Trump’s “It Could Be Worse” Strategy Is in Full Effect
Slate · L · trust 34/100
Welcome to this week’s edition of the Surge, which is happy to report that it has nothing to say about any insecure men who might commandeer national airwaves on a Thursday night to spread conspiratorial nonsense.
The politics were hot and heavy this week. Lindsey Graham is no longer with us, but his signature legislation of this Congress has never been more alive. House Democrats went on the record against the Israeli government in a way they never have before. We check in on the Michigan and Maine Senate races, and consider the nature of time.
Let’s begin, though, with a pair of major confirmation hearings in the Senate this week.
The Senate held two critical confirmation hearings on the same day this week. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche appeared before the Judiciary Committee to secure the gig officially, while Jay Clayton appeared before the Intelligence Committee in his bid to be director of national intelligence. Let’s review what we have in these two.
Blanche, in taking a brief break from his efforts to lock up President Donald Trump’s political appointments, recently oversaw the phony settlement of a phony case that raided the Treasury for $1.8 billion to disburse to goons who participated in Jan. 6 (while also giving Trump and his family immunity from any IRS investigation). It was one of the biggest scandals of either Trump term, and the only consequence Blanche faced was a promotion. In his hearing, Blanche said he “is” Trump’s lawyer, before catching himself to say he “ was ” Trump’s lawyer. No correction was needed.
Clayton—Trump’s U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York—just last weekend subpoenaed New York Times journalists who had reported on security concerns with Trump’s fresh new Air Force One gifted from the Qataris. He humiliated himself in his confirmation hearing on a question that Trump appointees frequently stumble over: Who won the 2020 election? He wouldn’t give a direct answer to numerous Democrats who asked the question.
And yet the nomination of neither appears to be in major doubt. Maybe commitments need to be made to a Thom Tillis here, a John Cornyn there. But they’re both likely to get through. Why? Due to fear of the alternative. Consider the argument from former Trump AG William Barr, who Trump now hates, urging senators to confirm Blanche. Rejecting Blanche “wouldn’t force the president to make a better choice,” Barr wrote in the Wall Street Journal. “It will simply invite more chaos and a less desirable appointment.” And the nomination of Clayton, similarly, should get through because Republicans and Democrats want the acting director, Bill Pulte, out of there. This is all it takes to win Senate appointment in Trump’s second term: Are you better than whatever fantastical manifestation of malevolence Trump could conjure as an alternative? You’re in.
We weren’t sure whether to write about the late senator in this entry or retire an entry in his honor, so frequently was he a subject of this newsletter. But rather than make an accounting of his career—you can find those here —let’s talk about his final project. Just a day or two before his death, Graham announced in Kiev that he’d finally made a deal with the White House on his major legislative effort of this Congress: sanctions legislation against Russia, which he believed could finally bring President Vladimir Putin to the bargaining table.
The initial bill from last year, which Graham spearheaded alongside Connecticut Sen. Richard Blumenthal, would have imposed secondary sanctions in the form of crushing tariffs on countries that imported Russian oil and gas. The new version softens those penalties and limits them to the five biggest importers (likely including China and India), along with other sanctions. The newer version does, however, give the White House more authority to waive the oil-and-gas importer penalties if it sees fit. That could allow Putin to preserve his greatest stalling tactic: charming Donald Trump out of doing anything too drastic.
This is a bill that will pass if it comes to a vote. The question is how big a priority it is for both the Senate majority leader and the White House. Well, Graham, for better or worse, didn’t have any problems with speaking indelicately about legislative matters so we won’t either: Graham’s allies on this issue will use his death to push for a vote, as a means of honoring him. No doubt, that’s exactly what he’d want them to do.
In a rare moment in which the rogue Republican did something his own leadership would have approved of, Rep. Thomas Massie offered an amendment to an appropriations bill this week that would cut off U.S. military aid to Israel. Even just a few years ago, the idea of such a bill getting more than a dozen or so votes in Congress would have been laughable. But much has changed in the last few years, with Democratic voters largely turning against Israel during the Gaza war. So when the amendment vote was held Thursday, a slim majority of Democrats—103 to 98—voted for Massie’s amendment, while 10 Democrats with commitment issues voted present. All Republicans except for Massie voted against it.
We’re not sure so many Democrats would have voted this way if the amendment had any chance of becoming law, as its drafting would have had unintended consequences . But it’s nevertheless a historic protest vote that crystallizes Democrats’ shifting—well, already shifted—view on Israel. The roll call also revealed some rare splits between members of Democratic leadership, present and past. Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries voted against it, while Minority Whip Katherine Clark voted for it. Among the old guard, former Speaker Nancy Pelosi ( reluctantly ) voted for the amendment while her former deputies, Reps. Steny Hoyer and Jim Clyburn, voted against it. Jeffries, in a letter to his caucus, did say that “moving forward, it is my strongly held view that for the good of Israel and the Palestinian people, American…
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