As we’ve seen the alt-right and various white supremacist and fascistic groups grow in prominence if not necessarily numbers in recent years and now be granted renewed prominence and validation from the President, we see a renewed debate about the role of violence in American politics. Specifically, what is the best way and the appropriate way to react to and combat the always menacing and often violent actions of the kind of people we saw protesting in Charlottesville? Read More

The Washington Post has a piece up tonight reporting that during the 2016 campaign Donald Trump was trying to put together a deal to build a Trump Tower Moscow. I would not be doing right by TPM’s crack reporting staff if I didn’t note that TPM’s Sam Thielman reported these details in this piece on August 1st. The Times was the first to reference this deal in February, though only obliquely. But in a series of conversations with Thielman, Sater provided considerably more detail about this key project. Read More

Telling Trump the forces of MAGA are in eclipse, Gorka resigns, according to The Federalist. [G]iven recent events, it is clear to me that forces that do not support the MAGA promise are – for now – ascendant within the White House,” worte Gorka. “As a result, the best and most effective way I can support you, Mr. President, is from outside the People’s House.”

President Trump pardons former Sheriff Joe Arpaio.

White House statement after the jump … Read More

The “Blacks for Trump” guy, who shows up right behind the President in so many campaign rallies, says he has no relationship with the Trump White House or campaign. But his description of how he breezes through to that one choice position sure makes it sound like the Trump advance team is happy to see him and makes sure he gets a choice spot. Allegra Kirkland talked to him about why he supports Trump: he believes Trump is a great emancipator who will liberate the white and black races from domination by the Cherokee Indians.

If there’s one thing Donald Trump has been consistently good at over 40-plus years in public life it’s been finding other people to pick up the downside of his bad or failed investments and projects. Sometimes that process has simply been crafty and ingenious. Other times it’s amounted to criminal fraud. Most often it’s been some combination of both. We now appear to be moving toward Trump’s most audacious attempt to accomplish the same thing – only now with the Republican party. Read More

Unsurprisingly, Donald Trump’s rhetoric about the confederacy and the death of “our culture” maps to the language and lures skinheads and white supremacists use to lure people into hate groups.

Take a moment and watch this video. It’s only 45 seconds long. But you need to listen to the words. Really take a moment and watch.

Russell Walker filed a lawsuit in York SC, demanding confederate flags be returned to the main courtroom @SpecNewsCLT pic.twitter.com/MVDYSEBIEe

— Yoojin Cho (@Yoojin_Cho) August 24, 2017

I wanted to note briefly the news of this new Russia-related email in the news today. The email is from Rick Dearborn, a key Trump staffer, whose role in the drama we’ll return to in a moment. We don’t have the email itself but rather descriptions of it. And it appears to reference an effort by an individual from West Virginia (who knows?) to set up a meeting between Trump campaign officials and Vladimir Putin. Notably, the email dates from June 2016, around the time of the notorious Trump Tower meeting with Don Jr and just as Russian intelligence operatives were kicking their election disruption campaign into high gear. Read More