Dean Blundell came straight from his son’s wedding on Thursday — congratulations to the new Mr. and Mrs. Blundell.
5️⃣ The red carpet
America is watching its empire fold in real time. Trump rolled red carpet from the tarmac to the East Room for Xi Jinping this week, then walked the whole room out to the building site of his ballroom. “It’s one year away from completion,” Trump said in his toast. “This is an honor of President Xi.” He did this for the leader of a country whose groups, CNN reported, have fed Iran intelligence to target U.S. sites. Xi repaid him with a warning: the Thucydides trap, a rising power and a fading one ending in war, with one way out — cooperation, on his terms. He came to Washington to set the terms of the next war. Trump gave no answer. “Watching Donald Trump torch 250 years of hegemony,” Dean said, left him as sad as he has ever been for America.
4️⃣ The locked door
Trump shut the American press out of the dinner and Friday’s tea, and let Chinese state media in. The press corps got one shot all day, shouted across the lawn at the arrival: why are you banning media outlets? Nobody answered. Inside, by the pool reports, sat Elon Musk, Jensen Huang, Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg, Justices Alito, Gorsuch and Barrett, and not one Democrat. “Why would you not want to have prying eyes in that room?” Dean asked. “There’s your answer about who Donald Trump serves. It’s not you.”
3️⃣ Cook moves 15
Cook Political Report moved 15 House races toward Democrats on Friday, six weeks out, and Axios reports Republicans are on track to lose the majority. Republicans in swing seats are keeping their distance, and Trump is rallying in Oklahoma and Alabama to hold what he can. No one wants to be seen with him. A party losing at the ballot box goes looking for another way to win.
2️⃣ The voter rolls
The Supreme Court on Friday let Trump switch his SAVE citizenship checks back on across state voter rolls, six weeks before Election Day, lifting a June ruling that found the system broke privacy law and flagged citizens as noncitizens. Sotomayor, Kagan and Jackson dissented; Jackson wrote that burdening “even a few lawful voters outweighs the nonexistent harm” to the government. Citizenship is the cover. They want the voter rolls so they can manipulate the numbers — question every vote that went the wrong way and refuse the result. “I know exactly what they’re going to do,” Dean said. Trump bowed to Xi all week and got the voter rolls on Friday.
1️⃣ The farewell
Friday morning Xi got more red carpet — at the White House arrival, at the tea, and on the steps of the National Archives, where he went to see the original Constitution. He is a Communist Party functionary, not royalty, and Trump carpeted his every step like a conquering emperor’s. “President Xi went and looked at that Constitution almost like, hey, cool document. I own you now,” Dean said. “And he does. He owns Donald Trump.” Then, Dean added, came the fundraising email: help me normalize relations with China. How many meals would that red carpet have put on American tables? None of it matters to this president — only the power and the money he stands to make off Xi Jinping. Show up in person and vote like your life depends on it. It does.
Thank you Ellie Leonard, Cat: Poli-Psych, LC - Silence is Complicity, Caro Henry, Dr. Eric Lullove, and many others for tuning into my live video with Dean Blundell! Join me for my next live video in the app.
