Republicans won back the House Wednesday, but are only on track for a very slim majority.
What was long predicted to be a midterm shellacking in the stylings of the Republican tsunamis of past Democratic-trifecta years of 1994 and 2010 fizzled out to the point that the lower chamber became little more than a tossup.
Continue reading “Republicans Flip House By Unexpectedly Small Margin”Conservative commentators have been trying to manufacture outrage about Gisele Fetterman ever since she posted a photo of herself and her partially cropped out husband Senator-Elect John Fetterman during his Senate orientation yesterday. But they’re mostly outing themselves as meme-illiterates.
Continue reading “Conservatives *Try* To Come After Gisele Fetterman, But It Seems They Don’t Know How To Do The Internet”The Respect for Marriage Act easily accumulated enough votes to advance Wednesday, netting 12 Republican yes votes and putting it on a glide path to final passage.
Continue reading “Same-Sex Marriage Bill Clears Filibuster On Glide Path To Passage”After months of fighting it in court, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) is set to testify on Thursday in the Georgia state investigation of Donald Trump’s interference in the 2020 election.
Continue reading “Lindsey Graham Will Testify This Week. What Do Prosecutors Want To Know?”Following their historical underperformance in last week’s midterms, Republicans need someone to blame. Some factions of the party are loudly pointing the finger at Donald Trump, his conspiracy theories and his slate of far-right candidates for the red wave that never was. Others in the MAGA crowd, now less sold on the electability of the Big Lie, are aiming their ire at other targets.
Continue reading “McConnell Easily Fends Off Scott Challenge To His GOP Leader Election”The New Mexico Supreme Court has dismissed an appeal from “Cowboys for Trump” founder Couy Griffin to overturn a decision that barred him from holding public office for life under the 14th Amendment’s Disqualification Clause.
Continue reading “Jan. 6 Rioter Barred From Holding Office For Life Under Insurrection Clause After His Appeal Is Dismissed”A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things. This is TPM’s Morning Memo.
Last Tuesday was a good start, but to well and truly vanquish Trumpism is going to require defeating Trump himself at the polls one more time. History needs a verdict of twice-defeated more that it does twice-impeached.
The fight against Trumpism will proceed in the meantime on multiple fronts. Criminal investigations into his actions to subvert the 2020 election and improperly retain classified information at Mar-a-Lago could yield indictments, prosecutions, and convictions that will vindicate the rule of law. That’s important, but it doesn’t serve the same cathartic cleansing of the body politic as his defeat at the polls.
Republicans can’t be relied upon to do their duty and render their own verdict against him in the GOP primary. And so it will fall to everyone else to end this repugnant realm.
While it’s true that Trump is a product of a long and consistent arc of American history, not the anomaly some claim, his defeat is a necessary precondition to returning to a more progressive, enlightened, optimistic American narrative. Here we go.
It seemed like a contest among news outlets to prove who could do the toughest, most contextual headline about Trump’s announcement that he’s running again.
NPR had a good showing: “Donald Trump, who tried to overturn Biden’s legitimate election, launches 2024 bid”
WaPo brought it: Trump, who as president fomented an insurrection, says he is running again
For what it’s worth, the broadcast nets and MSNBC did not carry the speech live. Fox and CNN did, but hilariously broke away as Trump droned on.
Ivanka! Where was Ivanka?
In his first byline since returning to TPM, Hunter Walker breaks some news on the Trump campaign.
Since Grover Cleveland has cornered the market on nonconsecutive terms as POTUS, the comparisons to Trump’s quest for a second term are inevitable. But Cleveland biographer Troy Senik says the comparisons basically stop there. A good thread:
Former Trump National Security Adviser turned conspiracist Mike Flynn lost his fight against a Georgia grand jury subpoena compelling his testimony in its probe of Trump’s 2020 election interference scheme. Flynn, a retired Army lieutenant general, was challenging the out-of-state subpoena in Florida state court. He is due to testify Nov. 22.
The Justice Department’s objections to unsealing some of the filings surrounding the federal grand jury investigating the Jan. 6 higher-ups was filed … under seal. Media outlets are attempting to get the chief judge in DC to unseal the filings related to what looks like a big fight over executive privilege, a fight Trump appears to have mostly lost with a stream of former high-ranking White House officials having now testified. We’ll have to wait a bit longer to learn exactly what’s been happening in these secret proceedings.
Prosecutors filed their sentencing memo on Rep. Matt Gaetz’s old running buddy Joel Greenberg and it’s a doozy of criming and other bad acts. Gaetz is going to walk away from this. Greenberg won’t.
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The fans are already lining up outside of Mar-a-Lago ahead of former President Trump’s “BIG ANNOUNCEMENT” scheduled for Tuesday evening. Trump is reportedly planning to kick off his 2024 White House bid at his private Florida beach club at 9 p.m. ET.
Based on photos posted on Instagram, some of the faithful are already lining up outside the compound’s pink walls including some waving “TRUMP 2024” flags and one of the self-described “Front Row Joes” who spend hours in line for prime placement at the former president’s rallies.
However, as is so often the case with Trump, the big event is bringing plenty of drama and questions to go along with the pomp and circumstance.
Continue reading “Trump Is Surrounded By Rivals And Questions As He Preps ‘BIG ANNOUNCEMENT’ At Mar-A-Lago”Yesterday Kate Riga and I held a TPM Newsmaker Briefing with Brendan McPhillips — a lot of very interesting details about how the campaign unfolded from the inside. Did it seem like a jump ball in the last week on the inside? Apparently so. What happened with that NBC interview? What about the debate? We get into all of that. If you’re a member and you weren’t able to join us live yesterday, you can watch the whole thing after the jump.
Continue reading “Inside the Fetterman Campaign”Can Kevin McCarthy possibly avoid the fate of John Boehner and Paul Ryan?
To the extent things have changed, they’ve changed for the worse.
The Freedom Caucus is more amped on its own supply than ever before; the MAGA-infused GOP conference now has members like Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and Lauren Boebert (R-CO) in addition to the old reliables like Paul Gosar (R-AZ) and Louie Gohmert (R-TX); and McCarthy is stuck with a majority so narrow that GOP control of the House isn’t even official yet.
All of those dynamics brought us to today’s scheduled vote on the House GOP leadership for the new Congress.
Continue reading “House GOP Selects McCarthy As Nom For Speaker. But His Bid Is Off To A Rocky Start”
