[Breaking news: First Citizens BancShares of Raleigh (NC) is purchasing the commercial segment of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB). Its 17 branches will reopen on March 27 under the new name. The purchase price for $72 billion assets was $16.5 billion. SVB’s private banking business was not included; FDIC is still looking for a buyer. FDIC expects to lose about $20 billion, losses funded by insured banks.]
Thirty years ago, the Waco Branch Davidians declared war on the U.S. government. On February 28, 1993, officers tried to enter the compound in Waco (TX) to arrest its leader for stockpiling illegal weapons, including machine guns. The Davidians shot at them, killing four officers and wounding 16 others. During a 51-day standoff, the FBI tried to negotiate a peace surrender before it raided the compound 51 days later. Occupants set fires inside, and by the conclusion 75 people, including 25 children, died.
Far-right groups have invoked this event to justify anti-government violence. On the second anniversary of the deaths at Waco, April 19, 1995, Timothy McVeigh blew up a federal building in Oklahoma City, murdering 168 people, including 19 children. Six years later, McVeigh said, “Waco started this war… The only way they’re going to get the message is, quote, with a body count.”
On March 25, 2023, Deposed Donald Trump (DDT) flew into the Waco regional airport, stood on the tarmac where he attacked and threatened his opposition, and then flew out. John Santucci, ABC journalist/producer, tweeted:
“I haven’t watched a Trump event in sometime… But here’s the difference between 2015 and now… In 2015 Trump talked about people’s problems… This rally is all of his problems.”
Nothing about the rally was unpredictable: in presenting himself the victim, DDT called himself the “most innocent man in the history of the country” when he assailed investigators and prosecutors of his crimes. He rejected Texas elected GOP officials—Sen. Ted Cruz, Gov. Greg Abbott, etc.—who have not yet endorsed him. He ridiculed Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a possibly opponent for DDT’s candidacy and repeated his story of DeSantis begging for his endorsement in 2018. According to DDT, the investigations into him are “the central issue of our time.” Forget war, crime, inflation, and the other issues that Republicans have run on in the past.
Arguably the most reprehensive part of the rally was the presentation of insurrectionists as heroes in a video of the January 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol accompanied by rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner” sung by the newly incorporated J6 choir, insurrection prisoners in the Washington, D.C. jail.
CNN has an extensive list of DDT’s lies in his speech. One notable statement is that he “completed” the wall on the southern border.
Twenty years ago, people were holding their breath about George W. Bush starting a war. His preemptive attack on Iraq lasted over seven years. This past week, DDT whipped his AGA followers into a frenzy, hoping for another war to support him. He declared, with no evidence, that he would be “arrested” for his part in paying $130,000 to Stormy Daniels to not talk about a relationship with him. Furious, he called his followers to “TAKE OUR NATION BACK!”
All week long MAGA folk raged, but the grand jury meetings were called off until this coming week. The media endlessly addressed the possibilities surrounding a potential indictment with conservative responders defending their leader. House GOP members tried to drag Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg into hearings, and former VP Mike Pence, who previously blamed DDT for his part in the insurrection, flipflopped to echo the Republicans in their declaration that DDT was being persecuted on the basis of politics. DDT called Bragg a “SOROS BACKED ANIMAL” and his former lawyer/fixer a “CONVICTED NUT JOB.” Artificial intelligence demonstrated its dangers when fake videos of New York cops arrested DDT circulated on the internet. All this with no case but a wonderful device for DDT to raise more money.
As DDT incites violence among his followers, he personally threatened it himself with a post of him with a baseball bat next to Bragg. Legal expert Norm Eisen tweeted:
“Threatening a prosecutor is a crime in NY. In fact MULTIPLE crimes: Harassment in the first degree NYPL 240.25; menacing in the second degree NYPL 120.14; stalking in the fourth or third degree NYPL 120.45 & 120.50 And that’s just for starters….”
Joe Tacopina, DDT’s lawyer in the case, criticized him for online attacks against Bragg:
“I’m not his social media consultant. I think that was an ill-advised post that one of his social media people put up & he quickly took down.”
The post has been pulled, but the internet has a long memory. Before DDT went to Waco, he warned of “potential death & destruction” if charges were filed against him. Soon afterwards, Bragg received a letter with non-hazardous white powder among other death threats. The postmark was Orlando (FL).
Bragg might not be able to convict DDT in the Stormy Daniels case, only a misdemeanor unless the money is connected to campaign funds. Yet Michael Cohen went to prison for having handed the funds over to her. Robert Costello, DDT loyalist and formal legal advisers, thought he could save DDT by smearing Cohen to the grand jury, and Cohen isn’t the only witness in the case.
Other cases, however, might be worse for DDT:
In E. Jean Carroll’s rape/defamation cases against DDT, the federal judge has ordered that the jurors be anonymous. He made the decision without a request, stating that this treatment was unusual and “most often” reserved for “terrorism and organized crime cases.” His justification was DDT’s long history of attempting to intimidate courts, witnesses, and even individual jurors. The trial is scheduled for April 25.
The issue with finding classified documents in DDT’s possession looks darker after a judge told his lawyer, Evan Corcoran, that he had to testify because the crime/fraud condition erased the attorney-client privilege. Even worse, Corcoran had to turn over his documents and tapes of conversations with DDT. According to reports, DDT told Corcoran to write the sworn affidavit in June 2022 lying about no more classified documents were at Mar-a-Lago. A judge determined that DDT “intentionally concealed” his having the additional classified documents from Corcoran. Over 100 more documents were found two months later. The charge could be obstruction of justice because DDT blocked the FBI from finding them.
Despite DDT’s attempts to block any charges in Fulton County, the grand jury heard three telephone calls from DDT to Georgia’s elected officials, urging them to overturn the state’s popular vote for the 2020 presidential election in his favor. This case includes racketeering and conspiracy charges used for organized criminals that could carry long prison sentences. DDT has filed a motion to have the county’s DA Fani Willis disqualified.
Before the House was turned over to Republicans last January, the members of the January 6 investigative committee gave its findings to the DOJ, that has appointed Jack Smith as a special counsel to continue this investigation. A federal judge rejected DDT’s claims of executive privilege and ordered DDT’s former chief of staff Mark Meadows and other officials receiving subpoenas from Jack Smith to testify before the DOJ grand jury. Other subpoenas went to DDT’s former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, his former national security adviser Robert O’Brien, former top aide Stephen Miller, and former deputy chief of staff and social media director Dan Scavino; former DDT aides Nick Luna and John McEntee; and former DHS official Ken Cuccinelli. Meadows was present with DDT for the telephone calls to Georgia officials and in the White House on January 6. DDT will likely appeal the ruling.
And then there are the investigations into Trump’s business behavior in New York and the securities investigation into Truth Social’s merger with DWAC.
The report from the New York Times describes the leader beloved by MAGA:
“In the last 28 months, former President Donald J. Trump has been voted out of the White House, impeached for his role in the Capitol riot and criticized for marching many of his fellow Republicans off an electoral cliff in the 2022 midterms with his drumbeat of election-fraud lies. He dined at home with a white supremacist in November. He called for the termination of the Constitution in December… He vowed to make retribution a hallmark of a second term in the White House in March. He has embraced the QAnon conspiracy theory movement, described President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia as a genius and used a gay joke to mock a fellow Republican. He has become the target of four criminal investigations, including one in New York that he warned might result in ‘potential death & destruction.’”
Twenty years ago, people were holding their breath about George W. Bush starting a war. The war in the U.S. is now all about DDT. David Remnick wrote:
“Trump lives in a state of constant auto-excitement. If he is not at the center of things, he is dead.”
Nel's New Day 
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