Why Republican Politicians Do Whatever Trump Says

[homersapien 11,388]

The former president’s stories of business dominance were often exaggerated. With Republican politicians, he’s found a group he can control.

By McKay Coppins

The story Donald Trump tells about himself—and to himself—has always been one of domination. It runs through the canonical texts of his personal mythology. In The Art of the Deal, he filled page after page with examples of his hard-nosed negotiating tactics. On The Apprentice, he lorded over a boardroom full of supplicants competing for his approval. And at his campaign rallies, he routinely regales crowds with tales of strong-arming various world leaders in the Oval Office.

This image of Trump has always been dubious. Those boardroom scenes were, after all, reality-TV contrivances; those stories in his book were, by his own ghostwriter’s account, exaggerated in many cases to make Trump appear savvier than he was. And there’s been ample reporting to suggest that many of the world leaders with whom Trump interacted as president saw him more as an easily manipulated mark than as a domineering statesman to be feared.

The truth is that Trump, for all of his tough-guy posturing, spent most of his career failing to push people around and bend them to his will.

That is, until he started dealing with Republican politicians.

For nearly a decade now, Trump has demonstrated a remarkable ability to make congressional Republicans do what he wants. He threatens them. He bullies them. He extracts from them theatrical displays of devotion—and if they cross him, he makes them pay. If there is one arena of American power in which Trump has been able to actually be the merciless alpha he played on TV—and there may, indeed, be only one—it is Republican politics. His influence was on full display this week, when he derailed a bipartisan border-security bill reportedly because he wants to campaign on the immigration “crisis” this year.

Sam Nunberg, a former adviser to Trump, has observed this dynamic with some amusement. “It’s funny,” he told me in a recent phone interview. “In the business world and in the entertainment world, I don’t think Donald was able to intimidate people as much.”

He pointed to Trump’s salary negotiations with NBC during Trump’s Apprentice years. Jeff Zucker, who ran the network at the time, has said that Trump once came to him demanding a raise. At the time, Trump was making $40,000 an episode, but he wanted to make as much as the entire cast of Friends combined: $6 million an episode. Zucker countered with $60,000. When Trump balked, Zucker said he’d find someone else to host the show. The next day, according to Zucker, Trump’s lawyer called to accept the $60,000. (A spokesperson for the Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment.)

Contrast that with the power Trump wields on Capitol Hill—how he can kill a bill or tank a speakership bid with a single post on social media; how high-ranking congressmen are so desperate for his approval that they’ll task staffers to sort through packs of Starbursts and pick out just the pinks and reds so Trump can be presented with his favorite flavors.

“I just remember that there’d be a lot of stuff that didn’t go his way,” Nunberg told me, referring to Trump’s business career. “But he has all these senators in the fetal position! They do whatever he wants.”

Why exactly congressional Republicans have proved so much more pliable than anyone else Trump has contended with is a matter of interpretation. One explanation is that Trump has simply achieved much more success in politics than he ever did, relatively speaking, in New York City real estate or on network TV. For all of his tabloid omnipresence, Trump never had anything like the presidential bully pulpit.

“It stands to reason that [when] the president and leader of your party is pushing for something … that’s what’s going to happen,” a former chief of staff to a Republican senator, who requested anonymity in order to candidly describe former colleagues’ thinking, told me. “Take away the office and put him back in a business setting, where facts and core principles matter, and it doesn’t surprise me that it wasn’t as easy.”

But, of course, Trump is not the president anymore—and there is also something unique about the sway he continues to have over Republicans on Capitol Hill. In his previous life, Trump had viewers, readers, fans—but he never commanded a movement that could end the careers of the people on the other side of the negotiating table.

And Trump—whose animal instinct for weakness is one of his defining traits—seemed to intuit something early on about the psychology of the Republicans he would one day reign over.

Nunberg told me about a speech he drafted for Trump in 2015 that included this line about the Republican establishment: “They’re good at keeping their jobs, not their promises.” When Trump read it, he chuckled. “It’s so true,” he said, according to Nunberg. “That’s all they care about.” (Nunberg was eventually fired from Trump’s 2016 campaign.)

This ethos of job preservation at all costs is not a strictly partisan phenomenon in Washington—nor is it new. As I reported in my recent biography of Mitt Romney, the Utah senator was surprised, when he arrived in Congress, by the enormous psychic currency his colleagues attached to their positions. One senator told Romney that his first consideration when voting on any bill should be “Will this help me win reelection?”

But the Republican Party of 2015 was uniquely vulnerable to a hostile takeover by someone like Trump. Riven by years of infighting and ideological incoherence, and plagued by a growing misalignment between its base and its political class, the GOP was effectively one big institutional power vacuum. The litmus tests kept changing. The formula for getting reelected was obsolete. Republicans with solidly conservative records, such as House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, were getting taken out in primaries by obscure Tea Party upstarts.

To many elected Republicans, it probably felt like an answer to their prayers when a strongman finally parachuted in and started telling them what to do. Maybe his orders were reckless and contradictory. But as long as you did your best to look like you were obeying, you could expect to keep winning your primaries.

As for Trump, it’s easy to see the ongoing appeal of this arrangement. The Apprentice was canceled long ago, and the Manhattan-real-estate war stories have worn thin. Republicans in Congress might be the only ostensibly powerful people in America who will allow him to boss them around, humiliate them, and assert unbridled dominance over them. They’ve made the myth true. How could he possibly walk away now?

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2024/02/trump-dominance-business-republicans-congress/677391/

 

 

[CoffeeTiger 5,133]

Well, for one thing an increasingly high number of these Republican politicians were elected specifically to be Trump allies. 

 

Once Trump become this legendary political icon for tens of millions of gullible Republican voters, the politicians who beg for their votes kind of just fell in line. 

 

These days it can be very bad for any given Republicans re-election chances for them to strongly criticize Trump or go against his wishes. Trumps demands become Republican's voters demands. 

 

 

[auburnatl1 4,965]

[auburnatl1 4,965]

I couldn’t make this up. Everyone understands the member issue but at a campaign rally? With Russia already actively killing 10s of thousands of Europeans. Foreign policy via slum lord tenant tactics.

[I_M4_AU 7,857]

9 hours ago, auburnatl1 said:

I couldn’t make this up. Everyone understands the member issue but at a campaign rally? With Russia already actively killing 10s of thousands of Europeans. Foreign policy via slum lord tenant tactics.

So the US should pay all or most of what is required to protect Ukraine when European nations are not willing to step up and are the most affected?  I thought you were a fiscal conservative.

[auburnatl1 4,965]

8 minutes ago, I_M4_AU said:

So the US should pay all or most of what is required to protect Ukraine when European nations are not willing to step up and are the most affected?  I thought you were a fiscal conservative.

Missed the point.  Whats vs how’s. There are things  you ethically can’t use as campaign fodder.  You don’t  broadcast to your advisory an “or else” within your allies. Again - Putin will continue murdering civilians as long as he feels the coalition might crumble.  He can’t win otherwise.  One of the few things Biden as done well is reunify the west against aggression. 

Of course our allies should pay their committed amount. But that’s a mommy and daddy talk behind close doors. Not as red meat to the kids/mob for no other reason than personal ambition.

 

[I_M4_AU 7,857]

19 minutes ago, auburnatl1 said:

One of the few things Biden as done well is reunify the west against aggression. 

It is easy to reunify the west when you pay for all the heavy lifting.  That is why the EU likes Biden, it’s all about the money.

20 minutes ago, auburnatl1 said:

Of course our allies should pay their committed amount.

Then why don’t they?  Trump had them ante up, Biden lets it slide and relies on the American taxpayer.  Whose more popular with the EU?

Politics is point out the failures of your opponent.  What do you think of Trump wanting any money given to our foreign recipients be in the form of a loan?

[auburnatl1 4,965]

10 minutes ago, I_M4_AU said:

It is easy to reunify the west when you pay for all the heavy lifting.  That is why the EU likes Biden, it’s all about the money.

Then why don’t they?  Trump had them ante up, Biden lets it slide and relies on the American taxpayer.  Whose more popular with the EU?

Politics is point out the failures of your opponent.  What do you think of Trump wanting any money given to our foreign recipients be in the form of a loan?

Trump has never shown any interest in deficit reduction and it completely exploded under him for 4 years. He’s a fiscal dumpster fire. Maybe the worse in US history.  This isn’t about saving money for the US. it’s simply about feeding the mob another bad group he’ll protect them from . It’s about  “thems” - hordes of murderous illegals, “elites”, rinos, sneaky Europeans (btw except Hungary - the one country with a quasi dictator), transgenders, ect. Bad people that are free loading, attacking you, looking down at you, want to take away your guns or other freedoms, wants to turn all boys into girls. Theres never any context - no 2 sides - just evil people. Basic wwe storyline -  faces (that’s you) and heels (that’s “them”).

Again, yes anything that balances the budget, secures the border, confronts our adversaries  and lessens the divide within our country - I’m all for.  Bottom line  - yes all our allies must pay up. I support that. You just don’t tell your enemy in a friggin rally that you can invade them otherwise simply for political gain. Sick stuff imo.

[arein0 967]

5 minutes ago, auburnatl1 said:

Trump has never shown any interest in deficit reduction and it completely exploded under him for 4 years. He’s a fiscal dumpster fire. Maybe the worse in US history.  This isn’t about saving money for the US. it’s simply about feeding the mob another bad group he’ll protect them from . It’s about  “thems” - hordes of murderous illegals, “elites”, rinos, sneaky Europeans (btw except Hungary - the one country with a quasi dictator), transgenders, ect. Bad people that are free loading, attacking you, looking down at you, want to take away your guns or other freedoms, wants to turn all boys into girls. Theres never any context - no 2 sides - just evil people. Basic wwe storyline -  faces (that’s you) and heels (that’s “them”).

Again, yes anything that balances the budget, secures the border, confronts our adversaries  and lessens the divide within our country - I’m all for.  Bottom line  - yes all our allies must pay up. I support that. You just don’t tell your enemy in a friggin rally that you can invade them otherwise simply for political gain. Sick stuff imo.

Sounds like a hostage situation. 

[TexasTiger 12,949]

1 hour ago, I_M4_AU said:

So the US should pay all or most of what is required to protect Ukraine when European nations are not willing to step up and are the most affected?  I thought you were a fiscal conservative.

You don’t actually follow this issue, do you?

[I_M4_AU 7,857]

25 minutes ago, TexasTiger said:

You don’t actually follow this issue, do you?

Yeah, I do.  I just have a different point of view.  I thought you knew that.

[homersapien 11,388]

1 hour ago, auburnatl1 said:

....it’s simply about feeding the mob another bad group he’ll protect them from . It’s about  “thems” - hordes of murderous illegals, “elites”, rinos, sneaky Europeans (btw except Hungary - the one country with a quasi dictator), transgenders, ect. Bad people that are free loading, attacking you, looking down at you, want to take away your guns or other freedoms, wants to turn all boys into girls. Theres never any context - no 2 sides - just evil people.......

 

Classic fascist politics.

Edited February 11 by homersapien

[homersapien 11,388]

1 hour ago, TexasTiger said:

You don’t actually follow this issue, do you?

That is endemic to MAGAs.

[AUFAN78 3,911]

1 hour ago, auburnatl1 said:

Trump has never shown any interest in deficit reduction and it completely exploded under him for 4 years. He’s a fiscal dumpster fire. Maybe the worse in US history.

To be fair, nearly half of the deficit incurred under Trump was towards Covid relief. A noble and necessary cause. 

https://www.crfb.org/blogs/how-much-did-president-trump-add-debt

https://www.investopedia.com/us-debt-by-president-dollar-and-percentage-7371225

[auburnatl1 4,965]

17 minutes ago, AUFAN78 said:

To be fair, nearly half of the deficit incurred under Trump was towards Covid relief. A noble and necessary cause. 

https://www.crfb.org/blogs/how-much-did-president-trump-add-debt

https://www.investopedia.com/us-debt-by-president-dollar-and-percentage-7371225

Oh you mean the checks trump demanded that he have his name as who it’s from  (1st time a presidents name is on a relief check in us history - it’s supposed to be from the treasurery) or he wouldn’t release them?

[AUFAN78 3,911]

4 minutes ago, auburnatl1 said:

Oh you mean the checks trump demanded that he have his name as who it’s from  (1st time a presidents name is on a relief check in us history - it’s supposed to be from the treasurery) or he wouldn’t release them?

A rather narcissistic thing to do indeed, but my point stands. Half of his deficit was to aid Covid 19. 

[homersapien 11,388]

Let’s just say it: The Republican problem is metastasizing

By E.J. Dionne Jr.

(Just for you David )

Twelve years ago, political scientists Thomas E. Mann and Norman J. Ornstein shook up Washington with their argument that the U.S. government wasn’t working because of what had happened to the Republican Party.

They made their case in a book, “It’s Even Worse Than It Looks,” and in a powerful Post op-ed titled “Let’s just say it: The Republicans are the problem.”

“The GOP has become an insurgent outlier in American politics,” they wrote. “It is ideologically extreme; scornful of compromise; unmoved by conventional understanding of facts, evidence and science; and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition. When one party moves this far from the mainstream, it makes it nearly impossible for the political system to deal constructively with the country’s challenges.”

Mann and Ornstein — I should note they’re my friends, and we wrote a subsequent book together — took a lot of grief for supposedly being partisan. This criticism flew in the face of their entire professional careers: thoroughly balanced, appreciative of the work of many Republican politicians and deeply engaged in making our nation’s political institutions work better.

Events of the past week not only ratify what they wrote but suggest that matters are, to borrow from them, even worse now.

It’s one thing for a party to oppose the other party’s proposals over differences of principle. Small-d democratic politics ought to be a contest of ideas and a debate over which remedies are more likely to work.

It’s something else entirely for a party to reject its own ideas to address a crisis simply because it doesn’t want to get in the way of a campaign issue. This is exactly what Republicans did at the behest of former president Donald Trump after President Biden and Senate Democrats offered the best deal the GOP could hope for to strengthen the nation’s southern border.

You have to feel for Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.), who was chosen by Republican Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) to negotiate the border deal precisely because he had tough immigration views. Trump himself described Lankford in his 2022 endorsement as “Strong on the Border.”

But if Trump claims the right as president to break the law, he also asserts the right to lie with impunity. He insisted, falsely: “I did not endorse Sen. Lankford. I didn’t do it.” Former students at Trump University are familiar with this sort of thing.

Lankford recounted on the Senate floor what happens these days to Republicans who try to legislate: A “popular commentator,” he said, threatened to “destroy” him if he dared try to solve the border crisis during a presidential election year.

The episode speaks to how the trends Mann and Ornstein caught on to early have metastasized. Power in the GOP has moved away from elected officials and toward those right-wing “commentators” on television, radio, podcasts and online. The creation of ideological media bubbles enhances their power. Republicans in large numbers rely on partisan outlets that lied freely about what Lankford’s compromise did and didn’t do, rather than on straight news reports.

The party’s hostile vibe can also be traced back to a habit in the Bush years to distinguish between “real America” (the places that vote Republican) and what is presumably unreal America. Declaring a large swath of the population to be less than American means they’re not worth dealing with and, increasingly, easy to hold in contempt.

Then there is the denigration of science, dispassionate research and technical knowledge. In his book “The Death of Expertise,” writer Tom Nichols described this mournfully as a “campaign against established knowledge.”

Challenging experts is, of course, a democratic right and can be useful in calling out those who disguise their interests behind claims of special understanding. But Republicans have put this practice to naked political use in pushing back against action on climate, necessary regulation and public health advice.

Something big happened in this arena in the late 2000s. GOP attitudes on climate are a telltale: In 2007, the Pew Research Center found, 62 percent of Republicans believed there was solid evidence of global warming. By 2009, only 35 percent did.

Many GOP legislators — notably John McCain — were active in climate discussions earlier in the decade; not so later. This speaks to the larger retreat from problem-solving, reflected now, in the most perverse way possible, in the flight from an immigration proposal Republicans could have written themselves — and, thanks to Lankford, largely did.

For those who try to be hopeful, there are a few straws to clutch at. The Senate just might approve aid for Ukraine, putting pressure on GOP leaders in the House to keep our nation’s commitments. For its part, the House passed an important increase in the child tax credit, which might move Senate Republicans to do the same.

But the way things are going, Republicans in each chamber are just as likely to ignore the other’s better instincts. “Worsest” is not a word, but Mann and Ornstein might need it if they publish a new edition.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/02/11/republicans-trump-congress-lankford/

Edited February 12 by homersapien

[homersapien 11,388]

4 minutes ago, AUFAN78 said:

A rather narcissistic thing to do indeed, but my point stands. Half of his deficit was to aid Covid 19. 

Too bad he didn't take it seriously earlier.  It would have saved a lot of money.

[AUFAN78 3,911]

3 minutes ago, homersapien said:

Too bad he didn't take it seriously earlier.  It would have saved a lot of money.

IDK. Perhaps, but you are welcome to show proof.

[auburnatl1 4,965]

1 minute ago, AUFAN78 said:

A rather narcissistic thing to do indeed, but my point stands. Half of his deficit was to aid Covid 19. 

He was trending up every year before then. When your predecessor is  a classic tax and spend liberal and completely smokes you by steadily bringing it down before you screw it up…. Count the number of times Trump has declared bankruptcy in his life. 

 

[AUFAN78 3,911]

3 minutes ago, auburnatl1 said:

He was trending up every year before then. When your predecessor is  a classic tax and spend liberal and completely smokes you by steadily bringing it down before you screw it up…. Count the number of times Trump has declared bankruptcy in his life. 

Sure, at a small scale. And not as high as 2009-2012. Your chart accurately depicts Covid as I previously mentioned.

[AUFAN78 3,911]

23 minutes ago, homersapien said:

Let’s just say it: The Republican problem is metastasizing

By E.J. Dionne Jr.

 

Twelve years ago, political scientists Thomas E. Mann and Norman J. Ornstein shook up Washington with their argument that the U.S. government wasn’t working because of what had happened to the Republican Party.

They made their case in a book, “It’s Even Worse Than It Looks,” and in a powerful Post op-ed titled “Let’s just say it: The Republicans are the problem.”

“The GOP has become an insurgent outlier in American politics,” they wrote. “It is ideologically extreme; scornful of compromise; unmoved by conventional understanding of facts, evidence and science; and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition. When one party moves this far from the mainstream, it makes it nearly impossible for the political system to deal constructively with the country’s challenges.”

Mann and Ornstein — I should note they’re my friends, and we wrote a subsequent book together — took a lot of grief for supposedly being partisan. This criticism flew in the face of their entire professional careers: thoroughly balanced, appreciative of the work of many Republican politicians and deeply engaged in making our nation’s political institutions work better.

Events of the past week not only ratify what they wrote but suggest that matters are, to borrow from them, even worse now.

It’s one thing for a party to oppose the other party’s proposals over differences of principle. Small-d democratic politics ought to be a contest of ideas and a debate over which remedies are more likely to work.

It’s something else entirely for a party to reject its own ideas to address a crisis simply because it doesn’t want to get in the way of a campaign issue. This is exactly what Republicans did at the behest of former president Donald Trump after President Biden and Senate Democrats offered the best deal the GOP could hope for to strengthen the nation’s southern border.

You have to feel for Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.), who was chosen by Republican Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) to negotiate the border deal precisely because he had tough immigration views. Trump himself described Lankford in his 2022 endorsement as “Strong on the Border.”

But if Trump claims the right as president to break the law, he also asserts the right to lie with impunity. He insisted, falsely: “I did not endorse Sen. Lankford. I didn’t do it.” Former students at Trump University are familiar with this sort of thing.

Lankford recounted on the Senate floor what happens these days to Republicans who try to legislate: A “popular commentator,” he said, threatened to “destroy” him if he dared try to solve the border crisis during a presidential election year.

The episode speaks to how the trends Mann and Ornstein caught on to early have metastasized. Power in the GOP has moved away from elected officials and toward those right-wing “commentators” on television, radio, podcasts and online. The creation of ideological media bubbles enhances their power. Republicans in large numbers rely on partisan outlets that lied freely about what Lankford’s compromise did and didn’t do, rather than on straight news reports.

The party’s hostile vibe can also be traced back to a habit in the Bush years to distinguish between “real America” (the places that vote Republican) and what is presumably unreal America. Declaring a large swath of the population to be less than American means they’re not worth dealing with and, increasingly, easy to hold in contempt.

Then there is the denigration of science, dispassionate research and technical knowledge. In his book “The Death of Expertise,” writer Tom Nichols described this mournfully as a “campaign against established knowledge.”

Challenging experts is, of course, a democratic right and can be useful in calling out those who disguise their interests behind claims of special understanding. But Republicans have put this practice to naked political use in pushing back against action on climate, necessary regulation and public health advice.

Something big happened in this arena in the late 2000s. GOP attitudes on climate are a telltale: In 2007, the Pew Research Center found, 62 percent of Republicans believed there was solid evidence of global warming. By 2009, only 35 percent did.

Many GOP legislators — notably John McCain — were active in climate discussions earlier in the decade; not so later. This speaks to the larger retreat from problem-solving, reflected now, in the most perverse way possible, in the flight from an immigration proposal Republicans could have written themselves — and, thanks to Lankford, largely did.

For those who try to be hopeful, there are a few straws to clutch at. The Senate just might approve aid for Ukraine, putting pressure on GOP leaders in the House to keep our nation’s commitments. For its part, the House passed an important increase in the child tax credit, which might move Senate Republicans to do the same.

But the way things are going, Republicans in each chamber are just as likely to ignore the other’s better instincts. “Worsest” is not a word, but Mann and Ornstein might need it if they publish a new edition.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/02/11/republicans-trump-congress-lankford/

The polarization paradox: Elected officials and voters have shifted in opposite directions

During the past four decades, the two major political parties have steadily moved farther away from each other and are now as deeply divided as they have been for more than a century. For most of this period, analysts agree, Republican elected officials have moved more to the right than Democratic officials have to the left.

But there’s a paradox: since the early 1990s, according to Gallup, Democratic voters have shifted more to the left than Republican voters have to the right. In 1994, the second year of Bill Clinton’s presidency, 25% of Democrats thought of themselves as liberal and the same share—25%—called themselves conservative. A strong plurality of Democrats—48%—identified as moderate.

By 2022, the second year of Joe Biden’s presidency, the picture had entirely changed. An outright majority of Democrats—54%—now called themselves liberal, while the share of conservatives fell to just 10%. Moderates, who once outnumbered the party’s liberals by 23 percentage points, now trailed them by 18 points.

The Republican Party has changed far less during this period, largely because it has long been more ideologically homogeneous at the grassroots. In 1994, 58% of Republicans were conservative, a figure that rose to 72% in 2022. During these three decades, Republican moderates fell from 33% to 22% while Republican liberals (already an endangered species in the early 1990s), declined from eight percent to just five percent.

For Democrats, the ideological changes have varied significantly along racial and ethnic lines. In 1994, White, Black, and Hispanic Democrats were equally likely to think of themselves as liberal. But during the next three decades, the share of White Democrats who identify as liberal rose by 37 points, from 26% to 63%, while Black and Hispanic Democrats rose by less than half as much, to 39% and 41%, respectively.

https://www.brookings.edu/articles/the-polarization-paradox-elected-officials-and-voters-have-shifted-in-opposite-directions/

[auburnatl1 4,965]

Just now, AUFAN78 said:

Sure, at a small scale. And not as high as 2009-2012. Your chart accurately depicts Covid as I previously mentioned.

Small scale? He almost doubled the budget deficit in 3 yrs.  As for Covid relief - we can argue its efficiency and effectiveness another time.  Bottom line: we now spend as much on just paying interest on the debt as we do on welfare. Itll be our 3rd largest expenditure in 2024. And one of largest holders we’re paying billions in interest to - China. Basically we’re buying them every single one of their new aircraft carriers.

[SaltyTiger 7,816]

14 hours ago, auburnatl1 said:

I couldn’t make this up. Everyone understands the member issue but at a campaign rally? With Russia already actively killing 10s of thousands of Europeans. Foreign policy via slum lord tenant tactics.

He was actually recounting a past story which was “Trump style” complaining about NATO freeloaders.

[AUFAN78 3,911]

9 minutes ago, auburnatl1 said:

Small scale? He almost doubled the budget deficit in 3 yrs.  As for Covid relief - we can argue its efficiency and effectiveness another time.  Bottom line: we now spend as much on just paying interest on the debt as we do on welfare. Itll be our 3rd largest expenditure in 2024. And one of largest holders we’re paying billions in interest to - China. Basically we’re buying them every single one of their new aircraft carriers.

Trump is credited with adding 7.8 trillion to the deficit. 3.9 trillion of that was from bipartisan spending on COVID-19 relief. 

Agree with your bottom-line commentary.