This Weekend in Politics, Bulletin 40. 1/4-1/5/25

… Stephen Miller is the driving policy train for both the Trump White House and Congress, as Mike Johnson made clear this weekend after meetings with Republican House leadership: “We’re in daily contact with the president himself and his lieutenants. Stephen Miller is the leader of this team and does a great job. He’s going to be wearing a lot of important hats.”

… Trump put out a long series of policy videos in 2023. I clipped key parts and posted all them, which included LOTS of outlandish right-wing proposals which would radically transform the landscape of this country. The scripts for those videos were obviously written by Stephen Miller, which I said repeatedly at the time. They were all things Miller cares about, and they used his syntax and style. But they were almost completely ignored by legacy media. I did my best.

… Instead, the media and Biden then Harris campaign chose to focus on Heritage’s Project 2025, and spent their time reporting on the details of that. As we saw, Trump simply countered by claiming that Project 2025 was not his plan, and said his plans were on his website. But while many picked apart the details of Project 2025, they ignored Trump’s policy videos and statements on his own website. Which were even worse.

… Do I agree that many of the things in Project 2025 came straight from people in Trump World who will serve in and advise his Admin? Yes, I do. But do I think it was a huge mistake politically to focus on Project 2025 rather than the dozens of insane policy videos that Trump put out himself? Yes, I do. Because he disavowed Project 2025, and a lot of voters ignored it based on that. But he couldn’t disavow what he said on those videos, which were not used AT ALL by the Biden then Harris campaigns.

… But now we are about to see the contents of those Trump videos in actual legislation. I went back and watched all of them again after the election. I wrote an article on all the specific things that Trump said he was going to do on those videos, which he released in 2023. I archived all of them. There were 93 specific policy proposals in those videos. So if you want to find out what Trump himself said that he was going to do, on video, you can read that list here.

… And all those scripts were written by Stephen Miller. Who is now Trump’s Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy. And the Speaker of the House says he will be writing Miller’s ideas into legislation that he will introduce in a few weeks. Nobody can say I didn’t try and warn people about these. I couldn’t even get a single person moderating a debate or interviewing Trump to ask one question about anything on these videos, which was incredibly frustrating to me at the time and still is. And most of them follow me on social media.

… While it may be true that the only policies Trump actually cares about are tax cuts and deregulation for millionaires/billionaires, and deportations of migrants who aren’t working for his friends’ companies, people like Miller and Budget Director Ross Vought have the most radical right-wing policy agenda in American history that they are ready to roll out. And those things are VERY important to THEM. And Mike Johnson is prepared to give them a blank check on all of it. I guess we will find out eventually if Senator Majority Leader John Thune is on board with all of this.

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… A day after Michael Flynn said that Trump should cancel his inauguration and just do a quick swearing-in behind the scenes, right-wing talk show host Dan Bongino continued to worry that Trump will be assassinated at it: “Assassination attempts by drone should be on everyone’s radar. We’re in perilous territory, and liars and frauds in our government aren’t being honest about the threat.”

… I think Trump should listen to Flynn and Bongino and just cancel it. Best for all concerned.

… Trump and House Republicans’ original plan was to divide their policy agenda into two massive reconciliation packages, but they have reportedly decided to put all of it in one because they don’t think the Republican deficit hawks will vote for the massive Trump tax cuts unless they are attached to a bunch of other stuff that they love - like increased funding to mass-deport migrants. A vote on that huge reconciliation bill will likely not occur until May-June.

… Freedom Caucus Chair Andy Harris told Fox that the reconciliation package will be a “big beautiful bill” that will likely be voted on early summer. So much for Republicans saying they wanted single subject bills. This thing will have most of their entire legislative agenda and budget in one big package for an up or down vote. Everything they complained about Pelosi doing procedurally, they continue to do. But now it’s apparently ok.

… Out of all his priorities, Trump reportedly told Johnson that his tax cuts are the most important to him, per Semafor.

… Amazon announced that it is making a movie about Melania Trump, which will be released later this year. They said it will give people “an unprecedented behind-the-scenes look” at her life story: “We are excited to share this truly unique story with our millions of customers around the world.”

… Filming on the Melania bio-pic began last month and will be directed by Brett Ratner. It is based of her autobiography ‘Melania’, which was released earlier this year. Ratner has been out of work for the last 10 years since Warner Brothers cut all ties with him after he was accused by multiple women of sexual misconduct, including actors Natasha Hensridge and Olivia Munn.

… Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL) is determined to prove that there is some connection between the guy with the gun on Trump’s golf course, the domestic terrorist who killed people in New Orleans, and the Trump-loving Republican who killed himself in a Cybertruck in front of the Trump Hotel in Vegas, since each of them at one point in their lives was on the giant Army base Ft. Liberty: “If you are at Ft. Liberty and have any information regarding these 3 men but are afraid to come forward, I can provide whistleblower protection.”

… Sen. Adam Schiff announced that he will attend Trump inauguration with DC Police Officer Daniel Hodges, who was beaten and injured by Trump’s mob while defending the Capitol on J6.

… Schiff was asked by NBC about Trump pardoning J6 defendants: “If the president goes forward with pardoning vast numbers of people involved in January 6 violence, he will begin his new administration the way he ended his last administration, and that is by celebrating violence against our democracy.”

… Sen Majority Leader John Thune was asked on Meet The Press whether he thought Trump pardoning J6 prisoners who beat cops was the right thing to do: “I’m focused on the future.”

… Welfare fraudster, massage therapist molester, and former Green Bay Packers QB Brett Favre is also suggesting there may be some conspiracy going on with these incidents: "What’s going on with the New Orleans and Trump Hotel story? A lot of information and hard to sift through to see what’s real!"

… The guy who blew himself up in the Cybertruck said in his suicide message that he denounces Democrats, wants them all to be “culled” from Washington, and hopes that his death will serve to inspire a “national rebirth of masculinity under the leadership of Trump, Musk, and Bobby Kennedy, Jr.”

… MAGA snowflakes were triggered by President Biden’s Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients, especially Hillary Clinton and George Soros. Others receiving the award were José Andrés, Jane Goodall, Earvin "Magic" Johnson, Bono, Fannie Lou Hammer, Bill Nye, George Romney, Denzel Washington, Michael J. Fox, and Anna Wintour.

… One day after Trump-loving UK right-wing Reform Party leader Nigel Farage called Elon Musk “a hero” after he demanded that PM Keir Starmer resign, Musk threw Farage under the bus and called for him to resign also today: “The Reform Party needs a new leader. Farage doesn’t have what it takes.” Awkward.

… Farage drew Musk’s ire because he felt that Musk using anti-immigration activist and prison inmate Tommy Robinson as his vehicle to rally support for toppling the government is misguided: “I don’t want Tommy Robinson to join the Reform Party, and he won’t be. Musk sees Robinson as one of these people that fought against the grooming gangs. But of course the truth is Tommy Robinson is in prison not for that, but for contempt of court.”

… Farage said Musk is doing right-wingers in the UK more harm than good: “We’re a political party aiming to win the next general election. Tommy Robinson is not what we need.”

… Musk chose one of the most disgusting racist extremists as a rallying symbol, and lied about his case to launch a week-long attack against the UK government. What he is doing would be the equivalent of Trump trying to build a presidential campaign around the issue of Steve Bannon’s prison sentence for contempt. Just dumb, but Musk knows more about everything than anyone. Just ask him.

… When Farage was told that his good friend Musk just called for him to resign, he said: “Well, this is a surprise! Elon is a remarkable individual but on this I am afraid I disagree. My view remains that Tommy Robinson is not right for Reform and I never sell out my principles.”

… Sen Mike Lee also chimed in that he didn’t agree with Musk, which is a first: “I respectfully disagree. Farage is a true hero - exactly who the UK Reform Party needs. Without Farage, there is no Reform.” I’m sure Musk can’t be wrong, though. He knows everything. When you’ve lost Mike Lee …

… Last week, Musk told right-wingers who disagreed with him about H-1B visas to “fuck yourselves in the face.” This week, he announced he is changing the X algorithm to deal with them after he took their blue checks away and demonetized them: “Algo tweak coming soon to promote more informational/entertaining content. Our goal is to maximize unregretted user-seconds. Too much negativity is being pushed that grows user time, but not unregretted user time.”

… I’m not exactly sure what he is saying, but I’m pretty sure it means he is going to suppress posts that criticize him.

… One MAGA account responded: “We were lured here for the promise of free speech. We all jumped at the opportunity to pay to support the movement that leveled the playing field. We championed Elon and supported and welcomed him with open arms as he joined MAGA. Then we watched as account after account was demonetized, stolen subscribers and eventually suspended. Now we’re told to zone out on entertainment content and pay no attention to the man behind the curtain and only share positive content. What the fuck kind of game is this?”

… Right-wing podcaster Patrick Bet-David just suddenly realized a lot of people in MAGA might be racist: “White nationalists do not want people like me in America. ‘Go back to Iran’ is the typical line.” And he thought all this time they were his friends. Sad!

… Pulitzer Prize winning cartoonist Ann Telnaes resigned her position with the Washington Post after her cartoon depicting owner Jeff Bezos and other oligarchs bowing down to Trump while holding up bags of cash to him was rejected by her editor.

… WaPo Editor David Shipley responded: “Not every editorial judgment is a reflection of a malign force. My decision was guided by the fact that we had just published a column on the same topic as the cartoon and had already scheduled another column for publication. The only bias was against repetition.”

… Yeah, I don’t know.

… This came after Apple’s CEO Tim Cook became the latest to pledge a personal donation of $1 million for Trump’s inaugural festivities. He said he made the donation “in the spirit of unity.” Trump has collected a staggering, record $200 million for his inauguration.

… Mark Cuban: “Why are Bezos, Zuckerberg, Musk, Pichai, and Tim Cook visiting and giving money to Trump? Because they are in ‘The Race’ to become the dominant platform in the world. Amazon/Anthropic v. Facebook/LLama v. Googge/Gemini v. Twitter/Grok v. iPhone/ChatGpt is the penultimate global power war ever.”

… More Cuban: “They don’t care about Trump. But they can’t let him put his thumb on the scale and push them back, or push one of the others forward. Giving millions and kissing the ring when trillions are at stake is nothing. The Ring Kissers truly don’t know where AI will take their businesses or the world. They just know they can’t let Trump write an executive order or make a move that changes the balance of AI power.”

… He summed up his long post with this: “Many will hate me for this, but Biden bears a lot of responsibility for this mess. He refused to engage with the biggest tech players. He ignored them. With so much at stake, that was one of the all-time blunders. It pushed them all into the arms of Trump. Neither Biden nor Trump understands tech at all, but one of them is transactional and the other was obstinate.”

… Sen Chris Murphy (D-CT): “In the coming days, watch for autocracy-fetishizing MAGA figures to call for Trump to use ‘emergency powers’ or ‘domestic war powers’ (i.e. - some form of martial law) to confront domestic terrorism. But they aren’t out to destroy terrorism. They’re out to destroy the rule of law.”

… Donald Trump, Jr. said on his podcast that the viral video clip where people said he was rubbing cocaine on his gums is fake news: “I understand according to the Left, I’m the biggest coke head ever. I was adjusting a Zyn (nicotine pouch) in my mouth. I’m standing next to my father and Musk in front of TV cameras. I’m not doing coke. It’s not my thing, contrary to popular belief and internet lore.”

… Junior continued his rambling explanation: “That video is me adjusting a Zyn pouch that slipped out of my lip. I do that. Sorry, I’m not perfect. In the latter stages of a campaign, with all the craziness, I get by on adrenaline, testosterone, caffeine and nicotine. That’s about the extent of it.”

… I’m skeptical of this story.

… After Mike Johnson said that he was not going to make any promises or deals to win the Speaker election, we continue to find out about all the promises and deals he made. Rep. Andy Biggs just disclosed that Johnson promised Rep. Morgan Griffith (R-VA) a coveted spot on the Rules Committee to flip his vote. Thomas Massie, the only Republican who voted against Johnson, will reportedly now be removed from the committee to allow Griffith to take his place.

… The Very Pious Mike Johnson also bent the rules on voting to get it done. In the initial round he was two votes short. But Republican leaders had the Tellers appointed by the Clerk, who are used to make the final official count of the votes, hiding off the floor so the Clerk was unable to find them. That allowed for a delay to give Trump time to talk to the holdouts who came back in and changed their votes, rather than force a second ballot.

… NOTUS reported that a Republican source told them: “We made a point of stashing the Tellers off the floor so the vote stayed open.”

… Johnson was also able to get a rules change that makes it more difficult for dissatisfied rebels to remove him as Speaker. The new rules require 9 members of the majority party to co-sponsor a motion to vacate. The previous rule required only one.

… CBS News Correspondent Scott Macfarlane noted that the 118th Congress officially ended with Mike Johnson refusing to hang a plaque to honor the J6 police officers who defended the Capitol, which is required by a bipartisan law passed in March 2023. He is breaking the law by refusing to hang the plaque.

… Nancy Mace noted that Tim Scott is now officially the longest serving Black US Senator. She also revealed that they go to the same church and “he was the first person to ever lay hands on me and pray over me.”

… After Matt Gaetz had another makeup malfunction which made him took like Wayne Newton on his debut broadcast on OAN, he brought on disgraced former Rep. George Santos to give him makeup advice: “Highlighter is not for you. Stop highlighting the center of your face. It makes your eyes very small.” Quality content from the new Matt Gaetz Show.

… Santos’s criminal fraud case that he pled guilty to is set for sentencing next month, but he has filed another motion trying to delay his case while he continues to lobby people close to Trump for a pardon. This time the excuse he is using is that he is making so much money on his Cameos and podcast that he claims if the court lets him stay out at least another 6 months he will be able to raise enough money to pay restitution in full to all the victims, which is $600,000.

… The victims are all Republican political donors. A lot of them were told to donate to Santos by Elise Stefanik, who vouched for him while stories were swirling that he was a fraud. The hell with restitution from Santos to them - send him to prison like everyone else. His sentencing guidelines call for 75-87 months in prison.

… WaPo reports that 8 people have qualified for the candidate forum on January 11 to replace Jaime Harrison as DNC Chair by getting at least 40 members to sign their petition. They are: Quintessa Hathaway, Ken Martin, Martin O’Malley, Jason Paul, James Skoufis, Nate Snyder, Ben Wikler and Marianne Williamson.

… Nikki Haley is upset about Trump’s attempt to get the bipartisan law forcing the Chinese divestiture from Tik Tok overturned: “If the Tik Tok ban is reversed, with the Chinese Communist Party still in control of it, it will be the first of many wins for China. Reminder, this Chinese app is banned in China. Why would we allow this app in the US knowing that? India banned Tik Tok due to the social disruption it was causing. We can’t cave when it comes to America’s national security.”

… Merrick Garland urged the Supreme Court to reject Trump’s request to delay their decision on Tik Tok’s lawsuit against the US. Trump requested the delay, claiming that he could “negotiate” a way around the law after meeting with Tik Tok’s CEO at Mar-a-Lago.

… Scott Presler, whose well-funded PAC registers voters for the Republican Party in swing states, approached Sen. John Fetterman at an event this weekend and asked him to switch parties. Fetterman said he wasn’t interested. He then asked him if he could use part of his booth that he wasn’t using to register voters. He was rejected on that request as well.

… Trump’s AG nominee Pam Bondi said on Newsmax that the Trump Admin will deport foreign students who expressed support for Hamas or any other “terror groups” on American campuses or on social media.

… Former SNL comic Rob Schneider and RFK Jr’s wife Cheryl Hines have reportedly pitched a political talk show to billionaire LA Times owner Patrick Soon-Shiong to finance in order to go head to head against The View. Schneider’s rep told Status that they had “a wonderful meeting.”

… The body of former president Jimmy Carter is currently lying in state for public viewing at the Georgia Capitol in Atlanta, where he also served as Governor. He will remain there until Tuesday, and will then be transported to the US Navy Memorial in DC for a horse-drawn caisson to the Capitol, where he will lie in state until Thursday when his funeral will take place at the Washington National Cathedral.

… Trump continued to fume all weekend about Judge Merchan’s decision to sentence him for his criminal conviction this week. He called for Merchan to be removed from the bench and disbarred: “There has never been a President who was so evilly and illegally treated as I. It is a fake, made up charge by a corrupt judge who is just doing the work of the Biden/Harris Injustice Department.”

… Meanwhile, Rudy Giuliani is blaming Hunter Biden again for his latest legal troubles: “The law firm of Willkie Farr & Gallagher are leading this abuse. One of their lawyers is friends with Hunter Biden. The judges are radicalized. I was never convicted by a judge or a jury for defamation. The papers all lied about that. The judge Beryl Howell hates anybody who thinks differently and she gave me the default judgment.”

… A reminder that the judge was forced to enter a default judgment because Rudy refused to participate in any discovery and was repeatedly warned that if he continued to refuse a default would be entered. He ignored the judge. Ironically, the current contempt hearing deals with his refusal to participate in discovery again, causing his previous attorneys to withdraw from his case.

… WaPo is reporting that several key aides were divided over Biden’s decision to reject the sale of US Steel to Nippon Steel. His foreign policy team urged him to approve the deal, including NSA Jake Sullivan, Sec of State Blinken, and Treasury Secretary Yellen. But domestic labor advocates inside the Admin, including Trade Rep Katherine Tai and Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, pushed to reject the deal.

… James Carville said this on CNN about the 2024 election: “I lost it myself. We made it about Trump and we didn’t make it about voters and that’s all. It’s never a good idea. And how could I, at 80 years old, been doing this for 50 years, lapse into that level of stupidity?”

… LA Senator Bill Cassidy, who MAGA has targeted to go after in a Republican primary because they view him as too moderate, went on Fox today and said that RJK Jr “is just wrong” on vaccinations. Cassidy is also a physician. RFK Jr is not. He could be a key vote in RFK Jr’s confirmation, although it is still possible that some Democrats like Fetterman and Bernie Sanders will vote for him.

… Sen Jim Banks (R-IN) said on CNN that Fox host Pete Hegseth is more qualified than General Lloyd Austin to be Secretary of Defense because Austin is “too woke.”

… Rep. Virginia Foxx said she is fine after falling down the stairs leaving the vote for Speaker: “Just a few small cuts and I’m doing just fine. I’m a mountain woman, and we’re tougher than a $2 steak.

… The state of Virginia has a crucial special election on Tuesday that will determine who will control the state House and Senate. Democrats only hold one-seat majorities in both chambers, and are worried that Dem voters will be too bummed out about the presidential election to show up and vote. Vote!