All day Monday, former president Donald Trump's Truth Social feed was active with posts ragging on Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and re-posts of his fandom's superhero memes. You would never have known that the night before he had been presented with a target letter from Special Counsel Jack Smith. On Tuesday, Trump fessed up and posted a rambling, incoherent official two-page "statement" announcing it to the world.
"Deranged Jack Smith, the prosecutor with Joe Biden's DOJ, sent a letter … stating that I am a TARGET of the January 6th Grand Jury investigation, and giving me a very short 4 days to report to the Grand Jury, which almost always means an Arrest and an Indictment" the statement began after which it immediately devolved into whining and crying over his alleged persecution at the hands of well... everyone. He lamented, "it is a very sad and dark period for our nation."
It is a sad and dark period for our nation that an accused criminal ex-president is the front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination. In fact, it's tragic.
Late last night several news outlets reported that the target letter specified three crimes they are contemplating charging Trump with. According to ABC, it mentions "three federal statutes: conspiracy to commit offense or to defraud the United States, deprivation of rights under color of law, and tampering with a witness, victim or an informant." Contrary to much speculation, the letter apparently did not mention sedition or insurrection.
Despite the fact that the letter refers to a conspiracy charge, no other targets have come forward to say they have been similarly informed. Trump's former lawyer Rudy Giuliani would be a likely choice but he spent many hours with the Special Counsel during two "proffer" sessions and claims that he is neither a cooperator nor a target. His spokesman told ABC,
Any speculation that Mayor Rudy Giuliani 'flipped' against President Donald Trump is as false as previous lies that America's Mayor was somehow a Russian Agent. In order to 'flip' on President Trump — as so many in the anti-Trump media are fantasizing over — Mayor Giuliani would've had to commit perjury because all the information he has regarding this case points to President Trump's innocence."
We'll have to see how that shakes out because it could mean almost anything. It's entirely possible that Giuliani remains more assured of his lawyerly prowess than he should be and those sessions actually implicated Trump — and himself. As for the other potential conspirators like John Eastman and Sidney Powell, who knows? All we are sure of at this point is that Donald Trump is very likely on the cusp of another federal indictment and this one is the big enchilada.
CNN reports that Trump has been on the horn to his allies on Capitol Hill twisting their arms to use their power to defend him. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., stepped up to the microphone immediately after Trump announced the news and said, "Well, I guess under a Biden administration, Biden America, you'd expect this. If you noticed recently, President Trump went up in the polls and was actually surpassing President Biden for reelection." (Recall that McCarthy took to the floor of the House chambers after January 6 and said the attack on the Capitol was "was undemocratic, un-American, and criminal," and that "the president bears responsibility.")
Trump also had a long conversation with House GOP Conference Chair Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., brainstorming talking points for the caucus to circulate in his defense. This was apparently what they came up with:
WITCH HUNT!#StandWithTrump pic.twitter.com/Eixv5ar8C6
— Elise Stefanik (@EliseStefanik) July 18, 2023
Stefanik didn't stop there, however, she also brought in yet another conspiracy theory which was echoed by other members and on Fox News. She tweeted:
It is no coincidence — on the same week that IRS whistleblowers are testifying about illegal corruption protecting the Biden crime family, Biden's DOJ targets President Trump with yet another corrupt Witch Hunt.
Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene was typically restrained in her recitation of the talking points, calling the target letter "bullshit" and saying that "the only way that the Democrats have to beat President Trump is to arrest him, smear him, charge him with ridiculous charges, all in a cover-up of Joe Biden's crimes, Hunter Biden's crimes." She later tweeted out this charming comment:
Jack Smith is a lousy attorney.
— Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene🇺🇸 (@RepMTG) July 18, 2023
His career is filled with mistrials, overturned cases, and judicial rebukes.
He only targets Republicans because he’s a weak little bitch for the Democrats.
Why do I have the feeling she's also been on the phone with Donald Trump?
On the campaign trail, Trump's rivals were predictably wishy-washy. The New York Times reported that former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley didn't address the merits of the issue and instead complained that it was a distraction from important issues and said "we don't need all this drama." Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis went with the talking points that it is "an attempt to criminalize politics and to try to criminalize differences" but tepidly pointed out that Trump could have come out more forcefully on January 6. Vivek Ramaswamy said, "it is un-American for the ruling party to use police power to arrest its chief political rivals," while Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., who has been accusing the Democrats of weaponizing the Justice Department (DOJ) in his speeches, boldly pointed out that "it's part of the distractions that are always going to be surrounding the former president."
Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson was the only one who actually addressed the big picture:
While Donald Trump would like the American people to believe that he is the victim in this situation, the truth is that the real victims of January 6th were our democracy, our rule of law, and those Capitol Police officers.."
The overriding theme among Trump's defenders is this notion of a "weaponized" DOJ. Someone should remind Republicans, however, of the 27 different people that Trump said he wanted thrown in jail, from Hillary Clinton and James Comey to Marco Rubio to Tim Kaine to Robert Mueller to Presidents Biden, Clinton and Obama. He wanted to sic the IRS on his political enemies and there's good reason to suspect he succeeded.
The reason Trump is being indicted for all these crimes is not because the "deep state" is out to get him but because he imperiously insists he is above the law and continually breaks it. He always has. When it came to taxes and various kinds of fraud he was able to worm his way out of any legal consequences because he was just another rich, white guy with friends in high places. When he became president his extreme narcissism and grandiosity took over completely and he stopped even pretending to believe that he had any limits. He used to say it all the time:
He was protected from legal liability while he was president and since he refuses to acknowledge that he lost his re-election bid, he seems to think it should still apply to him now as he runs for president again. It does not. Nobody's "weaponizing" the Justice Department against this poor innocent MAGA martyr. There is a mountain of evidence that he broke the law in half a dozen different ways and he is long overdue for a reckoning. It looks as though it's finally here.
