Today in Politics Bulletin 37, 12/31/24

… Bernie Sanders called Trump’s bluff on one of the hundreds of promises he made on the campaign trail. While Trump was busy promising everyone everything to get elected, he slipped in that he was going to pass a law to cap interest that credit card companies can charge at 10%. This would be huge for American consumers. Of course, Trump never had any intention of following through with that.

… So Sanders introduced legislation to do exactly what Trump promised. Now we will see if he really meant it, and what his Republican friends in the Senate think after they get a visit from banking lobbyists. Sanders: “During the recent campaign Donald Trump proposed a 10% cap on credit card interest rates. Great idea. Let’s see if he supports the legislation that I will introduce to do just that.”

… Rep. Victoria Spartz (R-IN) was asked why she first announced she wasn’t running for Congress again, but then changed her mind: “Unfortunately, I have to fight my own party because my party is betraying the American people. I was getting PTSD from this job. I think maybe I need to spend more time and get my sanity back. But a lot of people in my district were upset. So I said okay I’ll just let the people and God decide.”

… I agree with her about needing to get her sanity back.

… Steve Bannon continued to hammer away at the Tech Bros on his show: “Sacks, Musk, and Vivek - I’ve taken down bigger guys before.”

… Former George W. Bush Campaign Manager Stuart Stevens, who is now a Democrat, says that people should not ignore the fact that Steve Bannon has turned on Elon Musk: “Bannon is a guy who has defined himself as a thug, and thugs must do thuggish things. I think Musk has no idea what he’s getting into when he gets in a fight with Bannon over this.”

… Stevens then explained that if Bannon is ever able to turn Trump against Musk as he’s trying to do, that could be a big problem for him: “There’s been reporting that Musk was not a student when he got a visa, and when he made his application for naturalization he put false information on that document. That is grounds for revoking citizenship. It happens all the time. One reason why Musk is so obsessed with immigration is because he knows this. I wouldn’t bet against Steve Bannon.”

… Trump made a rare post on X today. He posts a lot on Truth Social but has averaged only about 1 a week on X. This was today: “Senate Democrats are organizing to improperly stall and delay the confirmation process of many of our Great Nominees. They will try all sorts of tricks starting very soon. Republicans must not allow them to do that. We have a Country to run, and many big problems to solve, mostly created by Democrats. REPUBLICANS, BE SMART AND TOUGH!!!”

… I have a theory that the words he randomly chooses to capitalize is some kind of code to his QAnon followers, but I haven’t cracked it yet.

… Elon Musk bizarrely changed his name on X today to “Kekius Maximus” and changed his profile photo to an alt-right, white nationalist meme that combines the Maximus character from Gladiator with the groyper Pepe the Frog. Kekius comes from the name of a fringe cryptocurrency. It is unknown whether Musk has an ownership stake in that particular coin, but he has promoted others in the past that he does own - including DOGE.

… Meanwhile, Musk addressed allegations that the “Adrian Dittmann” account that constantly praises him, which he reposts and promotes often, is really him: “Suppose for a moment that Adrian Dittmann IS my sock puppet account I use to flatter my main. Isn’t the Left always telling people to love themselves? Or am I just not loving myself in their narrow, conscripted, ‘right’ way? Hypocrisy at it’s finest.”

… This is why happens when a bad human also becomes a ketamine addict.

… Former Trump Press Secretary Sean Spicer posted a poll on X which asked if Republicans agreed with Musk on the H-1B visas or if they agreed with Steve Bannon on it. He got over 92,000 votes, with 67% siding with Bannon over Musk.

… But Musk continued his purge and punishments of right-wing accounts today who disagreed with him on this. White nationalist talk show host Stew Peters (758,000 followers): “Elon Musk is STEALING money from my subscribers and LYING to them. This morning I woke up to find that removed my blue check mark and canceled my ability to have subscribers. My subscribers were told that I canceled my subscription service and they would not be refunded for the next two weeks in which they’ve already paid X for, but which won’t allow me to provide them content. This is intentional deceit and theft.”

… White nationalist leader Nick Fuentes: “Today X appears to have un-verified 5 more prominent critics of the H-1B program. Their checkmarks were taken, subs were refunded, and character limit reduced. This is now overt political censorship. This comes after the Project Groyper brand account and all of its affiliates were suspended last week.” Sad!

… It might be time for a class action lawsuit. I suggest ‘Racist Broke MFers v. World’s Richest Racist MFer’.

… The stock market under Biden’s economy has been red hot for two years, breaking all-time highs on a regular basis. We are on course to have the best two year performance this century, with the highest returns on investments since 1997-98. The market was up 24% in 2023 and another 20% in 2024. Now we will see how things go with Trump.

… Republican Rep. Eric Burlison says that Trump’s DOJ needs to investigate J6: “We truly had some very disturbing things happen with the FBI and their involvement. They created many entrapment scenarios on American citizens who were just simply patriotic and wanted to express their 1st Amendment rights. Instead, they were enticed and encouraged to do things that they didn’t even know might be illegal.”

… But Burlison wasn’t done: “I also personally would like to see us continue the investigation of the Biden family.”

… AdImpact Politics study of spending in the 2024 election shows total amount spent by both campaigns combined was $3.2 billion, which was $70 million more than 2020. From the day Biden dropped out, Democrats spent $1.45 billion and Republicans spent $988 million.

… The total spent on ads for all US political campaigns in 2024 was $11.1 billion.

… $1.7 billion was spent on House races. The two most expensive races were NY-19 at $50 million and ME-02 at $42 million. Democrats narrowly won both races with Josh Riley winning in NY 51-49% and Jared Golden winning in Maine 50.3%-49.7%.

… $260 million in ads was spent on the abortion issue alone in 2024.

… Former Democratic Rep. Jamaal Bowman, who lost his primary to George Latimer after pulling the fire alarm in the Capitol and other incidents, told NBC that he may run for Governor of NY or Senate: “I’m a badass motherf—-er. For someone to have to spend $25 million to beat me - that must mean I’m a bad motherf—-er. I must be doing the right thing, fighting for the right things, and they are desperate and scared.”

… Trump’s incoming WH Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt says that she plans to completely remodel the WH Briefing Room. I agree it is a cramped space that is poorly laid out, but this quote made me wonder if it is more than just about the setup: “We’re exploring ways to make sure that room reflects the media habits of the American people in 2024, not the 1980s.”

… Not exactly sure what that means, but I have a feeling it has something to do with getting fringy right-wing podcasters and independent media into the room in front of legacy media.

… NewsNation host Chris Cuomo says one of the reasons Democrats lost the election is because they downplayed the assassination attempt of Trump: “What I found completely appalling and outrageous was how unimpressed lefties were by Trump getting shot in the head. That’s exactly why you lost the election. You are out of touch. You lost the plot about how people feel in the majority. That’s what you did. And that was a perfect example of it. That situation? ‘Well, I think it was just a teleprompter.’ You would have never assessed it that way if you didn’t wish the guy had died.”

… I disagree with the first part of Cuomo’s statement and have no comment on the last part.

… Doesn’t sound like Ivanka Trump will be going anywhere near the WH this time around: “My intention for 2025 is to lean into love, courage, and purpose—and to keep growing through it all. Here’s to fresh starts, deepening relationships, living with presence, being more gentle with ourselves and each other, and the beauty of what’s yet to come!”

… Then she posted a swimsuit photo. Living her best life on Saudi money.

… The Atlantic announced that they are hiring a bunch of new reporters to expand their political coverage for the Trump Administration. Two of the new additions are WaPo reporters Ashley Parker and Michael Scherer with others rumored to be announced soon.

… Matt Gaetz said the biggest reason why Trump got involved in endorsing Mike Johnson for Speaker yesterday is because he was worried about his election needing to be certified on Monday, and the Speaker election is this Friday. Without a Speaker sworn in before J6, the House can’t proceed with certifying the election for Trump.

… Four years ago, Trump wanted the certification delayed on J6 to cause chaos in a desperate attempt to hold on to power. Now he wants to make sure that certification isn’t delayed by the chaos of a Speaker election stretching on into the weekend. Gaetz: “We would have never held up McCarthy two years ago for concessions if a Trump certification hung in the balance. Now it does.”

… Thank you so much for supporting us in 2024. I know it ended up being a tough year. I fear 2025 and beyond will be quite a bit more difficult. When so many are appeasing and caving to curry favor with the new regime, that will never be our approach to dealing with Trump and this Administration because we are clear-eyed about who these people are, and we know what they intend to do. While others surrender, we will never stop fighting. Thanks for joining us in that.

… Rep. Chip Roy said even with Trump’s endorsement, he thinks Mike Johnson doesn’t have enough votes for Speaker. He said that he and “a number of my colleagues” still haven’t decided to vote for him. He told Fox: “We saw so many