TPM Reader BM has a theory that is at first glance ridiculous. In fact, on second glance it is also ridiculous. But when it comes to trying to figure out why Donald Trump is asking legislators in Denmark, Iceland and Australia to send him political contributions, I’m really not sure it’s more ridiculous than the other theories. Here’s BM …
I have a purely speculative alternate hypothesis for how this train wreck of funding solicitations to foreign legislatures came about.
First, posit that DJT and the rest of his clan have now, and/or have had in the past, business interests in the UK (golf courses), Iceland (google “FL Group”), Australia, Canada, etc.
Next, suppose that, in the course of pursuing their business interests, they at one point or another sent an email blast to legislators in the countries of interest, trying in some smarmy way to advance their interests.
Finally, imagine that instead of or in addition to buying email lists from more or less reputable aggregators, the Trumpkins just dumped their own email address books into the hopper and clicked “Send”.
Voila!
It’s because they’re so much smarter than all these consultants and politicians and lobbyists, see, and they don’t need any outside help or advice. They’re business geniuses, and they can do it all themselves.
As I said, this seems preposterous. But the other theory is that Trump’s people went to an email list vendor for fundraising emails for his presidential campaign and somehow ended up with list of official .gov email addresses for members of various foreign parliaments and even at least one former Prime Minister of Canada who hasn’t been in Parliament for many years. I don’t even know if that is a possible mistake to make. If I go to a list vendor, do they have that list? I have no idea. If you’re in a list vendor biz, can you help us out here?
