Posted on 02/01/2022 2:46:42 PM PST by NoLibZone
A baffling Trump endorsement in Tennessee has caused quite a stir in MAGA country. If you haven’t been paying close attention to political minutiae lately, Politico has the story:
Former President Donald Trump is facing serious backlash from die-hard loyalists over his decision to intervene in a Tennessee House race, with his supporters accusing him of spurning a staunch Republican ally who’s running. Trump on Tuesday evening endorsed Morgan Ortagus, who served as a State Department spokesperson during his administration and is pondering a run for a Middle Tennessee-based congressional district. The announcement has caused a firestorm, with far-right, high-profile backers ranging from North Carolina Rep. Madison Cawthorn to conservative activist Candace Owens taking to social media to voice their support for Robby Starbuck, a rival candidate who’s been a mainstay of the pro-Trump movement. [Politico] Is this all just a tempest in a teapot? Our research indicates this Trump endorsement is even worse than you might have thought at first glance. Megan Ortagus might be President Trump’s former State Department spokesperson, but she holds GOP establishment neocon views that are diametrically opposed to the America First, MAGA-movement.
Mere hours after Trump’s endorsement, The National Pulse publicized statements Ortagus had made vowing to “faithfully [serve] the incoming Biden Administration,” and trashing Trump back during the 2016 race. It turns out that, in 2016, she dutifully repeated all of the Never Trump talking points of the GOP establishment:
“You have somebody who makes fun of people with mental and physical disabilities. That’s disgusting; there’s no other way around it,” remarked Ortagus in January 2016 during an interview with Fox News. Ortagus, while working for a super PAC associated with Trump’s primary opponent former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, said she “fundamentally disagree[d]” with Trump’s approach to foreign policy. “In his gut, he does not think that Americans should be, quote unquote, the policemen of the world,” she said during a 2016 panel discussion dissecting Trump’s foreign policy speech. “I don’t see it that way. I think that America is the glue that holds the world together. … So there were points that I agreed with him today, but overall, I fundamentally disagree with his isolationist approach to foreign policy,” she added. Ortagus and her second husband were married by the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, in 2000. [National Pulse] Getting married by Ruth Bader Ginsburg might simply reflect a profound lack of taste in Ortagus’ personal life that can be overlooked, but championing America as the “policemen of the world,” casting President Trump’s policies as “isolationist,” and stating that she “fundamentally disagrees” with Trump’s America First, Jacksonian approach to foreign policy are political sins that cannot be forgiven.
Of course, many people criticized Donald Trump in 2016, and later came around on the importance of the political realignment he led. The issue with Ortagus, however, isn’t limited to her criticism of Trump—it’s her clear failure to have learned anything after serving in his administration.
If Ortagus is elected to the House, she will become one of the most extreme warhawks in the Republican Party—a natural ally of figures like Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger. Her Twitter timeline features a cascading list of demands that America get involved in a dizzying array of foreign entanglements.
Ortagus calls for the US government to ship more weapons to Ukraine, immediately:
Mr. Trump - tear down this endorsement!
That has nothing to do with the story but my guess is this is payback for supporting Trump at the State Dept.
Good or bad it’s probably a thank you.
This woman shouldn’t run for Congress.
She needs to pull out of the race.
It baffled us in Alabama when Trump endorsed Luther Strange instead of Roy Moore in the 2018 special senate election. Roy Moore won the primary anyway and lost to Doug Jones. If Trump had endorsed someone more conservative he might have won.
Trump is going to make a mistake here and there. Who in life
hasn’t.
Hopefully he’ll rethink this and rescind the endorsement.
Wonder who sold him on this idea. That person should be off
the team.
I like Morgan Ortegas but I hope Robby Starbuck wins.
Choosing RBG to perform your wedding should be automatically disqualifying for anyone seeking office as a conservative. Period.
what is Trump’s batting average?
His endorsements are a RINO parade.
Trump’s great flaw is picking bad people.
It is safe to say that anyone married by RBG is a bad person.
She’s a regular political commentator on Fox programs such as “Out Numbered” and “Gutfeld.”
She probably has the endorsement of Lindsey, Mitt, and the Turtle.
That's why he never endorsed Moore. He knew a loser when he saw it.
Interestingly, Trump had every reason to undermine Jeff Sessions when he ran to get his old seat back in 2020, but he refused to endorse his primary opponent Tommy Tuberville until polls came out very late in the campaign showing him with a huge lead.
I was probably his idea.
But wait, there’s more!
Trump's batting average is impressive -- but not because he's got any real influence in most of these races. He endorses candidates like a gambler who is allowed to place a bet on an NFL game at the two-minute warning.
So, yes -- he's got an impressive record of "successful" endorsements. He ran up that record by endorsing people like Mitt Romney even though he had no use for them.
I would have voted for you....
Thanks.
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