By T.LaDuke
As Ron Burgandy once famously said, “That escalated quickly.” And indeed it has.
As I wrote earlier today, Donald Trump had a great outing on Saturday in Ohio where he announced this was the first of many rallies to win the GOP back the House and Senate in 2022. Trump Mentions Arizona Audit at Ohio Rally and Says It Will Be a Big Deal. In the 48 hours since the rally, it sounds like he wants to change some of the GOP leaders also.
Yesterday, excerpts started to leak from a new book coming out from ABC News correspondent Jonathan Karl that highlights some comments from former Trump Attorney General Bill Barr. My colleagues Nick Arama and Bonchie wrote about this HERE and HERE.
Now, it sounds like Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell might have been encouraging Barr to end the investigation of fraud before his term expired on Jan 20th and that has set POTUS 45 off today. According to The Hill…Former President Trump on Monday lashed out at Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), incensed by a forthcoming book that reports McConnell urged former Attorney General William Barr to push back on Trump’s falsehoods after November’s election.
Trump implied that had McConnell intervened to block the certification of President Biden’s electoral votes, the Senate GOP leader would not be in a position where he is navigating bipartisan infrastructure talks.
Trump has, over the past 24 hours, been fixated on a newly published excerpt from ABC News correspondent Jonathan Karl’s upcoming book, “Betrayal,” in which Barr described the rapidly deteriorating relationship he had with Trump as the then-president became more entrenched in his belief that the 2020 election was fraudulent.
Barr told Karl that McConnell, at the time the Senate majority leader, had urged him to push back against Trump’s falsehoods, worrying that Trump’s rhetoric would cost the GOP in January’s Senate runoff elections in Georgia. Democrats went on to win both races and control of the Senate as a result.Trump released a statement over at his website that let his feelings be known.
Statement by Donald J. Trump, 45th President of the United States of America
Had Mitch McConnell fought for the Presidency like he should have, there would right now be Presidential Vetoes on all of the phased Legislation that he has proven to be incapable of stopping. Not to mention, he lost two Senatorial seats in Georgia, making the Republicans the Minority in the Senate. He never fought for the White House and blew it for the Country. Too bad I backed him in Kentucky, he would have been primaried and lost! Based on press reports, he convinced his buddy, Bill Barr, to get the corrupt (based on massive amounts of evidence that the Fake News refuses to mention!) election done, over with, and sealed for Biden, ASAP!I’m guessing from that statement #Don45 is a bit peeved with Mitch.
Trump looked in fine form on Saturday night and if he continues on this path, the GOP will benefit from him raising money and campaigning for their candidates in the next 15 months. We all know that historically, the party of the sitting President gets its clock cleaned during their first mid-term. With the combination of the former president and the current one who whispers into microphones, the Grand Old Party could make this easier than most mid-terms of taking back both chambers. The Democrats only hold a five-seat lead in the House and it is even in the Senate where Mitch resides.
McConnell was able to get most of what Trump wanted to be passed through the Senate and that needs to not be forgotten. Mitch is not the enemy here even if he is a creature of the Senate.
As I briefly mentioned in my Arizona piece above, there was not a helluva lot of time to compile a case of fraud in the election back in November, December, and January of last year.
In my career, I have been a crew lead, a supervisor and a manager. All in all, I preferred being a worker on the bench. Leadership has its perks, but it also has (or should have) responsibilities. One is you take responsibility for what your people do if they don’t meet expectations. If it was their failure, you hold people accountable. If it was out of their control, you stand up for them.
If it was your own failure, you stand up and take responsibility. The burden is heavy, though I was fortunate to have very capable and dedicated people working for me.
The same goes for our representatives in government. While they get to place their imprint on policies, sometimes tough situations arise. That is when they have to stand up for their constituency, which goes from a district to the entire nation.
When the Democrats decided to use massive and widespread fraud to “win” the 2020 Presidential election, the duty and responsibility of our elected officials and those emplaced by them was set. They had to do the right thing, no matter how tough it would be. Many, however, thought it was simply easier and less painful to allow the sham of an election to stand and work to prevent it from happening again (Democrats, of course, simply embraced it).
Everyone that did not stand up for and demand an accounting for all the substantive and credible accusations of fraud and either prove them false and put it behind us or prove the fraud was real and put the duly elected President in office failed the American people.