The Donald Trump Score Card

217(R) to 215(D) would mean Republicans can't afford to lose just one more seat, which would make the House 216(R) to 216(D).

If that number is reached after all the November election votes are tallied, it would stay that low possibly for months until the vacant House seats caused by Trump tapping them for administration roles are filled.

It's also assuming no other changes happening in the House, such as GOP members dying, afflicted with illnesses, resigning, being run out of office, or switching parties..

A margin that low also opens up the possibility of drama queen antics on the part of a few or just one GOP member.


https://electionlawblog.org/?p=147377

excerpt:

Given the new vote tallies in the five outstanding races, Politico estimates that the House will be down to a very narrow margin after cabinet appointments. From the morning feed:

“GOP Rep. JOHN DUARTE’s lead dwindled yesterday while fellow Republican MICHELLE STEEL fell further behind in the latest vote tallies. If Duarte loses and other current leads hold, Republicans could be left with 220 seats at full strength. And with three expected vacancies due to Trump Cabinet nominations, the House could spend months at 217-215 — meaning Republicans could not lose a single member on a straight party-line vote.”

 

Health care fraudster Philip Esformes is latest Trump clemency recipient to be arrested

excerpt:

"Philip Esformes, whose 20-year prison sentence for a massive, $1.3 billion Medicare fraud scheme was commuted in 2020 by then-President Donald Trump, was arrested over the weekend in Florida on domestic-violence related charges."

 

Trump’s pardons included health care execs behind massive frauds

excerpt:

“These aren’t just technical financial crimes. These were major, major crimes,” said Louis Saccoccio, chief executive officer of the National Health Care Anti-Fraud Association, an advocacy group.

The list of some 200 Trump pardons or commutations, most issued as he vacated the White House this week, included at least seven doctors or health care entrepreneurs who ran discredited health care enterprises, from nursing homes to pain clinics. One is a former doctor and California hospital owner embroiled in a massive workers’ compensation kickback scheme that prosecutors alleged prompted more than 14,000 dubious spinal surgeries. Another was in prison after prosecutors accused him of ripping off more than $1 billion from Medicare and Medicaid through nursing homes and other senior care facilities, among the largest frauds in U.S. history.

 

Regarding his criminal cases, Trump will get away with his criminal behavior at the federal level. At the state level, the situation is be murky with him as president again for an expected four years.

To date, Trump has been convicted in only one criminal case, the NY fraud case.

His underlings haven't faired as well in criminal cases.

Three of his former attorneys have pleaded guilty in the Georgia election subversion case (Ellis, Powell, Chesebro). Trump is a co-defendant.

Navarro and Bannon have each served four months in prison for defying subpoenas from Congress related to Trump's riot at the Capitol.

Bannon faces a criminal fraud trial in NY in January 2025 for his 'We Build The Wall' scam, a state charge that Trump can't pardon.

 

Trump and his cohorts have lost major civil cases

Trump lost two defamation cases to Carroll ($88 million).

Trump lost a civil fraud case in NY ($454 million)

Giuliani lost a defamation case to Freeman and Moss ($148 million) and faces another defamation trial in January 2025.

Lindell still faces defamation cases against him by election equipment manufacturers.

Fox lost a defamation suit againt it by Dominion and settled for $787 million the night before the trial was to begin. It also fired Tucker Carlson as part of the agreement. It still has another election-related defamation case against it by Smartmatic.

 

Giuliani has been disbarred in NY and DC after being suspended. When he was suspended, he said that he expected to regain his licenses soon.

Chesebro's law license has been suspended in NY.

Michael Cohen was disbarred in NY in 2019.

Eastman's law license has been suspended in NY and CA. He lost his two teaching positions at universities in CO and CA.

Ellis's law license was suspended.


Trump lawyers who were disbarred or had law licenses suspended

 

Brooks and Capehart on the dismissal of Trump's federal cases

excerpt:

"William Brangham:

I mean, David's point is that the voters looked at all of that, again, as much as you could, the charges, they don't see all of the evidence, but they looked at it and they sized up Donald Trump and said, we pick him.


Jonathan Capehart:

Right.

And that's what's among many things that I found troubling about the 2024 election. It was all out there. And he talked about it. Everyone talked about it. And yet the American people looked and decided, you know what? Gas is high, grocery store prices are too high. And so, yes, we're just going to go with this guy.

Leave aside all sorts of other things he said, such as mass deportations. Folks just seemed to put that to the wayside."

 

The U.S. is vulnerable to retaliatory tariffs by Canada.


Canadian PM Justin Trudeau visits Trump at Mar-a-Lago amid steep tariff threats: report

excerpt:

"About 60% of U.S. crude oil imports are from Canada, and 85% of U.S. electricity imports are from Canada."

 

Trump disavowed Project 2025.

Now he's stacking his administration with the authors of the right-wing manifesto.


https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/29/us/politics/trump-project-2025.html

 

Trump quacked like a duck into the mic at his rally just before the 2024 election.

He introduced a woman on stage with him by the wrong name.

He bragged about supposedly acing cognitive tests and supposedly being told by a doctor that they never saw someone do it that good before.

He started off the first 15 minutes of the rally by bragging about the supposed large size of Palmer's reproductive organ and other athlete's in the locker room supposedly being amazed by it.

Video reviewing Trump's behavior.


YouTube video:

 

The video includes a number of clips of Trump from 2016 and 2024.

It's very noticeable how Trump's speech and mind have degraded in eight years.

His diction was clearer and faster in 2016 and even in 2020. He didn't drift through one unrelated, meaningless rant after another, such as musing about Hannibal Lector. He also wasn't filled with the level of anger and hate in 2016 compared to 2024.

 

Chronister has withdrawn from the nomination to head the DEA. He cited the gravity of the position.


Chad Chronister, Trump's pick to lead DEA, withdraws from consideration

 

Chronister's name has surfaced nationally in the past.

He negotiated a Tampa pastor to turn himself in to authorities who was conducting church services with hundreds of people inside together during the pandemic.


https://www.usatoday.com/story/news...astor-arrested-church-amid-orders/5093160002/

 

As Hunter Biden pardon sparks backlash, experts say it can't be overturned

excerpt:

"Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Arkansas, condemned the pardon in an interview Monday on Fox News and issued a warning to President Biden.

"Joe Biden may come to regret this decision because, having given his son a blanket pardon of 11 years to include the time when Joe Biden was vice president, Hunter Biden now can't plead the fifth if he appears before Congress or appears before a grand jury," Cotton said.

He added, "He has to testify about exactly what he was up to, for instance, when he was traveling to China on Air Force Two and meeting with Chinese communist princelings, or why being paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to sit on a Ukrainian energy company's board for which he had no qualifications. So, that may be one unintended consequence of the pardon that Joe Biden didn't fully think through."

The full pardon is not just for Hunter Biden's recent convictions but covers any crime he may have committed over a nearly 11-year span from Jan. 1, 2014, to Dec. 1, 2024."

 

Biden's pardon gives Trump expanded pardon playbook.


https://www.politico.com/news/2024/12/03/biden-trump-pardon-playbook-00192289

excerpt:

“I do think this gives Trump greater leeway to exercise the pardon power in ways that he might otherwise have hesitated, because it gives Trump more political cover to do what he wants,” Morison said. “How can you say that the president can’t grant pardons to correct something that he believes is an injustice? Biden just did it.”

Ty Cobb, a White House lawyer during Trump’s first term who has since become a prominent Trump critic, agreed.

“Trump doesn’t really need excuses to act selfishly or vengefully,” Cobb said. “But this provides him one on a silver platter.”

 

Trump makes threat to those in Gaza holding hostages to release them before he starts office (so that he doesn't have to deal with the problem).


Trump demands immediate release of Oct. 7 hostages, says otherwise there will be 'HELL TO PAY'

 

Trump isn't talking about his border wall like he did in 2016.

He's been on a binge of threatening countries around the world with tariffs that will supposedly solve the problems of the U.S.

 

https://www.politico.com/news/2024/12/03/biden-trump-pardon-playbook-00192289

excerpt:

"One component of Trump’s mission may be a blanket pardon of Jan. 6 defendants shortly after he is inaugurated — a prospect that is worrying even one Trump-appointed judge. Another immediate component, Trusty suggested, is a pardon of Carlos de Oliveira and Walt Nauta, the two Trump aides who are charged with helping him obstruct the investigation into the classified documents that Trump kept at Mar-a-Lago after he left office."

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/02/us/politics/kash-patel-fbi.html

excerpt:

“The irony of this is that they all complained about the politicization of the F.B.I., and here Trump is putting in someone who’s going to do just that,” Mr. Kupperman said in an interview. “These are not reforms, they are punitive measures from a guy trying to be the enforcer for Trump.”

 

Trump says he will block the planned acquisition of U.S. Steel by Japan's Nippon Steel.


Trump says he will block Japanese firm's takeover of U.S. Steel

excerpt:

“Through a series of Tax Incentives and Tariffs, we will make U.S. Steel Strong and Great Again, and it will happen FAST!” he said.