DAUGHTERS TO GO DIE’

By BRITTANY BERNSTEIN March 3, 2023 8:15 PM

 

 

A crowd at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) booed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in absentia on Friday after Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R., Ga.) misleadingly claimed he “wants our sons and daughters to go die in Ukraine.”

Greene’s comments seemingly referred to a viral video in which Zelensky said, “The U.S. will have to send their sons and daughters exactly the same way as we are sending, their sons and daughters to war.”

However, that clip was missing additional context: Zelensky was suggesting that if Ukraine loses the war against Russia, Russia could go on to attack NATO member states. Under the NATO treaty, allies pledge that “an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all.”

Zelensky’s full quote read: “If it happens so that Ukraine, due to various opinions and weakening, depleting of assistance, loses, Russia is going to enter Baltic states, NATO member states, and then the U.S. will have to send their sons and daughters exactly the same way as we are sending, their sons and daughters to war.”

“They will have to fight. Because it’s NATO that we’re talking about, and they will be dying, God forbid, because it’s a horrible thing,” the Ukrainian president said. His comments came during a news conference marking the one-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and came in response to a question about polling that found that more Americans were worried the U.S. was offering too much support for Ukraine.

Greene, who has been a vocal critic of the United States’ support for Ukraine, said during her remarks at CPAC that she was still “committed to saying no money to Ukraine, and that country needs to find peace, not war.”  

“I will look at a camera and directly tell Zelensky, you’d better leave your hands off of our sons and daughters because they’re not dying over there,” she added.

Last week, Greene reintroduced legislation to audit the military aid the U.S. has sent Ukraine in the year since Russia first invaded. She told Fox News that the United States’ continued investment in Ukraine could lead the U.S. into World War III.

Greene was one of ten Republican lawmakers to co-sponsor legislation by Representative Matt Gaetz (R., Fla.) last month to end U.S. aid to Ukraine. On the one-year anniversary of the Russian invasion, the Biden administration announced a $10 billion aid package to support the Ukrainian government in addition to $2 billion in military aid.

 

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ATTACHMENT TWENTY TWO – From  Independent UK

CPAC 2023 – LIVE: DAILY WIRE SPEAKER SPARKS ALARM WITH ‘GENOCIDAL’ ANTI-TRANS RHETORIC

Right-wing conference CPAC promises speeches from GOP figures inclduing Trump as panelists and speakers return to familiar grievances, attacks, and conspiracy theories

By Gustaf Kilander

 

 

Criticism of Joe Biden’s administration, the Chinese surveillance balloon, attacks on transgender Americans and “wokeness” are proving to be recurrent themes at this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference, or CPAC, a four-day gathering for right-wing activists and Republican officials from across the US.

Donald Trump – who released a song with January 6 defendants as the conference hosts a panel with several people who were convicted for their roles in the riots – will headline the event on Saturday.

Trump says he will target medical staff offering care to trans children if re-elected

Michael Knowles of the Daily Wire sparked alarm on Saturday with his anti-trans oratory.

“Transgenderism must be eradicated from public life entirely,” he said.

John Knefel of Media Matters called it “eliminationist, genocidal rhetoric”.

Adam Vary of Variety urged people to “pay attention. This is genocidal. That is not hyperbole or alarmist; this rhetoric is calling for the eradication of a group of people for who they are”.

“It would be great if non-trans people would start paying attention to this, because the quiet part is getting shouted at this point,” Jaclyn Moore added.

KEY POINTS

·         Trump releases song with ‘J6 Prison Choir’ as CPAC gives a platform to rioters

·         Don Jr attacks John Fetterman: ‘Pennsylvania managed to elect a vegetable’

·         Marjorie Taylor Greene launches into anti-trans remarks: ‘Pure transphobia’

·         White nationalist Nick Fuentes says he was kicked out of CPAC

·         Libs of TikTok founder hailed as a ‘hero’ as panelists mock trans people

Kari Lake compares Hillary Clinton to George Soros: ‘They’re starting to look alike’

Kari Lake compared Hillary Clinton, 75, to George Soros, 92, on Friday night.

“I’m not trying to be mean here,” Ms Lake said. “Has anybody noticed that she’s looking more and more like George Soros?”

“I know they think alike, but they’re starting to look alike – it’s like an old married couple, they’re starting to look alike,” she added.

“We stand with our patriots, past and present, with George Washington, we stand with JFK, Ronald Reagan, Steve Bannon, [and] we stand with Donald J Trump,” she said, according to the Daily Mail.

The Anti-Defamation League wrote in a blog post in 2020 that conspiracy theories about Mr Soros are a “gateway to antisemitism”.

Daily Wire speaker sparks alarm with ‘genocidal’ anti-trans rhetoric

Michael Knowles of the Daily Wire sparked alarm on Saturday with his anti-trans rhetoric.

“Transgenderism must be eradicated from public life entirely,” he said.

John Knefel of Media Matters called it “eliminationist, genocidal rhetoric”.

Adam Vary of Variety urged people to “pay attention. This is genocidal. That is not hyperbole or alarmist; this rhetoric is calling for the eradication of a group of people for who they are”.

“‘Transgenderism’ is people. He’s talking about eradicating people. When newspapers print scare stories about kids transitioning too early, when podcast hosts whine about girls’ sports, when politicians snark about the definition of ‘woman,’ this is what they’re talking around,” Raphael Bob-Waksberg said.

“It would be great if non-trans people would start paying attention to this, because the quiet part is getting shouted at this point,” Jaclyn Moore added. “If only there was a word for when they want to ‘eradicate’ a kind of people. A word trans people have said these people were talking about but people called us hyperbolic. Hmmm I guess my vocabulary just isn’t good enough.”

Ms Lake bizarrely claimed that globalists “are trying to kill us to try to get rid of us”.

“I’m not just the most dangerous politician in America when it comes to globalism — I’m the most dangerous politician in the world,” she said, according to the Washington Examiner.

We asked conservatives at CPAC what ‘woke’ means. Their replies were revealing

Many conservative struggle to define the word that has become a right-wing boogeyman, finds Eric Garcia in National Harbor, Maryland

The fact is that conservatives don’t like the concept of “woke” these days.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, the potential Republican presidential candidate, has repeatedly said that his state is where “woke goes to die”. Former president Donald Trump has talked about generals being too “woke”.

Mr DeSantis did not attend the Conservative Political Action Conference just outside Washington this week. But plenty of others focused on “wokeness”.

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Presidential hopeful Nikki Haley said that “I’m running for president to renew an America that’s proud and strong, not weak and woke.” Senator Tommy Tuberville of Alabama held a talk on the first full day of the conference entitled “Sacking the Woke Playbook”.

“Today, they are being indoctrinated with all this woke — transgender athletes, CRT, 1619,” Mr Tuberville said in reference to allowing transgender athletes; critical race theory, the niche legal theory that many conservatives have used as a catch-all to describe education about Black history and racism; and the 1619 Project, the project by The New York Times led by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones that chronicles the impact of slavery in the founding and present day of the United States.

Black Americans largely adopted the term “woke” going back as late as the 1940s as a phrase meant to be aware of racism around them and became a staple of African American Vernacular English (AAVE). But plenty of activists at CPAC had a different definition.

Marleen Laska, a conservative activist from Pennsylvania who attended the conference, has a broad definition of what “woke” meant.

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“That’s a loaded question,” she said. “It covers so many things. It incorporated all the stupidity that is going on with the country.”

She specifically cited environmental and social governance investing practices.

“The children and in the schools and trying to make the transgender, and it came to so many things ... which is wrong in this country,” she told The Independent, also criticising including rainbow pride flags in classrooms.

“To me the word ‘woke’ is the antithesis of everything that America was founded on,” Marie Rogerson, an executive director of program development at Moms for Liberty based in Florida, told The Independent. “It’s anything for me that’s anti-American, anti-common sense, anti-really in the sense of education, what education was meant to do.”

Ms Rogerson said Mr DeSantis’s war on the concept of “woke” was necessary to help the state thrive.

“Killing ‘woke’ means, it’s like a garden, you’re getting rid of the weeds so that the things you actually want to grow, can,” she said. “In the instance of Florida, he’s talking about industry and our economics and our education. And all those things that we want to thrive can actually thrive because we’ve choked the weeds.”

Donald Trump Jr insults Senator John Fetterman's condition in CPAC rant

Ms Rogerson said people did not need to use the word “woke” to discuss racism.

““I think there’s a better way to say it,” she said. “Racism exists. I don’t think it’s a, you know, depending on the area and what we’re talking about, it could be a major problem, it could be a minor problem. I don’t think it’s necessary to say ‘stay woke’ to be concerned about any racism that exists in America. Woke means more than just racism.”

Ms Rogerson’s colleague Sheila Armstrong, who works with the group’s Philadelphia chapter, had a slightly different definition.

“So the word ‘woke’ is, they’re using it wrong. To be woke is when you recognize that maybe what you was doing was wrong,” she told The Independent. “Me being a Black woman, a lot of this slang and terminology they try to use is coming out of our community. But they use the terminology wrong. So for a person to be woke, that means you recognizing what you do is wrong. Just because you’re woke is right. That’s where the confusion is.”

Angelo Veltri, northeast regional director for Young Americans for Liberty, had a similarly vague description for what the word meant.

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“‘Woke’ to me means that you are basing your reality off of fiction and your feelings rather than actual facts,” he told The Independent. “‘Woke’ is more of the sense of like, if you feel a certain way, then you must be true, and they typically adhere to their truths rather than the truth as a whole. And it’s leading toward this woke postmodernism in a sense. Woke communism, where they’re trying to take over based on people’s feelings rather than actual factual evidence.”

 

 

ATTACHMENT TWENTY THREE – From Time

TRUMP AT CPAC PITCHES SENDING MILITARY TO CITIES 'UNTIL LAW AND ORDER IS RESTORED'

BY BRIAN BENNETT MARCH 4, 2023 9:26 PM EST

 

Former President Donald Trump promised attendees at an ultra-conservative gathering Saturday night that he would use a second term in the White House to implement an authoritarian vision for policing crime that would include deploying the National Guard into US cities with high crime rates.

“I will send in the National Guard until law and order is restored. You know we’re not supposed to do that,” Trump said in his address closing out the annual Conservative Political Action Conference conference in Oxon Hill, Md., where he easily won a presidential straw poll of attendees.

Trump used his diatribe against cities to zero in on nearby Washington, D.C., whose federal prohibition on fully governing itself has drawn increased attention in recent days, as President Joe Biden and Congress appear poised to block the district’s divisive crime bill from becoming law.

The CPAC crowd, made up largely of right-wing political supporters and various officials from his former administration, stood and applauded when Trump called for full federal control of the city that is also the nation’s capital. “Frankly the federal government should take over control and management of Washington, D.C.,” Trump said, adding at one point, “I wouldn’t even call the mayor.”

 

Washington, DC, is run by an elected city council and a mayor, but its laws can be overridden by Congress. The 700,000 residents of Washington, DC, who are 47% Black,. aren’t allowed to vote for members of Congress or the Senate, and the city’s license plates read: “Taxation Without Representation.”

Trump’s comments came a day after President Joe Biden when he announced he would not veto a bill overriding changes to DC’s crime laws passed by the DC city council. The move amounted to a flip-flop from Biden’s long-standing position that DC should become a state and be allowed to govern itself, and came just weeks after Biden had signaled he would back the DC council’s autonomy. The President’s decision seemed to show that he considers the public’s perceptions of crime rates, and Republican claims that Democrats are soft on crime, to be a political vulnerability going into the 2024 elections. Biden has said he intends to run for a second term, but hasn’t formally announced his candidacy.

Without evidence, Trump claimed that, as President, he ordered the clearing out of homeless encampments in Washington, DC. He also bemoaned how his chairman of the joint chiefs of staff Gen. Mark Milley objected to Trump’s June 2020 order for National Guard forces to use tear gas and rubber bullets to push out racial justice protestors from Lafayette Park in front of the White House so Trump could stage a photo op with a bible in front of St. John’s Episcopal Church. “He didn’t like me holding up a bible in front of a church,” Trump said about Milley.

Trump handily won the annual CPAC straw poll, with 62% support of attendees picking him to be the party’s nominee, followed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis at 20%, according to the Associated Press. Trump did not directly mention DeSantis or any of his other current or likely opponents for the 2024 GOP nomination by name.

n an hour and 45 minute speech to a receptive audience, Trump repeatedly praised the use of force to address the nation’s problems. He also praised those who continue to defend the rioters who broke through police lines at the Capitol Building on Jan. 6, 2021, and said that if he is elected back into the White House, he would be “your warrior” and “your retribution.”

“The sinister forces trying to kill America have done everything they can to stop me, to silence you, and to turn this nation into a socialist dumping ground for criminals, junkies, Marxists, thugs, radicals and dangerous refugees that no other country wants,” Trump said.

Trump also echoed the pledges of his first White House run, vowing to beef up immigration enforcement and pitching policies that at times seemed to equate immigrants with criminals.

Along with pushing to pass a funding bill that would deliver a “massive increase in border patrol and colossal increase in the number of ICE deportation officers,” Trump said he would ask every state and federal agency to identify every known or suspected gang member in America that is in the country illegally.

“We will pick them up and we will throw them out of our country,” Trump said. “And there will be no questions asked.”

 

ATTACHMENT TWENTY FOUR – From Capitol TN.gov

Tennessee lawmaker asks for 'hanging by tree' as execution, apologizes

Tennessee lawmaker apologizes after suggesting 'hanging by tree' as method of execution

Nashville TennesseanA

A Tennessee state representative is backpedaling after he suggested adding hanging by tree as a method of execution during discussion this week in Nashville over a bill concerning capital punishment.

Rep. Paul Sherrell, R-Sparta, made the suggestion during the criminal justice committee meeting Tuesday while lawmakers discussed HB1245 and an amendment to the bill that would allow for death by firing squad as an execution method in Tennessee.

"I was just wondering, could I put an amendment on that that would include hanging by a tree, also," Sherrell asked during the meeting Tuesday.

He then offered to sign as a co-sponsor to the bill.

Tennessee, like much of the south, has a traumatic history with hangings and particularly lynchings, which often took place publicly and without due process for the victim. Tennessee had 236 documented lynchings between 1877 and 1950, though there are likely more unreported cases, according to the Equal Justice Initiative.

 

The Tennessee Department of Corrections used hanging as its primary method of execution until 1913.

There are currently 46 inmates on death row in Tennessee — 45 men and one woman.

On Wednesday, the House Republican caucus press secretary released a statement from Sherrell in which he expressed regret over his "very poor judgement."

"My exaggerated comments were intended to convey my belief that for the cruelest and most heinous crimes, a just society requires the death penalty in kind," Sherrell said. "Although a victim's family cannot be restored when an execution is carried out, a lesser punishment undermines the value we place on protecting life."

Sherrell's statement continues to say that his suggestion was meant to express support for families of victims.

"I sincerely apologize to anyone who may have been hurt or offended," Sherrell said.

Community speaks out

Community members have voiced their concern over adding a firing squad and hanging to its methods of execution.

"A bill calling to expand the death penalty by firing squad, and even lynching, is deplorable, immoral and takes us back to the dark days of Jim Crow," said Rev. Dr. Kevin Riggs, pastor of Franklin Community Church. "I'm appalled by the words of Representative Sherrell. Suggesting firing squads and lynchings is unconscionable. Tennessee should be moving in the direction of outlawing state sanctioned killings, instead of towards more killings and in more inhumane ways than already exist."

 

ATTACHMENT TWENTY FIVE – From the Associated Press  

TRUMP SET TO HEADLINE DIMINISHED GATHERING OF CONSERVATIVES

By JILL COLVIN and MICHELLE L. PRICE March 2, 2023

 

OXON HILL, Md. (AP) — The annual Conservative Political Action Conference was once one of the premier gatherings on the GOP campaign calendar — a must-stop for serious contenders testing the waters on presidential runs.

No longer.

Many of the party’s best-known likely candidates — from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to former Vice President Mike Pence — are skipping the marquee event kicking off Wednesday as the group grapples with controversy and questions over its place in a movement that remains deeply split over its allegiance to former President Donald Trump.

Adding to the turmoil: A lawsuit filed by an unnamed Republican campaign staffer against Matt Schlapp, chair of the American Conservative Union, which organizes the conference. The suit accuses Schlapp of groping the staffer during a car ride in Georgia before the November election.

Schlapp, who has denied the staffer’s account, did not address the allegations against him as CPAC programming began Thursday, but did make a nod to the notable absences.

 “There’s a lot of chatter in the media about who’s here and not here,” he said.

Among those bypassing this year’s event are congressional leaders and governors, Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel, and several potential presidential prospects, including Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, who has been building buzz among some donors.

 

“He’s laser-focused on Virginia and having a good legislative session and now focused on passing the budget,” said Jeff Roe, a Youngkin political consultant.

Pence is a longtime CPAC speaker who has not appeared at the conference since he drew the ire of some Trump supporters by resisting Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election. In explaining why Pence declined to attend this year, his aides cited a full schedule of events, including a Club for Growth donor summit; a trip to South Carolina, where he will speak at the evangelical Bob Jones University; a speech at the conservative Christian Hillsdale College in Michigan; and a Students for Life of America event in Florida.

“We had other priorities this week, but I wish them well,” Pence told The Associated Press from South Carolina on Thursday. “That’s an important gathering filled with great Americans, and I look forward to returning someday.”

The glaring absence of many prominent Republicans this year marks a dramatic change from 2015, the year before the last competitive GOP presidential primary, when CPAC’s schedule included nearly all of the major candidates, Jeb Bush among them. The former Florida governor, who is now criticized by many on the right, received a warm reception, even as a small number of activists staged a walkout.

Alex Conant, a longtime GOP strategist, remembers attending his first CPAC as a high school student in the 1990s and being star-struck meeting Newt Gingrich, the Georgia congressman who had just stepped down as House speaker.

“I don’t think people go there to meet the next generation of leaders. They go to celebrate the last one,” Conant said.

Conant returned often as an aide, including when he was working for Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, a 2016 presidential candidate who was one of a long list of Republicans with a breakthrough moment on CPAC’s stage over the years.

This time, however, Rubio is absent.

“I think CPAC used to be a place where stars could break out. Now it’s much more the Trump show,” Conant said.

This year, Trump has top billing, delivering the conference’s headlining speech Saturday evening. He is almost guaranteed to win the event’s annual unscientific presidential preference poll of attendees.

Trump, hyping his speech as a “monster” and urging attendees to vote for him in the poll, said on his social media site: “The only reason certain ‘candidates’ won’t be going to CPAC is because the crowds have no interest in anything they have to say.”

Also on the schedule are the two other declared Republican candidates: Former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley and biotech investor Vivek Ramaswamy.

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who is also mulling a White House run, is set to speak. Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas and Rick Scott of Florida will appear. Both have recently signaled their intentions to run for reelection instead of vying for the nomination.

The conference schedule features a litany of election deniers who reject findings from judges, election officials and Trump’s own attorney general that there was no widespread fraud during the 2020 campaign. They include Mike Lindell, the MyPillow founder who continues to spread election conspiracy theories, and Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who recently called for a “national divorce” between blue and red states. Kari Lake, the news anchor-turned Arizona gubernatorial candidate who refused to concede after losing last year, will speak Friday night.

Both Greene and Lake are considered potential Trump vice presidential picks.

Activists will also hear from Jair Bolsonaro, the former president of Brazil, whose supporters stormed the country’s Congress, Supreme Court and presidential palace after he refused to accept his defeat in October. The siege bore striking similarities to the riot at the U.S. Capitol on Jan 6, 2021.

Schlapp said in a statement that CPAC was “gratified that all the announced candidates are coming” as the conference returns to National Harbor in Oxon Hill, Maryland, just outside of Washington, for the first time since 2020.

“When it comes to Presidential politics, talk is cheap. When you formally announce your name, you’re real,” he said. “We have never had such a strong lineup of speakers,. ... CPAC will continue to highlight conservatives and not be a mouthpiece for establishment conservative republicanism.”

The Club for Growth, the influential anti-tax group that has clashed with Trump, will hold a competing event, a donor summit in Florida, that is attracting DeSantis, Pence and others. Trump was not invited, underscoring the fierce divide in the conservative movement as some elements strongly back him and others look to move in a new direction.

Since Trump became president, the conference has really been all about him. In 2021, a procession of speakers declared their fealty to the former president as some attendees posed for selfies with a golden statue of his likeness.

That gives little incentive for other candidates to attend.

“If you’re Ron DeSantis, what’s the strategic reason for you to go to a place that’s pretty well on the record as just being a Trump fan club?” said Ross Hemminger, a former press secretary for the event and former deputy communications director for the ACU.

The group has also increasingly welcomed fringe elements of the party, and that’s made some former staff and participants uneasy. And as CPAC has expanded overseas, it’s begun hosting autocratic leaders such as Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.

Hemminger said the conferences used be a must-stop for Republican presidential candidates, with so many senators on the program that some had to be relegated to secondary stages. Now, he said, the lineup seems to feature “a bunch of like third-string radio talk show hosts.”

“You just look at it and you think, ‘Oh wow.’ CPAC used to be such a big deal and now it’s this,” he said. “The goal used to be setting the conservative agenda. The goal now is: It doesn’t matter how nutty you have to be, you just have to get Donald Trump’s attention and make him know that you are willing to make a fool of yourself for him so that you can stay in his good graces.”

 

ATTACHMENT TWENTY SIX – From 

ANTI-TRANS RHETORIC TOOK CENTER STAGE AT CPAC AMID HOSTILE REPUBLICAN EFFORTS

Republicans are pursuing a barrage of new restrictions related to healthcare and human rights for transgender people

By Lauren Gambino in Oxon Hill, Maryland Tue 7 Mar 2023 09.18 EST

 

There was a joke about the suspected Chinese spy balloon’s preferred pronouns; claims that Democrats believe there are “millions” of genders and a menacing call for “transgenderism” to be “eradicated”.

From the main stage of the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), far-right activists, members of Congress and the former president of the United States waged an aggressive assault on transgender rights last week, raising the issue in speeches and unrelated panel discussions, often under the guise of protecting children.

Headlining the conference on Saturday, Donald Trump drew some of the wildest applause of his more than 90-minute address when he pledged to stop the “chemical castration and sexual mutilization [sic]” of children if re-elected in 2024 while endorsing a national ban on transgender medical treatment for young people.

A day earlier, Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, one of Trump’s staunchest allies, rallied attendees with a speech devoted to the issue, unveiling her plan to reintroduce a bill that would criminalize doctors for providing gender-affirming care to a minor.

Left unsaid was that leading medical organizations, including the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics, consider gender-affirming care to be medically necessary and potentially lifesaving for children and adults diagnosed with gender dysphoria.

Much of the anti-trans discourse was aimed at liberals, who, according to the Republican senator John Kennedy of Louisiana, believe children “should be able to change their gender at recess” and “hyperventilate on their yoga mats if you use the wrong pronoun”. The remarks elicited peals of laughter from the audience.

Advocates say the vitriolic rhetoric on display at CPAC is reflective of the increasingly hostile movement among conservatives that seeks to regulate the lives of transgender Americans and marginalize vulnerable young people.

“People like Marjorie Taylor Greene will not be satisfied until every LGBTQ person is forced into the shadows,” said Geoff Wetrosky, campaign director for the Human Rights Campaign, an LGBTQ advocacy group. He added: “There’s really no legislative purpose other than discrimination in these bills.”

In state legislatures across the country, Republican lawmakers are pursuing a barrage of new restrictions related to transgender youth’s medical care, sports participation and bathroom use.

People like Marjorie Taylor Greene will not be satisfied until every LGBTQ person is forced into the shadows.

So far this year, anti-trans legislation has been proposed in 39 states, including 112 measures that focus on medical care restriction and 82 that pertain to education-related issues, according to the website Track Trans Legislation.

Last week, the Republican governor of Tennessee signed into law a bill prohibiting gender-affirming care for minors as well as one imposing new limits on drag performances, which have become a target for Republicans. Mississippi also enacted a ban on treatment for transgender youth while Republican state lawmakers in Kentucky advanced a similar measure, following a charged debate over a separate proposal allowing teachers to refuse to use students’ preferred pronouns.

Until recently, most legislation banning transgender healthcare was aimed at minors, but Republicans are increasingly pushing proposals that would limit treatment for adults.

Health experts and LGBTQ advocates say many of these anti-trans bills being pushed in state legislatures are not rooted in science – or reality.

Gender-affirming care is defined by the World Health Organization as “social, psychological, behavioral or medical (including hormonal treatment or surgery) interventions designed to support and affirm an individual’s gender identity”.

While treatment for transgender youths seeking care is highly individualized, experts say most begin with “social transitioning”, or presenting publicly in their preferred gender. Adolescents may consider puberty-blockers to temporarily pause sexual development, often before hormone therapy or sex reassignment surgery, which is not typically offered until age 18 or later. Research suggests regret is rare.

Toxic rhetoric and political actions can have profound consequences for LGBTQ Americans, especially transgender youth for whom suicide rates are high.

More than 70% of LGBTQ young people, including 86% of trans and/or nonbinary youth, say the political debate around trans issues has negatively affected their mental health, a 2022 survey by The Trevor Project found.

Harassment, intimidation and violence against LGBTQ Americans is rising, fueled, experts say, by a rise in online hate speech and an intensifying political debate. Hundreds of transgender people have been killed over the past decade, often in targeted shootings, with Black trans women at especially high risk.

“By spreading this propaganda, they’re creating more stigma and discrimination and violence against LGBTQ people,” Wetrosky said. “There are real repercussions and real world violence as a result of this rhetoric.”

Angelo Carusone, president and chief executive of Media Matters for America, which monitors rightwing media, said far-right influencers have helped stoke the present hysteria over trans rights. Some of the attacks pull from the online “fever swamps”, he said, merging discussions of gender identity with conspiracy theories about pedophilia and age-old tropes falsely accusing LGBTQ people of “grooming” children.

Increasingly, Republican politicians and party leaders see the issue of trans rights as a way to rile their base. It’s a strategy that seeks to capitalize on the conservative “parental rights” movement, which emerged in opposition to pandemic-era school polices requiring remote-learning and mask-wearing but quickly shifted to target classroom instruction related to race, sexual orientation and gender identity as well as transgender students’ bathroom use and sports participation.

“When that anti-education wave … started to talk about trans issues, the numbers were already there and their audience responded to it in a really visceral way,” Carusone said.

While the backlash may have helped Republicans claw back power in Virginia – a state thought to be increasingly out of reach for the party – their disappointing showing in the 2022 midterms suggests it has limited appeal.

But it was a central theme at CPAC, where panelists repeatedly mocked and misgendered transgender people, including Rachel Levine, who serves as the assistant secretary for health and is the highest-ranking transgender official in the US government.

On a panel dedicated to the issue, a former college athlete who competed against a transgender swimmer warned that there was an effort under way on the left to “fully eradicate women”.

A male panelist joked about “transitioning” into his female co-panelist, Chaya Raichik, who runs “Libs of TikTok”, an anti-LGBTQ social media account. Another lamented that students in China are taught calculus while American students learn that there are “72 genders”.

But the speech that LGBTQ advocates found the most chilling came from Michael Knowles, a rightwing political commentator for the Daily Wire, who declared that “for the good of society … transgenderism must be eradicated from public life entirely”. A range of voices, including public officials, experts and observers of rightwing rhetoric, condemned the remarks as inflammatory and dangerous, with some calling them “genocidal”. (Knowles insisted on Twitter that he was not referring to trans people, but “transgenderism” which he has described as a “false” ideology.)

Yet the intense focus on transgender rights at CPAC this year – nearly every speaker raised it – suggests it is likely to be an animating issue in the coming presidential election.

Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida, seen as Trump’s strongest potential rival for the Republican nomination, was not at CPAC this year but has aggressively targeted trans rights in his state.

He signed into law Florida’s so-called “Don’t Say Gay” bill as well as another measure that bans trans women and girls from competing in some school sports in the state. He has also sought to limit gender-affirming care for transgender youths and recently faced sharp criticism for requesting information about students who sought or received such care at public universities in Florida.

Meanwhile Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley, as well as possible 2024 contenders including the former vice-president Mike Pence, former secretary of state Mike Pompeo and the South Dakota governor, Kristi Noem, have all emphasized their opposition to trans rights.

Wetrosky, of the Human Rights Campaign, said he anticipates the emerging Republican presidential field will continue to embrace the anti-trans rhetoric and policies on offer at CPAC. And though it may boost them in their quest to win the party’s nomination, he predicted it would backfire in a general election.

“The vast majority of Americans support LGBTQ equality,” Wetrosky said, “and the people who are speaking at this conference are on the wrong side of history.”

 

ATTACHMENT TWENTY SEVEN – From  From People x15

MANY REPUBLICANS SKIP TOP GOP CONFERENCE AMID ORGANIZER'S GROPING ALLEGATIONS

CPAC has long been known as a premier gathering place for influential lawmakers — but this year's conference is only being attended by a handful of big names

By Virginia Chamlee Published on March 2, 2023 01:48 PM

 

While the annual Conservative Political Action Conference has historically been a can't-miss event for Republican lawmakers, this year's gathering is being overshadowed by allegations that the event's organizer once groped a male staffer for Senate candidate Herschel Walker.

CPAC has long been known as a premier gathering place for influential lawmakers — and a stage for those running for the presidency. But this year's conference, which kicked off on Thursday in Maryland, is only being attended by a handful of big names, while many notable Republicans are entirely absent.

Donald Trump, who speaks Saturday, is the headliner at the convention. Nikki Haley, who also recently announced her candidacy for president, will also speak.

And the four-day event's marquee, $375-per-plate dinner will be headlined by Kari Lake, a former news anchor who recently lost her first-ever campaign for Arizona governor.

But perhaps even more notable is who won't be in attendance—on the stage or otherwise.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is widely rumored to be considering a 2024 run and who has been lauded by Republicans since overwhelmingly winning reelection in November, will not be at CPAC.

Other top GOP officials have also abandoned the event, with Politico reporting that no members of the Senate or House leadership—with the exception of Rep. Elise Stefanik—will be in attendance, while Idaho Gov. Brad Little is expected to be the only Republican governor at CPAC.

Meanwhile, DeSantis will join other GOP notables, such as former Vice President Mike Pence and Sen. Tim Scott at a closed-door retreat held by the conservative Club for Growth at the Palm Beach resort, The Breakers. Trump, Politico reports, was not invited to attend that event.

As it does each year, CPAC will conclude with a straw poll of attendees, the results of which often help indicate how candidates could fare in a general election. But as one Republican strategist told Politico, with Trump headlining the event and few others in attendance, it could prove "to be a less accurate indication of where the grassroots are than in years past."

In other words, "You have to take the results with a grain of salt," the strategist added.

 Conservative Activist and Trump Loyalist Accused of 'Groping' Herschel Walker's Male Staffer

The diminished attendance of the event comes just weeks after Matt Schlapp, a longtime Republican activist and the organizer of CPAC, was accused of "groping" a male staffer for Walker's campaign during a trip to Georgia. Schlapp has denied the accusations.

In January, The Daily Beast reported that the staffer — who asked to remain anonymous, only sharing that he is a male in his late 30s — claimed to be the victim of "sustained and unwanted and unsolicited" sexual contact by Schlapp in October.

It allegedly began with Schlapp "inappropriately" intruding the staffer's personal space at two different bars. The men were reportedly out in Atlanta getting drinks to discuss the staffer's political future.

When the staffer was driving Schlapp back to a hotel, he said Schlapp placed a hand on his leg, then "fondled" his crotch. The staffer told the Beast he was frozen in shock, adding that the event was "scarring" and "humiliating."

The staffer claimed he then denied an invitation to Schlapp's room at the hotel and left "as quickly as I could."

 Donald Trump Shook Hands with CPAC Chairman Exposed to Attendee Infected with Coronavirus

Schlapp has denied the claims by way of an attorney who called the allegations "a personal attack," telling the Beast: "The attack is false and Mr. Schlapp denies any improper behavior. We are evaluating legal options for response."

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The staffer has since filed suit against Schlapp, again alleging the Republican strategist assaulted him and that he and his wife, Mercedes Schlapp, defamed him by denying his story.

Schlapp did not respond to questions from reporters when asked about the accusations at CPAC this week.

 

ATTACHMENT TWENTY EIGHT – From  Vox

CPAC USED TO BE A BAROMETER. NOW IT’S ALL ABOUT TRUMP.

A guide to the very Trumpy vibes at this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference.

By Ben Jacobs  Mar 3, 2023, 5:25pm EST

 

The Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) was once the place to capture the pulse of the conservative movement. The annual conference, which boasts that Ronald Reagan spoke at its inaugural event, was filled with attendees in tricorn hats during the rise of the Tea Party and in fedoras during the libertarian moment that followed. But, in 2023, CPAC attendees are still wearing the same MAGA hats that they’ve donned for over half a decade.

Yet, it’s hard to interpret this year’s CPAC as a barometer of the American right or a measuring stick for anything. Unlike past years when potential presidential candidates swarmed to appear at the annual event, this year’s conference was a purely Trumpist enterprise. Most of Trump’s potential competitors for the nomination — including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former Vice President Mike Pence — didn’t show up. They flocked instead to an event held by Club for Growth in South Florida to appeal to right-wing donors rather than the MAGA diehards roving the corridors of a Maryland hotel who were all seemingly ready for Trump to win his third consecutive presidential election. The nature of the event was made stark on the agenda: There were four members of the Trump family speaking over the course of the three-day conference as well as four elected Republicans who voted to certify the 2020 election in Trump’s favor.

The decay at CPAC was partly due to the challenges the event itself faces. Matt Schlapp, the head of the American Conservative Union (ACU), which puts on the event, has faced increasing scrutiny over his stewardship of the group. These concerns have been accelerated by allegations of sexual misconduct that he faces after an anonymous male Republican campaign staffer sued Schlapp in January, claiming that Schlapp groped and propositioned him.

But, then again, if allegations of sexual misconduct and problematic financial stewardship were enough to sink someone’s reputation in the conservative movement, Trump would never have won the nomination, let alone the presidency.

Instead, much of the enervated vibes at CPAC stem from the fact that the conference increasingly represented a diehard MAGA strain of the conservative movement. The media presence this year was not Fox but the Chinese religious movement Falun Gong: Instead of Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson, there were major media presences from the Epoch Times and New Tang Dynasty (NTD) TV, which are both affiliated with Falun Gong.

Even the slightest heterodoxy was frowned upon. After a lukewarm reception to her speech in a half-empty ballroom, former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley — who was one of the few 2024 presidential hopefuls to attend — was met with chants of “Trump, Trump, Trump” and “we love Trump” from attendees after she left the ballroom. The shouts drowned out her efforts to make small talk with those attendees who wanted selfies with Haley as well as the reporters who fruitlessly tried to ask her questions.

The exhibit hall was packed with Trump merchandise as well. Those attendees in need of a MAGA hat or yet another Trump T-shirt had four shops to choose from. And those who were all set on merchandise could pose in a replica of Trump’s Oval Office or simply buy a signed copy of Sean Spicer’s children’s book, The Parrots Go Bananas. The latter was easy to do; to get an autograph from the former White House press secretary, one did not exactly have to fight through the largest crowd in history. There was a longer line on Friday afternoon at the booth for Patriot Mobile, a self-proclaimed Christian conservative cellphone company, for fringe right-winger Jack Posobiec to sign copies of his book. Posobiec, a longtime promoter of the Pizzagate conspiracy theory, had been banned from CPAC in 2017 before eventually being allowed to return to the gathering, which held an affiliated event in Viktor Orban’s Hungary last year.

Through it all was a sense of slow and steady decay creeping through the event as the attendees talked quietly among themselves asking where and when CPAC started to go downhill. It felt like a homage to one of Trump’s favorite movies, Sunset Boulevard. There was a focus on faded past glories and Trump-era grievances as it was a cycle of the same extended universe of MAGA celebrities. Attendees vied for a selfie with Sebastian Gorka or Mike Lindell as crowds swarmed the booth where Steve Bannon broadcast his daily television show.

Inside the hall, CPAC attendees applauded when Matt Gaetz called for abolishing the FBI and hooted and hollered when Steve Bannon assailed Fox News because it “illegitimately called [the 2020 election] for the opposition and not Donald J. Trump.” Perhaps the liveliest moment in the ballroom where speakers came and went was when attendees scrambled to look under their chairs when Donald Trump Jr. announced that there were gold-covered chocolate bars scattered throughout the ballroom that served as a ticket to a private reception with his father. Some were so eager to attend that they worked their way through the ballroom in case there was a ticket hidden under one of the hundreds of empty chairs in the back.

The question from CPAC is simply just what percentage of the larger conservative movement CPAC and MAGA diehards currently represent. CPAC is no longer a measuring stick, it’s simply a factional gathering. If this subset represents half of the GOP or even a third, then Trump is the favorite for the nomination. If it’s a fifth or a quarter of the party, Trump is vulnerable in a primary but his diehards still present long-term challenges for whoever the nominee is. That question sparked hours of late-night debate over drinks in hotel bars at the conference between the operatives and journalists obligated to come for business. But, among the attendees, those who have probably spent, at minimum, hundreds of dollars on a ticket and traveled from across the country to attend, there was no debate. They were with Trump

 

ATTACHMENT TWENTY NINE – From  Deseret.com

TRUMP DOMINATES AT CPAC, BUT FORUM LOSES RELEVANCE AS SOME GOP FRONTRUNNERS DON’T ATTEND

Once a can’t-miss conservative event, now it’s Trump’s show. But that didn’t stop some Republicans from testing out anti-Trump messages

By Brigham Tomco   Mar 6, 2023, 12:49pm EST

 

A conference that was once a critical stop for Republican presidential candidates now seems completely dedicated to the “MAGA” movement, dominated by the merch and supporters of former President Donald Trump, who headlined the event. 

But the 50th annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) was also colored by a few not-so-subtle jabs at the nation’s 45th commander-in-chief by other 2024 hopefuls, as well as the notable absence of some of conservatism’s biggest names, throwing doubt on the continued relevance of the event. 

“There’s a lot of chatter in the media about who’s here and not here,” said CPAC chairman Matt Schlapp on Thursday, the second day of the event which ran through Saturday evening. 

CPAC has long been an important stop for Republican congressmen, candidates and cable news celebrities — calling itself “the largest and most influential gathering of conservatives in the world” — but recently it has come under increasing fire.

Earlier this year, Schlapp was accused of sexually assaulting a Republican strategist working on Herschel Walker’s Senate campaign. In 2017 and 2021, the conference rescinded invitations to speakers who were recorded making anti-semitic and paedophilic remarks. 

But this year, the proceedings were defined as much by who wasn’t there, as who was.

Testing out new and old messages

This year’s prominent speakers included House Freedom Caucus provocateurs Reps. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., and Matt Gaetz, R-Fla.; outspoken conservative favorites Sens. Ted Cruz, R-Tex., Rick Scott, R-Fla., and J.D. Vance, R-Ohio; and other right-wing media regulars, like former Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake, election security activist Mike Lindell, and Trump strategist Steve Bannon. 

Messages at the conference, whose theme was “Protecting America Now,” focused mostly on criticism of the Biden administration’s spending, particularly in Ukraine, and “woke” elements of the culture war, like transgender issues. 

Though topics like these have become staples at CPAC, last weekend’s conference was the first in seven years to feature potential presidential nominees hoping to take Trump’s place at the head of the party. 

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who is expected to announce a presidential campaign this spring, and former South Carolina Gov. and Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley, who announced her presidential run last month, were among those attempting to walk the difficult line between winning over the Republican base while not treading on the reputation of its favorite president. 

“I’m running for president to renew an America that’s strong and proud, not weak and woke,” Haley said as she articulated her own vision of “make America great again.”

While Pompeo and Haley took pains to praise Trump and communicate an America first agenda, Haley and Pompeo also took aim at the former president with indirect criticism centered around electability and the need to have a conservative message that can appeal to a majority of the country. 

“We lost three elections in a row. In the popular vote it’s seven of the last eight,” Pompeo said. “We need a conservative party that we can be proud to call home again, rooted in our founding ideas, led by people of real character, competence and commitment to the mission that brought you all here today. ”

In addition to expressing traditional conservative goals, like limiting the size and scope of government and maintaining a hawkish stance toward China and Russia, Haley and Pompeo emphasized the importance of uniting the country. As did Vivek Ramaswamy, an entrepreneur and “anti-woke” activist who announced his presidential bid at the end of February. 

“You get national unity in this country by embracing the extremism, the radicalism, of the ideals that set this nation into motion 250 years ago,” Ramaswamy said. 

But Haley’s, Pompeo’s and Ramaswamy’s calls for unity around a more publicly palatable conservatism were drowned out by calls to unite around Trump as the only way to avoid the country’s demise. 

“We’re not looking for unity. Sanity? We’re looking for victory. We’re not looking for compromise. We’re looking to save our country,” Bannon said. 

And in what seemed like a response to Pompeo — who had said earlier, “We can’t become the left, following celebrity leaders with their own brand of identity politics, those with fragile egos who refuse to acknowledge reality” — Bannon declared, “Donald J. Trump is not simply a leader of a political party. He is not a politician. He is the leader of the most powerful political movement in American history.”

Trump, who announced his bid for reelection shortly after the 2022 midterm elections, was the final speaker Saturday evening. He committed to finish what he had started in his first term as president, eliminating the “deep state,” ending the country’s involvement in foreign wars and undoing the damage done to our economy by the “corrupt establishment.” 

Continuing the populist rhetoric of Bannon, Trump framed his reelection in existential terms. “This is the final battle. … Either they win or we win. And if they win we no longer have a country,” Trump said to multiple standing ovations from a room with standing room only. “In 2016, I declared, ‘I am your voice.’ Today I add, I am your warrior, I am your justice, and, for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution.” 

 

ATTACHMENT THIRTY – From USA Today

CPAC: DONALD TRUMP AND NIKKI HALEY WILL BE THERE; RON DESANTIS AND MIKE PENCE WON'T

By David Jackson

 

WASHINGTON – The annual conservative activist confab known as CPAC – the Conservative Political Action Conference – takes place this week and features a list of prospective Republican presidential candidates.

A relatively short list.

Former President Donald Trump and Nikki Haley, so far his only announced big-name Republican challenger, are scheduled to address CPAC delegates, but potential contenders like Ron DeSantis and Mike Pence are skipping the high-profile conference this weekend at National Harbor, Maryland.

They and others will attend a closed-door donor conference in Florida while Trump works the CPAC crowd.

"We're going to be talking about very serious subjects, but we'll have some fun doing it," Trump said in a CPAC-sponsored video promoting the conference.

Among the CPAC topics:

The Trump show

Though CPAC was initially cool to the businessman-turned-politician – he finished third in the conference's presidential straw poll in 2016 – the gathering became increasingly pro-Trump during his presidency and afterward.

Trump's schedule:Donald Trump plans campaign stops targeting Republican opponents – and prosecutors

Haley v. Trump?Nikki Haley on 2024 White House campaign: 'Why not me?'

Now a CPAC fixture, Trump will again close the conference with a speech on Saturday.

 

After announcing his 2024 candidacy in November, Trump is expected to solicit continued support from CPAC. The only question is what, if anything, Trump says about rivals like DeSantis, Pence and Haley.

With some conservatives questioning the value of CPAC at this point, Trump senior adviser Jason Miller said the "mainstream media" is attacking the conference because Trump "is going to have a dominant presence there." He said some want to distract from the fact that Trump "is the leader of the conservative movement, the Republican Party and 2024 polling."

 

The Haley effect: What will she say about Donald Trump?

CPAC watchers will also look to see what Haley says about Trump in her speech Friday.

Since announcing her candidacy in mid-February, the former South Carolina governor and Trump-appointed United Nations ambassador has promoted herself as the leader of a "new generation" – mostly a dig at 80-year-old President Joe Biden but one that conveniently applies to the 76-year-old Trump.

This is first time Trump and a Republican primary opponent will be appearing at the same event.

CPAC delegates will also hear from former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who is considering a 2024 presidential bid.

 

DeSantis, Pence at competing Florida event

DeSantis, the Florida governor who polls the best among non-Trump candidates, will be at another event.

The Club for Growth, a conservative organization that specializes in economic issues, is holding a closed-door retreat for donors who will hear from a number of Republican presidential possibilities.

Pence is expected to be there, according to a Club For Growth schedule, as is Haley. Other possible presidential candidates attending the retreat include Tim Scott, Ted Cruz, Rick Scott, Chris Sununu, and Vivek Ramaswamy. (Cruz, Ramaswamy and Rick Scott also are scheduled to speak at CPAC.)

Trump v. DeSantis? Trump is under fire over the midterms. DeSantis is rising. And a 2024 rivalry is just beginning.

Trump v. Pence? Mike Pence's relationship with Donald Trump gets even more complicated with subpoena

The Club for Growth event is being held in Palm Beach, Florida, but local resident Trump will not be there. He has clashed with the organization over past presidential endorsements, and he said Tuesday that the "Club for NO Growth is an insignificant group of Globalists" who will get only the "stragglers" in the 2024 GOP presidential contest.

 

Marjorie Taylor Greene, Jim Jordan among GOP lawmakers at CPAC

After two years of events in Florida and Texas, the Conservative Political Action Conference returns to the Washington, D.C., area. That makes it easier for Republican members of Congress to attend.

This year's schedule includes Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., who has called for a national "divorce" between red states and blue states.

Also on the CPAC agenda is Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, who as chairman of the House Judiciary Committee is conducting a number of investigations into the Biden administration.

 

Election deniers among the speakers

Election denial is also a big topic at CPAC, Many delegates and speakers continue to protest Trump's 2020 loss to Biden, despite a lack of evidence of widespread voter fraud.

Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election are also the focus of multiple criminal investigations.

The CPAC agenda has an international flavor. One of the speakers is former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, whose supporters stormed government buildings to protest his loss in that country's president election last year, reminiscent of the pro-Trump insurrection of Jan. 6, 2021.

Also speaking at CPAC: Kari Lake, who is still protesting her loss in the 2022 Arizona governor's race.

 

CPAC troubles? 

This year's conference takes place amid trouble surrounding top organizer Matt Schlapp.

An anonymous male aide with Herschel Walker's Senate campaign in 2022 has filed a lawsuit accusing Schlapp of an unwanted sexual advance.

Schlapp has vigorously denied the claim and said he is the target of a smear campaign.

On his Twitter feed Tuesday, Schlapp said his organization is "thriving," and he added: "Join us in D.C. for the greatest #CPAC experience in history."

 

 

ATTACHMENT THIRTY ONE – From the National Review

SANCTITY-OF-LIFE ISSUES ARE NEGLECTED AT THIS YEAR’S CPAC

By MICHAEL J. NEW March 1, 2023 11:08 PM

 

 

This weekend, the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) will take place at National Harbor, Md. CPAC is typically the largest conservative conference in the country and thousands of conservative activists will be in attendance. This weekend’s agenda boasts an impressive lineup of conservative elected officials, activists, and policy-makers. Furthermore, the panels will cover a wide range of topics, including immigration, transgenderism, and election fraud. However, one issue is conspicuously absent from this weekend’s agenda — abortion.

What makes this especially disappointing is that sanctity-of-life issues were exceptionally salient this past year. In the past twelve months, Roe v. Wade was overturned, and 13 states are currently protecting preborn children. Research from Texas and other states shows that these pro-life laws have already saved thousands of lives. A U.S. district court in Texas is about to issue a ruling that might take dangerous chemical-abortion drugs off the market. Finally, we have also seen a politicized DOJ that has aggressively prosecuted pro-life activists but largely ignored numerous attacks on pro-life pregnancy-help centers.

Even worse, this is the second consecutive CPAC with no panel dedicated to sanctity-of-life issues. In March 2022, many pro-lifers thought there was a very good chance that the U.S. Supreme Court was about to overturn Roe v. Wade.  However, no panel at the 2022 CPAC was dedicated to sanctity-of-life issues. A Twitter thread by pro-life activist Alison Centofante on this topic went viral. During a in interview, CPAC chairman Matt Schlapp dismissed the concerns of Centofante and other pro-lifers, saying, “Everything is prolife that we talk about.” Schlapp later called into a gathering of pro-life leaders to mend fences. However, there was no public commitment to organizing a pro-life panel at a subsequent CPAC.

In the months after the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision, pro-life groups and pro-life elected officials have proposed a number of creative policies to build a culture of life. The state of Texas appropriated over $100 million to its Alternatives to Abortion program. Mississippi governor Tate Reaves has proposed expanding Medicaid coverage to mothers up to twelve months postpartum. Earlier this year, Americans United for Life and Democrats for Life collaborated on a proposal to make births free. Unfortunately, CPAC attendees looking for robust discussions about how best to protect preborn children in a post-Roe era will have to look elsewhere.

 

 

·         ATTACHMENT THIRTY TWO – From the Washington Examiner

·          

·         By Rachel Schilke, Washington Examiner   Mar 1, 2023

 

 

President Joe Biden will deliver a speech at the House Democratic Caucus Issues Conference in Baltimore, Maryland, ahead of the release of the administration's federal budget proposal.

Biden is likely to discuss big-ticket items such as the $1 trillion Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and the CHIPS Act, which boosted semiconductor production and increased funding for research and development.

The speech comes as the White House and House Republicans are battling over raising the debt ceiling, with GOP lawmakers looking to cut discretionary spending severely.

Republicans are expected to use the debt ceiling negotiations to exact concessions from Biden in exchange for votes.

Biden's budget proposal is expected to be released on March 9, with Republicans releasing their own plan in April. On Tuesday, he said he plans to raise taxes and bashed the GOP for its alleged attempts to restrict benefits for retirement and healthcare.

Over the last month, Biden has accused Republicans of wanting to cut Social Security and Medicare, which a majority of GOP members have blasted as inaccurate.

Biden's speech will begin at 6 p.m. on Wednesday.

 

 

ATTACHMENT THIRTY THREE – From the New Republic

THE SAD, DESOLATE SCENES OF CPAC 2023

By Laura Jedeed  March 4, 2023

 

VIBE SHIFTS

At the most famous annual gathering of America's conservatives, the chairs are empty, the energy is low—and everyone seems a little bit defensive about it.

An attendee yawns, amongst a sea of empty chairs, following a speech by Donald Trump Jr., at the 2023 Conservative Political Action Conference.

“It’s so great to see everyone here, and it’s so great to see a packed house, too!” 

It is approximately 11:15 AM in Washington DC, and investigative reporter Sara Carter is lying. The house is never crowded this early on the first day of CPAC, but even by those standards the Potomac Ballroom looks grim. The camera responsible for providing close-in crowd shots that  CPAC likes to work into their livestream footage is working hard to stay away from the deserted wasteland of chairs in the rear two-thirds of this auditorium, but there’s nothing it can do to disguise the gap-toothed emptiness of the front section. I am beginning to understand the reasoning behind yesterday’s tersely-worded email that expressly forbade reporters from “roam[ing] in the Potomac Ballroom”—but they might want to reconsider: This anemic crowd needs all the extra bodies it can get.

This is my fourth CPAC, a bi-yearly gathering of conservative groupies, donors, political operators, long-shot candidates, and packs of teenage boys in crisp suits who wander the hallways in packs and talk to no one else. Get an autograph from Lauren Boebert, snap a selfie with Steve Bannon, listen to speech after speech about how the Democrats are coming for you and everyone you love. It’s a bacchanale, it’s an indoctrination session, it’s ComiCon for politics nerds. 

Or at least, that’s what it usually is. But this year, CPAC feels like none of those things to me—or rather, those things feel as empty as those seats. The vibes are off. 

The sense of emptiness extends beyond the seats, a fact not lost on CPAC organizer Matt Schlapp. “There’s a lot of chatter in the media over who’s here or not here,” he told the crowd less than fifteen seconds into his opening speech. These are the very first words spoken on the event stage and the insecurities are palpable. 

Some of that aforementioned buzz is slightly silly. The New York Times pointed out the absence of Pence, McCarthy, and the party’s Senate leadership, as though any of those people would be welcome in these halls. Mike Pence quietly canceled his appearance at CPAC 2021 right around the time the event confirmed Trump as the keynote speaker and has wisely kept his distance ever since. A few weeks ago, Marjorie Taylor Greene called for McConnell’s removal from the Republican party. McCarthy is tolerated, but only because he bent the knee. This is no country for old backslappers.

Other absences, however, are more surprising. Two years ago, Fox Nation was a major sponsor of the conference; attendees received a free year-long streaming service membership and a tote bag full of branded swag. This year, the cable news giant is nowhere to be found: It’s not on sponsorship signs, not in CPAC Central, not even in Broadcast Row where Newsmax and Real America’s Voice now dominate. Other, more esoteric outlets include Proverbs Media Group, Lindell TV,  and a telegram channel called Frontline Flash. The “L” in “Flash” is a lightning bolt that looks nothing like an L, and the resulting visual—”Frontline F🗲ash—elicited an enormous double take from me.

Also missing in action: Ron DeSantis, who has instead opted to attend a closed donor event in his home state of Florida with the Club for Growth. This 800-pound fundraising gorilla scheduled their event over the exact four days as CPAC itself; shots fired. Participation in one does not preclude participation in the other—presidential hopefuls Nikki Haley and Vivek Ramaswamy plan to attend both events. Nonetheless, the Club for Growth has thrown down the gauntlet against both the American Conservative Union (ACU) and Trump himself, who was not invited to their party. It’s the end of an era. After six years of lock-step unity behind the Golden-Haired One, a war has begun for the future of the party.

When a party begins to bifurcate my first temptation is to search for some kind of ideological narrative, and at first glance one seems to be congealing:  While Trump addresses the people, DeSantis, who possesses degrees from both Harvard and Yale, hobnobs with the political elite. Ever since they called Arizona for Biden, Fox News has teetered at the edge of Fake News; Newsmax, the closest thing to a replacement so far, sits farther to the right. In Fox Nation’s tooth-rottingly obsequious documentary on DeSantis’ life, a Ghost of Republicans Past heaped effusive praise on the man many consider Trump’s most dangerous rival. “He’s been a really effective governor,” Jeb Bush said. “I think it’s time for a more forward-leaning, future-oriented conversation in our politics.”

Meanwhile, on the CPAC stage, President of Concerned Women for America Penny Nance gets biblical. “The Old Gods, Ba’al and Moloch, the god [sic] of death, are moving in,” she says. “We are seeing it now and it’s satanic.”

“Show us what Mitch McConnell has given us!” Stephen K. Bannon screams Friday afternoon. as the crowd applauds rapturously. “Show us what the Murdochs, a bunch of foreigners, have given us!” Earlier that day, Marjorie Taylor Greene elicited an enormous standing ovation when she announced her Protect Children’s Innocence Act, which would make it a felony to provide “anything to do with gender affirming care” to minors.

But an extremist/moderate split does not explain the third glaring absence of CPAC: Turning Point USA. In 2021, they too were a major sponsor; in 2023 they are nowhere to be found. No swag booth, no “socialism sucks” buttons, no speech by Charlie Kirk. Steve Bannon gave a speech at Americafest 2022; Marjorie Taylor Greene appeared there in 2021. Nor does it really explain DeSantis’ absence, regardless of his new friendships: this is the man who recently ended Disney’s de-facto self-governance and placed a board of five hand-picked zealots to oversee the company’s tax district; this is the man who passed the “Don’t Say Gay” bill and passed legislation allowing endless challenges against inappropriate or “pornographic” literature in school libraries. His politics fit onto the CPAC stage just fine.

So what gives?No one wants to go on record about the vibes. The Fake News Media has never exactly been popular at CPAC, but our relations are at a nadir. Apart from denying credentials to the Daily Beast, CPAC organizer Matt Schlapp has largely failed to follow through on his declared desire to “go a little bit Hungarian” on the press this year, but the general idea of the media as a weaponized arm of liberal left-wing communists permeates the atmosphere. At a certain point, I stop cold-approaching and start striking up conversations where I introduce myself, make it clear that I am a journalist, then meander slowly and casually to a discussion of the event itself.

I am sitting at the Belvedere Lobby Bar in the Gaylord Convention Center with a mediocre yet over-priced glass of red wine and a rotating group of millennials. The bar overlooks the atrium: tropical plants and fountains that extend to an enormous glass wall that affords an incredible view of the Anacostia River. The river is gray. The sky is gray. A wan gray sun tries and fails to shine: a stain of light across the sky, the memory of warmth.

The general consensus is that moving CPAC back to Washington D.C. from Orlando was a mistake. “Who wants to go to D.C.?,” one woman remarks. “Nobody wants to come to D.C.” Everything feels sluggish and low-energy. “It’s the swamp air,” someone else says later that evening.

The bad turnout doesn’t help the vibes at all, nor do the absences. I ask about Turning Point USA. “They don’t really fuck with each other,” someone says. “They’re trying to be the new CPAC, and I think they will be.” Everyone agrees that AmericaFest, TPUSA’s December conference in Phoenix was much more fun and I am forced to agree. At that event, speakers emerged onstage to thundering bass, a light show, and often pyrotechnics. There it was: A bacchanale, an indoctrination session: ComiCon for politics nerds. “[CPAC] feels a lot more professional,” the man continues. “This is like inside baseball.”

CPAC always has that feeling, but it’s never been this joyless—at least, not in my experience. No cardboard Donald Trumps in CPAC Central, the tabling and merch room; no golden Trump statue for photos. The swag has lost its swagger. The MAGA Mall, usually an ostentatious warren of bejeweled Amerian everything, is reduced to a single long table. They aren’t even displaying their golden gun purses this year.

Frankly, what inside baseball there is on hand seems pale by comparison as well. If the Ronald Reagan Dinner is any indication, a lot of donors are in Florida with DeSantis and the Club for Growth. The gala, which costs nearly $400 a plate, has always sold out far in advance. This year, CPAC pushed a text encouraging people to buy tickets the day of the dinner, and footage of the event shows—you guessed it—many empty seats. 

There is something absent in these speeches as well, especially compared to 2022: fire, urgency. Lurid tales of “mutilation” and the specter of gender-affirming care elicits reactions, of course, as do promises of House investigative committees. But it feels deflated. This is old hat. We’ve heard about Hunter Biden’s laptop. The Chinese Spy Balloon is played out. COVID has stabilized; masks and mandates are over, for better or for worse. The Ukraine war grinds on without end, the border situation remains a situation, Fentanyl is killing people. People are upset about these issues, of course, but the only solution on offer is snarling House committees and jokes about liberal tears. Nobody seems terribly energized by any of it.

“There’s no longer a gathering storm,” Steve Bannon told the crowd; “The storm is here!” Nah. It isn’t, not really. Last year at Orlando and then at Dallas, these speakers spoke in voices full of fire and brimstone. The Democrats, newly in power, had touched off the Marxist apocalypse. In response, CPAC’s bully-pulpiteers promised the total annihilation of their enemies after the Big Red Wave. None of it happened. The Republicans barely gained control of the house and, worse, the predicted apocalypse never really arrived. Prices are still high, but stabilizing. The border is no worse, the fentanyl epidemic is no worse. The federal debt is still high. The world feels as gray as the DC weather. For the people in love with Trump’s adrenaline-fueled politics, that might be worse than fire and brimstone.

Bannon surely knows this. He does what he can to conjure the End Times energy. Here it comes: imminent economic doom due to the debt ceiling and funding Ukraine; World War III due to Iranian and Chinese machinations. But his real vitriol is reserved for the “elites” and for the betrayers, specifically Fox News. “[Fox doesn’t] respect you. Read the depositions,” he says, referring to the recent bombshell testimony that Fox hosts knew the election was not stolen and pushed the narrative anyway.” They have a fear, a loathing and a contempt for you.” This is war—it’s always war with Bannon, one way or another. “‘We need unity, we need unity,’” he says, imitating Fox News. “We’re not looking for unity, we’re looking for victory!” The crowd roars to their feet.

It’s not the only feud, another attendee pointed out to me, and he’s not wrong. You can’t take two steps without running into either vicious infighting or complete catastrophe. The Daily Wire vs Stephen Crowder. Project Veritas in shambles. News articles about Matt Schlapp, the long-time face of CPAC, all feature at least a paragraph about the male Herschel Walker staffer who alleges that Schlapp nonconsensually “grabbed [his] junk and pummeled it at length.” Fox versus Trump, DeSantis versus Trump, the Club for Growth versus the ACU…it’s infighting all the way down.

In 2016, Donald Trump remade the Republican party in his own image. He was more than a party leader, he was God-emperor, creator and destroyer of worlds. For six years, the GOP has known just what to do and just where to go: Back Trump, get on the train, and enjoy the ride. The possibility of a DeSantis run was very abstract last year at this time. Before that Red Wave fizzled out, it was possible to imagine with crystal clarity the way 2024 would go: the debates, the media histrionics, oceans of liberal tears, then victory. It’s all a blank slate now. The primaries will be ugly, the outcome no longer predetermined. The Republicans are a flock without a shepherd, a party used to marching orders that finds itself suddenly still. 

No leader. No galvanizing cause. No hope. No wonder these seats are empty.

 

ATTACHMENT THIRTY FOUR – From New York Magazine 

CPAC WAS A JANKY HALF-EMPTY TRUMP CONVENTION

 This Conservative Political Action Conference lacked both conservatives and action.

By Ben Jacobs March 5th

 

The Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) was once a marquee event on the political calendar where Republicans seeking the favor of the party’s conservative base would attempt to woo a crowd of right-wing activists and diehards. In 2015, the last time there was a competitive Republican presidential primary, a dozen candidates showed up, representing all wings of the party from Chris Christie to Ted Cruz. And they weren’t the only ones there, it was a marquee event for the entire right-wing ecosystem with seemingly every group represented. Eight years later, the vibe was entirely different. The 2023 CPAC felt like a mall after all but one of its big department stores has shut down — an emptier, jankier, lower-rent version of conferences past. The rooms were more deserted, the vendors more downmarket, and speakers a little less important.

In the exhibit hall, where Facebook once had a booth with virtual reality games, there was now a booth where attendees could stand on a vibrating board promoted as effort-free exercise which could also boost sexual function. Many of the vendors simply sold Trump merchandise and nothing else. Upstairs, in the main ballroom, the list of speakers was considerably less A-list than in years past. Most potential presidential candidates didn’t show. Aside from Donald Trump, those who did attend had either served in the Trump administration or were political neophytes. And in the halls, it was far less crowded, save for a bottlenecked corner where, at one point, Steve Bannon held court and attendees flocked to see him.

 

There was no one reason for the event’s decline. The rise of competing conferences like Turning Point USA means CPAC is no longer the only show in town for those who want to spend an entire weekend listening to right-wing celebrities. And while CPAC is still a legacy brand, the allegations of sexual misconduct around its leader, Matt Schlapp, have further diminished its luster. Once a frequent Fox News guest, Schlapp has not appeared on the cable news network in months, and Fox News was almost a non-presence at the event; it did have journalists there, but no longer live-streamed it and none of its prime time hosts appeared on stage.

There’s also the fact that the event has, for years, been turning into a virtual proxy for Donald Trump and Trumpism. It wasn’t just that the halls were packed with attendees in red MAGA hats and wearing t-shirts proclaiming “Trump won” or “Let’s Go Brandon.” It was that the crowd was often indistinguishable from one at a Trump event. Many of the diehard Trump loyalists who followed the former president from rally to rally were now showing up at a conservative confab where panelists once held discussions about how to better achieve economic growth. And those devotees aren’t interested in other speakers. The attendance was at best sparse over much of the three-day conference, and Trump’s 2024 competitors, like Nikki Haley and Mike Pompeo, weren’t even given the courtesy of boos by the MAGA crowd, who reacted instead with something like polite indifference.

The event isn’t receding on all fronts, however. While once mainly a celebration of the American conservative movement, (just last year, Lee Greenwood, the singer of “Proud To Be An American” was inducted to the CPAC Hall of Fame), the event has taken on a somehwat more cosmopolitan air in recent years thanks to the sprouting of various international franchises. Among the most robust are CPAC Hungary, which celebrates strongman prime minister Viktor Orban, and CPAC Brazil, which celebrates ousted strongman president Jair Bolsonaro. The latter spoke at CPAC on Saturday, where a number of attendees waved Brazilian flags and wore Brazilian soccer jerseys as Bolsonaro gave an address in Portuguese. Even the media organizations ringing the ballroom have been internationalized. Outlets linked to the Falun Gong and to the New Federal State of China, a dissident group led by Steve Bannon and his ally Guo Wengui, had prominent space next to conservative outlets like Newsmax and Real America’s Voice.

But this also reinforced the parochial nature of the event. CPAC may have attracted the Trump of Brazil, but it couldn’t draw rising post-Trump Republican stars like Ron DeSantis or Glenn Youngkin. It felt like the continuation of CPAC’s slow spiral from a can’t-miss conservative confluence to an increasingly shabby Trump-con that seems smaller and smaller each year. The cycle feeds itself, just like the once popular mall that attracts fewer customers as stores close, causing more and more stores to close, drawing even fewer customers. And it seems like the exact same demographic of people who only go to a struggling mall to get in their daily steps are the same ones still converging at CPAC to celebrate Trump. The Orange Julius may be gone, but there’s still plenty of kiosks peddling the Orange Donald.

 

 

ATTACHMENT THIRTY FIVE – From CNN

RON DESANTIS KNOCKS REPUBLICANS WHO ACT ‘LIKE POTTED PLANTS’ IN REMARKS TO GOP DONORS

By Alayna Treene and Steve Contorno, Updated 7:07 PM EST, Fri March 3, 2023

 

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, in a closed-door speech to donors Thursday, sought to cement himself as the governor who will go places other Republicans will not as he accused fellow GOP leaders of sitting back in the cultural fights “like potted plants,” according to audio of his remarks obtained by CNN.

“I’m going on offense,” DeSantis said at a retreat hosted by the conservative Club for Growth. “Some of these Republicans, they just sit back like potted plants, and they let the media define the terms of the debate. They let the left define the terms of debate. They take all this incoming, because they’re not making anything happen. And I said, ‘That’s not what we’re doing.’”

DeSantis’ remarks come as the Club for Growth searches for a new 2024 party standard-bearer to support over former President Donald Trump. In addition to DeSantis, the anti-tax group has summoned other potential 2024 contenders – including former Vice President Mike Pence, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley – to Trump’s backyard in Palm Beach to speak with its backers.

David McIntosh, the Club’s president who introduced DeSantis at The Breakers Palm Beach resort, told CNN that the governor “gave a great speech that was well received.” The 40-minute address received multiple rounds of applause.

DeSantis says GOP will not 'mess with Social Security,' as Democrats and Trump slam his past support for privatization

 

DeSantis notably did not reference the 2024 presidential race during his lengthy remarks. However, he defined himself as a leader of not only Florida but the country as a whole, detailing what he saw as his “courage to lead” in a political environment when others are afraid to “step out and fight back.” It’s a theme that DeSantis leans into in his new book,”The Courage to Be Free,” which he released on Tuesday and has spent the week promoting on Fox News and in events throughout Florida.

DeSantis’ remarks to the Club for Growth were first reported by Fox News. A spokesperson for the governor did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Alayna Treene and Steve Contorno

A source familiar with DeSantis’ remarks told CNN that the governor showed up late to Thursday’s event and immediately left after his speech without talking to anyone. CNN previously reported that GOP donors have expressed frustration that DeSantis rarely lingers at gatherings, and he has earned a reputation for ducking out of events with guests still waiting for a photo. DeSantis hosted his own donor gathering in Palm Beach last weekend that was aimed at addressing those concerns.

In his speech before the traditionally business-friendly audience, DeSantis also defended his strong-arming of corporations and Wall Street, and criticized CEOs as being “just weak” for giving into what he described as the “woke mob” that pushes environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) policies, among other “leftist” issues.

“I think these companies should just stay out of this stuff. I don’t think it’s good for our economy,” the governor said. “I don’t think it’s good for society to have every decision that’s made in politics have corporate America weighing in.”

Some Republicans have bristled at DeSantis’ heavy-handed use of executive power to impose his ideology on private businesses. His moves to punish Disney for speaking out against a Florida measure to restrict certain lessons on sexual orientation and gender identity in schools has especially attracted criticism from the right. Several potential 2024 rivals, including Pence and New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, have seized on DeSantis’ top-down governing style to draw sharp contrasts with the popular governor.

DeSantis on Thursday dismissed the criticism from people who “claim to be on the right.”

 

“Republicans need to not shy away from these fights just because the media and the left are going to call you names,” he said.

Ahead of DeSantis’ upcoming visit this weekend to California, where he’ll appear at the Reagan Library and also deliver a speech at a fundraiser for the Orange County Republican Party, he took a shot at the state’s Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, for being “preoccupied” with DeSantis and Florida.

Newsom often posts criticism of DeSantis on social media and this past July 4, he took to the Sunshine State’s airwaves, paying $105,000 to run an ad on Fox News in Florida that declared, “Freedom is under attack in your state.”

“Literally, how many other governors does anyone even care about? I mean, when you go to California, they got all these problems there. Their governor’s preoccupied with me and what we’re doing in Florida. … It’s incredible,” DeSantis said Thursday. “And honestly, I just know that game. If they’re not shooting that means you’re not getting anything done. That they’re coming after me because I’m standing up for the people that I represent. I view that as positive reinforcement.”

DeSantis also spoke at length about his recent legislation giving him more control over Disney’s special tax district, and described the entertainment giant’s management as caving in to “woke ideology.”

“I believe woke ideology is pernicious. I believe what’s at stake is not just ‘My policies are good,’” he said. “We should not all be suffering under the cloak of wokeness. … This issue with Disney is a good example of that. … They were basically a law unto themselves, and they got away with it for a long time because they were so powerful. They were the 800-pound gorilla, but they made the mistake of trying to stick their nose into sensitive matters involving children, involving education, and involving family.”

DeSantis also went into detail about stacking Florida’s school boards with conservatives and his plan to fight “critical race theory” in schools.

“Gender ideology … not happening in Florida, critical race theory, not allowed in the state of Florida,” the governor said, garnering applause from the audience.

 

ATTACHMENT THIRTY SIX – From the Palm Beach Post

PRESIDENTIAL HOPEFULS APPEAR AT CLUB FOR GROWTH RETREAT, SNUBBING TRUMP

By Stephany Matat

 

PALM BEACH — Stars of the Republican firmament with their sights on the 2024 election — but not former President Donald Trump — were on hand at The Breakers over the weekend for a retreat held by the conservative Club for Growth, whose president said Saturday the group was trying to spotlight new party talent.

It was one of two dueling Republican events this past week, the other being the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Maryland, and occasionally both events hosted the same speakers. 

Trump, a Palm Beach resident, wasn’t invited to the Club for Growth retreat, only 3 miles from his Mar-a-Lago estate. Instead, Trump was the headline speaker at CPAC Saturday evening while his potential presidential rivals spoke at the Club for Growth confab. Speakers at the anti-tax group’s three-day event included Gov. Ron DeSantis, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, former Vice President Mike Pence, U.S. Sen. Rick Scott of Florida, Texas U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz and South Carolina U.S. Sen Tim Scott.

Trump told a cheering crowd at CPAC that he was engaged in his “final battle” as he tries to return to the White House, the Associated Press reported.

“We are going to finish what we started,” he said Saturday night. “We’re going to complete the mission. We’re going to see this battle through to ultimate victory.”

Although formerly aligned with Trump, the Club for Growth hosted this event to give "new talent" the opportunity to showcase those who support the ideas the club backs, including limited government and free markets, and for these speakers to share their vision of "where America should go, or what America would need," said David McIntosh, the club's president.

"We wanted to show all of the different talent that was in the Republican Party, thinking about running or being speculated about running," McIntosh told the Palm Beach Post on Saturday.

After finding out that he was not invited to the Palm Beach retreat, Trump posted on his TruthSocial social media platform, calling the Club for Growth "an assemblage of political misfits, globalists, and losers," and name-calling it the "Club for NO Growth."

To Trump's criticism, McIntosh said there was "nothing personal from my end," and that the organization would still consider supporting Trump if he won the nomination.

DeSantis spoke Thursday evening to the small conservative group about how he turned Florida into the "nation's leading red state." according to Fox News. The Florida governor has not announced a formal presidential run, but he is widely expected to launch a bid after the close of the current legislative session.

Haley spoke Saturday afternoon, criticizing President Joe Biden’s economic policies. Haley, who is Trump's current leading official presidential rival, could be heard from outside the ballroom, telling the audience that Biden’s administration will “tax even more money” and cost them more.

The event was closed to the press, but attendees told the Post that Fox News was the only outlet allowed inside. Security officials escorted a Post reporter from the premises Saturday, saying that event organizers did not want reporters in the building while the retreat was going on.

2024’s two-man show, but in Florida

Florida, particularly Palm Beach, has been central to Trump’s campaign, and has opened a campaign headquarters in West Palm Beach, according to Politico. Aside from speaking to conservative leaders and activists at Club 47 for Presidents Day, Trump also hosted a major donor event in Mar-a-Lago for his MAGA Inc. super PAC on Feb. 23. 

But Palm Beach is not just important to Trump. DeSantis has spent a substantial amount of time in Palm Beach County since the start of the year, including visting a three-day donor retreat at the Four Seasons Palm Beach late last month, and on Wednesday, making a stop at the Palm Beach Republican Club to tout his new book, "The Courage to Be Free."

DeSantis and Trump’s tensions are not new, but DeSantis has been less blunt in his jabs at the former president.

Trump’s blatant tarring of the Florida governor as “Ron DeSanctimonious” in his speeches and callouts on TruthSocial confirms one side of the strain between the two. But DeSantis had not responded to any of Trump's criticisms, until the release of his new book. 

DeSantis’ book features careful references to the former president that lauded Trump as a “unique star power,” yet also indirectly takes a dig at him for a lack of activity within his first two years as president despite having a Republican House and Senate. DeSantis' book focuses primarily on his work in Florida as a "blueprint" for a conservative remake of national policy.

Polls tend to remain close between the two Florida Republicans. In a Yahoo News/YouGov poll of potential Republican presidential nominees taken in early February, DeSantis was leading Trump by 4 percentage points. But a more recent YahooNews poll conducted toward the end of February showed Trump leading by 8 percentage points.

The governor is popular with right-wing Floridians because of his hostility to pandemic lockdowns and an aggressive culture war campaign that attacks "woke" ideologies in school such as critical race theory, and taking down diversity, equity and inclusion programs in educational institutions.

DeSantis has also been adopting slogans such as "Make America Florida," and touting himself as "America's governor," and he often has traveled nationwide to speak to conservative groups. This month, he will be heading to Iowa, an early presidential primary state, and then making additional stops in Nevada and New Hampshire.

 

ATTACHMENT THIRTY SEVEN – From USA Today

A GOP DIVIDED: TIRED TRUMP FADES AT CPAC WHILE DESANTIS RISES AT REAGAN LIBRARY

It's refreshing to see the growing number of Republican leaders like Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis who are not afraid of Donald Trump.

By Ingrid Jacques  3/7

 

Nothing burns former President Donald Trump more than a small, low-energy crowd. 

That's what he and his supporters got at last week’s Conservative Political Action Conference outside Washington, D.C. Headlines described the event as “desolate,” “half-full,” “diminished” and “janky.”

More than anything, it’s clear that Trump and his ilk now dominate the event, which has pushed away more traditional – and actual conservative – politicians and party members. 

It's not CPAC, it's 'TPAC'

Former Republican New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie hit the nail on the head on ABC News' “This Week”: “You saw the scenes at CPAC, that room was half-full. Let’s not pretend that CPAC is CPAC any more. It’s TPAC, OK? It’s Trump PAC. It’s not CPAC any longer, and only the most desperate people showed up at CPAC to even speak, other than Trump or people within Trump’s orbit.”

Ouch.

GOP strategist Dennis Lennox, who attended CPAC, also said the event revolved around Trump and is no longer conservative.

“It’s now one part tent revival and another part carnival for the America First, MAGA and ultra-MAGA,” Lennox told me. “The CPAC of today is a long way from the movement created by William F. Buckley Jr. and Russell Kirk.”

Meanwhile at the Club for Growth retreat …

This year, who didn’t attend CPAC was more telling than who did. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (and expected presidential contender) declined an invite to speak at the event, and so did former Vice President Mike Pence, South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott and New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu.

Many of these rising Republicans, including DeSantis, instead attended the private Club for Growth donor meeting in Florida. Trump, notably, was not invited. The Club for Growth has long supported conservative candidates who uphold small government ideals.

Who's running against Trump?:Will Nikki Haley 2024 presidential race benefit Republican Party – or Donald Trump?

Presidential contender and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley attended both events, which speaks to her desire to bridge the gap between the Trump wing of the party and those who are ready to move on. 

DeSantis, on the other hand, is charting his own course – fully apart from Trump. The rivalry between the two men has heated up in recent months, with Trump openly mocking and threatening DeSantis. DeSantis, smartly, has stayed above the fray. 

DeSantis waging war on 'woke'

In addition to his Club for Growth speech last week, DeSantis spoke at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in California on Sunday. He is promoting his new book, "The Courage To Be Free: Florida’s Blueprint For America’s Revival."

New College overhaul:DeSantis wants to give Florida college students an anti-woke option. What's the big deal?

It could also read like a blueprint for his 2024 campaign. During his speech, he advocated how Florida is pro-business and pro-freedom and how it’s “where woke goes to die,” which has become a common refrain for the governor. 

It’s noteworthy that Trump used similar verbiage Saturday in his CPAC speech when he said, “The era of woke and weaponized government is over.

Trump is aware of DeSantis’ popularity and sees him as his biggest competition, so he’ll likely continue to copy some of DeSantis’ messaging.

It’s refreshing to see Republicans like DeSantis who aren’t afraid of Trump – and are showing it’s possible to succeed without pledging fealty to the MAGA doctrine. 

 

ATTACHMENT THIRTY EIGHT – From CBS

TRUMP MET WITH EARLY PRIMARY STATE GOP LEADERS IN NEVADA WHILE FLORIDA GOV. RON DESANTIS SPOKE TO CONSERVATIVE GROUP CLUB FOR GROWTH

CBS, MARCH 4th, 2023 / 9:33 AM 

 

For nearly three hours on Thursday, former President Donald Trump met with a group of Nevada State GOP officials at his Mar-a-Lago club, which was his first direct outreach to party leaders of the early primary state, a Trump campaign official confirms. 

Trump discussed political strategy and campaigning in the battleground state and said he would make a trip within the next couple months, or sooner, to the Silver State. Trump campaign officials also briefed the Nevada GOP leaders on their 2024 path.  

The dinner was the latest example of the Trump campaign's aggressive outreach to state and local party officials in the early primary states like Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and beyond. Unlike his disorganized 2016 bid for the White House, Trump and his 2024 campaign have pushed a strategic, and early, focus on state GOP leaders and likely delegates to next year's Republican National Convention, according to Trump campaign sources.  

Senior Trump campaign adviser Brian Jack, who was at Thursday's dinner along with senior campaign cohorts Susie Wiles and Jason Miller, among others, has taken the lead on reaching out to state party leaders. 

Other 2024 rivals, like former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, and potential primary opponents to Trump like former Vice President Mike Pence and Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina also are increasing their  presence and imprint in early states like Iowa, South Carolina and New Hampshire. Haley and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, another potential GOP contender, head to Iowa next week, respectively. Trump heads to the Hawkeye State three days later.

On the same day as the Nevada GOP dinner, and only three miles away from Mar-a-Lago at the Breakers Hotel in Palm Beach, DeSantis addressed a  closed-door Club for Growth donor retreat. DeSantis framed himself as a new Republican leader who was not afraid to engage in a culture clash on issues that matter most to the GOP base.

"I'm going on offense," DeSantis said in a 40-minute speech, according to a source in the room." Some of these Republicans, they just sit back like potted plants and they let the media define the terms of the debate, they let the left define the terms of debate, they take all this incoming, because they're not making anything happen."

The Club for Growth, who previously supported Trump, did not invite the former president to attend. The influential conservative group with connections to high-dollar donors told CBS earlier this year that they are looking for a new GOP standard bearer to move past Trump, and win back the White House.

DeSantis remarks at the Club for Growth meetings were first reported by CNN.  

 

ATTACHMENT THIRTY NINE – From NPR

HOW (AND WHY) GOV. RON DESANTIS TOOK CONTROL OVER DISNEY WORLD'S SPECIAL DISTRICT

By Emily Olson Updated February 28, 2023 11:51 AM ET 

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a bill on Monday to take control of municipal services and development for the special zone encompassing Walt Disney World. ATTACHMENT 39 - From NPR

The move deals a major blow to the company's ability to operate with autonomy.

DeSantis says that the special district surrounding Disney World has enabled the park to unfairly skirt local rules and building codes.

But DeSantis' critics say the bill looks like retaliation for a growing feud between Disney and the governor, which hit a tipping point last year. DeSantis said Disney "crossed the line" by opposing an education bill that restricts classroom discussion around gender identity and sexual orientation.

Here's a rundown of the situation.

What's in the new bill?

"The corporate kingdom finally comes to an end," DeSantis said during a news conference announcing the move on Monday. "There's a new sheriff in town, and accountability will be the order of the day."

The heart of the bill is the appointment of a five-person state board to oversee municipal services, such as fire protection and road maintenance, where Disney World operates.

DeSantis wanted to punish Disney. Repealing its tax status may hurt taxpayers instead

The newly appointed board will have the ability to raise revenue to fund services and pay off Disney's debts. DeSantis' previous pledge to strip Disney of its special tax status sparked fears that local taxpayers would be left on the hook, which would, in turn, spark a significant spike in local tax rates.

DeSantis stressed on Monday that under the new structureDisney would still be responsible for its municipal debts and local governments would not raise taxes.

DeSantis wants to end Disney World's special status in Florida

The governor said the five board members include people who "very much want to see Disney be what Walt envisioned," implying that Disney's values wouldn't be negatively impacted.

The members include Martin Garcia, whose private investment firm regularly donates to Republican candidates, Michael Sasso, a local elections lawyer, and Bridget Ziegler, a conservative school board member and wife of the Florida Republican Party chairman.

In press materials released with the bill signing, DeSantis' office said the bill would also end some of Disney's other special privileges, such as exemption from state regulatory reviews.

What does the bill mean for Disney?

The creation of the self-governing zone, known as Reedy Creek Improvement District, was instrumental to Disney's decision to build its theme park near Orlando in the 1960s, according to WMFE reporter Amy Green.

The zone sits on nearly 25,000 acres, sandwiched between Orange and Osceola counties. Once a remote and rural area, the Reedy Creek Improvement District received electricity, water, roads and police thanks to Disney's investments.

DeSantis' power is on full display as he pushes lawmakers on Disney and redistricting

According to a local tax collector, Disney has taxed itself roughly $53 million each year to pay off the debts from that development.

Disney did not immediately respond to NPR's request for comment, but the company has previously told media outlets that it wouldn't fight the government takeover.

What's behind the Disney-DeSantis feud?

Disney, which employs nearly 80,000 people in central Florida, wields great influence in the state.

The company donated to DeSantis during the 2020 election cycle. In 2021, the governor's staff reportedly worked with Disney to give it an exemption from a law designed to crack down on big tech companies.

EFFORTS TO RESTRICT RIGHTS FOR LGBTQ YOUTH

After protests, Disney CEO speaks out against Florida's 'Don't Say Gay' bill

But the relationship between the two started to sour that same year after Disney took a stricter stance on preventing the spread of COVID-19, mandating its workers show proof of vaccination and its theme park guests continue to wear face coverings.

At the same time, Disney was increasingly drawing criticism from conservatives for making changes to its parks and films to increase inclusivity. Disney World closed Splash Mountain, for example, after a petition accusing it of "stereotypical racist tropes" gained 21,000 signatures.

DeSantis, who has been fighting what he calls "woke indoctrination," said the company "crossed the line" when Disney CEO Bob Chapek said he'd support the repeal of Florida's Parental Rights in Education Act, known by its critics as the "Don't Say Gay" bill.

DeSantis immediately turned Chapek's statement into a fundraising point. A month later, he introduced legislation on revoking Disney's special tax status.

 

ATTACHMENT FORTY – From Fox@

GOV. RON DESANTIS: DISNEY WILL FINALLY PAY ITS FAIR SHARE

 

DeSantis immediately turned Chapek's statement (above) into a fundraising point inciting former MSNBC host Keith Olbermann to argue that the easiest solution to push back against Gov. Ron would be to move Disney World to another state... bringing more howls of outrage and ridicult from The Fox.  (below)

"This isn't difficult. Move all the irreplaceable items out of the current DisneyWorld. Rebuild in the Carolinas or Puerto Rico. Then invite RonDeSantis to Disney's Orlando facility and burn the place down while he watches," Olbermann tweeted.

Social media users pounced on the tweet for returning to the suggestion that Disney could simply move its massive multi-billion operation to another state. 

Right-wingers pounced..."Don't threaten me with a good time," Washington Examiner executive editor Seth Mandel joking while conservative Twitter personality Noam Blum added, "Is there a compound German word that means ‘solutions to complex problems that sound like a teenager proposed them after getting high at a campfire?’"

Even alleged neutrals like Washington Post columnist Megan McArdle explained, "I actually looked into this possibility (minus the arson) and concluded that there simply aren't a lot of good substitutes for Disneyworld. Land is more expensive, construction is more expensive, and finding a place on the mainland with good weather and big plots of land is hard." 

Radio host Royce Lopez remarked, "Puerto Rico can't even keep their building standing when there's a strong wind do you really think Keith that they could handle a multi-billion dollar theme park industrial complex? Also all the New Yorkers moved to Florida so there's already enough Puerto Ricans at Disney now."

 

ATTACHMENT FORTY ONE  Also from the Fox

FAR-LEFT OLBERMANN RIDICULED FOR REVIVING 'MOVE DISNEY WORLD' IDEA TO SPITE DESANTIS

By Lindsay Kornick  Published March 2, 2023

 

After nearly a year, former MSNBC host Keith Olbermann once again argued on Wednesday that the easiest solution to push back against Gov. Ron DeSantis, R-Fla., would be to move Disney World to another state.

The tweet came two days after DeSantis signed a bill into law that officially revoked Disney’s previous self-governing power over the Reedy Creek Improvement District, the district where Disney World is located. The bill put the district under the control of a state board of term-limited members recently announced by DeSantis.

In response to this move, Olbermann insisted that Disney should fire back by moving its massive park and "burning" the remains.

"This isn't difficult. Move all the irreplaceable items out of the current DisneyWorld. Rebuild in the Carolinas or Puerto Rico. Then invite RonDeSantis to Disney's Orlando facility and burn the place down while he watches," Olbermann tweeted.

Social media users pounced on the tweet for returning to the suggestion that Disney could simply move its massive multi-billion operation to another state. 

Right-wingers pounced..."Don't threaten me with a good time," Washington Examiner executive editor Seth Mandel joking while conservative Twitter personality Noam Blum added, "Is there a compound German word that means ‘solutions to complex problems that sound like a teenager proposed them after getting high at a campfire?’"

Even alleged neutrals like Washington Post columnist Megan McArdle explained, "I actually looked into this possibility (minus the arson) and concluded that there simply aren't a lot of good substitutes for Disneyworld. Land is more expensive, construction is more expensive, and finding a place on the mainland with good weather and big plots of land is hard." 

Radio host Royce Lopez remarked, "Puerto Rico can't even keep their building standing when there's a strong wind do you really think Keith that they could handle a multi-billion dollar theme park industrial complex? Also all the New Yorkers moved to Florida so there's already enough Puerto Ricans at Disney now."

placeholder

RedState writer Bonchie tweeted sarcastically, "’It’s not difficult to move a bazillion dollar, already built theme park the size of a small city with 77000 employees.’"

"Someone please help Keith Olbermann," Substack writer Jim Treacher wrote.

Olbermann was previously one of several liberal journalists who offered the "simple" solution that Disney could relocate its 40-square mile theme park to a more politically agreeable state in Apr. 2022. This came after DeSantis originally signed a bill to begin dissolving Disney’s self-governing status within the state. 

Regarding the decision to revoke Disney’s privileges in Florida, DeSantis proclaimed on "Tucker Carlson Tonight" that the corporation would finally "pay" its "fair share."

"For the first time since 1967, Disney no longer has its own government," he explained. "They're going to have to abide by the same laws as everybody else. They're going to finally pay their fair share of taxes and pay all the debts that they've racked up over these decades."

 

ATTACHMENT FORTY TWO – From CNN 

DESANTIS APPOINTEE TO NEW DISNEY OVERSIGHT BOARD SUGGESTED TAP WATER COULD TURN PEOPLE GAY

By Andrew KaczynskiEm Steck and Steve Contorno, Updated 6:34 PM EST, Fri March 3, 2023

 

An appointee to Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ new oversight board in control of Disney’s special tax district called homosexuality “evil” last year and shared a baseless conspiracy theory that tap water could be making more people gay.

On Monday, the Republican governor appointed Ron Peri, an Orlando-based former pastor and the CEO of The Gathering – a Christian ministry focused on outreach to men – as one of five people who will now oversee the Reedy Creek Improvement District, the government body that has given Disney unique powers in Central Florida for more than half a century.

DeSantis signed a bill in February that allowed him to replace the district’s existing board – mostly people with ties to Disney – with a five-member body that he hand-picked. The move to remove power from Disney comes nearly a year after the company spoke out against a Florida bill – which DeSantis later signed into law – to restrict certain classroom instruction about sexual orientation and gender identity.

A CNN KFile review of Peri’s past comments found that he frequently made derogatory remarks about the LGBTQ community.

“So why are there homosexuals today? There are any number of reasons, you know, that are given. Some would say the increase in estrogen in our societies. You know, there’s estrogen in the water from birth control pills. They can’t get it out,” Peri baselessly said in a January 2022 Zoom discussion, later put on YouTube. “The level of testosterone in men broadly in America has declined by 50 points in the past 10 years. You know, and so, maybe that’s a part of it.”

“But the big part I would suggest to you, based upon what it’s saying here, is the removal of constraint,” he continued. “So our society provided the constraint. And so, which is the responsibility of a society to constrain people from doing evil? Well, you remove the constraints, and then evil occurs.”

Testosterone levels in men have dropped in recent decades, and researchers are unsure why, but the drop is not 50%, and there is no indication that a drop in testosterone affects sexual orientation. Likewise, there is no evidence that estrogen in the water supply, for which birth control pills account for a statistically insignificant amount, affects sexual orientation. The claim that chemicals in tap water could turn people gay has gained ground with conspiracy theorists over the years, most memorably with fringe commentator Alex Jones, who said chemicals in the water were “turning the friggin’ frogs gay.”

In the same discussion, Peri called homosexuality “shameful,” linking it to disease.

“There are a lot of unhealthy effects of a homosexual lifestyle,” said Peri. “There are diseases, but it goes beyond that.”

 

Peri has also said that LGBTQ people “don’t have a stake in the future” because many do not have children, and he called gay people “deviant.”

In one discussion, he linked homosexuality to the fall of the Roman Empire – a fringe historical belief occasionally pushed by some Christian activists.

“Homosexuality was praised,” Peri said. “LGBTQ today is being emphasized everywhere, even on children’s shows. And so ultimately the Romans had become weak.”

Peri’s discussions, which focused on seeing the modern world through a Biblical viewpoint, often touched on social topics. In other discussions uploaded on YouTube, Peri said that “not very long ago being a mother was the pinnacle of being a woman,” and he compared abortion to genocides like the Holocaust.

“It has boggled my mind that you have not seen a massive backlash from the Black population for what is effectively a genocide. And if you look to the right, you can see that in world history, there have been great killers. The Holocaust, 11 million were killed. Six million Jews,” said Peri, pointing to a chart comparing abortion to genocide.

Peri and DeSantis did not respond to CNN’s requests for comment.

DeSantis and Disney

Peri’s appointment to the oversight board comes after a long-standing battle between DeSantis and Disney over the Parental Rights in Education Act – which critics have called Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” law. The law bars schools from teaching about sexual orientation and gender identity in kindergarten through third-grade classrooms and in older classrooms that do not meet yet-to-be-defined standards.

After Disney’s then-chairman spoke out against the bill last year, DeSantis stripped the company of its unique governing power within the Reedy Creek Improvement District, the special taxing district created more than half a century ago that effectively gave the entertainment giant control of what has grown to 25,000 acres around its Orlando-area theme parks.

On Monday, DeSantis changed course and signed a new bill that extended the life of the Reedy Creek Improvement District but gave the governor new powers over its future. The new law ousted the existing board, renamed it the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District and allowed DeSantis to appoint all five members – one of whom was Peri.

This week, DeSantis told supporters that Disney’s opposition to the Parental Rights in Education Act was a “only a mild annoyance” and that the motivation for effectively punishing the company was in response to it allegedly injecting “a lot of this sexuality into the programming for young kids.” He has suggested that the new board could influence Disney’s business decisions by adding park discounts for Florida residents and even altering the company’s entertainment offerings.

“When you lose your way, you know, you gotta have people that are going to tell you the truth, and so we hope that they can get back on,” DeSantis said. “But I think all these board members very much would like to see the type of entertainment that all families can appreciate.”

Historically, the Reedy Creek board oversaw a fire department, water systems, roadways and building inspections around the Disney theme parks and could issue bonds and take on debt for long-term infrastructure programs. Democratic lawmakers in Florida who opposed DeSantis’ takeover of the board warned that a politically motivated body could wield that power over Disney.

“Are we going to see board members vetoing projects that are considered to go against any governor?” state Rep. Rita Harris said during floor debate on the proposal. “For instance, Walt Disney just changed Splash Mountain. They made it Tiana’s Bayou (Adventure). What if the governor didn’t like that? Would the board then be able to push a company into changing their business model just so that they don’t misalign (with) them?”

In addition to Peri, DeSantis also appointed to the board Martin Garcia, a Tampa lawyer whose private investment firm contributed $50,000 to the governor’s 2022 reelection campaign, and Bridget Ziegler, a co-founder of the conservative organization Moms for Liberty and the wife of Christian Ziegler, the new chairman of the Republican Party of Florida.

 

ATTACHMENT FORTY THREE  From the National Review

ABOUT MICHAEL KNOWLES’S CPAC SPEECH

By SARAH SCHUTTE

 

 

Rich is joined by Michael, Maddy, and Phil on today’s edition of The Editors, and prominent among their topics is a discussion of Michael Knowles’s CPAC speech.

This speech has spread like wildfire, drawing criticism for his saying transgenderism must be eradicated, among other things. Maddy sets the record straight, saying, “This isn’t verbatim, but what he really said was . . . that there’s no middle ground when it comes to transgenderism. Either it’s true or it’s false. . . . And then the clause that people conveniently left out was ‘this whole preposterous ideology.’ . . . So he was very clearly talking about the ideology and not . . . transgender people.”

Michael agreed, and then stressed that Knowles had a point. There’s only so long that this phenomenon can continue, he said, and “it’s time for a swift, decisive intervention of common sense. This stuff has no business being in public schools. . . . There’s a bias in American society towards allowing people to live in their self-delusions. Right? But this one is harmful enough that I think it’s totally appropriate for Michael Knowles and everyone else to long for the end of it.”

 

ATTACHMENT FORTY FOUR  From the Atlanta Journal-Constitution

EX-WALKER AIDE REVEALS IDENTITY IN GROPING LAWSUIT AGAINST CPAC HEAD

By Greg Bluestein, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution  March 9, 2023

 

A former Herschel Walker aide who accused the leader of the Conservative Political Action Conference of “aggressively fondling” him on the campaign trail in Georgia disclosed his identity after a judge required him to drop his anonymity to go forward with a lawsuit.

The staffer is Carlton Huffman, a North Carolina resident and longtime Republican operative who worked as a staffer last year for Walker’s failed U.S. Senate bid.

Huffman cited privacy concerns and fear of retaliation when he shielded his identity in a January civil lawsuit filed in January against Matt Schlapp, who leads one of the nation’s most influential conservative groups.

 

But he agreed to use his real name in the lawsuit, which seeks more than $9 million in damages, after a Virginia judge said he must disclose his identity for the complaint to proceed.

Huffman detailed the allegations in a January interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution before the filing. This week, he also shared with the AJC a series of videos detailing his allegations that he said he filmed shortly after he and Schlapp parted ways.

Schlapp has denied the accusations, and a spokesman accused Huffman of trying to “litigate this in the media while hiding behind anonymity to avoid scrutiny of his unsavory past, troubled work history and issues with honesty.”

“We are confident that when his full record is brought to light in a court of law, we will prevail,” said the spokesman, Mark Corallo.

The AJC typically grants anonymity to alleged victims of sexual assault, but Huffman has disclosed his identity because he’s agreed to make it public to advance his lawsuit. He said this week that he was “moving forward” with the case.

Schlapp heads the American Conservative Union, which hosted its annual Conservative Political Action Conference earlier this month. The closely watched event featured speeches from U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, former President Donald Trump and several potential 2024 hopefuls.

In the lawsuit, Huffman accused Schlapp of fondling his “genital area in a sustained fashion” on Oct. 19 as he drove Schlapp from a late-night stop at Manuel’s Tavern to his hotel near Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport.

“It’s to my shame that I didn’t say anything,” Huffman previously told the AJC. “I wish I had said, ‘What the hell — stop!’ "

Huffman informed leaders of the Walker campaign immediately after the alleged incident, the campaign confirmed to the AJC. A senior Walker staffer said the campaign ensured Huffman had no more contact with Schlapp and connected him with the campaign’s lawyer and other support.

Huffman said the incident took place as Walker was traveling the state to promote his unsuccessful challenge to Democratic U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock. Huffman, 39, was tasked with driving Schlapp from an event in the Middle Georgia town of Perry.

After he dropped Schlapp at the hotel, he received a text inviting him for drinks that night at the Capital Grille in Buckhead. He described Schlapp’s behavior at the restaurant as “weird” but not menacing.

Schlapp wanted to head to a livelier bar, Huffman said, so they drove to Manuel’s Tavern, a Midtown Atlanta watering hole known as a popular haunt for Democratic politicos.

He said around 10 p.m. the outing turned more uncomfortable, as Schlapp’s leg “was in almost constant contact” with his leg, according to the complaint. Schlapp also repeatedly asked the aide why he wouldn’t look at him, the lawsuit said.

On the drive back to Schlapp’s hotel, a Hilton Garden Inn near the airport, the aide said Schlapp reached over and fondled his crotch for at least 5 seconds.

“I think I mentally blocked out the look on his face at first,” Huffman said. “He then asked me to go up to his room, and I said no.”

Huffman said he called two friends to let them know what happened, and the next day, he informed other Walker staffers. He shared with the AJC texts he said were between him and Schlapp along with three videos he recorded on Oct. 20.

“This is probably one of the most ashamed posts that I’ve ever had to send,” Huffman said in one of the videos, in which he broke down as he questioned why he didn’t demand that Schlapp stop touching him.

Saying he made the video to share with someone he trusted to prove his allegations, Huffman then described Schlapp fondling him. “And I’m there saying, ‘What the hell is going on?’ ”

 

ATTACHMENT FORTY FIVE  From the Daily Kos

'IT’S ALL LOSERVILLE OVER THERE AT CPAC': DESPONDENT NEVER-TRUMPERS RELISH GOP'S MIDTERM DRUBBING

By Kerry Eleveld  Tuesday March 07, 2023 · 4:11 PM EST

 

Last weekend's Principles First Summit of Never-Trumpers who have effectively been banished from the Republican Party was generally a somber—even depressing—affair.

Panels at the downtown D.C. event included the jaunty topics of "Can the GOP survive?" and “Looking to 2024: Hope and Despair — but Mostly Despair,” according to Politico.

But even as their Republican counterparts simultaneously romped at the MAGA-fied Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) across town, these weary conservatives truly could rejoice in one thing: the comically abysmal showing of Donald Trump's hand-picked midterm candidates.

 

"It’s all loserville over there at CPAC," quipped one-time GOP rising star Barbara Comstock, a former congresswoman who was swept out of her northern Virginia district in the anti-Trump wave of 2018.

To be sure, Comstock's political future has been all but snuffed out by Trumpism, but she's not wrong about the MAGA cohort in Maryland either. Although they were zealously rocking the CPAC event, they've proven to be a bunch of bonafide losers for three consecutive election cycles now. In fact, the 2022 midterms proved that the more precisely defined candidates are by their anti-democratic MAGA credentials, the more likely they are to get crushed at the ballot box.

That electoral reality is something anti-MAGA Republicans are just as thrilled by as Democrats. And it's a reminder that at least at this moment in time, Democrats and many never-Trumpers share common cause even if we disagree on an abundance of policy questions.

So while Trump was disparaging old-guard fiscal conservatives and neocons as "freaks" and "fools," some of those so-called freaks and fools were openly embracing Democrats.

“It turns out that once you let the toothpaste out of the tube, so to speak, demagoguery and bigotry and all that, some people like it. It’s hard to get it back,” remarked longtime conservative, neocon, and never-Trumper Bill Kristol. “You can’t just give them a lecture.”

“We need to defeat the Trump Republicans. And if that means being with the Democrats for a while, that’s fine,” Kristol added. In fact, Kristol went so far as to imagine a Democratic 2024 ticket of Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Rep. Abigail Spanberger of Virginia. “That’s fine with me,” he said.

To be clear, the Principles summit had an unmistakable pity party vibe to it more than an actual strategy session.

“There are members of my family that don’t speak to me. They actually think I’m an enemy of the state,” said former national security official Olivia Troye, who resigned from Vice President Mike Pence’s office in August 2020. “It’s almost like you’re trying to teach critical thinking to someone again.”

Former Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, a veteran who served on the House select committee investigating Jan. 6, said he had a falling out with his former co-pilot in the U.S. Air Force.

“I had my co-pilot in the war that told me I should have just stayed a pilot because I’m a terrible politician,” Kinzinger said. “And he was ashamed to have fought with me.”

That is just brutal.

Democrats may not like many of these Republicans to varying degrees, but in many ways the meager slice of the conservative electorate they represent is the difference between Georgia being represented by Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock or MAGA right-winger and serial abuser Herschel Walker, or Arizona being led by Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs or MAGA election denier Kari Lake.

For now, we can all unite around the fact that CPAC remains Loserville

 

ATTACHMENT FORTY SIX – From the Guardian U.K.

RON DESANTIS IS JUST GETTING STARTED WITH HIS RIGHTWING AGENDA. THAT SHOULD WORRY US ALL

By Margaret Sullivan Fri 10 Mar 2023 06.10 EST

 

 

It’s appalling to see the media lavish DeSantis with so much fawning coverage. Especially after all he has done

·          

·          

 

The Florida governor Ron DeSantis likes to brag that he’s just getting started with his rightwing agenda.  “You ain’t seen nothing yet,” was how he put it in one recent speech.

 

Banning ideas and authors is not a ‘culture war’ – it’s fascism

Jason Stanley

 

He means it as a promise, but it ought to be heard as a threat. That’s particularly true for women whose abortion rights already are being dangerously curtailed and for gay and transgender students who are already being treated as lower life forms. It’s particularly true for those who care about voting rights and press rights, and for those who cherish the power of books and free expression as a foundation of societal wellbeing.

Of course, if DeSantis should somehow capture the presidency (he’s undeclared thus far but the Oval Office is clearly on his mind), that threat would extend to our entire nation and to the world beyond.

“DeSantis rules by an authoritarian playbook,” wrote Miami Herald columnist Fabiola Santiago, despite the Orwellian title of the governor’s book, The Courage to Be Free.

Let’s review some of what has happened on his watch with the help of a rubber-stamp Republican state legislature.

The Parental Rights in Education Act, better known as “don’t say gay”, prevents teachers from talking about gender identity and sexual orientation in some elementary-school grades.

The so-called Stop Woke Act restricts how race is discussed in Florida’s schools, colleges and even private workplaces.

Another law pulled a slew of books from public school libraries while they are reviewed for their supposed suitability. (There are no limits to the craziness: after one parent’s complaint, many high schools yanked The Bluest Eye, the literary masterpiece by Nobel laureate Toni Morrison.)

There’s more, including on the healthcare front. Florida’s medical boards now bar transgender youth from gender-affirming medical care such as hormone therapy. State law bans most abortions beyond 15-weeks gestation; a new bill would tighten that to only six weeks.

And, of course, never forget that true liberty means ready access to guns: Florida residents may soon be able to carry firearms without a state license.

Governor courage-to-be-free also wants to limit press rights, including supporting a challenge to the landmark US supreme court decision that for decades has given journalists enough protection from defamation lawsuits to let them do their jobs.

When DeSantis signed into law new restrictions on voting rights, he did so in a room where local reporters were shut out. Fox News, however, got special access. In another blast of Orwellian doublespeak, the law promises “election integrity” while actually making it harder to vote by mail and greatly limiting the use of drop boxes. No surprise: those rules have the harshest impact on voters of color and those with disabilities.

DeSantis also got his legislature to establish a new and completely unnecessary election crimes office. After the first few cases turned into a legal embarrassment, he got his rubber-stampers to change the law again.

Given all of this, it’s a scary thought that he’s just getting started.

That’s why it’s appalling to see the media lavish him with so much fawning coverage. Fox News has put its calamitous love affair with Donald Trump on ice while it swoons over his younger rival.

DeSantis enjoys glowing treatment from the mainstream press, too. All too predictably, many of the headlines from his recent State of the State speech not only centered on presidential politics but also magnified his boasts. Here’s a skepticism-free example from CNBC:

“‘You ain’t seen nothing yet’: Florida Governor Ron DeSantis touts state record and fuels 2024 speculation.”

The media should be delving into the substance of that record, including the kitchen-table economic issues that have nothing to do with performative anti-woke nonsense. Instead of letting DeSantis play at will on his favorite field of divisive social issues, reporters should dig into his war on teachers’ unions, like trying to limit how they can collect dues and where they conduct union business. Reporters might even point out that this runs counter to Republican claims that they are now the workers’ party.

One of the smartest things I read last week was a journalism manifesto in six words from NYU professor Jay Rosen: Not the odds, but the stakes. This sums up the organizing principle he recommends the media adopt for the political cycle ahead; such coverage would emphasize not the horserace but the consequences for our democracy.

With DeSantis, as with Trump, those stakes are incredibly high. Especially if his threat is true and we ain’t seen nothing yet.

·         Margaret Sullivan is a Guardian US columnist writing on media, politics and culture

 

ATTACHMENT FORTY SEVEN – From the Daily Beast

MADE FOR WALKING

Trump-DeSantis Feud Over Heeled Boots Spills Into Real Life

By Jake Lahut Updated Mar. 08, 2023 9:20AM ET / Published Mar. 07, 2023 8:03PM ET 

 

 

What was once an online spat materialized face-to-face between their supporters, portending what could be a massively bitter GOP primary fight.

The fight has been simmering for months, but what really set it off was a Super Bowl tweet.

Alex Bruesewitz, a 25-year-old Trump-aligned GOP consultant, started a flame war with the DeSantis influencerverse when he tweeted an old photo appearing to show Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis drinking with 18-year-old high school girls during his teaching stint at the Darlington School in Georgia as a 23-year-old.

In a since-deleted tweet, right-wing pundit and Army Green Beret veteran Jim Hanson defended the governor, arguing that “partying with 18-year-old hotties” made him like DeSantis more.

With tensions already simmering between Trump loyalists and a new brigade of defectors behind DeSantis, the online animosity finally spilled over into real life over the weekend at the Conservative Political Action Conference outside Washington.

 

Notably, DeSantis himself was absent, ditching the lightly attended Trump-loving confab for a speech with a TV-ready packed crowd at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in California. But many of his supporters were roaming the halls of CPAC in full force—so it was almost inevitable that a clash would ensue between supporters of Ronald and the Donald.

When DeSantisworld pundit John Cardillo was making his way through the media booths at CPAC, he found Bruesewitz.

Bruesewitz asked if Hanson, accompanied by his wife, was the “18-year-old hotties guy.” Cardillo interjected to warn Bruesewitz not to speak to Hanson like that in front of his wife.

Previous online grudges quickly resurfaced, including Bruesewitz tweeting photos of the Florida governor’s footwear to speculate that DeSantis has been using thicker boots to appear taller.

 “You want a picture of his boots?” Hanson said at the beginning of a video from the tussle. “Do you understand what a Cuban boot is?”

“It’s weird, dude,” Cardillo then interjected. “He doesn't know what boots are, we found that out.”

In the video, Cardillo then accused Bruesewitz of “stalking” and “harassing” him before Hanson declared: “You got nothing, dude?”

That, predictably, opened a whole separate can of worms, with Hanson telling the Trump consultant he isn't “interesting” or “funny.”

“Expendable child soldier,” Cardillo chimed in, taking further aim at Bruesewitz.

As for Hanson, he declined to speak on the record for the story. “I don’t conduct intra-party squabbles on enemy media,” he told The Daily Beast when reached for comment. Likewise, Cardillo declined to comment on the record.

Bruesewitz’s lawyer, Joseph McBride—who was present during the hostile exchange at CPAC—claimed in a phone interview that his client began the interaction cordially before Cardillo, in a “very juvenile-like fashion, started coming at Alex, and then the other guy joined in.”

“It’s all fun and games, it's just like people are trading barbs, obviously, you have people on the Trump side and you have people who are on the DeSantis side—healthy competition, nothing wrong with that,” McBride added.

As Trump and DeSantis inch closer to open war in the 2024 GOP primary, their camps have searched for useful lines of attack on issues like Social Security and COVID policies.

But the blow-up between their respective loyalists over tweets and boots at CPAC portends a fight that may get even more absurd and trivial than anyone thought possible.

Private conversations within Trumpworld about DeSantis suggest that plenty of new lows are still possible as the campaign heats up.

Just for starters, Trump confidants have been attempting to quantify DeSantis’ true Body Mass Index—the same metric that Trump obsessed over during his time in the White House. A reliable height and weight for the Florida governor have thus far evaded MAGA sleuths.

 

DeSantis is listed as 5’9”. The Florida governor was recently photographed standing beside golf legends Tiger Woods, who is known to be 6’1”, and Rory McIlroy, who stands at 5’9’. In the photo, DeSantis appeared to be as tall as Woods. That has led to some speculation that, on top of heeled boots, DeSantis may be using height inserts inside his boots.

The fixation on boots is yet another feature of the Trump-DeSantis feud that spilled over from the online meme wars.

Inside Trump's inner circle, those close to the former president have poked fun at a photo of DeSantis wearing tall white rubber boots while touring the damage left by Hurricane Ian last year. Since Trump’s trip to East Palestine, Ohio—where Trump wore a Timberland style boot—those in his inner circle have concluded that their boss has better taste in working men's footwear.

“Donald Trump had work boots on. DeSantis had Dallas Cowboy cheerleader boots on,” a source close to Trump bragged to The Daily Beast, while also making the case that “Donald Trump reacts to disasters. Ron DeSantis hesitates."

Further driving home Trumpworld’s fixation with DeSantis’ boots, as New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman noted on Monday evening, Trump associates have begun flagging mentions on the topic—even when that means sharing an article from a liberal website like Jezebel.

Those in DeSantis’ corner say the Florida governor is wearing a “Cuban-heeled” boot—which naturally is designed to feature an extended heel. Trumpworld operatives also argue that Ron’s fashion follies extend to the tailoring of his suits—an artform with which Trump has had his own struggles.

The entire feud—revolving around waistlines, boot heels, and height—is just the latest sign of a brewing Trump-DeSantis war. But the feud going from online to real life, even if it more closely resembled an elementary school recess argument than a fist fight, is the latest escalation.

“Why isn’t DeSantis vetting these people?” one seasoned Republican strategist told The Daily Beast, referring to Cardillo and Hanson.

Another GOP strategist said Bruesewitz made for an odd target, given both his age and the reputation of his consulting firm, which has business on both sides of the MAGA and GOP establishment divide.

“In a short time, Alex has built a strong business and become influential with MAGA warriors and GOP leadership,” the consultant said, requesting anonymity to avoid involving clients in the fracas.

“The 50-year-old guys like Cardillo in this video give massive Lincoln Project vibes,” this consultant added, referring to the NeverTrump political firm—a particularly stinging insult in today’s GOP.

One source who has spoken with Trump told The Daily Beast that in recent weeks the former president has privately weighed the idea of casting the Florida governor as “DeSoros,” one of a host of nicknames being floated behind the scenes.

Trump has also reportedly tested out the nickname “Tiny D.” While “Tiny D” hasn’t caught on among the MAGA faithful, attempts to paint DeSantis as a tool of Soros has, with Trump allies—including former Trump administration official Sebastian Gorka—amplifying such a line of attack.

“There is no other candidate in history who has the energy and stamina President Trump has, and he will out-work and out-pace Joe Biden to Save America,” Trump spokesman Steven Cheung told The Daily Beast when asked about the “DeSoros” nickname and Trump’s inner circle investigating DeSantis’ BMI.

While many GOP voters seem perfectly fine with a Trump-DeSantis feud—with the political chips falling as they may—this latest CPAC flare-up does indicate just how personal the feelings are between the two sides’ foot soldiers.

As the longtime GOP strategist said, “What a dumpster fire.”

 

ATTACHMENT FORTY EIGHT – From the Epoch Times

TRUMP IS ‘ONLY CHOICE FOR AMERICA,’ FLAG-WAVING SUPPORTER, OTHERS SAY AT CPAC

By Janice Hisle  March 7, 2023 Updated: March 9, 2023

 

WASHINGTON—Donald Trump is “the only choice for America,” declared Joseph Verderber Jr., after hearing the former president speak at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) outside Washington this past weekend.

Verderber and his brother, John, were literally flag-waving patriots at CPAC. That gathering, by all accounts, was heavily weighted toward Trump, perhaps even more so this year than in the past. Whether that popularity is reflected outside the CPAC sphere remains to be seen.

Some attendees, particularly the college-age crowd, think Trump’s brash style has divided the Republican Party and is unlikely to draw crossover votes from Democrats and Independents.

But most CPAC attendees at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center seemed to align with Verderber’s stance.

Verderber is a New Yorker who had been apolitical for his entire adult life until tragedy struck. His nephew, Joseph L. Verderber, 24, died of a fentanyl overdose in 2016.

Then Verderber saw how adamant Trump was about stopping the drug from flowing from China and Mexico into the United States. That prompted Verderber to get involved in politics. Now he’s all in. And he’s fighting especially hard for Trump because “this current regime has a wide open border,” potentially leading to more fentanyl deaths.

A still-undeclared challenger to Trump, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, would probably make a good president someday, Verderber conceded. But “now is not the right time” for DeSantis or anyone else who is inexperienced with the inner workings of “the D.C. Swamp,” Verderber said.

Verderber thinks that only Trump has the nerve and the knowledge to clean it out. “The Swamp is done,” Verderber declared. “Watching that is gonna be fun.”

And he is convinced that Trump is the right candidate to bring the party together under his “America First” policies and to win back the White House for the GOP in 2024.

An unidentified woman makes her way through a crowded corridor at CPAC, wearing a Donald Trump-theme dress, on March 2, 2023. (Janice Hisle/The Epoch Times)

Straw Poll Landslide

The CPAC straw poll reflected that same type of confidence in Trump, with 62 percent of the votes cast for him, trouncing DeSantis, who drew 20 percent.

DeSantis skipped the conference, causing a stir. Instead, he participated in a fundraiser in Florida.

All other potential candidates registered in the single digits, including a trio of declared challengers, all of whom spoke on the CPAC stage: Perry Johnson, a Michigan businessman (5 percent); Nikki Haley, former South Carolina governor (3 percent); and Vivek Ramaswamy, entrepreneur and author (1 percent).

Post-CPAC, Ramaswamy gave a Fox Business interview on March 6, claiming that a consultant contacted his campaign and said, “Hey, we can get you up to No. 2 on there (in the CPAC straw poll) if you pay one hundred thousand dollars.”

In a tweet that drew more than 340,000 views, Ramaswamy shared a video of that interview and commented, “Shocking to see how corrupt this process actually is. My #1 promise this year: I will expose the corruption and will not hold back.” Ramaswamy did not disclose for whom the consultant worked.

CPAC organizers did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Ramaswamy’s statement.

The conference, which ran March 1–4, also was criticized for seemingly drawing fewer attendees. Fake photos began making the rounds online, showing a sea of empty chairs, purporting to show the lack of interest in Trump’s speech. But chairs, carpeting and other fixtures in the photos did not resemble the venue where Trump spoke on March 4.

About 15 minutes before Trump took the stage, an Epoch Times reporter took a photograph showing that about a half-dozen back rows were unoccupied; the rest of the ballroom, which holds about 5,000 people, seemed to be filled.

CPAC organizers said those rows were later filled. CPAC spokeswoman Megan Powers said, “Despite the Biden inflation economy, it was a full house in the ballroom during President Trump’s speech, which did not even include those watching online.”

Powers also disputed reports that attendance was abysmal. “It is typical that the fake news is making up fake ticket sales to portray CPAC as a failure. We had to stop ticket sales on Friday (March 3) because we were at capacity,” Powers said in a text to The Epoch Times. “Numbers were on par with where we were the last time we were in DC in 2020.” Powers gave no specific figures, but organizers did say that a record number of participants, more than 2,000, voted in the straw poll.

Immigrants Love Trump

Interviews with CPAC attendees revealed mostly unwavering enthusiasm for Trump; those who admitted only lukewarm support or opposition seemed to be few and far between, except among the younger crowd. And even most of them said they would grudgingly support Trump if he becomes the nominee.

Quite a few immigrants said they support Trump for fiercely defending the freedoms that attracted them to this country. They think some Americans don’t understand what is at stake because they have never known what living under an oppressive regime is like. But they say President Joe Biden’s administration has given them a taste of that, with vaccine mandates and other heavy-handed intrusions on personal liberty.

Stephanie Liu, a Chinese-American wearing a red hat with Trump’s “Make America Great Again” slogan,  says Trump has worked hard to fend off the threat of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

Liu also said Trump’s strength inspires her and others to be courageous, despite worries over the CCP seeking out those who speak out against communism.

She thinks many other Americans cannot comprehend the tyranny of such a regime.

Liu is concerned that the United States seems to be taking steps in that direction. A prime example: The people who have been locked up for more than two years without bail after they were arrested on various charges stemming from the Save America rally to support President Trump on Jan. 6, 2021, Liu said.

“Don’t forget the J-6ers!” Liu exclaimed to passersby at CPAC.

Although some people did smash windows and confront police at the U.S. Capitol, most people were peaceful at the massive protest against irregularities in the 2020 presidential election.

The real stories of what happened that day have been suppressed, four people who were prosecuted for nonviolent acts told an overflowing CPAC session on March 3.

Images of an angry mob of “insurrectionists” dominated much of the news coverage that has been aired for the past two years, said Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson.

But footage showing officers calmly escorting people into the building has been hidden from the American public by Democrats who wanted to construct an anti-Trump narrative, he said. That was revealed after Republicans took the majority in the U.S. House of Representatives and released thousands of hours of video exclusively to Carlson’s team.

Four days before that footage aired, Liu told The Epoch Times at CPAC that she strongly objects to U.S. citizens being held without bail.

“This is un-American,” she said. “How can America have political prisoners?”

Liu, of New York, is part of a group that for months has held a nightly vigil outside the jail, singing patriotic songs to lift the prisoners’ spirits.

And, about 35 people from that group are now chipping in about $100 apiece per month to rent a home where relatives of the prisoners and other supporters can stay for free, she said.

“We are people who take action.”

Dozens of people swarmed around Liu at CPAC during her impassioned live interview with Trump surrogate and political commentator Steve Bannon.

The group began chanting, “Take down the CCP!” Liu smiled, saying the response encouraged her.

Bannon helped start a political movement called the New Federal State of China, a lobbying group that seeks to overthrow the CCP.

Some Young Voters Favor DeSantis

In a spacious atrium, away from the hubbub, five students from Liberty University, a Christian university in Lynchburg, Va., paused for a photo and spoke with The Epoch Times on March 2.

All staff members of the school’s student newspaper, “The Liberty Champion,” the 20-somethings nodded in unison when one of them mentioned preferring DeSantis for president.

But James DuVall confessed he also really likes Haley.

“She is different than Trump, more gentle in approach, and represents a broader demographic,” DuVall said, referring to her status as the daughter of immigrants.

But Kristina Smith said that, to her, Haley comes across as “too weak.” She thinks DeSantis comes across as “more bipartisan.”

“Trump divided the Republican Party more than he’s helped it,” Smith said. Among her peers, she estimated that 60 percent “hated” the former president’s infamous Twitter storms.

Micah Gilmer found Trump’s statements about illegal immigrants troubling. “He seemed to imply that all illegal immigrants are bad,” Gilmer said. “Some of them are people who just need a new home and a new start.”

The way Trump has expressed himself seems to betray character flaws, Gilmer said. “The way he talks and behaves all go to the man inside,” he said.

Kristen Pace said she disliked Trump’s name-calling.

All five students said they generally favored Trump’s policies; his style is what bothered them.

When asked how much style matters, Smith said, “Policies do affect people the most. But personal character and integrity affect people just about as much as policies do.”

Some people in political circles say, “There can be no Trump policies without Trump.” But DuVall disagreed. “Anyone can do the policies,” he said.

If Trump wins the Republican nomination, “I would most likely vote for him,” Pace said in a text message. “I think most average Americans, whether they be Republican or Democrat, have seen the pitfalls of Biden and may be more likely to swing for the upcoming election.”

Smith also responded via text:  “Even though he’s not my first pick (or even my second pick), he would be favorable over Joe Biden or another Democrat candidate. I’d rather support a candidate with strong policies and poor morals than a candidate with poor policies and poor morals.”

Smith was skeptical about whether the straw poll represented the majority of Republicans. She thinks CPAC “seemed to be filled with Republicans that are more on the extreme side” and “mega-Trump fans.”

Viewpoints Differ

One of those fans proudly decked out in Trump gear was 24-year-old Patrycja Brylska, who immigrated to the United States from Poland when she was 13.

“I love Trump for so many reasons,” she said. “I think the most important thing for people to consider is his policies… I truly believe he is the only president I have seen that has actually loved America so much that he was willing to sacrifice everything that he has in order to bring comfort to this country, to the American people.”

Brylska rattled off policies she likes: a secure border, supporting the police and military, adding jobs, strengthening the American economy, “everything that touches our everyday lives.”

“I think he does an incredible job,” she said. She also thinks the establishment fiercely opposes him because he’s an outsider.

“He’s a billionaire; they can’t buy Trump, and that’s why they hate him.”

When told that some of her peers disapproved of Trump’s style but liked his policies, Brylska responded: “Even if some people don’t like his style, this is why he’s been so successful.

“He doesn’t take anything from anybody. He stands up for his opinion, and he speaks his mind and the truth exactly how it is. He doesn’t need to sugarcoat it.”

And while Trump does engage in name-calling that some people see as childish, “most of the time they do deserve it, to be quite frank with you, and I don’t think it damages the party at all.”

Brylska grew up in Florida, and she likes DeSantis. But, for her, there’s no comparison.

“DeSantis is an amazing governor with amazing policies,” she said. “But the only person who can run this country effectively, and fix all the bad things happening, in my opinion, is Donald Trump.”

 

ATTACHMENT FORTY NINE – From Gingrich360.com

PRESIDENT TRUMP’S SURPRISINGLY POWERFUL CPAC SPEECH

March 9, 2023

 

It is worthwhile to read Donald Trump’s CPAC speech to better understand the candidate and his extraordinary base among Republicans and independents.

President Donald Trump returned to the Conservative Political Action Conference as candidate Trump.

As always, the CPAC audience was supportive and engaged (members gave President Trump a 62 percent majority in a straw poll compared with Gov. Ron DeSantis’s 20 percent).

However, to truly appreciate the speech, I recommend you read the transcript as it was delivered. President Trump’s staying power as a national leader is better understood by seeing the details of his approach.

First, he constantly wove in specific references to people in the audience. Other than former President Bill Clinton, I do not know anyone else who can recognize dozens of people and ad lib at the right moments throughout a long speech.

Second, he cited the facts from his five years of changing America (counting 2016 for the language and issues he raised). Trump changed the direction of American politics and government more than any other president since Franklin Delano Roosevelt. On topic after topic, he made the unthinkable into the debatable – and then the doable. He pushed for taking on China, insisting that NATO meet its obligations, revising our agreements with Mexico and Canada, controlling the border, and fighting the swamp. Again and again, Trump set new standards and charted a new direction.

Third, he contrasted his handling of the Taliban – and the methodical steps he was taking to end the Afghanistan war with dignity, honor, and safety – to the disastrous Joe Biden-Mark Milley incompetence. (Remember, there were no Americans killed in 18 months under Trump, and he had a clear commitment to keep Bagram Airfield operating due to its proximity to Chinese nuclear capabilities.) Similarly, he contrasted his America First energy policy with Biden’s American last energy strategy. Trump’s approach kept oil prices low so that Vladimir Putin could not afford to invade Ukraine. Biden has enriched Putin and empowered him to sell Russian petroleum to sustain a war. On point points, Trump was vivid and convincing.

The specificity, clarity, and power of Trump’s commitments were stunning. He vowed to “obliterate the deep state” and settle Russia’s war against Ukraine. Further he said he would greatly increase funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, and use “all necessary state, local, federal, and military resources” to find, catch and deport people in the country illegally who commit crimes and are involved in criminal gangs. In his words:

“We will pick them up, and we will throw them out of our country, and there will be no questions asked. It will be my policy to take down the cartels just as I took down the ISIS caliphate.

Trump went on in specific commitments:

“I will direct the Department of Justice to go after Marxist prosecutors’ offices to make them pay for their illegal, race-based enforcement of the law… On day one, I will revoke Joe Biden’s crazy executive order installing Marxist Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Czars in every federal agency, and I will immediately terminate all staffers hired to implement this horrible agenda… We will ban all racial discrimination by the government.

“I will fight for parents’ rights… including universal school choice, and the direct election of school principals by the parents…

“I will revoke every Biden policy promoting the chemical castration and sexual mutilation of our youth — and ask Congress to send me a bill prohibiting child sexual mutilation in all 50 states…

“I will revoke China’s Most Favored Nation trade status. I will implement a four-year plan to phase out all Chinese imports of essential goods and gain total independence from China… And I will hold China financially accountable for unleashing the China Virus upon the world.”

Fourth, more than any candidate since President Ronald Reagan, Trump has begun to vividly describe a better, more dynamic, and more exciting future:

“It is not enough just to stop the forces tearing America down. I want once again to build America up… Our objective will be a quantum leap in the American standard of living, especially for our young people. As I announced yesterday, we will hold a competition to build new Freedom Cities on the frontier to give countless Americans a new shot at home ownership and the American Dream.”

The CPAC speech is the tip of an iceberg of a whole series of positive, visionary policy videos which can be seen here,” and more are coming.

For anyone who thinks President Trump will be worn down by the left, various Justice Department assaults, the continued bias of the elite media, and the ranting of the Never Trumpers, consider the most recent Emerson College Poll in New Hampshire has President Trump at 58 percent, Gov. DeSantis at 17 percent, and every other candidate in single digits.

With that big a lead, it is probably worthwhile to read the CPAC speech and try to better understand the candidate and his extraordinary base among Republicans and independents.

 

 

ATTACHMENT FIFTY – From The American Conservative

By Micah Meadowcroft Mar 8, 2023 12:05 AM

 

“That’s why I’m standing before you. Because we are going to finish what we started. We started something that was America. We’re going to complete the mission. We’re going to see this battle through to ultimate victory. We’re going to make America great again.” 

The Conservative Political Action Conference was, by all reports, a much diminished affair this year. Like much of the country, CPAC remains not fully recovered to pre-Covid lockdown glory (not that I would know what that looked like; I’ve never been, and, at this rate, seem unlikely to ever go). But if it is a pettier kingdom than it once was, Donald Trump remains its sovereign. 

The 45th won the conference straw poll handily, with 62 percent. And though some viewers were predictably put off by a speech they found “dark,” Trump won the day rhetorically, too. His CPAC address suggests a renewed focus by his re-election campaign on the themes and realities that placed him in the White House in the first place. 

“In 2016, I declared I am your voice. Today, I add I am your warrior, I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution.” Much has been made of this line in particular, a new “American carnage” synecdoche for the speech as a whole. And it should be, for to those not blinkered by the conventions and norms of professional politics, “I am your retribution” is a reminder of what made Trump a special candidate from the start. 

“I had a beautiful life before I did this. I lived in luxury. I had everything. People said to me, ‘Are you sure you want to do it, sir?’ I said, ‘Oh, this will be so amazing.’ What the hell did you get me into? I didn’t know the word subpoena. I didn’t know the word grand jury.” This is the fact that the deranged have so much difficulty acknowledging; it still rankles, and so they still reach for fantasies of Russian conspiracy. 

George W. Bush became president the old way, the final rung on an American cursus honorum, scion of an establishment family and already a governor. Barack Obama streamlined the Clinton process, the presidency a stepping stone into the public-private life of wealth and power that defines our global elite. Joe Biden, too, only became rich after becoming a senator. Trump broke that mold, leaving a life of opulence to enter an arena that has left him far more vulnerable than he ever was before.

This is why the MAGA base believes him when Trump says, as he has before and did again last week, “But they’re not coming after me, they’re coming after you and I’m just standing in their way.” He stands for the base; he stands up for them—it is what representation, re-presentation, means. “When a wonderful town in Ohio has difficulty, we are going to take care of that town, that city, that village prior to worrying about the rest of the world.” And if Trump sticks to that, he will be the 2024 Republican nominee for president. 

 “People are tired of RINOs and globalists. They want to see America first. That’s what they want. It’s not too complicated.” It really isn’t that complicated, putting America first. On trade, on the border, and most of all on foreign policy, this is where Trump has further set himself apart from the American political establishment and its conventions, assumptions, and interests as a global class apart. 

“At the top of my list, we’ll be stopping the slide into costly and never-ending wars, we got to stop it. Can’t keep spending hundreds of billions of dollars protecting people that don’t even like us.” As the last year of Ukraine hysterics has shown, Europe has no interest in pulling its own weight and the old GOP has no interest in making them. “We are never going back to a party that wants to give unlimited money to fight foreign wars that are endless wars, that are stupid wars, but at the same time, demands that we cut veterans benefits and retirement benefits at home.”

On China: “They built their military and they have a very powerful military with the money that we gave them. How stupid are we?” On his record: “I was the only president in modern history who did not have any new wars, no new wars. I finished some old ones.” On his temperament: 

Remember when the Democrats and my Republican opponents would often look at me during the debates or whatever and they’d say, “No, no. He’s going to bring us into World War III because it’s a personality type.” They said I had the personality. No, I had the personality type that kept us out of wars because people knew that they weren’t going to mess around with us.

Is he wrong? 

If you look at Ukraine, and we all feel so badly about it, but why isn’t NATO putting up dollar for dollar with us? We put up $140 billion and they put up just a tiny fraction of that. And we all want to see success, but it’s far more important to them than it is to us because of that location.

No one talks about NATO like Trump: 

They’re rich as hell right now, they spent on an office building that cost $3 billion. It’s like a skyscraper in Manhattan laid on its side, it’s one of the longest buildings I’ve ever seen, and I said, “You should have, instead of spending $3 billion, you should have spent $500 million building the greatest bunker you’ve ever seen.” Because Russia wouldn’t even need an airplane attack. One tank, one shot through that beautiful glass building and it’s gone.

Is he wrong? 

One can dispute the man on Iran, the danger to America it does or doesn’t pose and the tactics of non-proliferation. But that is a sideshow, and will be a sideshow, unless people like Nikki Haley and Mike Pompeo are allowed back into a Trump administration. There is potential for misstep in personnel once again. One cannot dispute that China is our nearest peer rival, however, or that our southern border is in chaos. Both are as much foreign policy and national security issues as they are trade and culture questions, and in regards to both of them Donald J. Trump shows himself less narcissistic than our political establishment. 

“Fentanyl is pouring in. Families are being wiped out, destroyed, and there’s death everywhere, all caused by incompetence. Millions of illegal aliens are stampeding across our border. Interior enforcement has been shut down.” A Republican House says it will hold Biden and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to account for a worsening disaster, but Congress is weak, and there is only so much a realist can expect C-SPAN show ponies to do. “To stop the flow of deadly drugs, it will be my policy to take down the cartels just as I took down the ISIS caliphate that everybody said was impossible to do.”

The proverbial first step of recognizing that we have a problem in China has been taken by more and more of the governing class since Trump forced it on them, but he remains the boldest voice about it on the national stage. “I will revoke China’s most favored nation’s trade status immediately on day one, and I will implement a four-year plan to phase out all Chinese imports of essential goods and gain total independence from China. We have to do it.” Decoupling, as the nerds here in D.C. put it, will be a painful process, though, sure to meet resistance at home as much as abroad. “​​I smashed the false idols of the free trade fanatics. These are fools or they’re getting very rich, probably the second.”

If it was a dark speech, it is only because we live in dark times. Who can pretend now that they are certain their children will inherit a safer, more prosperous America than they did? There were thirty years of excess, America standing tall alone, detached from limits and reality, and now the bill is coming due. “If those opposing us succeed, our once beautiful USA will be a failed country that no one will even recognize. A lawless, open borders, crime-ridden, filthy, communist nightmare.” Is he wrong?

It was not a speech without hope, however: 

Our objective will be a quantum leap in the American standard of living, especially for our young people. As I announced yesterday, we will hold a competition to build new freedom cities on the frontier to give countless Americans a new shot at home ownership and the American dream. It’s such a wonderful, beautiful thing. 

I’ll challenge the governors of all fifty states, all fifty states, to join me in a great beautification campaign. We will rename our schools and boulevards not after communists, but after great American patriots. We will get rid of bad and ugly buildings in return to the magnificent classical style of Western civilization. 

We will support baby boomers, and we will support baby bonuses for a new baby boom. How does that sound? I want a baby boom. Oh, you men are so lucky out there. You’re so lucky. You are so lucky, men. 

Our country will shine, thrive, and prosper like never before. All of this is within our reach, but only if we have the courage to complete the job, gut the deep state, reclaim our democracy, and banish the tyrants and Marxists into political exile forever.

 

 

 

ATTACHMENT A - From CNN

FACT CHECK: TRUMP DELIVERS WILDLY DISHONEST SPEECH AT CPAC

 

By Daniel Dale, CNN  Updated 9:06 PM EST, Sun March 5, 2023

 

As president, Donald Trump made some of his most thoroughly dishonest speeches at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference.

As he embarks on another campaign for the presidency, Trump delivered another CPAC doozy Saturday night.

Trump’s lengthy address to the right-wing gathering in Maryland was filled with wildly inaccurate claims about his own presidency, Joe Biden’s presidency, foreign affairs, crime, elections and other subjects.

Here is a fact check of 23 of the false claims Trump made. (And that’s far from the total.)

Crime and civil unrest

1 Crime in Manhattan

While Trump criticized Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, who has been investigating Trump’s company, he claimed that “killings are taking place at a number like nobody’s ever seen, right in Manhattan.”

Facts First: It isn’t even close to true that Manhattan is experiencing a number of killings that nobody has ever seen. The region classified by the New York Police Department as Manhattan North had 43 reported murders in 2022; that region had 379 reported murders in 1990 and 306 murders in 1993. The Manhattan South region had 35 reported murders in 2022 versus 124 reported murders in 1990 and 86 murders in 1993. New York City as a whole is also nowhere near record homicide levels; the city had 438 reported murders in 2022 versus 2,262 in 1990 and 1,927 in 1993.

Manhattan North had just eight reported murders this year through February 19, while Manhattan South had one. The city as a whole had 49 reported murders.

2 The National Guard and Minnesota

Talking about rioting amid racial justice protests after the police murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis in 2020, Trump claimed he had been ready to send in the National Guard in Seattle, then added, “We saved Minneapolis. The thing is, we’re not supposed to do that. Because it’s up to the governor, the Democrat governor. They never want any help. They don’t mind – it’s almost like they don’t mind to have their cities and states destroyed. There’s something wrong with these people.”

Facts First: This is a reversal of reality. Minnesota’s Democratic governor, Tim Walz, not Trump, was the one who deployed the Minnesota National Guard during the 2020 unrest; Walz first activated the Guard more than seven hours before Trump publicly threatened to deploy the Guard himself. Walz’s office told CNN in 2020 that the governor activated the Guard in response to requests from officials in Minneapolis and St. Paul – cities also run by Democrats.

 

Trump has repeatedly made the false claim that he was the one who sent the Guard to Minneapolis. You can read a longer fact check, from 2020, here.

3 Trump’s executive order on monuments

Trump boasted that he had taken effective action as president to stop the destruction of statues and memorials. He claimed: “I passed and signed an executive order. Anybody that does that gets 10 years in jail, with no negotiation – it’s not ’10’ but it turns into three months.” He added: “But we passed it. It was a very old law, and we found it – one of my very good legal people along with [adviser] Stephen Miller, they found it. They said, ‘Sir, I don’t know if you want to try and bring this back.’ I said. ‘I do.’”

Facts FirstTrump’s claim is false. He did not create a mandatory 10-year sentence for people who damage monuments. In fact, his 2020 executive order did not mandate any increase in sentences.

Rather, the executive order simply directed the attorney general to “prioritize” investigations and prosecutions of monument-destruction cases and declared that it is federal policy to prosecute such cases to the fullest extent permitted under existing law, including an existing law that allowed a sentence of up to 10 years in prison for willfully damaging federal property. The executive order did nothing to force judges to impose a 10-year sentence.

4 Vandalism in Portland

Trump claimed, “How’s Portland doing? They don’t even have storefronts anymore. Everything’s two-by-four’s because they get burned down every week.”

Facts First: This is a major exaggeration. Portland obviously still has hundreds of active storefronts, though it has struggled with downtown commercial vacancies for various reasons, and some businesses are sometimes vandalized by protesters. Trump has for years exaggerated the extent of property damage from protest vandalism in Portland.

Russia, Ukraine and NATO

5 Russian expansionism

Boasting of his foreign policy record, Trump claimed, “I was also the only president where Russia didn’t take over a country during my term.”

Facts First: While it’s true that Russia didn’t take over a country during Trump’s term, it’s not true that he was the only US president under whom Russia didn’t take over a country. “Totally false,” Michael Khodarkovsky, a Loyola University Chicago history professor who is an expert on Russian imperialism, said in an email. “If by Russia he means the current Russian Federation that existed since 1991, then the best example is Clinton, 1992-98. During this time Russia fought a war in Chechnya, but Chechnya was not a country but one of Russia’s regions.”

Khodarkovsky added, “If by Russia he means the USSR, as people often do, then from 1945, when the USSR occupied much of Eastern Europe until 1979, when USSR invaded Afghanistan, Moscow did not take over any new country. It only sent forces into countries it had taken over in 1945 (Hungary 1956, Czechoslovakia 1968).”

6 NATO funding

Trump said while talking about NATO funding: “And I told delinquent foreign nations – they were delinquent, they weren’t paying their bills – that if they wanted our protection, they had to pay up, and they had to pay up now.”

Facts First: It’s not true that NATO countries weren’t paying “bills” until Trump came along or that they were “delinquent” in the sense of failing to pay bills – as numerous fact-checkers pointed out when Trump repeatedly used such language during his presidency. NATO members haven’t been failing to pay their share of the organization’s common budget to run the organization. And while it’s true that most NATO countries were not (and still are not) meeting NATO’s target of each country spending a minimum of 2% of gross domestic product on defense, that 2% figure is what NATO calls a “guideline”; it is not some sort of binding contract, and it does not create liabilities. An official NATO recommitment to the 2% guideline in 2014 merely said that members not currently at that level would “aim to move towards the 2% guideline within a decade.”

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg did credit Trump for securing increases in European NATO members’ defense spending, but it’s worth noting that those countries’ spending had also increased in the last two years of the Obama administration following Russia’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea and the recommitment that year to the 2% guideline. NATO notes on its website that 2022 was “the eighth consecutive year of rising defence spending across European Allies and Canada.”

7 NATO’s existence

Boasting of how he had secured additional funding for NATO from countries, Trump claimed, “Actually, NATO wouldn’t even exist if I didn’t get them to pay up.”

Facts First: This is nonsense.

There was never any indication that NATO, created in 1949, would have ceased to exist in the early 2020s without additional funding from some members. The alliance was stable even with many members not meeting the alliance’s guideline of having members spend 2% of their gross domestic product on defense.

We don’t often fact-check claims about what might have happened in an alternative scenario, but this Trump claim has no basis in reality. “The quote doesn’t make sense, obviously,” said Erwan Lagadec, research professor at George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs and an expert on NATO.

Lagadec noted that NATO has had no trouble getting allies to cover the roughly $3 billion in annual “direct” funding for the organization, which is “peanuts” to this group of countries. And he said that the only NATO member that had given “any sign” in recent years that it was thinking about leaving the alliance “was … the US, under Trump.” Lagadec added that the US leaving the alliance is one scenario that could realistically kill it, but that clearly wasn’t what Trump was talking about in his remarks on spending levels.

James Goldgeier, an American University professor of international relations and Brookings Institution visiting fellow, said in an email: “NATO was founded in 1949, so it seems very clear that Donald Trump had nothing to do with its existence. In fact, the worry was that he would pull the US out of NATO, as his national security adviser warned he would do if he had been reelected.”

8 The cost of NATO’s headquarters

Trump mocked NATO’s headquarters, saying, “They spent – an office building that cost $3 billion. It’s like a skyscraper in Manhattan laid on its side. It’s one of the longest buildings I’ve ever seen. And I said, ‘You should have – instead of spending $3 billion, you should have spent $500 million building the greatest bunker you’ve ever seen. Because Russia didn’t – wouldn’t even need an airplane attack. One tank one shot through that beautiful glass building and it’s gone.’”

Facts First: NATO did spend a lot of money on its headquarters in Belgium, but Trump’s “$3 billion” figure is a major exaggeration. When Trump used the same inaccurate figure in early 2020, NATO told CNN that the headquarters was actually constructed for a sum under the approved budget of about $1.18 billion euro, which is about $1.3 billion at exchange rates as of Sunday morning.

9 The Pulitzer Prize

Trump made his usual argument that The Washington Post and The New York Times should not have won a prestigious journalism award, a 2018 Pulitzer Prize, for their reporting on Russian interference in the 2016 election and its connections to Trump’s team. He then said, “And they were exactly wrong. And now they’ve even admitted that it was a hoax. It was a total hoax, and they got the prize.”

Facts First: The Times and Post have not made any sort of “hoax” admission. “The claim is completely false,” Times spokesperson Charlie Stadtlander said in an email on Sunday.

Stadtlander continued: “When our Pulitzer Prize shared with The Washington Post was challenged by the former President, the award was upheld by the Pulitzer Prize Board after an independent review. The board stated that ‘no passages or headlines, contentions or assertions in any of the winning submissions were discredited by facts that emerged subsequent to the conferral of the prizes.’ The Times’s reporting was also substantiated by the Mueller investigation and Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee investigation into the matter.”

The Post referred CNN to that same July statement from the Pulitzer Prize Board.

10 Awareness of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline

Trump claimed of his opposition to Russia’s Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline to Germany: “Nord Stream 2 – Nobody ever heard of it … right? Nobody ever heard of Nord Stream 2 until I came along. I started talking about Nord Stream 2. I had to go call it ‘the pipeline’ because nobody knew what I was talking about.”

Facts First: This is standard Trump hyperbole; it’s just not true that “nobody” had heard of Nord Stream 2 before he began discussing it. Nord Stream 2 was a regular subject of media, government and diplomatic discussion before Trump took office. In fact, Biden publicly criticized it as vice president in 2016. Trump may well have generated increased US awareness to the controversial project, but “nobody ever heard of Nord Stream 2 until I came along” isn’t true.

11 Trump and Nord Stream 2

Trump claimed, “I got along very well with Putin even though I’m the one that ended his pipeline. Remember they said, ‘Trump is giving a lot to Russia.’ Really? Putin actually said to me, ‘If you’re my friend, I’d hate like hell to see you as my enemy.’ Because I ended the pipeline, right? Do you remember? Nord Stream 2.” He continued, “I ended it. It was dead.”

Facts First: Trump did not kill Nord Stream 2. While he did approve sanctions on companies working on the project, that move came nearly three years into his presidency, when the pipeline was already around an estimated 90% complete – and the state-owned Russian gas company behind the project said shortly after the sanctions that it would complete the pipeline itself. The company announced in December 2020 that construction was resuming. And with days left in Trump’s term in January 2021, Germany announced that it had renewed permission for construction in its waters.

The pipeline never began operations; Germany ended up halting the project as Russia was about to invade Ukraine early last year. The pipeline was damaged later in the year in what has been described as an act of sabotage.

12 The Obama administration and Ukraine

Trump claimed that while he provided lethal assistance to Ukraine, the Obama administration “didn’t want to get involved” and merely “supplied the bedsheets.” He said, “Do you remember? They supplied the bedsheets. And maybe even some pillows from [pillow businessman] Mike [Lindell], who’s sitting right over here. … But they supplied the bedsheets.”

Facts First: This is inaccurate. While it’s true that the Obama administration declined to provide weapons to Ukraine, it provided more than $600 million in security assistance to Ukraine between 2014 and 2016 that involved far more than bedsheets. The aid included counter-artillery and counter-mortar radars, armored Humvees, tactical drones, night vision devices and medical supplies.

13 Biden and a Ukrainian prosecutor

Trump claimed that Biden, as vice president, held back a billion dollars from Ukraine until the country fired a prosecutor who was “after Hunter” and a company that was paying him. Trump was referring to Hunter Biden, Joe Biden’s son, who sat on the board of Ukrainian energy company Burisma Holdings.

Facts FirstThis is baseless. There has never been any evidence that Hunter Biden was under investigation by the prosecutor, Viktor Shokin, who had been widely faulted by Ukrainian anti-corruption activists and European countries for failing to investigate corruption. A former Ukrainian deputy prosecutor and a top anti-corruption activist have both said the Burisma-related investigation was dormant at the time Joe Biden pressured Ukraine to fire Shokin.

Daria Kaleniuk, executive director of Ukraine’s Anti-Corruption Action Center, told The Washington Post in 2019: “Shokin was not investigating. He didn’t want to investigate Burisma. And Shokin was fired not because he wanted to do that investigation, but quite to the contrary, because he failed that investigation.” In addition, Shokin’s successor as prosecutor general, Yuriy Lutsenko, told Bloomberg in 2019: “Hunter Biden did not violate any Ukrainian laws – at least as of now, we do not see any wrongdoing.”

Biden, as vice president, was carrying out the policy of the US and its allies, not pursuing his own agenda, in threatening to withhold a billion-dollar US loan guarantee if the Ukrainian government did not sack Shokin. CNN fact-checked Trump’s claims on this subject at length in 2019.

The economy

14 Trump and job creation

Promising to save Americans’ jobs if he is elected again, Trump claimed, “We had the greatest job history of any president ever.”

Facts FirstThis is false. The US lost about 2.7 million jobs during Trump’s presidency, the worst overall jobs record for any president. The net loss was largely because of the Covid-19 pandemic, but even Trump’s pre-pandemic jobs record – about 6.7 million jobs added – was far from the greatest of any president ever. The economy added more than 11.5 million jobs in the first term of Democratic President Bill Clinton in the 1990s.

15 Tariffs on China

Trump repeated a trade claim he made frequently during his presidency. Speaking of China, he said he “charged them” with tariffs that had the effect of “bringing in hundreds of billions of dollars pouring into our Treasury from China. Thank you very much, China.” He claimed that he did this even though “no other president had gotten even 10 cents – not one president got anything from them.”   False 25 cents

Facts First: As we have written repeatedly, it’s not true that no president before Trump had generated any revenue through tariffs on goods from China. In reality, the US has had tariffs on China for more than two centuries, and FactCheck.org reported in 2019 that the US generated an “average of $12.3 billion in custom duties a year from 2007 to 2016, according to the U.S. International Trade Commission DataWeb.” Also, American importers, not Chinese exporters, make the actual tariff payments – and study after study during Trump’s presidency found that Americans were bearing most of the cost of the tariffs.

16 The trade deficit with China

Trump went on to repeat a false claim he made more than 100 times as president – that the US used to have a trade deficit with China of more than $500 billion. He claimed it was “five-, six-, seven-hundred billion dollars a year.”

Facts First: The US has never had a $500 billion, $600 billion or $700 billion trade deficit with China even if you only count trade in goods and ignore the services trade in which the US runs a surplus with China. The pre-Trump record for a goods deficit with China was about $367 billion in 2015. The goods deficit hit a new record of about $418 billion under Trump in 2018 before falling back under $400 billion in subsequent years.

Elections

17 Trump and the 2020 election

Trump said people claim they want to run against him even though, he claimed, he won the 2020 election. He said, “I won the second election, OK, won it by a lot. You know, when they say, when they say Biden won, the smart people know that didn’t [happen].”

Facts First: This is Trump’s regular lie. He lost the 2020 election to Biden fair and square, 306 to 232 in the Electoral College. Biden earned more than 7 million more votes than Trump did.

18 Democrats and elections

Trump said Democrats are only good at “disinformation” and “cheating on elections.”

Facts First: This is nonsense. There is just no basis for a broad claim that Democrats are election cheaters. Election fraud and voter fraud are exceedingly rare in US elections, though such crimes are occasionally committed by officials and supporters of both parties. (We’ll ignore Trump’s subjective claim about “disinformation.”)

War and peace

19 The liberation of the ISIS caliphate

Trump repeated his familiar story about how he had supposedly liberated the “caliphate” of terror group ISIS in “three weeks.” This time, he said, “In fact, with the ISIS caliphate, a certain general said it could only be done in three years, ‘and probably it can’t be done at all, sir.’ And I did it in three weeks. I went over to Iraq, met a great general. ‘Sir, I can do it in three weeks.’ You’ve heard that story. ‘I can do it in three weeks, sir.’ ‘How are you going to do that?’ They explained it. I did it in three weeks. I was told it couldn’t be done at all, that it would take at least three years. Did it in three weeks. Knocked out 100% of the ISIS caliphate.”

Facts First: Trump’s claim of eliminating the ISIS caliphate in “three weeks” isn’t true; the ISIS “caliphate” was declared fully liberated more than two years into Trump’s presidency, in 2019. Even if Trump was starting the clock at the time of his visit to Iraq, in late December 2018, the liberation was proclaimed more than two and a half months later. In addition, Trump gave himself far too much credit for the defeat of the caliphate, as he has in the past, when he said “I did it”: Kurdish forces did much of the ground fighting, and there was major progress against the caliphate under President Barack Obama in 2015 and 2016.

IHS Markit, an information company that studied the changing size of the caliphate, reported two days before Trump’s 2017 inauguration that the caliphate shrunk by 23% in 2016 after shrinking by 14% in 2015. “The Islamic State suffered unprecedented territorial losses in 2016, including key areas vital for the group’s governance project,” an analyst there said in a statement at the time.

20 Military equipment left in Afghanistan

Trump claimed, as he has before, that the US left behind $85 billion worth of military equipment when it withdrew from Afghanistan in 2021. He said of the leader of the Taliban: “Now he’s got $85 billion worth of our equipment that I bought – $85 billion.” He added later: “The thing that nobody ever talks about, we lost 13 [soldiers], we lost $85 billion worth of the greatest military equipment in the world.”

Facts First: Trump’s $85 billion figure is false. While a significant quantity of military equipment that had been provided by the US to Afghan government forces was indeed abandoned to the Taliban upon the US withdrawal, the Defense Department has estimated that this equipment had been worth about $7.1 billion – a chunk of about $18.6 billion worth of equipment provided to Afghan forces between 2005 and 2021. And some of the equipment left behind was rendered inoperable before US forces withdrew.

As other fact-checkers have previously explained, the “$85 billion” is a rounded-up figure (it’s closer to $83 billion) for the total amount of money Congress has appropriated during the war to a fund supporting the Afghan security forces. A minority of this funding was for equipment.

21 The Afghanistan withdrawal and the F-16

Trump claimed that the Taliban acquired F-16 fighter planes because of the US withdrawal, saying: “They feared the F-16s. And now they own them. Think of it.”

Facts First: This is false. F-16s were not among the equipment abandoned upon the US withdrawal and the collapse of the Afghan armed forces, since the Afghan armed forces did not fly F-16s.

Immigration

22 The border wall

Trump claimed that he had kept his promise to complete a wall on the border with Mexico: “As you know, I built hundreds of miles of wall and completed that task as promised. And then I began to add even more in areas that seemed to be allowing a lot of people to come in.”

Facts First: It’s not true that Trump “completed” the border wall. According to an official “Border Wall Status” report written by US Customs and Border Protection two days after Trump left office, about 458 miles of wall had been completed under Trump – but about 280 more miles that had been identified for wall construction had not been completed.

The report, provided to CNN’s Priscilla Alvarez, said that, of those 280 miles left to go, about 74 miles were “in the pre-construction phase and have not yet been awarded, in locations where no barriers currently exist,” and that 206 miles were “currently under contract, in place of dilapidated and outdated designs and in locations where no barriers previously existed.”

23 Latin America and deportations

Trump told his familiar story about how, until he was president, the US was unable to deport MS-13 gang members to other countries, “especially” Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras because those countries “didn’t want them.”

Facts First: It’s not true that, as a rule, Guatemala and Honduras wouldn’t take back migrants being deported from the US during Obama’s administration, though there were some individual exceptions.

In 2016, just prior to Trump’s presidency, neither Guatemala nor Honduras was on the list of countries that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) considered “recalcitrant,” or uncooperative, in accepting the return of their nationals.

For the 2016 fiscal year, Obama’s last full fiscal year in office, ICE reported that Guatemala and Honduras ranked second and third, behind only Mexico, in terms of the country of citizenship of people being removed from the US. You can read a longer fact check, from 2019, here.

 

 

Mar 6, 2023

ATTACHMENT (A)

DONALD TRUMP’S CPAC SPEECH – UNCENSORED, UNEDITED and UN-FACTCHECKED

 

Donald Trump (00:00):

Well, thank you very much and I’m thrilled to be back at CPAC with thousands of great and true American patriots, and that’s what you are. I want to start by thanking Matt and Mercedes Schlapp and everyone at the American Conservative Union. Thank you, Matt, for hosting this wonderful event. It really has been something over the years. I also want to, we have so many people here, I’m going to leave out some, but they’ll understand. We have a lot of Congress, a lot of Senate, a lot of everything, but we’ll do a few words and a few names. Diana Harshbarger, thank you, Diana, Congresswoman. Mike Collins, Elise Stefanik, I call her the rocket ship. Where is Elise? She’s a rocket. Thank you, Elise. Jason Smith, a friend of mine, great guy. Thank you, Jason. Wesley Hunt, Cory Mills, Dr. Ronny Jackson. He’s a doctor, he’s an admiral. Where’s Ronny Jackson? He said I’m the healthiest man ever to be president by far. Said, if I wouldn’t eat junk food, I’d live 200 years. Where is he? He’s the greatest. We love you, Ronny.

(01:25)
He had a lot of things under his belt. Another one who’s a serious character, but a great guy. You got to know him. He’s a great guy. Matt Gates. Where’s Matt? Thank you, Matt. Great guy. He’s a brave guy. And another brave person, she started off very slow, very, very slow. She’s a low-key person, Marjorie Taylor Greene. Where is Marjorie? Thank you. Thank you, Marjorie. A good location, Marge. A friend of mine, a man who’s terrific, almost won for governor of New York. Could have done it, but so many people have moved out of New York, it gets tougher. But he’s a terrific guy, a great lawyer too, and he is a strong guy. He stopped somebody coming at him with a knife. I don’t know. He grabbed that guy’s hand, he looked pretty tough, and he drove him to the ground. Lee Zeldin, where’s Lee? Where’s Lee? Hi, Lee. Thank you. Good job, Lee. West Virginia attorney general Patrick Morrissey. Patrick, thank you, Patrick. Thank you. Thank you, Patrick.

(02:39)
Ohio attorney general Dave Yost. Thank you, Dave. Former acting attorney general of the United States, Matt Whitaker, Matt. A friend of mine who knows the border, knows more about illegal immigration than the next 10 people combined, Stephen Miller. Steven, hi, Steve. Great, good to have you here. One of my favorite generals, a guy who’s just great. He’s got a lot of common sense and a lot of smarts. And he’s been doing a lot of television lately and he does a fantastic job, General Keith Kellogg. Thank you, Keith. A very popular man in South America, very, very popular in Brazil, the former president of Brazil. President Bolsonaro, a great honor.

(03:41)
I don’t know, you beat all these US politicians. That’s pretty good. And his son, who’s a friend of mine, Brazilian chamber of deputies, Eduardo Bolsonaro. Hi, Eduardo. Great job you’re doing. Just got reelected. And somebody that we really like in this room, I think. I certainly like a lot. He had a lot of courage, very smart guy, James O’Keefe. Where’s James? Where is James? Thank you, James. Good guy. As we gather today, our country and our movement, the greatest political movement in the history of our country, as nobody going to even question it, even the fake news media. That’s a lot of fake news back there. And by the way, I want to thank the fire department. Look at these people. They’re up the rafters. Thank you, fire department. But the greatest in our history, most important battle in our lives is taking place right now as we speak. For seven years, you and I have been engaged in an epic struggle to rescue our country from the people who hate it and want to absolutely destroy it.

(05:25)
The sinister forces trying to kill America have done everything they can to stop me, to silence you, and to turn this nation into a socialist dumping ground for criminals, junkies, Marxists, thugs, radicals, and dangerous refugees that no other country wants. No other country wants them. If those opposing us succeed, our once beautiful USA will be a failed country that no one will even recognize. A lawless, open borders, crime-ridden, filthy, communist nightmare. That’s what it’s going and that’s where it’s going. I used to say that we will never be a socialist country. I said it oftentimes. I said it once at the State of the Union address and people didn’t understand what I was saying. But I’d shout it out loud and I was right because that train has passed the station long ago of socialism. It never even came close to stopping, frankly.

(06:26)
We’re now in a Marxism state of mind, a communism state of mind, which is far worse. We’re a nation in decline. Our enemies are desperate to stop us because they know that we are the only ones who can stop them. They know that this room is so important, the people in this room. They know that we can defeat them. They know that we will defeat them. But they’re not coming after me, they’re coming after you and I’m just standing in their way. That’s all I’m doing. I’m standing in their way. And that’s why I’m here today. That’s why I’m standing before you, because we are going to finish what we started. We started something that was America. We’re going to complete the mission. We’re going to see this battle through to ultimate victory. We’re going to make America great again. With you at my side, we will demolish the deep state. We will expel the warmongers. They are people that don’t get it, although, in some cases, they get it. They get it for their wallets, but we can’t do that. We can’t let that happen. We will drive out the globalists, we will cast out the communists. We will throw off the political class that hates our country. They actually hate our country. No walls, no borders, bad elections, no voter ID. We will beat the Democrats. We will route the fake news media. We will expose and appropriately deal with the rhinos. We will evict Joe Biden from the White House. And we will liberate America from these villains and scoundrels once and for all. When we started this journey, a journey like there has never been before, there’s never been anything like this. We had a Republican Party that was ruled by freaks, neocons, globalists, open border zealots, and fools. But we are never going back to the party of Paul Ryan, Karl Rove, and Jeb Bush.

(09:14)
We’re not going back to people that want to destroy our great social security system, even some in our own party, I wonder who that might be, that want to raise the minimum age of social security to 70, 75, or even 80 in some cases. And that are out to cut Medicare to a level that it will no longer be recognizable. And when that was their original thought, that’s what they always come back to. Remember that. You have to remember that. You heard it here first. We are never going back to a party that wants to give unlimited money to fight foreign wars that are endless wars, that are stupid wars. But at the same time, demands that we cut veterans benefits and retirement benefits at home.

(10:21)
Our soldiers will no longer live in the streets of our city. We have cities where our soldiers, our great soldiers, are living on concrete, they’re living on asphalt. We will take care of our soldiers. There has never been a time like this. Illegal immigrants come in and we house them in the Waldorf Astoria and many other of the greatest hotels anywhere in the world. But our soldiers, we do nothing for them. They sleep out at night and they freeze. They freeze in the cold and they die in the heat, while people that came into our country illegally are in beautiful hotel suites, perhaps watching us on television right now. We were taking care of our soldiers just a short while ago, but we don’t do that anymore. But we’ll start doing it again. Our soldiers are very special to us. When a wonderful town in Ohio has difficulty, we are going to take care of that town, that city, that village prior to worrying about the rest of the world.

(11:39)
We’re taking care of the problems of the rest of the world that they’re not taking care of themselves. They have us put up the money. You know what I’m talking about. If you look at Ukraine, and we all feel so badly about it, but why isn’t NATO putting up dollar for dollar with us? We put up $140 billion and they put up just a tiny fraction of that. And we all want to see success, but it’s far more important to them than it is to us because of that location. We are never going to be a country ruled by entrenched political dynasties in both parties. Rotten special interests, China-loving politicians, of which there are many. You listening to this, Mitch McConnell? You listening? And a militant left wing news media that’s either frightened of telling the truth or is truly evil and bad. I don’t know. I think in many ways they’re frightened, but you never really know which. We are not going back to this mindset, not now, not ever, not ever.

(13:06)
And thank you, Mark Levin, for being here tonight. Thank you very much. And Julie. Thank you. Thank you, Mark. Very important voice. Stay healthy, Mark. We can’t lose you. Just stay healthy. Stay healthy, Mark. We’re not going to lose you. In 2016, we took away the power of this corrupt political class. And we did more in four years than any administration in the history of our country, if you look at what we did. We shut down the illegal foreign invasion on our borders and achieved the most secure border in US history. We deported illegal criminal aliens by the tens of thousands. MS-13, taking them out by the thousands. We set records every single week, we were cleaning up our country. I smashed the false idols of the free trade fanatics. These are fools or they’re getting very rich, probably the second. And left the China lobby reeling from our historic tariffs and taxes that we charge them, bringing in hundreds of billions of dollars pouring into our treasury from China.

(14:22)
Thank you very much, China. When no other president had gotten even 25 cents, not one president got anything from them. Our trade deficits were five, six, $700 billion a year. A billion, think of it, dollars a year. Not sustainable by any country. They built their military and they have a very powerful military with the money that we gave them. How stupid are we? I was the only president in modern history who did not have any new wars, no new wars. I finished some old ones. I finished some old ones. Remember when the Democrats and my Republican opponents would often look at me during the debates or whatever and they’d say, “No, no. He’s going to bring us into World War III because it’s a personality type.” They said I had the personality. No, I had the personality type that kept us out of wars because people knew that they weren’t going to mess around with us.

(15:40)
That’s why I rebuilt our military. We were strong, we were safe. And I told delinquent foreign nations, they were delinquent, they weren’t paying their bills, that if they wanted our protection, they had to pay up and they had to pay up now. And they did. They paid $ 450 billion as soon as I said, “No, I won’t be protecting you if you don’t pay.” We truly had a policy of peace through strength. This was a serious, powerful policy. And we didn’t have to lose our loved ones fighting wars in countries that nobody’s ever heard of. I stood firm against the forces of anarchy and decay. I arrested the Marxists to topple statues of our great heroes in Washington, DC. We arrested them. They were knocking down the most beautiful artwork, the most beautiful statues of great heroes. They didn’t even know who they were doing. They just wanted anarchy. And I passed and signed an executive order. Anybody that that gets 10 years in jail with no negotiation. It’s not 10, but it turns into three months.

(16:59)
And it’s an incredible thing that stopped right away. They were heading to the Jefferson Memorial. They wanted to take out Thomas Jefferson. I don’t think so. I don’t think so. I don’t think we’re going to let that happen. But we passed it. It was a very old law that we founded. One of my very good legal people, along with Steven Miller, they found it. They said, “sir, I don’t know if you want to try and bring this back.” I said, “I do.” And as soon as we passed it, that was the end that just stopped. It’s amazing. It’s a miracle. We banned transgender insanity from our military and signed the world’s first ban on critical race theory long before anybody had even heard of the term. It was all banned, everything was good.

(17:51)
When Biden came back in, this guy came in and he put everything right back in place where it was. We were paying these people hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in salary among our highest paid people to teach all of this nonsense to our military yet. But it was all out, it was all done. There’s only one president in history who has ever taken on the entire corrupt establishment in Washington. And when we win in 2024, we will do it again even stronger, faster, and better, because… now I am experienced and I know the people of Washington. I didn’t know them. I was from New York. I only came here 17 times, they said. I read that in the fake news, so probably it’s not true, but it’s the best I could do. And I never stayed over. I was from New York. But I now know the good ones, the bad ones, the weak ones, the strong ones. I know them all. I know the people that have to do the job and can do the job. A lot of them are in this room right now.

(19:13)
And as I did for four incredible years, I will put America first every single time, every single day. From the beginning, we have been attacked by a sick and sinister opposition, the radical left communists, the bureaucrats, the fake news media, the big money special interests, the corrupt Democrat prosecutors. Oh, they’re after me for so many things. Oh, those prosecutors. Some are racists. Some hate our country. They all hate me. They’ll get me for anything, anything. You put a comma in this paragraph. Why did you do that? I don’t really know. The partisan and often corrupt intelligence agencies, the George Soros money machine that spends a lot of money on the prosecutors, by the way. The Antifa thugs who are allowed to roam the streets while we have people that in many cases are great patriots, great, great patriots, sing prayers every night, playing our national anthem every day. And they’re sitting in a jail nearby, rotting away, and being treated so unfairly like nobody’s probably ever been treated in this country before, except maybe me.

(20:48)
And Marjorie, you’ve been so fantastic on that issue. Where’s Marjorie? You’ve been so fantastic on that issue. And Elise and Matt, people that love our country, people that love our country have been so great on that issue. And the perverts who use the names of Washington and Lincoln to buy millions of dollars in ads to say bad, lifeless, and incorrect things about us. I didn’t know this was a rally, Matt. It really is a rally. And by the way, thank you for that beautiful straw poll. That was a big win, thank you. Our enemies are lunatics and maniacs. They cannot stand that they do not own me. I don’t need them. I don’t need anything about them. I don’t need their money. They cannot steer me, they cannot shake me, and they will never, ever control me. And they will never, ever, therefore, control you.

(22:13)
At the end of the day, anyone else will be intimidated, bought off, blackmailed, or ripped to shreds. I alone will never retreat. And that is why we must stand together and charge. We have to charge full speed ahead. I had a beautiful life before I did this. I lived in luxury. I had everything. People said to me, “Are you sure you want to do it, sir?” I said, “Oh, this will be so amazing.” What the hell did you get me into? I didn’t know the word subpoena. I didn’t know the word grand jury, those words, grand jury. I didn’t know that they want to lynch you for doing nothing wrong. I didn’t know they want to lynch you for doing a great job. I didn’t know they want to put you away because your poll numbers are better than anybody they’ve seen in years.

(23:20)
And then they go with the disinformation campaign. First of all, we’re leading every Republican by massive numbers. And very importantly, perhaps more importantly, we’re leading Biden by a lot, and we’re leading Kamala by a lot. And every time the polls go up higher and higher, the prosecutors get crazier and crazier. We got to stop these guys. Says, “We have to stop Trump now. We got to stop him now because we can’t stop him at the ballot box.” They tried that in 2016. How did that work out? Not too good. And we actually, and I have to say this, I hope Fox doesn’t turn up, but we did much better in 2020 than we did in 2016, much better.

(24:06)
But We have no choice. If we don’t do this, our country will be lost forever. People are tired of rhinos and globalists. They want to see America first. That’s what they want. It’s not too complicated. This is the final battle. They know it, I know it, you know it, everybody knows it. This is it. Either they win or we win. And if they win, we no longer have a country. And I promise you this, if you put me back in the White House, that beautiful building, but I live in very beautiful buildings, it’s not that reason. The beautiful. That building wasn’t the easiest building to live in with what I was put through. And I get a lot of credit. A lot of people say, “How do you do it, sir?” I had a man come up to me the other day, one of the toughest, strongest people that you can imagine. You all know his name, big businessman, a lot of money, a lot of success, tough as hell.

(25:06)
And he said, “Could I ask you a question, president?” A friend of mine, used to call me Donald, now he calls me president. “Could I ask you a question, president?” “What?” “How do you do it? How do you do it every day? They sent you subpoenas every day. There’re after you. They’re looking to take you down at levels that nobody’s ever put up with before.” Seven years I’ve gone through this. We beat them all, but it continues. And he said to me, “Seriously, how do you do it? I could never do it.” This is one of the toughest guys. I said, “Maybe you could.” He said, “Nope, I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t get out of bed in the morning. But I do it for you, and that’s what I’m doing it for. I do it for you.” Thank you, [inaudible 00:26:09]. Thank you very much. And if you put me back in the White House, their reign is over. Their reign will be over, and they know it. And America will be a free nation once again. We’re not a free nation right now. We don’t have free press. We don’t have free anything. In 2016, I declared I am your voice. Today, I add I am your warrior, I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution. I am your retribution. Not going to let this happen. Not going to let it happen. I will totally obliterate the deep state. I will fire…

Speaker 1 (27:00):

USA, USA, USA, USA, USA, USA, USA.

Donald Trump (27:00):

I will fire the unelected bureaucrats and shadow forces who have weaponized our justice system like it has never been weaponized before, these are sick people, and I will put the people back in charge of this country again, the people will be back in charge of our country. The Biden administration is the most corrupt administration in American history. Hunter Biden is a criminal, and nothing happened to him, nothing happened. Joe Biden is a criminal and nothing ever seems to happen to him, because you know, say what you want, but the Democrats stick together. They don’t have Mitt Romney, they don’t have guys like that, they stick together. How’s Mitt Romney doing? Not too good. I could name plenty of others too, but they do stick together whether you like them or not, and many of us don’t, but maybe someday we get together..

(28:15)
A question was asked of me just before Covid came in. They said, “The country is coming together, do you think this is real?” And I said to myself, “It is real, it’s amazing.” I was getting calls from radical left people, the nicest calls, it’s amazing, because we had the best employment numbers in history, we had the best economy in history. We were lapping China, China was supposed to have taken over as the world’s largest economy, and we were actually increasing at a level that nobody thought possible, we were doing great. And then you had Covid come in and a lot of things had to happen, and we did a great job. We never got the credit for that job, but we did a great job with Covid and then gave back something very strong, but we were really bringing this country together. Had Covid not come in, I think you would’ve had a much different… Because a lot of people want to know, can we all get along together? And if I didn’t have that experience, I would say no, because the thought process is so different, but we were starting to really get along, and then we had the disaster, as I call it, the China virus, because I want to be open and I want to be accurate.

(29:33)
But Biden openly held back a billion dollar taxpayer, old taxpayer money, for the government of Ukraine. Remember he said, “Until they fire the prosecutor, when they fire that prosecutor.” And this prosecutor was after Hunter and the company that was paying him a fortune of money. Remember Joe Biden stood up and said, “And I looked at them and I said, you’re not getting that billion dollars until you get rid of that.” I can’t believe he did that. Can you imagine if I did that. I wouldn’t be here right now, I suspect. And nobody picks it up, nobody wants to pick it up, it doesn’t get any worse, doesn’t get any worse than that. Although maybe it does, it’s called The Laptop from Hell. And yet they go after me over and over again about something that’s not even a crime. They make up Russia, Russia, Russia, which was a plan made up by crooked Hillary Clinton, Adam Shifty Schiff, and the Democrats, the DNC.

(30:40)
They then made up a fake phone call. They took a phone call that was perfect, and they pretended that I said things that weren’t even there. They actually imitated, remember Schiff, he stood up in Congress and he repeated the call like I was a gangster over and over again, quid pro quo. Remember the term, quid pro quo? But there wasn’t. I called downstairs at the White House, I said, “Listen, do we have that call taped? Because there’s no way I said those things.” And they called back and tell me, “Yes, sir, we do.” Essentially, we had transcripts of the call. Thank goodness we had transcripts because these guys they’re sick, they’re sick people, and they were looking to do a number. I’ll tell you how bad they are, and I tell this story seldom, but it’s a strong story. Monica, thank you very much for the great job you did, by the way, what a defender she is.

(31:38)
But they’re so bad, so they come up with this Russia, Russia, Russia hoax, and they know it’s a hoax. They know it’s hoax, I know it’s a hoax too, but they know it’s a hoax. And Adam Shifty Schiff comes out from a very secretive room, intelligence committee or whatever, and he meets the press right in front. The press is going crazy, they’re going crazy because they’ll do anything to hurt Trump, anything, they’re evil people in many cases. In some cases they’re great people, but a lot of evil people. And he stands up before a microphone. Now, this is a man who knows it’s a fake story, Russia. Russia, Russia. They checked six years of phone calls, millions of calls were made from my office, not one call to Russia, not one call. They weren’t surprised, but some people were surprised.

(32:28)
But he stood up before the microphones and he said, “Donald Trump Jr. will go to prison for what he has done with Russia.” My son’s going to go to prison. He said my son’s going to go to prison for what he’s done with Russia. And my son didn’t have anything to do with it, and he knew it was a fake story, and when it was finally revealed, now the Times, the Washington Post, they all admit it was fake story. We’re trying to get the Pulitzer Prize taken away, they got Pulitzer Prize. We’re suing. You know what the prize says? “For its concise and accurate reporting on the Russia, Russia, Russia event.” And they have it actually totally wrong. Actually, Mark Levin should get a prize, and Greg Jared, Greg Jared should get a prize. And even it’s not his deal, Sean Hannity should get a prize. And frankly, Jesse should get a prize, Jesse should. And a lot of people, and I’ll tell you, you know who should get a prize? Tucker should get a prize, they’re very strong,

(33:45)
And we have numerous writers that should get it, but the ones that got it were the New York Times, certain reporters from the New York Times, and certain reporters from the Washington Post, they got the Pulitzer Price, and they were exactly wrong. And now they’ve even admitted that it was a hoax, it was a total hoax, and they got the prize. But how bad is a person that stands before a big gaggle of press and they just can’t get enough, and says that my son is going to prison for something that he knows was a hoax? Only a really bad person would do that. But they then came in with Ukraine, Ukraine, Ukraine, the Mueller hoax. How did Mueller present himself at the hearings? It wasn’t too pretty. But you know what? I’ll say this, at least they came to the right conclusion, because I was concerned they’d come to the conclusion, I think we have prosecutors now, they don’t give a if you’re guilty. They’re looking at me in Atlanta on a perfect phone call, I said, “Even more perfect than my perfect call to Ukraine.” That was a perfect call, this is even more perfect.

(35:05)
By the way, where’s Hunter? Where is Hunter? Remember, where’s Hunter? Will there ever be a time when Joe Biden says, “This thing with Hunter just isn’t working out well, I’m starting to get a little angry at Hunter.”? Or when Hunter comes to him and says, “Dad, dad, we have a problem.” “What is it, son? Another one, oh, son, you’re a disaster son. Son, you’re a disaster.” “Dad, we have a problem, I left my laptop at the repair shop.” And Joe looks at him and says, “What’s on it, son, what’s on it?” And Hunter looks back and he says, “Every single crime that you’ve ever committed dad.” And hence is called The Laptop from Hell. And Miranda Devine did a great book on that, and she actually thanked me. She said, “I got the name from Trump.” She told me, she said, “I want to thank you for the name.” I said, “No charge.” But she did a great job, great book, The Laptop from Hell. If I so much is fly over a blue state, they do so many bad things, it’s just crazy.

(36:29)
The racist Manhattan District Attorney, Alvin Bragg, who is presiding over one of the most dangerous and violent cities in the United States, you have to see this, the United States where killings are taking place at a number like nobody’s ever seen, right in Manhattan. And he’s doing nothing about it, nothing whatsoever. No cash bail for people that just kill people, knife them in the back, hit them over the head with a baseball bat, push them into subways when this train is right there. But this racist DA is being pushed by radical left Democrats, the fake news media, and the Department of Injustice to bring charges against me for now ancient, no affair story of Stormy Horseface Daniels. No attraction, No affair, I call it no affair, where there’s no crime anyway. And charges have never been brought in such a case before, and this case has been looked by every prosecutor, they’re all looking, they’ve looked at it for years now. She was represented by Michael Avenatti, how’s he doing? He’s now in jail and the whole thing is a complete con job, and she was ordered to pay me in federal court order this, hundreds of thousands of dollars. But they’re still looking at it, they’re still looking, and all they do is they cause anger and problems for our country, because our people aren’t going to take this stuff.

(38:14)
It never ends, in the meantime, Hunter and Joe Biden skate, they skate. They go away free, what’s going on with that? That laptop is a disaster. Has anyone read this thing? How can it be possible? They’re looking in Delaware. How’s he doing? He’s not the same guy that I have for the document oaks. I have a man, he’s a total animal. Known to be, and he’s looking, looking, looking, in the meantime, Biden’s guy that’s looking, looking, looking. And don’t forget, I had a very strong privilege as president. I was able to do things that he wasn’t able to do as vice president and wasn’t able to do as a senator. Even the Senate, they can’t believe it. The Senate cannot believe it, but when you look at what happened, they’re not even looking at him, they haven’t even started. Congress and various radical left Democrat prosecutors, in an effort to stop me, go to the Supreme Court twice. They went twice, and the Supreme Court, in a moment of total weakness, gives them everything they want in order to try and prosecute Trump everything.

(39:21)
Thank you very much, Supreme Court, I appreciate it. But they found nothing. They looked at 11 million pages of documents, it’s a big company, it’s a great company. Remember my taxes? “We’re after his taxes.” Five years I heard about my taxes. They came out about two months ago, everyone said, “Wow, it’s a great company he built, that’s great.” That’s the end of it. No, right? And I had the biggest and most prestigious one of them, at least law firms, accounting firms, doing all this stuff. I don’t do it, they do it, you rely on these people, they do it. But I didn’t hear one word, and how stupid am I telling you this story right now? Because now they’ll go, “We got to find something in there.” He made a typographical error. There’s a revolution going on within the FBI because they don’t want to be doing what they’re being told to do because they know right from wrong, I’m talking about the people that work in the FBI, and they like me and they like you a lot, so many of them. A recent article in the Washington Post, of all papers, stated very succinctly that many did not want to raid Mar-a-Lago, they didn’t want the agents. They said, “That’s terrible.” But they were forced to do so by their Marxist radical left leadership, and it drove my popularity numbers through the roof. Who would think this?

(40:46)
I got impeached and I went up 11 points. It’s not supposed to work like that. Mark, when Nixon got impeached, it went down right away, it was as spiral down, he couldn’t stop it. I got impeached, we went up, but the FBI people, they didn’t want to do this. To those in the FBI that are with us, I want to thank you very much, I really do, I want to thank you. Stay strong, stay strong, help is coming. Then there’s the racist DA from Atlanta, whose city is among the most violent and dangerous places per capita in the country. More murders than even Chicago per capita. It’s totally out of control and yet she has her kangaroo court focused on a perfect phone call that I made, while her jury foreman, a rather bizarre young woman, is going around doing media interviews and saying exactly what’s going on in this one of many grand juries. Our opponents do anything they can to hurt me politically because they’re afraid of me and they’re afraid of you, that’s what it is, but it’s not supposed to work that way.

(41:59)
The disinformation, people say they are great at disinformation. The one we want to run against is Trump. Do you ever hear that? “Oh, we want to run against Trump.” Even though I’m leading every one of these guys, and even though I won the second election, I won it by a lot. When they say Biden won, the smart people know they didn’t. But right now, we’re way up. But they say, “Oh, we want to run against Trump.” They always say that, they say that about everybody. When they have somebody that they don’t want to run against, a governor, or senator, they say, “We want to run against.” Because it’s like demeaning, in other words, like you’re supposed to be schlemiel. I got 75 million votes, I got more votes than any city president in history the second time. And we really did, we did a much better job than we did in 2016. 2020, we did better than 2016, but they say, “We want to run against Trump.” In the meantime, they’re spending hundreds of millions of dollars trying to find just a single word, a sentence, anything to prosecute Trump because they don’t want to run against me. That’s what they say, “We want to run against Trump, we’ll do anything to run against Trump.”

(43:13)
They have the greatest line of bullshit of any group of people I’ve ever seen. Want to run against Trump. But at the same time, they send people from the Justice Department to the local DA’s office of Manhattan. Do you know the Justice Department sent their top people to the Manhattan DA’s office to help in the prosecution of Trump? This way, we have it a little bit away from Washington. It’s local. Oh, we had nothing to do, but their top guy was put in that office to help prosecute Trump. How would you like to have my life? Would anybody like my life? But I still like it. But they want to try and find anything they can when they’ve already been exonerated, I’ve been exonerated many times. You take a look at what this meant, time after time, but all of this is happening for one single reason. They know that when we return to power, we will bring their lies, and their corruption, and their disinformation tumbling down. Our getting back in the White House is their worst nightmare, but it is our country’s only hope, it’s our only hope. If we don’t get back now, this country can’t take it, even the two years, and now, fortunately it’s less than that, it’s hard to believe it’s less. We used to say four years, a lot of people said, “Well, sir, the election was so bad, you’ll be in in one year.” A lot of people in this room, “You’ll be back in six weeks, sir.” But it’s a bad system in many ways, very bad, very dangerous system, but nobody else can do it but us. In recent weeks, I’ve been laying out a bold detailed agenda for how we’re going to complete this mission in our next term. I do weekly statements and people are liking them. Today, I want to go through some of our big plans that I will do as the 47th President of the United States. Thank you.

(45:45)
At the top of my list, we’ll be stopping the slide into costly and never-ending wars, we got to stop it. Can’t keep spending hundreds of billions of dollars protecting people that don’t even like us. Now in business, if you did that, what you do is you put up the money and then you say, “But listen, we own half your country in case you win.” You take a piece of the upside, right? I don’t get nothing. In fact, the opposite, we put up the money, and then after it’s finished, assuming it’s successful, let’s say it’s successful, they don’t want to even talk to us. “Nope, you have nothing to do with us, get out of here.” You have nothing. No, no, in business, you put up money, seed money, call it whatever you want, you end up owning the country by the time it’s over, and the only reason they’re doing well is we’re giving them the greatest equipment, that I bought, the greatest equipment ever made. And the only reason they’re doing well with NATO is I raised $440 billion from countries that weren’t paying anything.

(46:47)
And the Secretary General, Stoltenberg, a good man, he said, “It’s one of the greatest jobs I’ve ever seen.” I hope he still says that, but one of the greatest jobs. He said, “Obama would come and make a speech, Bush would come make a speech, and then they’d leave.” I came, I looked, I said, “Man, these people aren’t paying, we’re paying for the whole thing practically.” Of the 28 countries at the time, only eight were paid up, 20 weren’t, including Germany, they paid a fraction of what they were supposed to be paying. And I said to him, “Either you pay or we’re not going to protect you.” And a man stood up, a president of a country stood up, and he said, “Sir, could I ask you a question?” This was a round table with nobody in the room, but the presidents, prime ministers, and dictators, okay? Some of them are all the same, but they stood up and he stood up and said, “Sir, can I ask you a question? If we don’t pay up and if we get attacked by Russia, will you protect us, sir?” I said, “Now you’re not paid up, right?” “That’s right.” “You’re delinquent, right?” “Yes.” I will not protect you from Russia.” “Sir, we’ll send you a check tomorrow, sir. We’ll send you a check tomorrow. It’ll be sent by overnight mail, sir, I promise you’ll have it tomorrow.”

(48:10)
Now, if I said like the stupid politicians say, “Absolutely. Article 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, where you’re supposed to do it? But those articles all suppose that you’re supposed to be paid up. But let’s say I said the opposite, “Yes, we will always protect you.” And I took a lot of heat because they said, “I’m not a good member.” Actually, NATO wouldn’t even exist if I didn’t get them to pay up, but they paid up $449 billion or something, and that’s the money they use. They’re rich as hell right now, they spent on an office building that cost $3 billion. It’s like a skyscraper in Manhattan later in its side, it’s one of the longest buildings I’ve ever seen, and I said, “You should have, instead of spending $3 billion, you should have spent $500 million building the greatest bunker you’ve ever seen.” Because Russia wouldn’t even need an airplane attack. One tank, one shot through that beautiful glass building and it’s gone. Same architect I used in Chicago, great architects, but they didn’t have war in mind, but when things happen, that building would be gone at about 15 minutes.

(49:20)
They should have spent a $500 million bunker, nice thick ceiling, six inches, six feet of concrete. And by the way, we have a great gentleman, speaking of China, will you please stand up? Gordon, stand up, please. Gordon. I’m talking a lot about China, and I’m looking over, I’m studying him, and I’m studying his face as I’m speaking, because people do like me to go off script a little bit, right? It’s a little bit more risky, but it’s more exciting. And I’m looking at Gordon, and I’m saying, “I hope he agrees with what I’m saying.” But basically I’m saying exactly what you say. They’re not out for our good, are they? They’re not out for our good, and nobody ever taxed them like I did, and nobody ever took any money in like I did. $440 billion, we took in so much money from China, it’s so incredible. So I just, it’s an honor to have you here, really it is. I agree with almost everything you said, almost everything. Great. Thank you very much, thank you, madam, thank you very much, great job, both of you.

(50:33)
I was the only president in decades that didn’t have a war, but I completed wars that were already started, including defeating 100% of the ISIS Caliphate. I was also the only president where Russia didn’t take over a country during my term. Russia took over, not because I got along with Vladimir Putin very well. I said, “Vladimir, don’t do it. You know, you and I have friends, don’t take over any countries because Moscow will be hit very hard.” Well, I told him things. He probably didn’t believe it, but you know what, he believed it 10%, and President Xi believed it when I talked about Beijing. He probably said, “I don’t believe him, but there’s a 10% chance we’re not going to do anything.” It’s true, it’s true, you have no idea these conversations. I wish they could have been recorded, actually, people would think a lot of me. But with Bush, they invaded Georgia, right? With Obama, they took Crimea, with Biden, they’re trying to take everything. And he won’t even know they took it. Thank you. And with me, they took nothing, nothing. And I didn’t really even have to threaten them very much, they understood me very well, I wanted them to understand me very well. They knew that they couldn’t do it. Putin knew that, President Xi knew it too. Likewise, China now has its eyes strongly focused on Taiwan, and we could soon have a nuclear armed Iran. That’s the saddest thing of all though, when we talk about Iran, that’s the saddest thing when you see. I had them in a box. I said to China, “You can’t buy any oil from Iran.” They said, “No, no, we have to buy. We buy millions of barrels here.” And I said, “You can’t buy, you have to buy from somebody else.” “No, no, we’ll buy.” I said, good, we’re not going to do any more trading with China, we’re going cold Turkey.” “We will promise you not to buy from Iran.”

(52:57)
That was the end of that, that was a conversation I had. I said, “If you buy from Iran, any oil, we’re not going to do any business, or if for some reason we do, we’re going to put a hundred percent tariff on every single thing that you sell into the United States.” And they didn’t buy any oil, and nobody was buying oil, and they were in a position, had the election not turned out the way it did, they were in a position where they were going to give us everything. We were going to make a great deal. But now they’re rich Again, China’s buying unlimited amounts of oil from Iran, unlimited amounts in other places, and we’ve done something else that’s terrible. From the time I’m a young man, I learned, never allow Russia and China to get together to, wed never ever allow it. And we’ve not only allowed it, we’ve made them bosom buddies, we’ve forced them together. And you can add

Donald Trump (54:00):

Had another group in there, a nuclear armed Iran. So the three of them are now together. That should have never been allowed to happen, would’ve never happened with me. And it was all over oil, our stupid oil policy. We’re not going to drill. We have more oil in the United States than any country in the world, including Saudi Arabia, people don’t realize it. In Alaska, I approved a site, we all know what the site is, probably the biggest in the world. And the Democrats said, “No, it’s over.” They turned it down. Ronald Reagan tried to do it. Every president, Republican and some Democrats tried to do it, they couldn’t get it done, I got it done. And the first day in office, the Secretary of the Interior for Biden signed off on it where they’re going to not allow it to happen bigger probably than Saudi Arabia. If we had that without even my talking to Putin, oil would’ve been at $40, $35, maybe $30 a barrel.

(55:09)
So he wouldn’t have even had the money to prosecute a war against Ukraine. He wouldn’t have done it anyway, but… And that’s not even what I’m saying from previous. But he wouldn’t have had the money, even if he wanted to. Ukraine would’ve been thriving. There would’ve been no dead people, and there would’ve been no obliterated cities that can never be rebuilt, can never rebuild those cities. Russia never would’ve pulled the trigger. This is the most dangerous time in the history of our country, and Joe Biden is leading us into oblivion. He’s leading us into oblivion. We all smile when he falls downstairs and things, it’s cute. When he falls off his bicycle, isn’t this cute? You know what amazed me that the reporters didn’t catch him when the bike was going down. They’re standing right next to him. They let him fall. It’s amazing. I’m surprised.

(56:09)
But when he makes statements that are so bad when he gets out of Afghanistan and takes the soldiers, takes [inaudible 00:56:16] takes the soldiers out first. And in Afghanistan for 18 months, I had a talk with Abdul who was the leader of Afghanistan. I said, “Abdul…” Oh, I got a lot of criticism. Remember when I was talking to him, everyone said, “Oh, he is talking to the leader of the Taliban.” That’s right. Because our soldiers were being killed, a lot of them by snipers, and I didn’t want that. I don’t want to deal with the problems, and I don’t want to talk to the mothers and fathers who I would speak to a lot. I don’t want to talk to them and tell them their son was shot through the head from 2000 yards away by a sharp shooter. They have very good sharp shooters. So I spoke to this man, his name was Abdul, and I said, “Abdul, don’t kill any more of our soldiers because if you kill our soldiers, we are going to hit you harder than any country has ever been hit in the history of the world.”

(57:33)
And he called me Your Excellency. See, he and I got along. He’s still there. He’s still the leader of the Taliban, but now he’s got $85 billion worth of our equipment that I bought, $85 billion. I said to General Millie, I want every piece of equipment, “Sir, I think it would be cheaper to leave it behind, sir.” That’s when I lost faith, that, and when he didn’t like me holding up a Bible in front of a church, I said, “This guy’s not with us. This is not a smart guy.” But he didn’t like it. I said, “I want every single…” Because I was getting out of… But I would’ve kept Bagram, because Bagram is one hour away from where China, forget about Afghanistan, where China makes its nuclear weapons, one hour away. The biggest, most powerful runways in the world, we built it many years ago for tens of billions of dollars, and we gave it away one night.

(58:24)
We just left the lights on. We did leave the dogs behind. Everyone says, “Oh, did they take the dogs? Because they’re dog lovers.” No, we left the dogs behind. And the Taliban doesn’t like dogs, by the way, not at all. But we left in disgrace. It was the most embarrassing moment in the history of our country, in my opinion. And it probably is what caused Putin to say, “Wow, Trump is gone. This is a great time to take over Ukraine.” Right? It’s probably a reason that that happened. But I stand here today and I’m the only candidate who can make this promise. I will prevent and very easily World War III, very easily. And you’re going to have World War III, by the way. You’re going to have World War III if something doesn’t happen fast, you’re going to have World War three. And by the way, just to conclude that little story, when Abdul heard me say that, he said, “Your Excellency, thank you so much for telling me that.”

(59:38)
He said, “But why, but why?” I thought it was a very interesting plan, words I’ve never heard. I use it now sometimes myself. I liked it. He said, “But why, but why, Mr. President, do you send me pictures of my home?” He said that. I said, “You’ll have to ask your wives that question.” And we didn’t have, Mark will tell you this, we didn’t have one soldier killed in 18 months, not one soldier was killed, not one soldier, right? In fact, it was so good that the media didn’t mind that I called. I took a lot of heat, tremendous heat. “Why do you call him?” I said, “Well, they asked Jesse James, the great bank robber from many years ago, “Why is it that you robbed banks? Why do you always go after banks?” And he looked at him, he says, “Because that’s where the money is.” Well, I spoke to Abdul because that’s where the problem was.” But we won 18 months until that horrible day when we lost 13 soldiers.

(01:01:02)
And the thing that nobody ever talks about, we lost 13. We lost 85 billion worth of the greatest military equipment in the world, goggles, night goggles that are so good, so sophisticated, better than anything, we have brand new, never even taken out of the box. And the Afghans, and they’re actually very good. The Taliban are good fighters. Afghan, because it’s really very much the same thing, frankly. They didn’t fight good for us, but they fought good for themselves and they took a lot of money from us. I asked General Mattis, I said, “We got to get out of there. They’ve been there for 20 years. We got to get out of there.” “Sir, they’re fighting for their country, sir.” I said, “Hmm, that’s right. I guess they are.” Then about two days later, I was thinking about it. I said, “I don’t know why,” because we had more blue on green, green on blue where they’d get their gun and then they’d shoot our master sergeants and our sergeants that are training them.

(01:01:59)
I said, “Why are they fighting for us if we’ve never had this problem to the extent that we had it?” But he said that. He said, “They’re fighting.” And I said, “Are we paying them a lot of money to fight?” And I had it checked. Yeah, we were paying billions and billions and billions of dollars to these Afghan soldiers, tens of billions of dollars. I said, “They’re not fighting, General…” I called him back, “They’re not fighting because they love us or they love their country. They’re fighting because they’re the highest paid soldiers in the world. We’re basically bribing them to fight.” And they didn’t fight, but the Taliban did fight. Same people, but the Taliban did fight. But they didn’t kill anybody for 18 months. I’m very proud. In fact, Biden got up and he actually said that, “They didn’t kill anybody. I will say that they didn’t kill anybody for 18 months.” And you know what happened? Because people start screaming, “Don’t say that,” because that’s a good thing for us.

(01:02:57)
But then when we left, we lost soldiers, 13 killed. But what they don’t talk about, they talk about the equipment. They talk about the fact that there are still to this day, a lot of Americans in there that we’ve lost contact with, it’s a rough place. But they don’t talk about the fact that many of these soldiers were absolutely destroyed. Destroyed. They lost their arms, they lost their legs. They had their face blown off, and they were absolutely destroyed. And they don’t talk about that. They don’t talk about it. That it’s very sad because these people, many of them, we lost 13, they died, but nobody ever talks about the gravity of the injuries to these soldiers. And it’s a very sad thing. I got it down to 2,500 people. I was the one that got it down. But we were going to get out with dignity, with strength. We were going to be respected and admired. And I could just see Abdul, they took out the soldiers first.

(01:04:03)
You don’t take the soldiers first. You take the soldiers out last. You get the Americans out first. Because they feared our soldiers, they feared our soldiers. They feared the F-16s, and now they own them. Think of it, you get the soldiers and they go out last. You take our American citizens out, you then take our equipment out. And Millie said to me, “Sir, it’s cheaper to leave the equipment than it is to take it out.” I said, “Let me ask you, General. So we have a plane that cost a hundred million dollars, brand new. You want to let…” “Yes, sir. It’s cheaper, sir.”

(01:04:39)
I thought he was another April fools deal, right? I said, “No, General, you fill it up with a tank of jet fuel. You fly it back home, or at a minimum you fly it into Pakistan or some semi friendly country and you take it from there.” “No, sir.” I actually told them I want the tents. You know the tents, they have big canvas, incredible tents with the… “I want every piece of steel. I want every screw. I want every nut. I want every bolt. I want every tractor. I want every Jeep.”

(01:05:12)
You know what they did? They left 700,000 rifles and guns, 700,000. They left 70,000 vehicles, 70,000, many of them brand new, many of them armor-plated where they have six inches of steel on the bottom. Of course, your millions of dollars to build. And they left that all behind. There’s not a car company, used car lot, new car lot anywhere in the world that would have 70,000 vehicles. I said to a friend of mine who’s one of the Arrigo in Florida, great guy. I said, “How many cars?” He said, “I think he’s like the biggest in Florida.” They sold, they did very well, thank you. But the biggest. I said, “How many cars would you have?” “I don’t know. A couple of hundred extra. Couple of hundred.” And he’s like, “A big one. Real big one. Run runs a great operation.” 70,000 vehicles. So now I read the other day that the Taliban, that Afghanistan is the second-largest seller of arms anywhere in the world because they’re selling everything that we gave them.

(01:06:25)
And by the way, as I’m speaking, I see cash? Is that cash? Oh, my eyes are better than I think. And is that Rick Grinnell? Huh? Wow. I better check with Gordon and I better check this audience a little more closely. I’m going to miss a lot of people in here. Great, two real patriots. They really are two great people, thank you very much. But they’re the second largest to us. They’re the second largest arms dealer in the world. They’re selling off all the beautiful brand new equipment we gave them. The Apache helicopter, which is the best in the world. They gave one to Russia, gave it. They gave one to China, and they’re very good. They take it apart and they reduplicate it. They take it apart, they reduplicate it because they’ve never been able to build one like we have. Now they’re able to do it because they’re very smart, actually. Before I even arrive at the Oval Office, I will have the disastrous war between Russia and Ukraine settled. It will be settled quickly quickly.

(01:07:36)
I will get the problem solved, and I will get it solved in rapid order, and it will take me no longer than one day. I know exactly what to say to each of them. I got along very well with them. I got along very well with Putin, even though I’m the one that ended this pipeline. Remember they said, “Trump is giving a lot to Russia.” Really? Putin actually said to me, “If you’re my friend, I’d hate like hell to see you as my enemy,” because I ended the pipeline, do you remember? Nord Stream II, nobody ever heard of it, right? Nobody ever heard of Nord Stream II until I came along. I started talking about Nord Stream II. I had to go call it the pipeline because nobody knew what I was talking about, but I ended it. It was dead. I told every company that had sucked into it that you’re not doing business with the United States of America if you go forward and allow this to be built, it was done.

(01:08:29)
On day one, Biden came in… And this is the biggest economic development project. This is the most important project that Russia has on day one. This is the biggest money they could ever make. There’s nothing they could ever do to compete with us. This is the biggest pipeline in the world. Going to supply Europe, Germany in particular. On day one, Biden came in and what did he do? He approved the Nord Stream pipeline. And then they’d say, “Trump was soft on Russia.” I was the one that gave a thousand Javelins, that’s the anti-tech busters. And they are vicious because I looked at those tanks and they ended up, they got hit one shot, and that was the end of that, you wouldn’t want to be in those tanks. But I was the one that supplied the Javelins. They supplied the bedsheets, do you remember? They supplied the bedsheets and maybe even some pillows from Mike who’s sitting right over here. Where the hell is Mike? Did you send some pillows over there? Maybe? But they supplied the bedsheets, they call it. We supplied the sheets. They didn’t want to get involved.

(01:09:36)
I gave the Javelins, and then they say, “Trump was weak on Russia.” Disinformation. Again, it’s disinformation, right? That’s all they’re good at, cheating on elections and disinformation. Instead of spending hundreds of billions of dollars to defend the borders of distant foreign countries. Under my leadership, we will defend our borders first. Three years ago, we had the safest border in the history of our country, and I will quickly do that again. As you know, I built hundreds of miles of wall and completed that task as promised, and then I began to add even more in areas that seemed to be allowing a lot of people to come in. So we’re going to do another 200 miles of wall, and it could have been done and completed in three weeks but the Biden administration said they weren’t going to do it. And in fact, the wall was sitting there waiting to be installed, the easiest part, and Biden, they took it away. So the Texas and Arizona couldn’t use it.

(01:10:48)
Texas and Arizona said, “Could we use that wall? We’ll finish it right up.” And they said, no. And they actually took it away and they hid it. They put it in a hiding area, which of course was revealed pretty quickly, all you have to do is send a couple of helicopters up. But they wouldn’t let them use it. Under my leadership, we will seal it up and expand that wall till we have total control. Well, we did a great job in the wall. Remember with Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell? “Yeah, we’ll give it to you next year.” I said, “Nope, nope. Give it to me this year.” “Well, sir, if you approve this budget, we’ll give it to you next year.” I said, “All right, that’s okay.” So I waited, then they didn’t give it, and yet Mitch McConnell approves five and a half trillion dollars for Green New Deal garbage. It’s a disgrace. But I took it from the military because I considered it an invasion.

(01:11:42)
So Marjorie, I said, “You know what I’m going to do? I’m going to take it right out of the military because they’re invading our country.” And I got it built, and we did a great job. We did it quickly. And we used the Army [inaudible 01:11:53] Engineers, they were fantastic. Before Biden came into office, we had illegal immigration at a record low, refugees were at the lowest level in history. Human trafficking, women and children was at the lowest in 30 years. And drug dealers were finding the US border a very inhospitable place to be. It was very inhospitable. In my last year, less drugs came through the southern border than had been seen in many, many decades. We weren’t playing games. Now we have complete chaos. Fentanyl is pouring in. Families are being wiped out, destroyed, and there’s death everywhere, all caused by incompetence. Millions of illegal aliens are stampeding across our border. Interior enforcement has been shut down. Everyone is overstaying their visas. Nobody even thinks about reporting it anymore. My wonderful travel ban is gone. I had a travel ban, it was so wonderful.

(01:12:54)
Refugee numbers are through the roof. And spies and terrorists are infiltrating our country totally unchecked like never before. When I’m back in the White House, the very first reconciliation bill I will sign will be for a massive increase in Border Patrol and a colossal increase in the number of ice deportation officers. And I want to thank the Border Patrol. These are incredible people. And I want to thank ICE. And in particular, I want to thank Brandon Judd, Border Patrol and Tom Holman, Central Casting. He’s Central Casting. Under my leadership, we will use all necessary state, local, federal, and military resources to carry out the largest domestic deportation operation in American history. Other countries are emptying out their prisons, insane asylums and mental institutions and sending all of their problems right into their dumping ground, the USA. Think of it, they’re emptying out their prisons, and you’ve heard me say that, but they’re also emptying out their mental institutions and to use a strong couple of words, insane asylum.

(01:14:19)
Insane asylum, that’s where… Anybody see Silence of the Lamb? That’s where they come from. Insane asylum. That’s a stronger word than a mental institution. And they’re putting them into our country, thank you very much. I will ask every state and federal agency to identify every known or suspected gang member in America and every one of them that is here illegally. And the towns know who they are, the towns and cities or the police. We love our police. The police know who they are. And we will pick them up and we will throw them out of our country and there will be no questions asked. We had a problem when I first assumed the office in 2016, it was a big problem. We’d have these people, we’d round them up, MS-13 gangs, the worst people. These are absolute brutal killers. They used to knife 16 year old girls because it was more painful. It would take longer to kill her. These are real animals. And Nancy Pelosi said, “How dare you call them animals? These are human beings.”

(01:15:27)
I said, “No, they’re not.” But these are real animals. And we couldn’t get them back into their countries because the country was like, especially three… You take a look at Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras in particular, and Mexico to an extent, you couldn’t get them back in because they didn’t want them. They sent them out in the first place here. They forced them into our country, just so you know. These are very smart people that run these places. They’re very streetwise. So I said, “What’s the problem?” “Sir, we have thousands of people, but they won’t allow us to land the planes. They won’t allow the buses to cross the border. They won’t allow them back in their country.” I said, “How much money do we pay to these various countries?” “Sir, we pay $750 million a year.” I said, “All right, inform the country that we’re no longer paying any money. And if they ask why, you can tell them.”

(01:16:16)
“Yes sir, we’ll do that.” So the following morning, almost simultaneously early, about eight o’clock, I got calls from all three at one time. In fact, I had to tell two of them, “I’ll call you back,” because they all came in right on time, Matt, right on time, like you call on time. And what happens is they came in and they called. They said, “Sir, there must be a misunderstanding. We would love to have MS-13 back in our country.” And we started dropping them off by the tens of thousands, and I still hadn’t paid them back their money. I kept it. I figured, let’s hold it as long as possible because they’ve been ripping us off long enough. To stop the flow of deadly drugs, it will be my policy to take down the cartels just as I took down the ISIS caliphate that everybody said was impossible to do. A lot of parents in this audience that lost a child, that lost a loved one to Fentanyl and all of the drugs that are pouring in so many different kinds, fentanyl is a big problem.

(01:17:26)
In fact, with the ISIS caliphate, a certain general said, ” It could only be done in three years and probably it can’t be done at all, sir.” And I did it in three weeks. I went over to Iraq, met a great general. “Sir, I can do it in three weeks,” you’ve heard that story. “I could do it in three weeks, sir.” How are you going to do that? They explained it. I did it in three weeks. I was told it couldn’t be done at all, but it would take at least three years. Did it in three weeks, knocked out 100% of the ISIS caliphate. We have a great military. The reason I say that, we have a great military. And I will direct the Department of Justice to go after Marxist prosecutor’s offices to make them pay for their illegal race-based enforcement of the law. By the way, we have one of those great generals with us, General Kellogg. Where’s General Kellogg? Is he around here [inaudible 01:18:21]? Where is General Kellogg? He’s the greatest. He’s here. Thank you, General. Thank you. Thank you, General. And in cities where there’s been a complete breakdown of public safety, I will send in federal assets, including the National Guard, until law and order is restored. We’re not supposed to do that. And one thing I think about a lot is when we had some difficulty in certain cities like Minneapolis. And if you take a look at Portland, how’s Portland doing? They don’t even have storefronts anymore. Everything’s two by four is because they get burned down every week. They don’t put news storefronts up. It’s chaos. But what we had in Seattle, remember they took over a large portion. I was ready to send in the National Guard. They heard that. More than the National Guard, I was ready to go to town. And they heard that. You know what they did? They said, “We’re going to break it up now.” They left. But we saved Minneapolis.

(01:19:19)
The thing is, we’re not supposed to do that because it’s up to the governor, the Democrat governor. They never want any help. They don’t mind. It’s almost like they don’t mind to have their cities and states destroyed. There’s something wrong with these people. All of us have seen too many videos of 13 year old carjackers and 14 year old hoodlums viciously beating their victims, saw it just yesterday, a horrible situation. They kill people without retribution because they may be day short of the age required to put them away, put them in jail, and throw away the keys for a long time. My administration will crack down on these out of control monsters. Young though, they may be an imposed tough consequences on juvenile criminals. Criminals use young people. They actually hire young people, pay them some money, not a lot, because if they get caught, nothing’s going to happen to them.

(01:20:13)
That will end. I will end the scourge of homelessness taking over our cities and suburbs. I just drove through Washington DC coming here for the first time in quite a while, and the roads and highways were littered with trash like I’ve never seen before. It looked like somebody just took their garbage and just threw it all over the highways, the beltway. It’s so disgraceful, so disgusting. I always made it a point as president, when I saw the highways were dirty or that the homeless encampments were starting to form, to take care of the problem immediately. I used to have people out here all the time, sweeping highways, cleaning highways, hosing them down.

Donald Trump (01:21:00):

It bothered me so much. I’m in the Beast. I’m being driven back to the White House from some site, and I’d see this filthy, dirty highway with paper that hasn’t been … You could see it’s been laying there for months, and I’d have them cleaned up. I wouldn’t even call the mayor because it was never going to get done with the mayor. Frankly, the federal government should take over control and management of Washington, DC, good project because it’s horrible.

(01:21:35)
I think of it differently. Foreign leaders come in to see us. We want them to do what we want them to do, and they drive through these terrible, disgusting streets, where their streets are much better, much better maintained, much nicer. They see camps and homeless all over our once beautiful parks, all over, hundreds and hundreds of tents. I used to have them taken down … I’d see one or two or three. I said, “Do it fast, immediately.” Then I’d check, and it was done.

(01:22:07)
They’d never have time to do it. Once they have 500, 600, 700 of these things up, it’s a much more difficult thing, but you can do that, too. Under our leadership, we will take the homeless, drug addicted, and severely deranged, get them off our streets and create tent cities where we will get them the help they so desperately need. On day one, I will revoke Joe Biden’s crazy executive order installing Marxist diversity, equity, and inclusion czars in every federal agency, and I will immediately terminate all staffers hired to implement this horrible agenda.

(01:22:55)
I will urge Congress to create a restitution fund for Americans who have been unjustly discriminated against by these Biden policies. They’re so unfair. They’re so un-American. They’re so un-American. We will ban all racial discrimination by the government. I will fight for parents’ rights. Can you believe that here we are and I’m saying I’m going to fight for parents’ rights? Who would think that you have to ever say, “Parents’ rights?” Don’t you think parents have pretty good rights, right? Who would think that you have to actually say it? But you do because they took the rights away, including universal school choice and the direct election of school principals by the parents.

(01:23:37)
We want the school principal to be appointed and elected by parents. You’ll get some good principals then. Who loves the children more than the parents? If any principal is not getting the job done, the parents should be able to fire that principal immediately and select someone new. Continuing the work of our 1776 Commission, we will teach our values and promote our history and our traditions to our children. We will, in other words, be proud of our country again.

Audience (01:24:18):

USA, USA, USA, USA, USA, USA, USA, USA.

Donald Trump (01:24:35):

I will revoke every Biden policy promoting the chemical castration and sexual mutilation of our youth and ask Congress to send me a bill prohibiting child sexual mutilation in all 50 states. That should be easy. We will keep men out of women’s sports. How ridiculous. That will take place on day one. I will destroy the illegal censorship regime and bring back free speech in America because we do not have free speech.

(01:25:23)
I will stop Joe Biden’s demolition of our economy with his crushing inflation and mass layoffs. We will take care of inflation very, very quickly. 4.9 million people have dropped out of the labor force since I was president. As the Trump administration’s great Larry Kudlow … Does everybody know Larry? As Larry Kudlow said, “Biden is setting a record on economic regulations that are absolutely killing American companies. His spending and his borrowing are at record levels. It’s causing historic inflation, sir, which is only going to get worse and worse, sir.”

(01:26:07)
He just called me before I got here. I said, “I don’t want to say this, Larry. It’s only going to get worse and worse. It’s driving up interest rates, and new cars and homes are going to be impossible to buy.” Amidst this economic disaster, Biden talks about saving you a few dollars on some junk fees, don’t mean anything. By defeating Joe Biden, I will save your economy. I will save your retirement accounts, and I will save your jobs. We had the greatest job history of any president ever.

(01:26:37)
I will create a true national trade policy like the kind that made America the world’s economic powerhouse. What we were doing prior to the dust coming in from China was … Nobody’s ever seen it. There’s never been anything like it. That period of two and a half years was … There’s never been anything like it. I’ll tell foreign nations where we spend billions of dollars on military protection that if American products do not receive preferential treatment in their markets, our military is packed up and leaving, which some countries I did that with.

(01:27:16)
Usually it took a phone call and everything was just fine because economic security is national security. I will revoke China’s most favored nation’s trade status immediately on day one, and I will implement a four-year plan to phase out all Chinese imports of essential goods and gain total independence from China. We have to do it. We have to do it. I will hold China financially accountable for unleashing the China virus upon the world, and I will again withdraw from the WHO, which stands for We Hide Outbreaks. We Hide Outbreaks. The United States was paying.

(01:28:15)
I think this is important because, again, it’s so much common sense involved. The United States was paying the World Health Organization $450 million a year. Now, in terms of money and the kind of trillions and trillions we’re talking about, it’s not that much, but it’s still $450 million a year. I took them out. That’s what it was. The price was 450, and that’s for 350 million people. China was paying $39 million a year for 1.4 billion people. Doesn’t sound too right, and they had total control, by the way. We had no control. They’d literally own it.

(01:28:57)
When I withdrew from the WHO, they offered me to stay in, “Please don’t leave, please, please, please. But what China pays,” they said, “we’ll bring it down to 39 million.” I was actually close to doing this deal, If you wanted know the truth, but you would have been angry at me. I said, “I don’t don’t want to have CPAC angry at me.” But I might have gone back in, but I could have done it for 39. I could have probably done it for less than that. But now Biden has gone back for the full price of $450 million. Now, all he has to do is read the newspapers. They were begging me to come back in for 39 million, so why would you pay $450 million? Do you understand that? Gordon, do you understand that? How crazy. So China’s in for 39. They’re saying, “You’re right. It’s unfair. It’s unfair. We will do it for 39. We will take you back.” The head man, you know who that is. “We will take you back.” Then I started to say, “Actually, it should be much less. It should be like five or six million, right?” But I didn’t want to go there.

(01:30:01)
“We will take you back for 39 million. You’re right, President.” I said, “Well, we’ll think about it. We’ll see what happens. But the offer will remain open, right?” “Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Yes, sir.” They went back in for the original amount. It’s so sad, and we have no control, by the way. China controls WHO. So that’s what it does. WHO is totally controlled by China. We could have saved $400 million a year. It’s a lot of money. Now they’re asking for even more dictatorial power and more and more and more of our money, but they’re getting nothing more from China.

(01:30:40)
When we’re dealing with the Biden administration, it seems that every single day is April Fools’ Day, every day. They want an open border so that anybody can come in, and everybody else wants it to be closed. It’s April Fools’. We want an open border. That’s April Fools’. We want voter ID. They don’t want voter ID. Who wouldn’t want voter ID? 88% of the Democrats, except for the leadership because they can’t cheat with voter ID, but 88% of the Democrats want voter ID, but they don’t want voter ID. It’s April Fools’ Day.

(01:31:31)
They want to take the soldiers out of Afghanistan before we take our people and equipment out, but we want the soldiers to come out last. So then they blow it into a catastrophe, the most embarrassing event in the history of our country. It’s April Fools’ Day. They want all electric cars that don’t go very far. I have a friend. He bought a car. He said, “The car’s wonderful. But I go for an hour and a half and I got to put a charger and I can’t find a charger. I’m going crazy.” Also, all the batteries and everything, the material comes all out of China.

(01:32:14)
We have oil and gas, but we don’t want the oil and gas cars. But we want everything, including electric cars. But we also want gasoline because the cars go longer, and they’re preferred by many people. We don’t like quick drives that are stopped for two and a half hours. It’s April Fools’. They want all electric stoves all over the country, but we don’t have the electric power for that. We want electric stoves, but we also want gas stoves. It’s April Fools’. Why do they want that?

(01:32:58)
They want windmills all over the place that ruin our fields, kill our birds, and are very unreliable and are the most expensive energy ever developed. We want oil, gasoline, natural gas because it’s cheaper, better, and much more powerful. It’s April Fools’ Day. Under my leadership, we will regain energy independence that we had three years ago. We were on our way to massive energy dominance. We would have been paying off our debt because energy is big numbers.

(01:33:33)
It’s not like you’re selling a little product. You’re selling the biggest product of all is energy. We would have been paying off our debt. We would have been the strongest. We were going to be. We were already bigger under my administration, bigger than Saudi Arabia or Russia. We were going to be much bigger than both of them combined. Within about a year, we would have made the kind of money they’re making times five, and we would have been paying off debt and we would have been reducing taxes. It would have been a beautiful thing. But they came in and they said, “We don’t want that.”

(01:34:06)
I will fight for a constitutional amendment to impose term limits on members of Congress, and I will move heaven and Earth to fully and finally secure our elections. All Republican governors should immediately go for paper ballots, one-day voting, and voter ID. The problem we have is we have governors, and some of them we like and some of them we don’t, but they’re all talk. Think of it. They control the state. We have a lot of governors. They should go for that, paper ballots, same-day voting.

(01:34:59)
France had 37 million people voting. They voted in one day, and at 10:30 in the evening, they called the winner. There were no problems. They had paper ballots, same-day voting, voter ID. They only had a little mail-in, and we would have this, too, for soldiers that are very far away or people that are legitimately sick, legitimately, as opposed to millions and millions of ballots flooding the offices. They used COVID to cheat. But until that day comes, Republicans must compete using every lawful means to win. That means swamping the left with mail-in votes, early votes, and election day votes. Have to do it.

(01:35:49)
We have to change our thinking because some bad things happened. For some reason, Republicans like to vote on election day, right? The problem is you get there, and they have so many already started. But worse, if you take a look at Kari Lake in Arizona where they waited and waited. “Don’t vote now. Wait till Tuesday. Wait till Tuesday. Wait till Tuesday.” In the Republican areas, a tremendous percentage of the machines were broken, and you couldn’t vote. They had lines that were a mile long all over the place, Republican areas, and they couldn’t vote.

(01:36:28)
They said, “Come back in seven hours.” But people can’t do that. They have Little League. They have doctors. They might love Kari. They might love the Republican party and everything we stand for, but they can’t do that. They were standing in the hot sun for hours and hours. And then they sent in mechanics to fix them, and when the mechanics left, they were far worse. They lose those cases in courts because our judges have no courage to do what’s right. They have no courage to do what’s right.

(01:36:56)
I can tell you that was the case in 2022, where we can’t get rid of drop boxes. We need them in every church. What we have to do, we have to put our own drop boxes in. Zucker Bucks spent $500 million. If you contribute $5,700, $1 more than that, to a candidate, they put you in jail. This guy gave $500 million for all of this crap that they were doing shenanigans. They were handing out the money like it was candy, and that’s fine, but people are going to jail for spending like $93 too much because it’s not according to election law.

(01:37:46)
Until we can eliminate ballot harvesting, we will become masters at ballot harvesting. We have no choice, beating the Democrats at their own game. We’ll do it legally. The agenda I’ve laid out today will end America’s destruction, but it is not enough just to stop the forces tearing America down. I want once again to build America up. We have to build our country. We don’t build anymore. All we do is investigate everybody.

(01:38:20)
You ever see television? It used to be we’d build our military. We were proud of it. We’d be doing all things. All you see on the thing, investigation, investigation, investigation. Now, with that being said, you got to look at Hunter. I mean how crooked is that deal? But it’s not something I really … I’d like to get back to building our country and making our country great again, but it’s time to start talking about greatness for our country.

(01:38:50)
Our objective will be a quantum leap in the American standard of living, especially for our young people. As I announced yesterday, we will hold a competition to build new freedom cities on the frontier to give countless Americans a new shot at home ownership and the American dream. It’s such a wonderful, beautiful thing. I’ll challenge the governors of all 50 states, all 50 states, to join me in a great beautification campaign. We will rename our schools and boulevards not after communists, but after great American patriots. We will get rid of bad and ugly buildings in return to the magnificent classical style of western civilization. We will support baby boomers, and we will support baby bonuses for a new baby boom. How does that sound? I want a baby boom. Oh, you men are so lucky out there. You’re so lucky. You are so lucky, men. Our country will shine, thrive, and prosper like never before. All of this is within our reach, but only if we have the courage to complete the job, gut the deep state, reclaim our democracy, and banish the tyrants and Marxists into political exile forever.

(01:40:26)
They are bad for us. They want us to fail. They want our country to go down. They are sick people. Change only happens if we plow fearlessly ahead and declare with one voice that the era of woke and weaponized government is over. That is our task. That is our mission. This is the turning point and the time for that decision because, as you’ve probably heard me say before, we will not back down. We will not bend. We will not quit. We will not yield. We will press forward with push. We will press forward with vigor. We will push onward, and we will finish what we started.

(01:41:14)
We started a great, great, positive revolution. Nobody’s ever seen anything like it before. It’s called Make America Great Again. We want to make America great again. We will cross the finish line. We will dismantle the deep state. We will demolish woke tyranny, and we will restore the American republic to all of its radiant glory, and with God’s help and your support, we will make America powerful again. We want to have a powerful country. We need to have a powerful country.

(01:41:58)
We will make America wealthy again. We will make America strong again. That’s what we want. We want strength. Think of your heart pounding, we will make America proud again. We will make America safe again, not like our streets of the cities which are a disgrace for the entire world to watch, and we will make America great again. Thank you very much, CPAC. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you, everybody. Thank you. Thank you.

(01:42:40)
(singing)

Speaker 2 (01:42:40):

Ladies and gentlemen, the silent auction is now closed. Please don’t forget to pick up your items from the...

 

 

ATTACHMENT (B)

FROM DONALD TRUMP’S CPAC SPEECH (INCLUDING FACT CHECKS IN RED)

 

Donald Trump (00:00):

Well, thank you very much and I’m thrilled to be back at CPAC with thousands of great and true American patriots, and that’s what you are. I want to start by thanking Matt and Mercedes Schlapp and everyone at the American Conservative Union. Thank you, Matt, for hosting this wonderful event. It really has been something over the years. I also want to, we have so many people here, I’m going to leave out some, but they’ll understand. We have a lot of Congress, a lot of Senate, a lot of everything, but we’ll do a few words and a few names. Diana Harshbarger, thank you, Diana, Congresswoman. Mike Collins, Elise Stefanik, I call her the rocket ship. Where is Elise? She’s a rocket. Thank you, Elise. Jason Smith, a friend of mine, great guy. Thank you, Jason. Wesley Hunt, Cory Mills, Dr. Ronny Jackson. He’s a doctor, he’s an admiral. Where’s Ronny Jackson? He said I’m the healthiest man ever to be president by far. Said, if I wouldn’t eat junk food, I’d live 200 years. Where is he? He’s the greatest. We love you, Ronny.

(01:25)
He had a lot of things under his belt. Another one who’s a serious character, but a great guy. You got to know him. He’s a great guy. Matt Gates. Where’s Matt? Thank you, Matt. Great guy. He’s a brave guy. And another brave person, she started off very slow, very, very slow. She’s a low-key person, Marjorie Taylor Greene. Where is Marjorie? Thank you. Thank you, Marjorie. A good location, Marge. A friend of mine, a man who’s terrific, almost won for governor of New York. Could have done it, but so many people have moved out of New York, it gets tougher. But he’s a terrific guy, a great lawyer too, and he is a strong guy. He stopped somebody coming at him with a knife. I don’t know. He grabbed that guy’s hand, he looked pretty tough, and he drove him to the ground. Lee Zeldin, where’s Lee? Where’s Lee? Hi, Lee. Thank you. Good job, Lee. West Virginia attorney general Patrick Morrissey. Patrick, thank you, Patrick. Thank you. Thank you, Patrick.

(02:39)
Ohio attorney general Dave Yost. Thank you, Dave. Former acting attorney general of the United States, Matt Whitaker, Matt. A friend of mine who knows the border, knows more about illegal immigration than the next 10 people combined, Stephen Miller. Steven, hi, Steve. Great, good to have you here. One of my favorite generals, a guy who’s just great. He’s got a lot of common sense and a lot of smarts. And he’s been doing a lot of television lately and he does a fantastic job, General Keith Kellogg. Thank you, Keith. A very popular man in South America, very, very popular in Brazil, the former president of Brazil. President Bolsonaro, a great honor.

(03:41)
I don’t know, you beat all these US politicians. That’s pretty good. And his son, who’s a friend of mine, Brazilian chamber of deputies, Eduardo Bolsonaro. Hi, Eduardo. Great job you’re doing. Just got reelected. And somebody that we really like in this room, I think. I certainly like a lot. He had a lot of courage, very smart guy, James O’Keefe. Where’s James? Where is James? Thank you, James. Good guy. As we gather today, our country and our movement, the greatest political movement in the history of our country, as nobody going to even question it, even the fake news media. That’s a lot of fake news back there. And by the way, I want to thank the fire department. Look at these people. They’re up the rafters. Thank you, fire department. But the greatest in our history, most important battle in our lives is taking place right now as we speak. For seven years, you and I have been engaged in an epic struggle to rescue our country from the people who hate it and want to absolutely destroy it.

(05:25)
The sinister forces trying to kill America have done everything they can to stop me, to silence you, and to turn this nation into a socialist dumping ground for criminals, junkies, Marxists, thugs, radicals, and dangerous refugees that no other country wants. No other country wants them. If those opposing us succeed, our once beautiful USA will be a failed country that no one will even recognize. A lawless, open borders, crime-ridden, filthy, communist nightmare. That’s what it’s going and that’s where it’s going. I used to say that we will never be a socialist country. I said it oftentimes. I said it once at the State of the Union address and people didn’t understand what I was saying. But I’d shout it out loud and I was right because that train has passed the station long ago of socialism. It never even came close to stopping, frankly.

(06:26)
We’re now in a Marxism state of mind, a communism state of mind, which is far worse. We’re a nation in decline. Our enemies are desperate to stop us because they know that we are the only ones who can stop them. They know that this room is so important, the people in this room. They know that we can defeat them. They know that we will defeat them. But they’re not coming after me, they’re coming after you and I’m just standing in their way. That’s all I’m doing. I’m standing in their way. And that’s why I’m here today. That’s why I’m standing before you, because we are going to finish what we started. We started something that was America. We’re going to complete the mission. We’re going to see this battle through to ultimate victory. We’re going to make America great again. With you at my side, we will demolish the deep state. We will expel the warmongers. They are people that don’t get it, although, in some cases, they get it. They get it for their wallets, but we can’t do that. We can’t let that happen. We will drive out the globalists, we will cast out the communists. We will throw off the political class that hates our country. They actually hate our country. No walls, no borders, bad elections, no voter ID. We will beat the Democrats. We will route the fake news media. We will expose and appropriately deal with the rhinos. We will evict Joe Biden from the White House. And we will liberate America from these villains and scoundrels once and for all. When we started this journey, a journey like there has never been before, there’s never been anything like this. We had a Republican Party that was ruled by freaks, neocons, globalists, open border zealots, and fools. But we are never going back to the party of Paul Ryan, Karl Rove, and Jeb Bush.

(09:14)
We’re not going back to people that want to destroy our great social security system, even some in our own party, I wonder who that might be, that want to raise the minimum age of social security to 70, 75, or even 80 in some cases. And that are out to cut Medicare to a level that it will no longer be recognizable. And when that was their original thought, that’s what they always come back to. Remember that. You have to remember that. You heard it here first. We are never going back to a party that wants to give unlimited money to fight foreign wars that are endless wars, that are stupid wars. But at the same time, demands that we cut veterans benefits and retirement benefits at home.

(10:21)
Our soldiers will no longer live in the streets of our city. We have cities where our soldiers, our great soldiers, are living on concrete, they’re living on asphalt. We will take care of our soldiers. There has never been a time like this. Illegal immigrants come in and we house them in the Waldorf Astoria and many other of the greatest hotels anywhere in the world. But our soldiers, we do nothing for them. They sleep out at night and they freeze. They freeze in the cold and they die in the heat, while people that came into our country illegally are in beautiful hotel suites, perhaps watching us on television right now. We were taking care of our soldiers just a short while ago, but we don’t do that anymore. But we’ll start doing it again. Our soldiers are very special to us. When a wonderful town in Ohio has difficulty, we are going to take care of that town, that city, that village prior to worrying about the rest of the world.

(11:39)
We’re taking care of the problems of the rest of the world that they’re not taking care of themselves. They have us put up the money. You know what I’m talking about. If you look at Ukraine, and we all feel so badly about it, but why isn’t NATO putting up dollar for dollar with us? We put up $140 billion and they put up just a tiny fraction of that. And we all want to see success, but it’s far more important to them than it is to us because of that location. We are never going to be a country ruled by entrenched political dynasties in both parties. Rotten special interests, China-loving politicians, of which there are many. You listening to this, Mitch McConnell? You listening? And a militant left wing news media that’s either frightened of telling the truth or is truly evil and bad. I don’t know. I think in many ways they’re frightened, but you never really know which. We are not going back to this mindset, not now, not ever, not ever.

(13:06)
And thank you, Mark Levin, for being here tonight. Thank you very much. And Julie. Thank you. Thank you, Mark. Very important voice. Stay healthy, Mark. We can’t lose you. Just stay healthy. Stay healthy, Mark. We’re not going to lose you. In 2016, we took away the power of this corrupt political class. And we did more in four years than any administration in the history of our country, if you look at what we did. We shut down the illegal foreign invasion on our borders and achieved the most secure border in US history. We deported illegal criminal aliens by the tens of thousands. MS-13, taking them out by the thousands. We set records every single week, we were cleaning up our country. I smashed the false idols of the free trade fanatics. These are fools or they’re getting very rich, probably the second. And left the China lobby reeling from our historic tariffs and taxes that we charge them, bringing in hundreds of billions of dollars pouring into our treasury from China.

(14:22)
Thank you very much, China. When no other president had gotten even 25 cents, not one president got anything from them.
False 15 Our trade deficits were five, six, $700 billion a year. A billion, think of it, dollars a year. Not sustainable by any country. They built their military and they have a very powerful military with the money that we gave them. How stupid are we? I was the only president in modern history who did not have any new wars, no new wars. I finished some old ones. I finished some old ones. Remember when the Democrats and my Republican opponents would often look at me during the debates or whatever and they’d say, “No, no. He’s going to bring us into World War III because it’s a personality type.” They said I had the personality. No, I had the personality type that kept us out of wars because people knew that they weren’t going to mess around with us.

(15:40)
That’s why I rebuilt our military. We were strong, we were safe. And I told delinquent foreign nations, they were delinquent, they weren’t paying their bills, that if they wanted our protection, they had to pay up and they had to pay up now. And they did.
False 6 They paid $ 450 billion as soon as I said, “No, I won’t be protecting you if you don’t pay.” We truly had a policy of peace through strength. This was a serious, powerful policy. And we didn’t have to lose our loved ones fighting wars in countries that nobody’s ever heard of. I stood firm against the forces of anarchy and decay. I arrested the Marxists to topple statues False 3 of our great heroes in Washington, DC. We arrested them. They were knocking down the most beautiful artwork, the most beautiful statues of great heroes. They didn’t even know who they were doing. They just wanted anarchy. And I passed and signed an executive order. Anybody that that gets 10 years in jail with no negotiation. It’s not 10, but it turns into three months.

(16:59)
And it’s an incredible thing that stopped right away. They were heading to the Jefferson Memorial. They wanted to take out Thomas Jefferson. I don’t think so. I don’t think so. I don’t think we’re going to let that happen. But we passed it. It was a very old law that we founded. One of my very good legal people, along with Steven Miller, they found it. They said, “sir, I don’t know if you want to try and bring this back.” I said, “I do.” And as soon as we passed it, that was the end that just stopped. It’s amazing. It’s a miracle. We banned transgender insanity from our military and signed the world’s first ban on critical race theory long before anybody had even heard of the term. It was all banned, everything was good.

(17:51)
When Biden came back in, this guy came in and he put everything right back in place where it was. We were paying these people hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in salary among our highest paid people to teach all of this nonsense to our military yet. But it was all out, it was all done. There’s only one president in history who has ever taken on the entire corrupt establishment in Washington. And when we win in 2024, we will do it again even stronger, faster, and better, because… now I am experienced and I know the people of Washington. I didn’t know them. I was from New York. I only came here 17 times, they said. I read that in the fake news, so probably it’s not true, but it’s the best I could do. And I never stayed over. I was from New York. But I now know the good ones, the bad ones, the weak ones, the strong ones. I know them all. I know the people that have to do the job and can do the job. A lot of them are in this room right now.

(19:13)
And as I did for four incredible years, I will put America first every single time, every single day. From the beginning, we have been attacked by a sick and sinister opposition, the radical left communists, the bureaucrats, the fake news media, the big money special interests, the corrupt Democrat prosecutors. Oh, they’re after me for so many things. Oh, those prosecutors. Some are racists. Some hate our country. They all hate me. They’ll get me for anything, anything. You put a comma in this paragraph. Why did you do that? I don’t really know. The partisan and often corrupt intelligence agencies, the George Soros money machine that spends a lot of money on the prosecutors, by the way. The Antifa thugs who are allowed to roam the streets while we have people that in many cases are great patriots, great, great patriots, sing prayers every night, playing our national anthem every day. And they’re sitting in a jail nearby, rotting away, and being treated so unfairly like nobody’s probably ever been treated in this country before, except maybe me.

(20:48)
And Marjorie, you’ve been so fantastic on that issue. Where’s Marjorie? You’ve been so fantastic on that issue. And Elise and Matt, people that love our country, people that love our country have been so great on that issue. And the perverts who use the names of Washington and Lincoln to buy millions of dollars in ads to say bad, lifeless, and incorrect things about us. I didn’t know this was a rally, Matt. It really is a rally. And by the way, thank you for that beautiful straw poll. That was a big win, thank you. Our enemies are lunatics and maniacs. They cannot stand that they do not own me. I don’t need them. I don’t need anything about them. I don’t need their money. They cannot steer me, they cannot shake me, and they will never, ever control me. And they will never, ever, therefore, control you.

(22:13)
At the end of the day, anyone else will be intimidated, bought off, blackmailed, or ripped to shreds. I alone will never retreat. And that is why we must stand together and charge. We have to charge full speed ahead. I had a beautiful life before I did this. I lived in luxury. I had everything. People said to me, “Are you sure you want to do it, sir?” I said, “Oh, this will be so amazing.” What the hell did you get me into? I didn’t know the word subpoena. I didn’t know the word grand jury, those words, grand jury. I didn’t know that they want to lynch you for doing nothing wrong. I didn’t know they want to lynch you for doing a great job. I didn’t know they want to put you away because your poll numbers are better than anybody they’ve seen in years.

(23:20)
And then they go with the disinformation campaign. First of all, we’re leading every Republican by massive numbers. And very importantly, perhaps more importantly, we’re leading Biden by a lot, and we’re leading Kamala by a lot. And every time the polls go up higher and higher, the prosecutors get crazier and crazier. We got to stop these guys. Says, “We have to stop Trump now. We got to stop him now because we can’t stop him at the ballot box.” They tried that in 2016. How did that work out? Not too good. And we actually, and I have to say this, I hope Fox doesn’t turn up, but we did much better in 2020 than we did in 2016, much better.

(24:06)
But We have no choice. If we don’t do this, our country will be lost forever. People are tired of rhinos and globalists. They want to see America first. That’s what they want. It’s not too complicated. This is the final battle. They know it, I know it, you know it, everybody knows it. This is it. Either they win or we win. And if they win, we no longer have a country. And I promise you this, if you put me back in the White House, that beautiful building, but I live in very beautiful buildings, it’s not that reason. The beautiful. That building wasn’t the easiest building to live in with what I was put through. And I get a lot of credit. A lot of people say, “How do you do it, sir?” I had a man come up to me the other day, one of the toughest, strongest people that you can imagine. You all know his name, big businessman, a lot of money, a lot of success, tough as hell.

(25:06)
And he said, “Could I ask you a question, president?” A friend of mine, used to call me Donald, now he calls me president. “Could I ask you a question, president?” “What?” “How do you do it? How do you do it every day? They sent you subpoenas every day. There’re after you. They’re looking to take you down at levels that nobody’s ever put up with before.” Seven years I’ve gone through this. We beat them all, but it continues. And he said to me, “Seriously, how do you do it? I could never do it.” This is one of the toughest guys. I said, “Maybe you could.” He said, “Nope, I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t get out of bed in the morning. But I do it for you, and that’s what I’m doing it for. I do it for you.” Thank you, [inaudible 00:26:09]. Thank you very much. And if you put me back in the White House, their reign is over. Their reign will be over, and they know it. And America will be a free nation once again. We’re not a free nation right now. We don’t have free press. We don’t have free anything. In 2016, I declared I am your voice. Today, I add I am your warrior, I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution. I am your retribution. Not going to let this happen. Not going to let it happen. I will totally obliterate the deep state. I will fire…

Speaker 1 (27:00):

USA, USA, USA, USA, USA, USA, USA.

Donald Trump (27:00):

I will fire the unelected bureaucrats and shadow forces who have weaponized our justice system like it has never been weaponized before, these are sick people, and I will put the people back in charge of this country again, the people will be back in charge of our country. The Biden administration is the most corrupt administration in American history. Hunter Biden is a criminal, and nothing happened to him, nothing happened. Joe Biden is a criminal and nothing ever seems to happen to him, because you know, say what you want, but the Democrats stick together. They don’t have Mitt Romney, they don’t have guys like that, they stick together. How’s Mitt Romney doing? Not too good. I could name plenty of others too, but they do stick together whether you like them or not, and many of us don’t, but maybe someday we get together..

(28:15)
A question was asked of me just before Covid came in. They said, “The country is coming together, do you think this is real?” And I said to myself, “It is real, it’s amazing.” I was getting calls from radical left people, the nicest calls, it’s amazing, because we had the best employment numbers in history, we had the best economy in history. We were lapping China, China was supposed to have taken over as the world’s largest economy, and we were actually increasing at a level that nobody thought possible, we were doing great. And then you had Covid come in and a lot of things had to happen, and we did a great job. We never got the credit for that job, but we did a great job with Covid and then gave back something very strong, but we were really bringing this country together. Had Covid not come in, I think you would’ve had a much different… Because a lot of people want to know, can we all get along together? And if I didn’t have that experience, I would say no, because the thought process is so different, but we were starting to really get along, and then we had the disaster, as I call it, the China virus, because I want to be open and I want to be accurate.

(29:33)
But Biden openly held back a billion dollar taxpayer, old taxpayer money, for the government of Ukraine. Remember he said, “Until they fire the prosecutor, when they fire that prosecutor.” And this prosecutor was after Hunter and the company that was paying him a fortune of money
False 13. Remember Joe Biden stood up and said, “And I looked at them and I said, you’re not getting that billion dollars until you get rid of that.” I can’t believe he did that. Can you imagine if I did that. I wouldn’t be here right now, I suspect. And nobody picks it up, nobody wants to pick it up, it doesn’t get any worse, doesn’t get any worse than that. Although maybe it does, it’s called The Laptop from Hell. And yet they go after me over and over again about something that’s not even a crime. They make up Russia, Russia, Russia, which was a plan made up by crooked Hillary Clinton, Adam Shifty Schiff, and the Democrats, the DNC.

(30:40)
They then made up a fake phone call. They took a phone call that was perfect, and they pretended that I said things that weren’t even there. They actually imitated, remember Schiff, he stood up in Congress and he repeated the call like I was a gangster over and over again, quid pro quo. Remember the term, quid pro quo? But there wasn’t. I called downstairs at the White House, I said, “Listen, do we have that call taped? Because there’s no way I said those things.” And they called back and tell me, “Yes, sir, we do.” Essentially, we had transcripts of the call. Thank goodness we had transcripts because these guys they’re sick, they’re sick people, and they were looking to do a number. I’ll tell you how bad they are, and I tell this story seldom, but it’s a strong story. Monica, thank you very much for the great job you did, by the way, what a defender she is.

(31:38)
But they’re so bad, so they come up with this Russia, Russia, Russia hoax, and they know it’s a hoax. They know it’s hoax, I know it’s a hoax too, but they know it’s a hoax. And Adam Shifty Schiff comes out from a very secretive room, intelligence committee or whatever, and he meets the press right in front. The press is going crazy, they’re going crazy because they’ll do anything to hurt Trump, anything, they’re evil people in many cases. In some cases they’re great people, but a lot of evil people. And he stands up before a microphone. Now, this is a man who knows it’s a fake story, Russia. Russia, Russia. They checked six years of phone calls, millions of calls were made from my office, not one call to Russia, not one call. They weren’t surprised, but some people were surprised.

(32:28)
But he stood up before the microphones and he said, “Donald Trump Jr. will go to prison for what he has done with Russia.” My son’s going to go to prison. He said my son’s going to go to prison for what he’s done with Russia. And my son didn’t have anything to do with it, and he knew it was a fake story, and when it was finally revealed, now the Times, the Washington Post, they all admit it was fake story. We’re trying to get the Pulitzer Prize taken away, they got Pulitzer Prize. We’re suing. You know what the prize says? “For its concise and accurate reporting on the Russia, Russia, Russia event.” And they have it actually totally wrong. Actually, Mark Levin should get a prize, and Greg Jared, Greg Jared should get a prize. And even it’s not his deal, Sean Hannity should get a prize. And frankly, Jesse should get a prize, Jesse should. And a lot of people, and I’ll tell you, you know who should get a prize? Tucker should get a prize, they’re very strong,

(33:45)
And we have numerous writers that should get it, but the ones that got it were the New York Times, certain reporters from the New York Times, and certain reporters from the Washington Post, they got the Pulitzer Price, and they were exactly wrong. And now they’ve even admitted that it was a hoax, it was a total hoax, and they got the prize.
False 9 But how bad is a person that stands before a big gaggle of press and they just can’t get enough, and says that my son is going to prison for something that he knows was a hoax? Only a really bad person would do that. But they then came in with Ukraine, Ukraine, Ukraine, the Mueller hoax. How did Mueller present himself at the hearings? It wasn’t too pretty. But you know what? I’ll say this, at least they came to the right conclusion, because I was concerned they’d come to the conclusion, I think we have prosecutors now, they don’t give a if you’re guilty. They’re looking at me in Atlanta on a perfect phone call, I said, “Even more perfect than my perfect call to Ukraine.” That was a perfect call, this is even more perfect.

(35:05)
By the way, where’s Hunter? Where is Hunter? Remember, where’s Hunter? Will there ever be a time when Joe Biden says, “This thing with Hunter just isn’t working out well, I’m starting to get a little angry at Hunter.”? Or when Hunter comes to him and says, “Dad, dad, we have a problem.” “What is it, son? Another one, oh, son, you’re a disaster son. Son, you’re a disaster.” “Dad, we have a problem, I left my laptop at the repair shop.” And Joe looks at him and says, “What’s on it, son, what’s on it?” And Hunter looks back and he says, “Every single crime that you’ve ever committed dad.” And hence is called The Laptop from Hell. And Miranda Devine did a great book on that, and she actually thanked me. She said, “I got the name from Trump.” She told me, she said, “I want to thank you for the name.” I said, “No charge.” But she did a great job, great book, The Laptop from Hell. If I so much is fly over a blue state, they do so many bad things, it’s just crazy.

(36:29)
The racist Manhattan District Attorney, Alvin Bragg, who is presiding over one of the most dangerous and violent cities in the United States, you have to see this, the United States where killings are taking place at a number like nobody’s ever seen, right in Manhattan.
False 1  And he’s doing nothing about it, nothing whatsoever. No cash bail for people that just kill people, knife them in the back, hit them over the head with a baseball bat, push them into subways when this train is right there. But this racist DA is being pushed by radical left Democrats, the fake news media, and the Department of Injustice to bring charges against me for now ancient, no affair story of Stormy Horseface Daniels. No attraction, No affair, I call it no affair, where there’s no crime anyway. And charges have never been brought in such a case before, and this case has been looked by every prosecutor, they’re all looking, they’ve looked at it for years now. She was represented by Michael Avenatti, how’s he doing? He’s now in jail and the whole thing is a complete con job, and she was ordered to pay me in federal court order this, hundreds of thousands of dollars. But they’re still looking at it, they’re still looking, and all they do is they cause anger and problems for our country, because our people aren’t going to take this stuff.

(38:14)
It never ends, in the meantime, Hunter and Joe Biden skate, they skate. They go away free, what’s going on with that? That laptop is a disaster. Has anyone read this thing? How can it be possible? They’re looking in Delaware. How’s he doing? He’s not the same guy that I have for the document oaks. I have a man, he’s a total animal. Known to be, and he’s looking, looking, looking, in the meantime, Biden’s guy that’s looking, looking, looking. And don’t forget, I had a very strong privilege as president. I was able to do things that he wasn’t able to do as vice president and wasn’t able to do as a senator. Even the Senate, they can’t believe it. The Senate cannot believe it, but when you look at what happened, they’re not even looking at him, they haven’t even started. Congress and various radical left Democrat prosecutors, in an effort to stop me, go to the Supreme Court twice. They went twice, and the Supreme Court, in a moment of total weakness, gives them everything they want in order to try and prosecute Trump everything.

(39:21)
Thank you very much, Supreme Court, I appreciate it. But they found nothing. They looked at 11 million pages of documents, it’s a big company, it’s a great company. Remember my taxes? “We’re after his taxes.” Five years I heard about my taxes. They came out about two months ago, everyone said, “Wow, it’s a great company he built, that’s great.” That’s the end of it. No, right? And I had the biggest and most prestigious one of them, at least law firms, accounting firms, doing all this stuff. I don’t do it, they do it, you rely on these people, they do it. But I didn’t hear one word, and how stupid am I telling you this story right now? Because now they’ll go, “We got to find something in there.” He made a typographical error. There’s a revolution going on within the FBI because they don’t want to be doing what they’re being told to do because they know right from wrong, I’m talking about the people that work in the FBI, and they like me and they like you a lot, so many of them. A recent article in the Washington Post, of all papers, stated very succinctly that many did not want to raid Mar-a-Lago, they didn’t want the agents. They said, “That’s terrible.” But they were forced to do so by their Marxist radical left leadership, and it drove my popularity numbers through the roof. Who would think this?

(40:46)
I got impeached and I went up 11 points. It’s not supposed to work like that. Mark, when Nixon got impeached, it went down right away, it was as spiral down, he couldn’t stop it. I got impeached, we went up, but the FBI people, they didn’t want to do this. To those in the FBI that are with us, I want to thank you very much, I really do, I want to thank you. Stay strong, stay strong, help is coming. Then there’s the racist DA from Atlanta, whose city is among the most violent and dangerous places per capita in the country. More murders than even Chicago per capita. It’s totally out of control and yet she has her kangaroo court focused on a perfect phone call that I made, while her jury foreman, a rather bizarre young woman, is going around doing media interviews and saying exactly what’s going on in this one of many grand juries. Our opponents do anything they can to hurt me politically because they’re afraid of me and they’re afraid of you, that’s what it is, but it’s not supposed to work that way.

(41:59)
The disinformation, people say they are great at disinformation. The one we want to run against is Trump. Do you ever hear that? “Oh, we want to run against Trump.” Even though I’m leading every one of these guys, and even though I won the second election, I won it by a lot. When they say Biden won, the smart people know they didn’t.
False 17 But right now, we’re way up. But they say, “Oh, we want to run against Trump.” They always say that, they say that about everybody. When they have somebody that they don’t want to run against, a governor, or senator, they say, “We want to run against.” Because it’s like demeaning, in other words, like you’re supposed to be schlemiel. I got 75 million votes, I got more votes than any city president in history the second time. And we really did, we did a much better job than we did in 2016. 2020, we did better than 2016, but they say, “We want to run against Trump.” In the meantime, they’re spending hundreds of millions of dollars trying to find just a single word, a sentence, anything to prosecute Trump because they don’t want to run against me. That’s what they say, “We want to run against Trump, we’ll do anything to run against Trump.”

(43:13)
They have the greatest line of bullshit of any group of people I’ve ever seen. Want to run against Trump. But at the same time, they send people from the Justice Department to the local DA’s office of Manhattan. Do you know the Justice Department sent their top people to the Manhattan DA’s office to help in the prosecution of Trump? This way, we have it a little bit away from Washington. It’s local. Oh, we had nothing to do, but their top guy was put in that office to help prosecute Trump. How would you like to have my life? Would anybody like my life? But I still like it. But they want to try and find anything they can when they’ve already been exonerated, I’ve been exonerated many times. You take a look at what this meant, time after time, but all of this is happening for one single reason. They know that when we return to power, we will bring their lies, and their corruption, and their disinformation tumbling down. Our getting back in the White House is their worst nightmare, but it is our country’s only hope, it’s our only hope. If we don’t get back now, this country can’t take it, even the two years, and now, fortunately it’s less than that, it’s hard to believe it’s less. We used to say four years, a lot of people said, “Well, sir, the election was so bad, you’ll be in in one year.” A lot of people in this room, “You’ll be back in six weeks, sir.” But it’s a bad system in many ways, very bad, very dangerous system, but nobody else can do it but us. In recent weeks, I’ve been laying out a bold detailed agenda for how we’re going to complete this mission in our next term. I do weekly statements and people are liking them. Today, I want to go through some of our big plans that I will do as the 47th President of the United States. Thank you.

(45:45)
At the top of my list, we’ll be stopping the slide into costly and never-ending wars, we got to stop it. Can’t keep spending hundreds of billions of dollars protecting people that don’t even like us. Now in business, if you did that, what you do is you put up the money and then you say, “But listen, we own half your country in case you win.” You take a piece of the upside, right? I don’t get nothing. In fact, the opposite, we put up the money, and then after it’s finished, assuming it’s successful, let’s say it’s successful, they don’t want to even talk to us. “Nope, you have nothing to do with us, get out of here.” You have nothing. No, no, in business, you put up money, seed money, call it whatever you want, you end up owning the country by the time it’s over, and the only reason they’re doing well is we’re giving them the greatest equipment, that I bought, the greatest equipment ever made. And the only reason they’re doing well with NATO is I raised $440 billion from countries that weren’t paying anything.

(46:47)
And the Secretary General, Stoltenberg, a good man, he said, “It’s one of the greatest jobs I’ve ever seen.” I hope he still says that, but one of the greatest jobs. He said, “Obama would come and make a speech, Bush would come make a speech, and then they’d leave.” I came, I looked, I said, “Man, these people aren’t paying, we’re paying for the whole thing practically.” Of the 28 countries at the time, only eight were paid up, 20 weren’t, including Germany, they paid a fraction of what they were supposed to be paying. And I said to him, “Either you pay or we’re not going to protect you.” And a man stood up, a president of a country stood up, and he said, “Sir, could I ask you a question?” This was a round table with nobody in the room, but the presidents, prime ministers, and dictators, okay? Some of them are all the same, but they stood up and he stood up and said, “Sir, can I ask you a question? If we don’t pay up and if we get attacked by Russia, will you protect us, sir?” I said, “Now you’re not paid up, right?” “That’s right.” “You’re delinquent, right?” “Yes.” I will not protect you from Russia.” “Sir, we’ll send you a check tomorrow, sir. We’ll send you a check tomorrow. It’ll be sent by overnight mail, sir, I promise you’ll have it tomorrow.”

(48:10)
Now, if I said like the stupid politicians say, “Absolutely. Article 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, where you’re supposed to do it? But those articles all suppose that you’re supposed to be paid up. But let’s say I said the opposite, “Yes, we will always protect you.” And I took a lot of heat because they said, “I’m not a good member.” Actually, NATO wouldn’t even exist if I didn’t get them to pay up, but they paid up $449 billion or something, and that’s the money they use.
False 7 They’re rich as hell right now, they spent on an office building that cost $3 billion. It’s like a skyscraper in Manhattan later in its side, it’s one of the longest buildings I’ve ever seen, and I said, “You should have, instead of spending $3 billion, you should have spent $500 million building the greatest bunker you’ve ever seen.” Because Russia wouldn’t even need an airplane attack. One tank, one shot through that beautiful glass building and it’s gone. False 8 Same architect I used in Chicago, great architects, but they didn’t have war in mind, but when things happen, that building would be gone at about 15 minutes.

(49:20)
They should have spent a $500 million bunker, nice thick ceiling, six inches, six feet of concrete.
False 16 And by the way, we have a great gentleman, speaking of China, will you please stand up? Gordon, stand up, please. Gordon. I’m talking a lot about China, and I’m looking over, I’m studying him, and I’m studying his face as I’m speaking, because people do like me to go off script a little bit, right? It’s a little bit more risky, but it’s more exciting. And I’m looking at Gordon, and I’m saying, “I hope he agrees with what I’m saying.” But basically I’m saying exactly what you say. They’re not out for our good, are they? They’re not out for our good, and nobody ever taxed them like I did, and nobody ever took any money in like I did. $440 billion, we took in so much money from China, it’s so incredible. So I just, it’s an honor to have you here, really it is. I agree with almost everything you said, almost everything. Great. Thank you very much, thank you, madam, thank you very much, great job, both of you.

(50:33)
I was the only president in decades that didn’t have a war, but I completed wars that were already started, including defeating 100% of the ISIS Caliphate. I was also the only president where Russia didn’t take over a country during my term.
False 5 Russia took over, not because I got along with Vladimir Putin very well. I said, “Vladimir, don’t do it. You know, you and I have friends, don’t take over any countries because Moscow will be hit very hard.” Well, I told him things. He probably didn’t believe it, but you know what, he believed it 10%, and President Xi believed it when I talked about Beijing. He probably said, “I don’t believe him, but there’s a 10% chance we’re not going to do anything.” It’s true, it’s true, you have no idea these conversations. I wish they could have been recorded, actually, people would think a lot of me. But with Bush, they invaded Georgia, right? With Obama, they took Crimea, with Biden, they’re trying to take everything. And he won’t even know they took it. Thank you. And with me, they took nothing, nothing. And I didn’t really even have to threaten them very much, they understood me very well, I wanted them to understand me very well. They knew that they couldn’t do it. Putin knew that, President Xi knew it too. Likewise, China now has its eyes strongly focused on Taiwan, and we could soon have a nuclear armed Iran. That’s the saddest thing of all though, when we talk about Iran, that’s the saddest thing when you see. I had them in a box. I said to China, “You can’t buy any oil from Iran.” They said, “No, no, we have to buy. We buy millions of barrels here.” And I said, “You can’t buy, you have to buy from somebody else.” “No, no, we’ll buy.” I said, good, we’re not going to do any more trading with China, we’re going cold Turkey.” “We will promise you not to buy from Iran.”

(52:57)
That was the end of that, that was a conversation I had. I said, “If you buy from Iran, any oil, we’re not going to do any business, or if for some reason we do, we’re going to put a hundred percent tariff on every single thing that you sell into the United States.” And they didn’t buy any oil, and nobody was buying oil, and they were in a position, had the election not turned out the way it did, they were in a position where they were going to give us everything. We were going to make a great deal. But now they’re rich Again, China’s buying unlimited amounts of oil from Iran, unlimited amounts in other places, and we’ve done something else that’s terrible. From the time I’m a young man, I learned, never allow Russia and China to get together to, wed never ever allow it. And we’ve not only allowed it, we’ve made them bosom buddies, we’ve forced them together. And you can add

Donald Trump (54:00):

Had another group in there, a nuclear armed Iran. So the three of them are now together. That should have never been allowed to happen, would’ve never happened with me. And it was all over oil, our stupid oil policy. We’re not going to drill. We have more oil in the United States than any country in the world, including Saudi Arabia, people don’t realize it. In Alaska, I approved a site, we all know what the site is, probably the biggest in the world. And the Democrats said, “No, it’s over.” They turned it down. Ronald Reagan tried to do it. Every president, Republican and some Democrats tried to do it, they couldn’t get it done, I got it done. And the first day in office, the Secretary of the Interior for Biden signed off on it where they’re going to not allow it to happen bigger probably than Saudi Arabia. If we had that without even my talking to Putin, oil would’ve been at $40, $35, maybe $30 a barrel.

(55:09)
So he wouldn’t have even had the money to prosecute a war against Ukraine. He wouldn’t have done it anyway, but… And that’s not even what I’m saying from previous. But he wouldn’t have had the money, even if he wanted to. Ukraine would’ve been thriving. There would’ve been no dead people, and there would’ve been no obliterated cities that can never be rebuilt, can never rebuild those cities. Russia never would’ve pulled the trigger. This is the most dangerous time in the history of our country, and Joe Biden is leading us into oblivion. He’s leading us into oblivion. We all smile when he falls downstairs and things, it’s cute. When he falls off his bicycle, isn’t this cute? You know what amazed me that the reporters didn’t catch him when the bike was going down. They’re standing right next to him. They let him fall. It’s amazing. I’m surprised.

(56:09)
But when he makes statements that are so bad when he gets out of Afghanistan and takes the soldiers, takes [inaudible 00:56:16] takes the soldiers out first. And in Afghanistan for 18 months, I had a talk with Abdul who was the leader of Afghanistan. I said, “Abdul…” Oh, I got a lot of criticism. Remember when I was talking to him, everyone said, “Oh, he is talking to the leader of the Taliban.” That’s right. Because our soldiers were being killed, a lot of them by snipers, and I didn’t want that. I don’t want to deal with the problems, and I don’t want to talk to the mothers and fathers who I would speak to a lot. I don’t want to talk to them and tell them their son was shot through the head from 2000 yards away by a sharp shooter. They have very good sharp shooters. So I spoke to this man, his name was Abdul, and I said, “Abdul, don’t kill any more of our soldiers because if you kill our soldiers, we are going to hit you harder than any country has ever been hit in the history of the world.”

(57:33)
And he called me Your Excellency. See, he and I got along. He’s still there. He’s still the leader of the Taliban, but now he’s got $85 billion worth of our equipment that I bought, $85 billion. I said to General Millie, I want every piece of equipment, “Sir, I think it would be cheaper to leave it behind, sir.” That’s when I lost faith, that, and when he didn’t like me holding up a Bible in front of a church, I said, “This guy’s not with us. This is not a smart guy.” But he didn’t like it. I said, “I want every single…” Because I was getting out of… But I would’ve kept Bagram, because Bagram is one hour away from where China, forget about Afghanistan, where China makes its nuclear weapons, one hour away. The biggest, most powerful runways in the world, we built it many years ago for tens of billions of dollars, and we gave it away one night.

(58:24)
We just left the lights on. We did leave the dogs behind. Everyone says, “Oh, did they take the dogs? Because they’re dog lovers.” No, we left the dogs behind. And the Taliban doesn’t like dogs, by the way, not at all. But we left in disgrace. It was the most embarrassing moment in the history of our country, in my opinion. And it probably is what caused Putin to say, “Wow, Trump is gone. This is a great time to take over Ukraine.” Right? It’s probably a reason that that happened. But I stand here today and I’m the only candidate who can make this promise. I will prevent and very easily World War III, very easily. And you’re going to have World War III, by the way. You’re going to have World War III if something doesn’t happen fast, you’re going to have World War three. And by the way, just to conclude that little story, when Abdul heard me say that, he said, “Your Excellency, thank you so much for telling me that.”

(59:38)
He said, “But why, but why?” I thought it was a very interesting plan, words I’ve never heard. I use it now sometimes myself. I liked it. He said, “But why, but why, Mr. President, do you send me pictures of my home?” He said that. I said, “You’ll have to ask your wives that question.” And we didn’t have, Mark will tell you this, we didn’t have one soldier killed in 18 months, not one soldier was killed, not one soldier, right? In fact, it was so good that the media didn’t mind that I called. I took a lot of heat, tremendous heat. “Why do you call him?” I said, “Well, they asked Jesse James, the great bank robber from many years ago, “Why is it that you robbed banks? Why do you always go after banks?” And he looked at him, he says, “Because that’s where the money is.” Well, I spoke to Abdul because that’s where the problem was.” But we won 18 months until that horrible day when we lost 13 soldiers.

(01:01:02)
And the thing that nobody ever talks about, we lost 13. We lost 85 billion worth of the greatest military equipment in the world,
False 20 goggles, night goggles that are so good, so sophisticated, better than anything, we have brand new, never even taken out of the box. And the Afghans, and they’re actually very good. The Taliban are good fighters. Afghan, because it’s really very much the same thing, frankly. They didn’t fight good for us, but they fought good for themselves and they took a lot of money from us. I asked General Mattis, I said, “We got to get out of there. They’ve been there for 20 years. We got to get out of there.” “Sir, they’re fighting for their country, sir.” I said, “Hmm, that’s right. I guess they are.” Then about two days later, I was thinking about it. I said, “I don’t know why,” because we had more blue on green, green on blue where they’d get their gun and then they’d shoot our master sergeants and our sergeants that are training them.

(01:01:59)
I said, “Why are they fighting for us if we’ve never had this problem to the extent that we had it?” But he said that. He said, “They’re fighting.” And I said, “Are we paying them a lot of money to fight?” And I had it checked. Yeah, we were paying billions and billions and billions of dollars to these Afghan soldiers, tens of billions of dollars. I said, “They’re not fighting, General…” I called him back, “They’re not fighting because they love us or they love their country. They’re fighting because they’re the highest paid soldiers in the world. We’re basically bribing them to fight.” And they didn’t fight, but the Taliban did fight. Same people, but the Taliban did fight. But they didn’t kill anybody for 18 months. I’m very proud. In fact, Biden got up and he actually said that, “They didn’t kill anybody. I will say that they didn’t kill anybody for 18 months.” And you know what happened? Because people start screaming, “Don’t say that,” because that’s a good thing for us.

(01:02:57)
But then when we left, we lost soldiers, 13 killed. But what they don’t talk about, they talk about the equipment. They talk about the fact that there are still to this day, a lot of Americans in there that we’ve lost contact with, it’s a rough place. But they don’t talk about the fact that many of these soldiers were absolutely destroyed. Destroyed. They lost their arms, they lost their legs. They had their face blown off, and they were absolutely destroyed. And they don’t talk about that. They don’t talk about it. That it’s very sad because these people, many of them, we lost 13, they died, but nobody ever talks about the gravity of the injuries to these soldiers. And it’s a very sad thing. I got it down to 2,500 people. I was the one that got it down. But we were going to get out with dignity, with strength. We were going to be respected and admired. And I could just see Abdul, they took out the soldiers first.

(01:04:03)
You don’t take the soldiers first. You take the soldiers out last. You get the Americans out first. Because they feared our soldiers, they feared our soldiers. They feared the F-16s, and now they own them.
False 21 Think of it, you get the soldiers and they go out last. You take our American citizens out, you then take our equipment out. And Millie said to me, “Sir, it’s cheaper to leave the equipment than it is to take it out.” I said, “Let me ask you, General. So we have a plane that cost a hundred million dollars, brand new. You want to let…” “Yes, sir. It’s cheaper, sir.”

(01:04:39)
I thought he was another April fools deal, right? I said, “No, General, you fill it up with a tank of jet fuel. You fly it back home, or at a minimum you fly it into Pakistan or some semi friendly country and you take it from there.” “No, sir.” I actually told them I want the tents. You know the tents, they have big canvas, incredible tents with the… “I want every piece of steel. I want every screw. I want every nut. I want every bolt. I want every tractor. I want every Jeep.”

(01:05:12)
You know what they did? They left 700,000 rifles and guns, 700,000. They left 70,000 vehicles, 70,000, many of them brand new, many of them armor-plated where they have six inches of steel on the bottom. Of course, your millions of dollars to build. And they left that all behind. There’s not a car company, used car lot, new car lot anywhere in the world that would have 70,000 vehicles. I said to a friend of mine who’s one of the Arrigo in Florida, great guy. I said, “How many cars?” He said, “I think he’s like the biggest in Florida.” They sold, they did very well, thank you. But the biggest. I said, “How many cars would you have?” “I don’t know. A couple of hundred extra. Couple of hundred.” And he’s like, “A big one. Real big one. Run runs a great operation.” 70,000 vehicles. So now I read the other day that the Taliban, that Afghanistan is the second-largest seller of arms anywhere in the world because they’re selling everything that we gave them.

(01:06:25)
And by the way, as I’m speaking, I see cash? Is that cash? Oh, my eyes are better than I think. And is that Rick Grinnell? Huh? Wow. I better check with Gordon and I better check this audience a little more closely. I’m going to miss a lot of people in here. Great, two real patriots. They really are two great people, thank you very much. But they’re the second largest to us. They’re the second largest arms dealer in the world. They’re selling off all the beautiful brand new equipment we gave them. The Apache helicopter, which is the best in the world. They gave one to Russia, gave it. They gave one to China, and they’re very good. They take it apart and they reduplicate it. They take it apart, they reduplicate it because they’ve never been able to build one like we have. Now they’re able to do it because they’re very smart, actually. Before I even arrive at the Oval Office, I will have the disastrous war between Russia and Ukraine settled. It will be settled quickly quickly.

(01:07:36)
I will get the problem solved, and I will get it solved in rapid order, and it will take me no longer than one day. I know exactly what to say to each of them. I got along very well with them. I got along very well with Putin, even though I’m the one that ended this pipeline. Remember they said, “Trump is giving a lot to Russia.” Really? Putin actually said to me, “If you’re my friend, I’d hate like hell to see you as my enemy,” because I ended the pipeline, do you remember? Nord Stream II, nobody ever heard of it, right? Nobody ever heard of Nord Stream II until I came along.
False 10  I started talking about Nord Stream II. I had to go call it the pipeline because nobody knew what I was talking about, but I ended it. It was dead. False 11 I told every company that had sucked into it that you’re not doing business with the United States of America if you go forward and allow this to be built, it was done.

(01:08:29)
On day one, Biden came in… And this is the biggest economic development project. This is the most important project that Russia has on day one. This is the biggest money they could ever make. There’s nothing they could ever do to compete with us. This is the biggest pipeline in the world. Going to supply Europe, Germany in particular. On day one, Biden came in and what did he do? He approved the Nord Stream pipeline. And then they’d say, “Trump was soft on Russia.” I was the one that gave a thousand Javelins, that’s the anti-tech busters. And they are vicious because I looked at those tanks and they ended up, they got hit one shot, and that was the end of that, you wouldn’t want to be in those tanks. But I was the one that supplied the Javelins. They supplied the bedsheets, do you remember?
False 12 They supplied the bedsheets and maybe even some pillows from Mike who’s sitting right over here. Where the hell is Mike? Did you send some pillows over there? Maybe? But they supplied the bedsheets, they call it. We supplied the sheets. They didn’t want to get involved.

(01:09:36)
I gave the Javelins, and then they say, “Trump was weak on Russia.” Disinformation. Again, it’s disinformation, right? That’s all they’re good at, cheating on elections and disinformation.
False 18 Instead of spending hundreds of billions of dollars to defend the borders of distant foreign countries. Under my leadership, we will defend our borders first. Three years ago, we had the safest border in the history of our country, and I will quickly do that again. As you know, I built hundreds of miles of wall and completed that task as promised, and then I began to add even more in areas that seemed to be allowing a lot of people to come in. False 22 So we’re going to do another 200 miles of wall, and it could have been done and completed in three weeks but the Biden administration said they weren’t going to do it. And in fact, the wall was sitting there waiting to be installed, the easiest part, and Biden, they took it away. So the Texas and Arizona couldn’t use it.

(01:10:48)
Texas and Arizona said, “Could we use that wall? We’ll finish it right up.” And they said, no. And they actually took it away and they hid it. They put it in a hiding area, which of course was revealed pretty quickly, all you have to do is send a couple of helicopters up. But they wouldn’t let them use it. Under my leadership, we will seal it up and expand that wall till we have total control. Well, we did a great job in the wall. Remember with Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell? “Yeah, we’ll give it to you next year.” I said, “Nope, nope. Give it to me this year.” “Well, sir, if you approve this budget, we’ll give it to you next year.” I said, “All right, that’s okay.” So I waited, then they didn’t give it, and yet Mitch McConnell approves five and a half trillion dollars for Green New Deal garbage. It’s a disgrace. But I took it from the military because I considered it an invasion.

(01:11:42)
So Marjorie, I said, “You know what I’m going to do? I’m going to take it right out of the military because they’re invading our country.” And I got it built, and we did a great job. We did it quickly. And we used the Army [inaudible 01:11:53] Engineers, they were fantastic. Before Biden came into office, we had illegal immigration at a record low, refugees were at the lowest level in history. Human trafficking, women and children was at the lowest in 30 years. And drug dealers were finding the US border a very inhospitable place to be. It was very inhospitable. In my last year, less drugs came through the southern border than had been seen in many, many decades. We weren’t playing games. Now we have complete chaos. Fentanyl is pouring in. Families are being wiped out, destroyed, and there’s death everywhere, all caused by incompetence. Millions of illegal aliens are stampeding across our border. Interior enforcement has been shut down. Everyone is overstaying their visas. Nobody even thinks about reporting it anymore. My wonderful travel ban is gone. I had a travel ban, it was so wonderful.

(01:12:54)
Refugee numbers are through the roof. And spies and terrorists are infiltrating our country totally unchecked like never before. When I’m back in the White House, the very first reconciliation bill I will sign will be for a massive increase in Border Patrol and a colossal increase in the number of ice deportation officers. And I want to thank the Border Patrol. These are incredible people. And I want to thank ICE. And in particular, I want to thank Brandon Judd, Border Patrol and Tom Holman, Central Casting. He’s Central Casting. Under my leadership, we will use all necessary state, local, federal, and military resources to carry out the largest domestic deportation operation in American history. Other countries are emptying out their prisons, insane asylums and mental institutions and sending all of their problems right into their dumping ground, the USA. Think of it, they’re emptying out their prisons, and you’ve heard me say that, but they’re also emptying out their mental institutions and to use a strong couple of words, insane asylum.

(01:14:19)
Insane asylum, that’s where… Anybody see Silence of the Lamb? That’s where they come from. Insane asylum. That’s a stronger word than a mental institution. And they’re putting them into our country, thank you very much. I will ask every state and federal agency to identify every known or suspected gang member in America and every one of them that is here illegally. And the towns know who they are, the towns and cities or the police. We love our police. The police know who they are. And we will pick them up and we will throw them out of our country and there will be no questions asked. We had a problem when I first assumed the office in 2016, it was a big problem. We’d have these people, we’d round them up, MS-13 gangs, the worst people. These are absolute brutal killers. They used to knife 16 year old girls because it was more painful. It would take longer to kill her. These are real animals. And Nancy Pelosi said, “How dare you call them animals? These are human beings.”

(01:15:27)
I said, “No, they’re not.” But these are real animals. And we couldn’t get them back into their countries because the country was like, especially three… You take a look at Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras in particular, and Mexico to an extent, you couldn’t get them back in because they didn’t want them.
False 23  They sent them out in the first place here. They forced them into our country, just so you know. These are very smart people that run these places. They’re very streetwise. So I said, “What’s the problem?” “Sir, we have thousands of people, but they won’t allow us to land the planes. They won’t allow the buses to cross the border. They won’t allow them back in their country.” I said, “How much money do we pay to these various countries?” “Sir, we pay $750 million a year.” I said, “All right, inform the country that we’re no longer paying any money. And if they ask why, you can tell them.”

(01:16:16)
“Yes sir, we’ll do that.” So the following morning, almost simultaneously early, about eight o’clock, I got calls from all three at one time. In fact, I had to tell two of them, “I’ll call you back,” because they all came in right on time, Matt, right on time, like you call on time. And what happens is they came in and they called. They said, “Sir, there must be a misunderstanding. We would love to have MS-13 back in our country.” And we started dropping them off by the tens of thousands, and I still hadn’t paid them back their money. I kept it. I figured, let’s hold it as long as possible because they’ve been ripping us off long enough. To stop the flow of deadly drugs, it will be my policy to take down the cartels just as I took down the ISIS caliphate that everybody said was impossible to do. A lot of parents in this audience that lost a child, that lost a loved one to Fentanyl and all of the drugs that are pouring in so many different kinds, fentanyl is a big problem.

(01:17:26)
In fact, with the ISIS caliphate, a certain general said, ” It could only be done in three years and probably it can’t be done at all, sir.” And I did it in three weeks. I went over to Iraq, met a great general. “Sir, I can do it in three weeks,” you’ve heard that story. “I could do it in three weeks, sir.” How are you going to do that? They explained it. I did it in three weeks. I was told it couldn’t be done at all, but it would take at least three years. Did it in three weeks, knocked out 100% of the ISIS caliphate.
False 19 We have a great military. The reason I say that, we have a great military. And I will direct the Department of Justice to go after Marxist prosecutor’s offices to make them pay for their illegal race-based enforcement of the law. By the way, we have one of those great generals with us, General Kellogg. Where’s General Kellogg? Is he around here [inaudible 01:18:21]? Where is General Kellogg? He’s the greatest. He’s here. Thank you, General. Thank you. Thank you, General. And in cities where there’s been a complete breakdown of public safety, I will send in federal assets, including the National Guard, until law and order is restored. We’re not supposed to do that. And one thing I think about a lot is when we had some difficulty in certain cities like Minneapolis. And if you take a look at Portland, how’s Portland doing? They don’t even have storefronts anymore. Everything’s two by four is because they get burned down every week. They don’t put news storefronts up. It’s chaos. False 4   But what we had in Seattle, remember they took over a large portion.  I was ready to send in the National Guard. They heard that. More than the National Guard, I was ready to go to town. And they heard that. You know what they did? They said, “We’re going to break it up now.” They left. But we saved Minneapolis. False 2 

(01:19:19)
The thing is, we’re not supposed to do that because it’s up to the governor, the Democrat governor. They never want any help. They don’t mind. It’s almost like they don’t mind to have their cities and states destroyed. There’s something wrong with these people. All of us have seen too many videos of 13 year old carjackers and 14 year old hoodlums viciously beating their victims, saw it just yesterday, a horrible situation. They kill people without retribution because they may be day short of the age required to put them away, put them in jail, and throw away the keys for a long time. My administration will crack down on these out of control monsters. Young though, they may be an imposed tough consequences on juvenile criminals. Criminals use young people. They actually hire young people, pay them some money, not a lot, because if they get caught, nothing’s going to happen to them.

(01:20:13)
That will end. I will end the scourge of homelessness taking over our cities and suburbs. I just drove through Washington DC coming here for the first time in quite a while, and the roads and highways were littered with trash like I’ve never seen before. It looked like somebody just took their garbage and just threw it all over the highways, the beltway. It’s so disgraceful, so disgusting. I always made it a point as president, when I saw the highways were dirty or that the homeless encampments were starting to form, to take care of the problem immediately. I used to have people out here all the time, sweeping highways, cleaning highways, hosing them down.

Donald Trump (01:21:00):

It bothered me so much. I’m in the Beast. I’m being driven back to the White House from some site, and I’d see this filthy, dirty highway with paper that hasn’t been … You could see it’s been laying there for months, and I’d have them cleaned up. I wouldn’t even call the mayor because it was never going to get done with the mayor. Frankly, the federal government should take over control and management of Washington, DC, good project because it’s horrible.

(01:21:35)
I think of it differently. Foreign leaders come in to see us. We want them to do what we want them to do, and they drive through these terrible, disgusting streets, where their streets are much better, much better maintained, much nicer. They see camps and homeless all over our once beautiful parks, all over, hundreds and hundreds of tents. I used to have them taken down … I’d see one or two or three. I said, “Do it fast, immediately.” Then I’d check, and it was done.

(01:22:07)
They’d never have time to do it. Once they have 500, 600, 700 of these things up, it’s a much more difficult thing, but you can do that, too. Under our leadership, we will take the homeless, drug addicted, and severely deranged, get them off our streets and create tent cities where we will get them the help they so desperately need. On day one, I will revoke Joe Biden’s crazy executive order installing Marxist diversity, equity, and inclusion czars in every federal agency, and I will immediately terminate all staffers hired to implement this horrible agenda.

(01:22:55)
I will urge Congress to create a restitution fund for Americans who have been unjustly discriminated against by these Biden policies. They’re so unfair. They’re so un-American. They’re so un-American. We will ban all racial discrimination by the government. I will fight for parents’ rights. Can you believe that here we are and I’m saying I’m going to fight for parents’ rights? Who would think that you have to ever say, “Parents’ rights?” Don’t you think parents have pretty good rights, right? Who would think that you have to actually say it? But you do because they took the rights away, including universal school choice and the direct election of school principals by the parents.

(01:23:37)
We want the school principal to be appointed and elected by parents. You’ll get some good principals then. Who loves the children more than the parents? If any principal is not getting the job done, the parents should be able to fire that principal immediately and select someone new. Continuing the work of our 1776 Commission, we will teach our values and promote our history and our traditions to our children. We will, in other words, be proud of our country again.

Audience (01:24:18):

USA, USA, USA, USA, USA, USA, USA, USA.

Donald Trump (01:24:35):

I will revoke every Biden policy promoting the chemical castration and sexual mutilation of our youth and ask Congress to send me a bill prohibiting child sexual mutilation in all 50 states. That should be easy. We will keep men out of women’s sports. How ridiculous. That will take place on day one. I will destroy the illegal censorship regime and bring back free speech in America because we do not have free speech.

(01:25:23)
I will stop Joe Biden’s demolition of our economy with his crushing inflation and mass layoffs. We will take care of inflation very, very quickly. 4.9 million people have dropped out of the labor force since I was president. As the Trump administration’s great Larry Kudlow … Does everybody know Larry? As Larry Kudlow said, “Biden is setting a record on economic regulations that are absolutely killing American companies. His spending and his borrowing are at record levels. It’s causing historic inflation, sir, which is only going to get worse and worse, sir.”

(01:26:07)
He just called me before I got here. I said, “I don’t want to say this, Larry. It’s only going to get worse and worse. It’s driving up interest rates, and new cars and homes are going to be impossible to buy.” Amidst this economic disaster, Biden talks about saving you a few dollars on some junk fees, don’t mean anything. By defeating Joe Biden, I will save your economy. I will save your retirement accounts, and I will save your jobs. We had the greatest job history of any president ever.
False 14

(01:26:37)
I will create a true national trade policy like the kind that made America the world’s economic powerhouse. What we were doing prior to the dust coming in from China was … Nobody’s ever seen it. There’s never been anything like it. That period of two and a half years was … There’s never been anything like it. I’ll tell foreign nations where we spend billions of dollars on military protection that if American products do not receive preferential treatment in their markets, our military is packed up and leaving, which some countries I did that with.

(01:27:16)
Usually it took a phone call and everything was just fine because economic security is national security. I will revoke China’s most favored nation’s trade status immediately on day one, and I will implement a four-year plan to phase out all Chinese imports of essential goods and gain total independence from China. We have to do it. We have to do it. I will hold China financially accountable for unleashing the China virus upon the world, and I will again withdraw from the WHO, which stands for We Hide Outbreaks. We Hide Outbreaks. The United States was paying.

(01:28:15)
I think this is important because, again, it’s so much common sense involved. The United States was paying the World Health Organization $450 million a year. Now, in terms of money and the kind of trillions and trillions we’re talking about, it’s not that much, but it’s still $450 million a year. I took them out. That’s what it was. The price was 450, and that’s for 350 million people. China was paying $39 million a year for 1.4 billion people. Doesn’t sound too right, and they had total control, by the way. We had no control. They’d literally own it.

(01:28:57)
When I withdrew from the WHO, they offered me to stay in, “Please don’t leave, please, please, please. But what China pays,” they said, “we’ll bring it down to 39 million.” I was actually close to doing this deal, If you wanted know the truth, but you would have been angry at me. I said, “I don’t don’t want to have CPAC angry at me.” But I might have gone back in, but I could have done it for 39. I could have probably done it for less than that. But now Biden has gone back for the full price of $450 million. Now, all he has to do is read the newspapers. They were begging me to come back in for 39 million, so why would you pay $450 million? Do you understand that? Gordon, do you understand that? How crazy. So China’s in for 39. They’re saying, “You’re right. It’s unfair. It’s unfair. We will do it for 39. We will take you back.” The head man, you know who that is. “We will take you back.” Then I started to say, “Actually, it should be much less. It should be like five or six million, right?” But I didn’t want to go there.

(01:30:01)
“We will take you back for 39 million. You’re right, President.” I said, “Well, we’ll think about it. We’ll see what happens. But the offer will remain open, right?” “Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Yes, sir.” They went back in for the original amount. It’s so sad, and we have no control, by the way. China controls WHO. So that’s what it does. WHO is totally controlled by China. We could have saved $400 million a year. It’s a lot of money. Now they’re asking for even more dictatorial power and more and more and more of our money, but they’re getting nothing more from China.

(01:30:40)
When we’re dealing with the Biden administration, it seems that every single day is April Fools’ Day, every day. They want an open border so that anybody can come in, and everybody else wants it to be closed. It’s April Fools’. We want an open border. That’s April Fools’. We want voter ID. They don’t want voter ID. Who wouldn’t want voter ID? 88% of the Democrats, except for the leadership because they can’t cheat with voter ID, but 88% of the Democrats want voter ID, but they don’t want voter ID. It’s April Fools’ Day.

(01:31:31)
They want to take the soldiers out of Afghanistan before we take our people and equipment out, but we want the soldiers to come out last. So then they blow it into a catastrophe, the most embarrassing event in the history of our country. It’s April Fools’ Day. They want all electric cars that don’t go very far. I have a friend. He bought a car. He said, “The car’s wonderful. But I go for an hour and a half and I got to put a charger and I can’t find a charger. I’m going crazy.” Also, all the batteries and everything, the material comes all out of China.

(01:32:14)
We have oil and gas, but we don’t want the oil and gas cars. But we want everything, including electric cars. But we also want gasoline because the cars go longer, and they’re preferred by many people. We don’t like quick drives that are stopped for two and a half hours. It’s April Fools’. They want all electric stoves all over the country, but we don’t have the electric power for that. We want electric stoves, but we also want gas stoves. It’s April Fools’. Why do they want that?

(01:32:58)
They want windmills all over the place that ruin our fields, kill our birds, and are very unreliable and are the most expensive energy ever developed. We want oil, gasoline, natural gas because it’s cheaper, better, and much more powerful. It’s April Fools’ Day. Under my leadership, we will regain energy independence that we had three years ago. We were on our way to massive energy dominance. We would have been paying off our debt because energy is big numbers.

(01:33:33)
It’s not like you’re selling a little product. You’re selling the biggest product of all is energy. We would have been paying off our debt. We would have been the strongest. We were going to be. We were already bigger under my administration, bigger than Saudi Arabia or Russia. We were going to be much bigger than both of them combined. Within about a year, we would have made the kind of money they’re making times five, and we would have been paying off debt and we would have been reducing taxes. It would have been a beautiful thing. But they came in and they said, “We don’t want that.”

(01:34:06)
I will fight for a constitutional amendment to impose term limits on members of Congress, and I will move heaven and Earth to fully and finally secure our elections. All Republican governors should immediately go for paper ballots, one-day voting, and voter ID. The problem we have is we have governors, and some of them we like and some of them we don’t, but they’re all talk. Think of it. They control the state. We have a lot of governors. They should go for that, paper ballots, same-day voting.

(01:34:59)
France had 37 million people voting. They voted in one day, and at 10:30 in the evening, they called the winner. There were no problems. They had paper ballots, same-day voting, voter ID. They only had a little mail-in, and we would have this, too, for soldiers that are very far away or people that are legitimately sick, legitimately, as opposed to millions and millions of ballots flooding the offices. They used COVID to cheat. But until that day comes, Republicans must compete using every lawful means to win. That means swamping the left with mail-in votes, early votes, and election day votes. Have to do it.

(01:35:49)
We have to change our thinking because some bad things happened. For some reason, Republicans like to vote on election day, right? The problem is you get there, and they have so many already started. But worse, if you take a look at Kari Lake in Arizona where they waited and waited. “Don’t vote now. Wait till Tuesday. Wait till Tuesday. Wait till Tuesday.” In the Republican areas, a tremendous percentage of the machines were broken, and you couldn’t vote. They had lines that were a mile long all over the place, Republican areas, and they couldn’t vote.

(01:36:28)
They said, “Come back in seven hours.” But people can’t do that. They have Little League. They have doctors. They might love Kari. They might love the Republican party and everything we stand for, but they can’t do that. They were standing in the hot sun for hours and hours. And then they sent in mechanics to fix them, and when the mechanics left, they were far worse. They lose those cases in courts because our judges have no courage to do what’s right. They have no courage to do what’s right.

(01:36:56)
I can tell you that was the case in 2022, where we can’t get rid of drop boxes. We need them in every church. What we have to do, we have to put our own drop boxes in. Zucker Bucks spent $500 million. If you contribute $5,700, $1 more than that, to a candidate, they put you in jail. This guy gave $500 million for all of this crap that they were doing shenanigans. They were handing out the money like it was candy, and that’s fine, but people are going to jail for spending like $93 too much because it’s not according to election law.

(01:37:46)
Until we can eliminate ballot harvesting, we will become masters at ballot harvesting. We have no choice, beating the Democrats at their own game. We’ll do it legally. The agenda I’ve laid out today will end America’s destruction, but it is not enough just to stop the forces tearing America down. I want once again to build America up. We have to build our country. We don’t build anymore. All we do is investigate everybody.

(01:38:20)
You ever see television? It used to be we’d build our military. We were proud of it. We’d be doing all things. All you see on the thing, investigation, investigation, investigation. Now, with that being said, you got to look at Hunter. I mean how crooked is that deal? But it’s not something I really … I’d like to get back to building our country and making our country great again, but it’s time to start talking about greatness for our country.

(01:38:50)
Our objective will be a quantum leap in the American standard of living, especially for our young people. As I announced yesterday, we will hold a competition to build new freedom cities on the frontier to give countless Americans a new shot at home ownership and the American dream. It’s such a wonderful, beautiful thing. I’ll challenge the governors of all 50 states, all 50 states, to join me in a great beautification campaign. We will rename our schools and boulevards not after communists, but after great American patriots. We will get rid of bad and ugly buildings in return to the magnificent classical style of western civilization. We will support baby boomers, and we will support baby bonuses for a new baby boom. How does that sound? I want a baby boom. Oh, you men are so lucky out there. You’re so lucky. You are so lucky, men. Our country will shine, thrive, and prosper like never before. All of this is within our reach, but only if we have the courage to complete the job, gut the deep state, reclaim our democracy, and banish the tyrants and Marxists into political exile forever.

(01:40:26)
They are bad for us. They want us to fail. They want our country to go down. They are sick people. Change only happens if we plow fearlessly ahead and declare with one voice that the era of woke and weaponized government is over. That is our task. That is our mission. This is the turning point and the time for that decision because, as you’ve probably heard me say before, we will not back down. We will not bend. We will not quit. We will not yield. We will press forward with push. We will press forward with vigor. We will push onward, and we will finish what we started.

(01:41:14)
We started a great, great, positive revolution. Nobody’s ever seen anything like it before. It’s called Make America Great Again. We want to make America great again. We will cross the finish line. We will dismantle the deep state. We will demolish woke tyranny, and we will restore the American republic to all of its radiant glory, and with God’s help and your support, we will make America powerful again. We want to have a powerful country. We need to have a powerful country.

(01:41:58)
We will make America wealthy again. We will make America strong again. That’s what we want. We want strength. Think of your heart pounding, we will make America proud again. We will make America safe again, not like our streets of the cities which are a disgrace for the entire world to watch, and we will make America great again. Thank you very much, CPAC. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you, everybody. Thank you. Thank you.

(01:42:40)
(singing)

Speaker 2 (01:42:40):

Ladies and gentlemen, the silent auction is now closed. Please don’t forget to pick up your items from the…