As Trump mayhem spreads, MAGA unity cracks
"From the Wall Street Journal editorial board to Fox News, capitulation is on the way out.
Wednesday found White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt doing what she does every other day of the week.
“This is classic Fake News,” she announced, in her briefing and in a social media post, from a news outlet that doesn’t “care ... about the truth” and is instead “running these lies,” which are “absolutely false” and “erroneous.”
The only unusual thing this time was the diatribe was directed at the Murdoch-owned Wall Street Journal. And not just any part of the Journal but its editorial board, which has been a clarion voice of the right in the United States for 135 years. Now, it is using that voice to defend its longtime motto — “free markets and free people” — by becoming a daily scold of the Trump administration for its constant violations of both.
Leavitt’s particular objection was over a minor point, about whether an adviser to President Donald Trump was on the now-infamous Signal group chat while in Moscow, but the White House was no doubt stung by Wednesday’s editorial overall, which criticized “JD Vance’s contempt for allies” and the vice president’s apparent willingness “to let the Houthis shut down shipping to spite the Europeans.” The editorial suggested Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had been “cavalier about the details of incoming military strikes” and was “silly” to try to “shift the blame for the fiasco on the journalist who was put on the chat.” It suggested Trump negotiator Steve Witkoff “is out of his depth in dealing with world crises,” and it warned that “America’s allies may conclude they can no longer trust the U.S. in a crisis.”
After Leavitt’s rebuke, the Journal came back at the administration even harder in Thursday’s paper. “The White House won’t let bad enough alone when it comes to the Signal app fiasco,” it thundered. While conceding the White House’s point about the adviser’s phone, it blasted the administration’s “defensive insistence that the chat didn’t disclose any ‘war plans,’ which is a weak attempt at obfuscation.” Criticizing Hegseth for trying to dismiss the flap as a hoax, it concluded that the administration “seems to think it can bully its way through anything by shouting Fake News and attacking the press” but should instead “take the loss.”
The Journal paired this with another editorial in Thursday’s paper on Republicans’ “shock” loss of a special election in a heavily Republican area of Pennsylvania. “Even voters who like the GOP’s policy agenda could be jolted by the impression of chaos in Washington, plus Mr. Trump’s recent focus on retribution,” it wrote, warning against following “out-of-touch leaders down ideological rabbit holes.” The day before, the Journal denounced the “dumb-and-dumber trade war” and Trump’s desire to “sabotage America with protectionism.”
We have seen entirely too much cowering and capitulation in the face of Trump’s threats: by the Paul Weiss law firm and Columbia University, by Meta and much of Silicon Valley, by Big Pharma and other industries, by mostly supine congressional Republicans, by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (in the eyes of many on the left), and by media outlets. But in a crisis, courage can be found in unexpected places. This is why it’s heartening to see some on the right (beyond the usual never-Trumpers) beginning to speak out about Trump’s overreach. We might be seeing the first cracks in MAGA unity, which Trump has maintained by threats and fear.
Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Mississippi) and Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Alabama), who lead the Senate and House Armed Services committees, respectively, pushed back firmly against the administration’s plans to restructure the military and retreat from Europe, saying they “will not accept” changes without congressional approval. Wicker has also said he is directing the administration to preserve documents in the Signal group chat matter, as his committee begins an inquiry into the fiasco. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-South Dakota), Sen. Mike Rounds (R-South Dakota), Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-North Dakota) and others pushed back firmly against the administration in the Signal screwup, directing them to “own it and fix it,” as Thune put it. A Republican Jewish Coalition board member and GOP fundraiser called on Trump’s lead peace negotiator, Steve Witkoff, to resign for his “utter incompetence” in dealing with Vladimir Putin and with Hamas.
Some in the MAGA echo chamber are likewise pushing back. Fox News host Laura Ingraham was skeptical of national security adviser Michael Waltz as he tried to explain how he added Atlantic editor in chief Jeffrey Goldberg’s number to his group chat (“Somehow it gets sucked in”). Fox News’s chief national security correspondent said her sources told her “what was shared may have been FAR MORE sensitive” than the term “war plans” conveys. Broadcaster Piers Morgan pointed out that if “this had happened on [Joe] Biden’s watch, Republicans would have rightly gone berserk.” The (Murdoch-owned) New York Post branded the flap “OPERATION OVERSHARE,” and Fox News contributor Andrew McCarthy wrote a piece for the paper arguing: “It is undeniable, or at least it should be, that ‘information providing advance warning that the US or its allies are preparing an attack’ is to be classified as ‘top secret.’”
The courts have risen to the occasion in restraining Trump, from dozens of trial judges across the country to the chief justice. When an appeals court this week rejected the administration’s appeal of Judge James Boasberg’s order in the Venezuelan deportation case, Judge Karen Henderson, a George H.W. Bush appointee, wrote in her opinion that the administration was “incorrect” to claim that it was immune from judicial review and that the lower-court judge’s order was written “for a quintessentially valid purpose.”
The Journal’s editorial board has been tough on Trump from the start of his term. But lately, it has run one editorial after the other excoriating his positions on trade, national security and the law. It blasted “the administration’s propensity to fall for Russian propaganda,” warning that it might be following in Neville Chamberlain’s footsteps when it comes to Ukraine. It admonished that “Taunting John Roberts is a lousy strategy,” that Trump “can’t defy court orders” and that Trump’s military reorganization “sounds more like an American retreat.” It said the calls to impeach “judges who rule against Trump are a corrosive stunt.” And it righteously declared, “Mr. Trump’s decision to use government power to punish [law] firms for representing clients breaks a cornerstone principle of American justice going back to John Adams and the Founders.”
The administration has richly earned condemnation from right, left and center for its fast-and-loose handling of the government and the law. Let’s consider this week’s parade of horribles.
Trump and senior advisers called the Signal scandal a “hoax,” a “witch hunt” and “bulls---,” while blaming the “scumbags” at the Atlantic and a “defective” Signal app, while maintaining the ludicrous position that no classified information was shared in the chat. (“1215et: F-18s LAUNCH (1st strike package). ... 1536: F-18 2nd Strike Starts — also, first sea-based Tomahawks launched.”
Trump imposed 25 percent tariffs on cars and threatened to impose 25 percent across-the-board tariffs next week against China and other countries that buy oil or gas from Venezuela. Trump said he will also impose sweeping “reciprocal tariffs” next week against a broad range of countries. Amid the turmoil, the Conference Board reported that consumer confidence fell in March for the fourth-straight month, to the lowest in more than four years.
Trump publicly agreed with Vance in disparaging European allies: “Yeah, I think they’ve been freeloading.” Vance’s wife, Usha, had to abandon plans to make a public visit to Greenland with Waltz, after furious reaction from Greenlanders over the Americans’ “highly aggressive” effort to “demonstrate power over us.” The Vances will instead visit a U.S. military base on the island. Danish media reports that shopkeepers and residents refused when “Americans” over the last week “knocked on doors and rang doorbells” to ask whether Greenlanders would meet with Usha Vance: “They have been told no, no, no, no, no, every time they [the Americans] have asked if they would like the vice president’s wife to visit.”
Witkoff gave a stunning interview to Tucker Carlson in which he said that Putin was “straight up” and not a “bad guy.” Witkoff accused Britain and France of “a posture and a pose” in their pro-Ukraine positions and said he was “100 percent” certain that Russia “doesn’t want to overrun Europe,” while embracing the Russian claim that people in the seized Ukrainian territory “want to be under Russian rule.” Witkoff recounted how “President Putin had commissioned a beautiful portrait of President Trump from the leading Russian artist” and how “when the president was shot, he went to his local church and met with his priest and prayed for the president.” (National intelligence director Tulsi Gabbard, meanwhile, testified to Congress that it was her “First Amendment right” to repost a social media message from a contributor to RT, a Russian propaganda outlet.)
The administration’s slash-first-ask-questions-later approach to the federal government hit the Department of Health and Human Services, which is reportedly cutting 20,000 jobs and dramatically scaling back the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention at a time when measles is spreading and avian flu is threatening. The White House has canceled funding for studies of antiviral drugs and vaccines to fight future pandemics, as well as grants to track infectious diseases. It has hired a man who promotes the false claim that immunization causes autism to do a study on the topic. This comes as the administration is cutting off payments by paper checksto Social Security recipients, even as it backs away from its plans to cut phone services because of a fierce backlash. Its cuts to the IRS have been so severe that Treasury Department and IRS officials predict a decrease of more than 10 percent in tax revenue — or more than $500 billion — the Post’s Jacob Bogage reports.
In the rule-of-law category, Trump attacked the “Rigged System” of the federal judiciary, alleging “Corruption and Radicalism” in federal courts in New York and D.C. He linked to an article from a conspiracy site arguing that judges who oppose him could be guilty of “Sedition and Treason.” He issued an order attempting to destroy another law firm, Jenner & Block, by seeking to deny it security clearances and access to federal buildings and contracts because it once employed a lawyer who worked on a Justice Department probe of Trump during his first term. The president issued an order mandating proof of citizenship to vote in federal elections, seizing a power the Constitution assigns to the states and Congress. He mulled offering financial compensation to those convicted (and pardoned by Trump) for their roles in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot. And his cryptocurrency business launched a new coin to further enrich him and his family.
Finally, under the heading of miscellaneous weirdness, Trump expressed his wish at a Women’s History Month event to “be known as the fertilization president.” He complained that a portrait of him in the Colorado state capitol was “purposefully distorted.” And, hours after the first reports that four U.S. soldiers had gone missing during a NATO exercise in Lithuania near the border of Belarus, Trump appeared unaware. Asked by reporters whether he had been briefed, he replied, “No, I haven’t.”
When it comes to opposing Trump’s overreach, courage hasn’t been lacking. The law firm Perkins Coie, represented by Williams & Connolly, is fighting back against Trump’s vindictiveness. The Associated Press took the administration to court on Thursday over Trump’s banishment of the news organization from the Oval Office and Air Force One. Countless Americans have stood up to Trump — in court, on the streets, at town-hall events and rallies.
Still, the resistance from his natural allies appears to sting Trump in particular. Last week, he attacked the “absolutely terrible” work of Fox News White House correspondent Jacqui Heinrich, apparently because she asked on air about the propriety of Trump hosting a Tesla marketing event at the White House. Brit Hume and others at the network came to her defense.
Trump has likewise seethed over Wall Street Journal editorials. When one argued late last month that his tariffs would “harm U.S. auto workers and Republican prospects in Michigan,” Trump fired off a post saying he “greatly appreciate[s]” when the Journal sides with him, “but then they come out with some real CLINKERS, like today’s Editorial. … They are sooo WRONG.”
When the Journal condemned Trump’s proposed tariffs against Mexico and Canada in late January as “the dumbest trade war in history” and an “economic assault on our neighbors,” the White House issued a statement saying the “Journal’s editorial page has supported America Last policies such as open borders and outsourcing for years now.” Days later, Trump denounced the “Globalist, and always wrong, Wall Street Journal” for supporting the “RIPOFF OF AMERICA.”
But the editorials keep coming. Politicizing the judiciary is a “disreputable racket.” Trump must act “within the bounds of American law.” The administration is pursuing the “Fool’s Gold of a Crypto Reserve.” Hegseth shut down the Pentagon’s internal think tank “for no good reason.” Trump’s “willy-nilly” tariffs “Whack Trump Voters” and “someone should sue” him for claiming emergency powers. HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is “dangerous to public health.” Ending Secret Service protection for former aides facing threats from Iran is a “vindictive whim” and a “new low.” The Oval Office showdown with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky that Vance instigated “only helps Russia’s dictator.” The administration’s “rehabilitation of Vladimir Putin is especially hard to take.” Witkoff “parroted one specious Russian talking point after another.” Vance promotes an “abandon Ukraine strategy”; Trump “won’t tell the truth about which country started the war”; and the president’s vision is “less a brave new world than a reversion to a dangerous old one.”
When Trump pardoned the Jan. 6 offenders, the Journal denounced this “rotten message from a president about political violence done on his behalf. ... What happened that day is a stain on Mr. Trump’s legacy. By setting free the cop beaters, the president adds another.”
If the Journal’s editorialists can keep saying all this while neither fearing the wrath of Trump nor feeling the hammer of Murdoch, there might yet be hope for us all."
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