Nevada GOP Candidate Put Out Campaign Ads In…Florida. When Trump Was There. Hmm.

A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things.

Why Bother With Subtlety

Some Florida residents would have seen something interesting on television during Thanksgiving week last year: An ad for a candidate … in the Nevada gubernatorial race.

Republican Michele Fiore had bought ads in the West Palm Beach-Fort Pierce media market — timed specifically to a period when Trump and his family were staying at Mar-A-Lago, according to Federal Communications Commission filings flagged by the Associated Press.

• The ads are a brazen appeal to Trump’s ego. After emerging from a truck with a big ol’ “Trump 2024” bumper sticker slapped on the back, Fiore brags about being one of the first elected officials to endorse Trump and being referred to as “Lady Trump.”
• Fiore’s campaign isn’t even bothering to pretend it wasn’t trying to score brownie points from him. “It’s important to remind the President’s team that Michele Fiore is the only true America First candidate running for Governor,” a campaign consultant told the Associated Press.
• Sadly, it doesn’t seem to have paid off, at least not yet. Trump hasn’t endorsed anyone in Fiore’s race.
  • In fact, it’s not clear Trump ever even saw the ads.

Schumer Moves Voting Rights Legislation Vote To Next Week

After Sens. Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ) and Joe Manchin (D-WV) both tossed grenades at Biden’s push to change the filibuster rules for sweeping voting rights legislation, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) announced Thursday night that the chamber would take up the package on Tuesday.

• Schumer’s announcement followed Biden’s private meeting with Sinema and Manchin at the White House after the senators doubled down on their refusal to tweak the filibuster.
  • We don’t know how well the Sinemanchin meeting went for Biden. The White House hasn’t offered any details.
• The Democratic Senate leader had previously planned to put the legislation to a vote by Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

RNC Ready To Boycott Presidential Debates

The Republican National Committee is moving toward barring GOP candidates from participating in debates held by the Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD), according to a letter from RNC officials to the commission obtained by the New York Times. 

• Under the proposed rule, candidates who want to run under the GOP banner would be required to sign a pledge to not participate in the CPD’s debates.
• The requirement hasn’t been established yet. The RNC will vote on it during its meeting next month.
• The RNC threatened to boycott the debates during the 2020 election after Trump whined that the commission was biased against him and demanded changes to the debate format.

SCOTUS Blocks Biden’s Employer Vaccine Mandate

Read TPM’s coverage of the decision.

Woman Arrested Outside Capitol, Allegedly With Three Firearms, Cops Say

The U.S. Capitol Police said on Thursday that officers had arrested a woman from Michigan who had parked her vehicle near the Capitol building.

• Officers found two rifles and a shotgun in the vehicle, the USCP said.
• The woman allegedly told the officers that she wanted to talk about “information” that she claimed to have “about Jan. 6, 2021.” It’s unclear whether she was specifically referring to the Capitol insurrection.

Portman Rejects Ohio Local News Editorial Pleading For Him To Stay

Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH) wasn’t swayed by an op-ed by the editorial board of cleveland.com and the Plain Dealer begging him to cancel his plan for retirement in order to “give Ohio a chance” to “retain sanity and probity” in its Senate representation.

• Ohio is increasingly leaning Republican, and its GOP primary is a bit of a mess.

Glenn Beck Gets COVID-19 Again And Announces He’s Fat

Beck, who’s said he won’t get vaccinated against COVID, told fellow conservative radio host Mark Levin on Wednesday that he was sick with the virus for the second time — and that it was starting to get into his lungs, which was “a little disturbing.”

• “I am a fatty-fat-fatso, so that is probably not the best thing,” Beck said.
• The monoclonal antibody treatment he’s getting “doesn’t seem to be working.”
• Beck claimed he wasn’t worried about his situation while also coughing several times as he was speaking.
• The radio host declared in April that he wouldn’t be getting the vaccine because he’d already had COVID.

Manafort Gets Roasted By His Ex-Cellmate

One of the inmates who shared a cell with ex-Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort wrote a scathing Daily Beast op-ed on his experience of being locked up with “Paulie,” who allegedly used free kitchen food to pay for other inmates to do his laundry, didn’t bother to tell the cellmate he was switching cells before the cellmate could find a decent replacement and was an overall “full-of-crap dandy and user.” “Watching him on TV go on about how his shit didn’t stink reminds me how much his farts did,” the cellmate wrote.

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