POLITICO NIGHTLY: Trump 2024 is here, if he wants it

 

BY DAVID SIDERS With help from Maggie Miller Former President Donald Trump waves prior to Game Four of the World Series in October in Atlanta. | Michael Zarrilli/Getty Images HE'S RUNNING? — Presidential campaigns do not start in any definitive way. The 2024 race had “already begun” last June, or was it March, or even before the last election, back in the fall of 2020. Turn up at a Lincoln Day dinner in Portsmouth or Des Moines, and you’ll feast on a smorgasbord of “flirts with, “teases,” “kick[s] the tires” and other “unofficial start[s]” to a presidential campaign. But every four years, there is a moment when the two political parties and the news media decide to stop daydreaming about the next one and jump right in. And sometime during this week’s pundit wish-casting about the Democratic 2024 ticket and the GOP’s threatened debate boycott, between the deconstruction of Mike Pompeo’s weight loss and the run-up to Donald Trump’s first rally of the year, on Saturday, it happened. Ten months before the 2022 midterm elections, Washington’s head is firmly in 2024. The proximate cause of the shift in perspective, as so often happens, is Trump. The 45th president plainly has not suffered from his banishment from social media or — as next week’s one-year anniversary of Joe Biden’s inauguration approaches — his loss of the bully pulpit. Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor and an early handicappers’ favorite in the Republican primary field, delivered a State of the State address Tuesday that CNN called his “first 2024 speech,” only to be overshadowed by the former president. Trump kicked DeSantis, implicitly, in an interview with the right-wing One America News Network, belittling “gutless” politicians who refuse to say if they’ve received a Covid booster shot. Then came Trump’s hang-up on NPR and his release of his All-Star roster of election truthers who will join him for his Saturday rally in Arizona, including the state’s leading Republican candidate for governor, Kari Lake, who has said she would not have certified the 2020 election results, and Mike Lindell, the pillow salesman who thinks he has “enough evidence to put everybody in prison for life, 300-and-some million people.” (He does not.) The attention Trump gobbled up was a reminder — to DeSantis and any other potential Republican candidate — that he has not lost his gift for drawing attention. The nomination seems almost certainly his if he wants it. The Republican National Committee is preparing for 2024 by remaining hard at work on Trump’s grievances. In a reopening of Trump’s 2020 feud with the Commission on Presidential Debates, the RNC said this week it plans to amend its rules to prohibit future presidential nominees from participating in commission-sponsored debates. Trump is the reason, primarily, that many Democrats are losing their minds over 2024, too. Biden’s public approval ratings are dismal, and Democrats fear that if Trump runs again, as is widely expected, he could win a rematch. “All anyone can talk about is Trump — donors, policy folks, party insiders, the media,” one adviser to major Democratic Party donors told Nightly. “It’s a weird cycle, where Dems want to talk about anything but Trump, but the conversation keeps coming back to Trump. Everything that the Dems do is viewed as bad, then compared to Trump, then analyzed to see how the GOP will run against it in the midterms, then how Trump will run against what the Dems did on the heels of a GOP wave in ’22.” Welcome to POLITICO Nightly. A programming note: Nightly will be off Monday in observance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day, but we’ll be back in your inbox Tuesday evening. Reach out with news, tips and ideas at nightly@politico.com. Or contact tonight’s author at dsiders@politico.com, or on Twitter at @davidsiders.   BECOME A GLOBAL INSIDER: The world is more connected than ever. It has never been more essential to identify, unpack and analyze important news, trends and decisions shaping our future — and we’ve got you covered! Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, Global Insider author Ryan Heath navigates the global news maze and connects you to power players and events changing our world. Don’t miss out on this influential global community. Subscribe now.     CYBERSECURITY Russian and American flags fly prior to a meeting between U.S. President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin in June in Geneva, Switzerland. | Sean Gallup/Getty Images CARROTS AND STICKS — Cybersecurity reporter Maggie Miller emails Nightly: After weeks of warning that Russia may use cyberattacks as part of its efforts in Ukraine, Moscow gave a clear demonstration today of its ability to both wreak havoc and do good in cyberspace. According to Ukrainian authorities, 70 government websites were hacked and defaced overnight, including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the State Treasury Service. While formal attribution has not been made, early indicators point to Moscow, which is massing troops on the border of Ukraine. The timing for the attack was even more suspect, as it occurred the same day the Russian Federal Security Service announced it had seized hundreds of thousands of dollars and detained members of the notorious REvil ransomware group . The hacking organization has been linked to the attacks last year on meat producer JBS and IT company Kaseya, and the Biden administration has put pressure on Moscow to act against this group and others that often do not face consequences in Russia. Taken together, Russian President Vladimir Putin may have been giving a preview to the United States of the cybersecurity penalties of conflict with Russia — and possible benefits that could come from improved relations. “We had two signaling events from Russia over the past 48 hours,” Mark Montgomery, senior director of the Center on Cyber and Technology Innovation at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said. “The stronger one was the cyberattacks on Ukrainian government sites … This signal was: Look what happens when we don’t get along. The second signal was the takedown of REvil, which signaled: Look what happens when we do get along.” Senate Intelligence Chair Mark Warner (D-Va.) was also pessimistic about the timing. “While the Russian government has finally taken steps to address the significant and devastating cybercrime that originates from within its borders, it’s hard to ignore that this belated action comes at the same time that Russian actors have reported stepped up cyber-attacks on Ukraine, in the context of a wider set of provocations and aggressiveness from Moscow,” Warner said in a statement provided to POLITICO. The track record: Two days before Christmas 2015, around a quarter million Ukrainians lost power in the dead of winter for several hours when Russian hackers compromised multiple Ukrainian energy stations. Even more devastating was an attack two years later, when the NotPetya malware virus was released, impacting Ukrainian banks, government agencies, and even the radiation monitoring systems at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. In light of Russia’s previous attacks, Ukraine has strengthened its cyber defense capabilities, and many of the websites impacted were back up within hours. The Ukrainian Cyber Police, along with the State Special Service and Security Service, put out a statement emphasizing that no data was stolen, and that the hackers likely used “the infrastructure of a commercial company” to access the websites. Negotiations as background: The White House is even more likely to be keeping a close eye on developments in Ukraine around cyberattacks in the wake of months of negotiations between Biden administration officials and Moscow. The level of dialogue increased following the meeting in Geneva last year between Biden and Putin, during which Biden urged him to crack down on cybercriminal groups, such as REvil, and handed him a list of the 16 critical infrastructure sectors that were off-limits to attacks. While talks have been ongoing since the summit, until today, Russia had not made significant public progress in taking actions against hackers that often face little pushback from Russian authorities, with some top officials hinting at the pressing need for more effort. WHAT'D I MISS? — Biden admin to start offering free at-home Covid tests on Wednesday: The Biden administration will begin making free at-home Covid-19 tests available through a government website starting Jan. 19 — but the public may have to wait a week or longer to receive them. Households will be able to order four tests at a time through the website COVIDTests.gov and the tests will “typically ship within 7-12 days of ordering,” according to a fact sheet. — Top Ohio court strikes down state’s gerrymandered congressional map: Ohio’s state Supreme Court has struck down the state’s new congressional map as a Republican gerrymander that violates the state constitution. The ruling is a boon to Democrats, who could have held as few as two of the state’s 15 House seats after the next election. — Zuckerberg and Google CEO approved deal to carve up ad market, states allege in court: Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Google chief executive Sundar Pichai personally approved a secret deal that gave the social network a leg up in the search giant’s online advertising auctions, attorneys for Texas and other states alleged in newly unsealed court filings. The 2018 deal gave Facebook possibly unlawful advantages when the social network used Google’s advertising exchange, according to allegations by Texas, 14 other states and Puerto Rico in the latest version of their federal antitrust suit against Google. — Biden moves to remake the Fed: Biden’s latest nominations to the Federal Reserve Board mark a major victory for lawmakers and other diversity advocates who have long pushed for new voices at the world's most powerful central bank. Biden today tapped two Black economists — Lisa Cook and Philip Jefferson — for open seats on the board. He also named Sarah Bloom Raskin, an aggressive regulator and former Fed governor, for the top job overseeing the nation’s banks, which would make her the first woman to hold that post.   STEP INSIDE THE WEST WING: What's really happening in West Wing offices? Find out who's up, who's down, and who really has the president’s ear in our West Wing Playbook newsletter, the insider's guide to the Biden White House and Cabinet. For buzzy nuggets and details that you won't find anywhere else, subscribe today.     AROUND THE WORLD IRAN DEAL OPTIMISM? DEPENDS WHO YOU ASK — EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said today he was optimistic about an Iran nuclear deal being struck within “the next few weeks” amid warnings that the window for reaching an agreement is closing fast, Hans von der Burchard writes. Iran and the U.S., Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China have spent months trying to resurrect the original Iran nuclear deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, which was thrown into jeopardy when Trump withdrew from the deal in 2018. Even though there was optimism last year that a new deal could be reached, talks failed to yield a breakthrough and by Christmas the situation was essentially back to where it had been at the beginning of summer. Yet today, Borrell said that the most recent talks had seen some progress. “The atmosphere has improved since Christmas,” he told reporters following an informal meeting of EU foreign ministers in the French city of Brest. “I was pessimistic prior to that but now I think we can reach an agreement.” Speaking alongside Borrell, French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said it was “vital” that negotiations “succeed,” but he sounded less optimistic as he warned that the speed of negotiations was not sufficient. NIGHTLY NUMBER 2 The number of rallies per month Trump plans to hold leading up to the midterm election, according to an adviser. H/t Meridith McGraw PARTING WORDS FedEx airplanes are parked at Nashville International Airport. | Brett Carlsen/Getty Images SPECIAL DELIVERY — Package delivery giant FedEx wants to equip some of its aircraft with military-style missile countermeasures , which could allow it to continue flying over contested areas that might otherwise be closed to air traffic, according to a filing posted by the Federal Aviation Administration, Oriana Pawlyk writes. In a notice of this “special condition” posted today, the FAA dryly observed that its design standards for commercial cargo planes “did not envisage that a design feature could project infrared laser energy outside the airplane” and therefore it sought special approval for this “novel design feature.” The proposed infrared laser system is intended to fool missiles fired from the ground. “In recent years, in several incidents abroad, civilian aircraft were fired upon by man-portable air defense systems,” FAA said in its filing. “The FedEx missile-defense system directs infrared laser energy toward an incoming missile, in an effort to interrupt the missile’s tracking of the aircraft’s heat.” When tensions in contested regions rise, the FAA tends to restrict civilian air traffic around those areas, forcing them to fly less-direct routes that cost more in time and fuel burn.   Follow us on Twitter Chris Suellentrop @suellentrop Tyler Weyant @tweyant Renuka Rayasam @renurayasam Myah Ward @myahward   FOLLOW US

POLITICO, LLC 1000 Wilson Blvd. Arlington, VA, 22209, USA

RSN: FOCUS: How Trump Is Supercharging His Financial Grift Machine by Pretending He's Undecided About 2024

 

 

05 October 21

Live on the homepage now!
Reader Supported News

100% READER SUPPORTED IS HARD — You want to actually run the organization and pay your bills on Reader Support alone? Sounds crazy but we’ve done it for 20 years. It’s hard, hard work especially at this stage. What will it take? Hit the donation link and chip-in what you can manage. It works.
Marc Ash • Founder, Reader Supported News

Sure, I'll make a donation!

 

FOCUS: How Trump Is Supercharging His Financial Grift Machine by Pretending He's Undecided About 2024
Ryan Bort, Rolling Stone
Bort writes: "A missive arrived Monday from the outer reaches of the Trump Expanded Universe heralding the formation of 'Make America Great Again, Again!,' a new political action committee 'approved' by former President Trump."

The former president’s hesitance to declare his candidacy involves — you guessed it — money and skirting the law

A missive arrived Monday from the outer reaches of the Trump Expanded Universe heralding the formation of “Make America Great Again, Again!,” a new political action committee “approved” by former President Trump. In reality, MAGAA is simply a rebrand for MAGA Action, the super PAC helmed by former Trump adviser Corey Lewandowski until he was jettisoned from Trump’s orbit last week after a donor accused him of sexual harassment. This particular universe is used to such scandal-based reshuffling.

Another tidbit from reality: Trump very much seems like he is running for president in 2024, which according to campaign finance law should prohibit him from coordinating with super PACs like MAGAA, or his leadership PAC Save America, which together brought in north of $80 million in the first half of this year. Trump is able to coordinate with those PACs, though — and use their money to finance his travel, his campaign-style rallies, his God knows what else — because he hasn’t yet officially declared his candidacy. The former president is then, in essence, running what appears to be a shadow campaign designed to skirt campaign finance regulations while holding the still-distant race for the Republican nomination hostage.

In other words, Trump is back in the spotlight, and back to his old tricks.

“He’s in this unique situation where he is trying to exert influence in the political arena, trying to raise money in advance for a race, and trying to freeze out other candidates more than three years out,” says Noah Bookbinder, president of the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. “He’s trying to get all those benefits of being in the race while also getting the benefits of not being in the race, and you could certainly imagine that he will try for the next year-plus to have his cake and eat it, too.”

The Washington Post on Monday pulled back the curtain on this early “wink-and-nod” campaign strategy Trump’s advisers convinced him to adopt after he raised the prospect of declaring his candidacy following the withdrawal from Afghanistan. He was told it would be best to hold off announcing because, A) He doesn’t want his candidacy blamed for a poor Republican showing in the 2022 midterms, and B) All of the aforementioned financial activity that could help Trump both personally and presidentially in ways that might not be possible — or would at least be more difficult — were he to declare himself a candidate.

Trump agreed, and it appears he will continue to say he’s running for president without actually saying he’s running for president (and in some cases, actually saying it). The Post reported that of 13 current and former advisers surveyed, 10 said they believed he will run in 2024, and that Trump has been regularly telling people, “I’m running,” another, uhh, pretty solid indication that he’s planning to run. So is the fact that Rolling Stone reported in July that Trump had spent the spring telling his friends he was running. So is the fact that Save America PAC is hiring people with ties to Iowa. So is the fact that Trump is holding campaign-style rallies again, including one this Saturday in — you guessed it — Iowa. So is the fact that late last month he said only a “bad call from a doctor” would keep him from running. So is the fact that a few weeks earlier he explicitly told Fox News that he can’t announce anything because “campaign finance laws are extremely complicated and unbelievably stupid,” adding only that people “are going to be happy.”

As long as Trump doesn’t explicitly announce he’s running for president, he can essentially raise as much money as he wants from whomever he wants, and spend it unfettered by the restrictions or transparency requirements imposed upon actual candidates. “Right now he’s just a citizen, a pre-declared person,” says Nick Penniman, CEO of the political reform group Issue One. “He is a free agent. He can do whatever he wants in the same way that any CEO could, or a minister, or whoever. He can show up for whatever he wants without stumbling across any kind of campaign finance laws.”

It’s worth mentioning that what Trump is doing here is nothing new. Penniman notes how Jeb Bush raised tens of millions of dollars for an allied super PAC before officially declaring his candidacy in 2015. Craig Holman, government affairs lobbyist for Public Citizen, cites how Marco Rubio went on a book tour through early primary states before declaring his candidacy the same year. “The problem is the lack of contribution limits and the lack of a ban on corporate and union money,” Holman says of the financial leeway potential candidates have before they declare. “They can accept unlimited funds for their super PACs or any electioneering nonprofit group that they’ve set up. They can accept corporate money to fly out on a book tour that’s really nothing more than a campaign rally.”

“The way to look at the super PAC is as a giant slush fund for Trump to do whatever he wants with,” adds Fred Wertheimer of the reform nonprofit Democracy 21, who points to Trump’s own efforts to collect donations from foreign individuals in 2016 as an example of how easy it is to violate campaign finance law with little to no consequences. “Unlimited secret money is the most dangerous money in American politics.”

The ability to skirt campaign finance law, which holds even that those “testing the waters” of a run for office subject themselves to restrictions, was enabled largely by the man to whom much of democracy’s degradation can be traced: Mitch McConnell. The Senate minority leader has fought campaign finance reform for years. His biggest blow came in 2008, when he was able to turn the Federal Election Commission against itself by installing Don McGahn as a commissioner. “McConnell realized that he couldn’t convince Congress to repeal campaign finance laws, and he certainly couldn’t get the public to support repealing the campaign finance laws, but what he could do was appoint people to the Federal Election Commission who don’t believe in the campaign finance laws,” Holman explains.

McGahn, who would later serve as the White House lawyer under Trump, sabotaged the commission from the inside by rallying his fellow Republican commissioners to oppose anything resembling real regulation. This paved the way for pre-campaign financial free-for-alls. Bush, Rubio, and others were happy to take advantage of an FEC that wasn’t able to enforce its own laws, but there are few entities in the history of humankind who are more keen to exploit lax financial oversight than Donald Trump.

It’s unclear exactly if and to what extent Trump will use this potential pre-campaign campaign to enrich himself personally. It might not differ too much from how he enriched himself when he was a declared candidate, or when he was a sitting president. He has at every step found ways to funnel money into his own pockets, toeing the line of what’s legal and bulldozing past any ethical considerations. The lack of contribution restrictions, disclosure requirements, and oversight that access to PACs affords him certainly figures to at least make it easier, though. “The opportunity for self-dealing with leadership PACs is really extraordinary,” Penniman says. “[They] are pretty much used for lifestyle. If, for instance, Trump were to hold some kind of an event at Mar-a-Lago, he could ‘reimburse’ that event out of his leadership PAC. This could very well end up just being a way for him to inject money into Trump, Inc.”

The landscape may also be ripe for Trump to cash in because of the nation’s collective inability to accept that despite losing in 2020, he is very much poised to reclaim his place at the forefront of American politics. “I think both politicians and people are sort of relying on a belief that Donald Trump is gone from the political scene and is not going to run again, and so accountability and dwelling on the abuses of the Trump era is not necessary,” Bookbinder says. “Republicans can support his election claims and say that it’s not that serious because he’s gone. So there are all these kinds of things happening based on this false idea that he’s gone off the landscape.”

His burgeoning shadow campaign, complete with media appearances and rallies and public displays of dominance over his competitors, is the loudest siren yet that Trump is very much not gone, and neither is his unfathomably brazen corruption. “All of that crossing of lines between politics, business, and public life is going to come roaring back like acne,” says Penniman. “All this stuff that we just cringed at is just going to be happening again.”

READ MORE

 

Contribute to RSN

Follow us on facebook and twitter!

Update My Monthly Donation

PO Box 2043 / Citrus Heights, CA 95611