'Republicans have finally found a spine' | Simon Marks' American Week

For every camel's back, there is always a final straw.And President Donald Trump's massive problem at the end of this American week is that Republicans on Capitol Hill have suddenly had enough.After bending to his will consistently over the last 16 months, after allowing him to ride roughshod over their constitutionally guaranteed role as a third co -equal branch of government here, after watching him lay waste to the checks and balances that are supposed to serve as guardrails against this country ever becoming a dictatorship, finally they have found just a teeny little bit of spine.Unfortunately for America, it may have come too late.

This isn't unusual in any way, shape, or form.It's unusual because it involves President Trump, and it involves the Department of Justice.But beyond that, the fact that the IRS is settling a case and not moving forward with an audit is not unusual.

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, who just happens to be Donald Trump's former personal lawyer on CNN, trying to justify the utterly unjustifiable.To understand the scale of the venality that is underway here, we have to spin back in time to the halcyon days of September 2016.I've been under audit almost for 15 years.

I know a lot of wealthy people that have never been audited.I said, do you get audited?I get audited almost every year.And in a way, I should be complaining.I'm not even complaining.I don't mind it.

It's almost become a way of life.

I get audited by the IRS.Blimey, he sounded young there.Donald Trump in a presidential debate with Hillary Clinton, insisting that much as he would love to let the American people see his tax returns, he could not do it because he was Under audit by the IRS, America's equivalent of HMRC.Well, eventually some of those tax returns were leaked to the press by an IRS contractor.The leaker broke the law and he was sent to jail.But once the president returned to power last year, he sued the IRS.

very government he leads for $10 billion over the leak of the documents back in 2017.And follow me here, because this is where the corruption allegations begin.He appointed Mr. Blanche, his former personal lawyer, to lead the very Department of Justice that, under Trump's aegis, is of course no longer independent of the White House.And this week, to the possible $100 million million dollar personal advantage for Trump, his family, and his businesses, the Justice Department, and let me remind you, it's led by his former personal lawyer, agreed to grant the president, his sons, and his businesses total immunity for any past tax offenses they may have committed.And that was just the tip of the iceberg.

The Justice Department has now set up a fund paid for in taxpayer money, $1 .8 billion, what the president calls an anti -weaponization fund to compensate Trump allies, including the rioters, on January 6th.

Tom, this is an extraordinary legal drama that involves the president dropping his multiple lawsuits against the federal government.But in exchange, the Trump administration today created what it calls an anti -weaponization fund using more than $1 .7 billion of taxpayer money that could pay out compensation to Trump allies.

Now, I know this is complex, so let me put it in British terms.Imagine a Prime Minister suing HMRC for 10 million pounds over the leak of a couple of documents, then putting the arm on his own Justice Secretary to settle the case by providing the Prime Minister with permanent immunity against any investigation into his family's past tax affairs, and forcing the Justice Secretary also to come up with a couple of billion quid of your money to pay the Prime Minister's mates, many of whom have previously been jailed for GBH after breaking into Parliament running for office.and trying to launch a coup.And not covering any of this up, by the way, but doing it all in plain sight.Couldn't happen there, at least not yet.But even here, it's proving to be a step too far.

Congressman, what do you make of this $1 .7 billion fund?

Bad news.We're going to try to kill it.Congressman Brian Fitzpatrick, a Republican from Pennsylvania who, like every other member of the House of Representatives, is up for re -election in just five months.He knows this fund is going to be a disaster for his hopes of returning to office.So he's now launched a bill aimed at derailing his own president's self -dealing and overturning the immunity that Trump has effectively granted him against investigation of his past tax affairs.

We're trying to unpack exactly, you know, what the legal machinations are, but can't do that.

Can't do that.Have you ever heard of any other Americans, like, other than Trump as an associate?I haven't.Who are unauditable by the IRS?I've never heard that before.So would that be part of the legislative?

Of course.Of course.

Yeah, you can't do that.At the other end of Capitol Hill, in the Senate, there was also uproar.More than two dozen Republicans confronted the acting Attorney General in a furious two -hour meeting on Thursday, one of them Senator Tom Tillis of North Carolina.

compensate someone who assaulted a police officer, admitted their guilt, got convicted, got pardoned, and now we're going to pay them for that?That's absurd.The American people are going to reject this out of hand.

Worse even than that, the acting attorney general was not even able to say this week that one January the 6th rioter who was pardoned then jailed again in Texas for life on fresh charges.of child molesting, would be ineligible for a payout from the weaponization fund.Meanwhile, the president, accused by his own lawmakers of being stupid on stilts, is very much still walking around on them, repeating his claims that the Biden administration weaponized justice.

What they did in terms of weaponization will never be allowed to happen in this country again.So we think that those people, we think that anybody involved in that process should partake.And you're talking about peanuts compared to the value.It destroyed the lives of people.many, many people.

Now, if you're wondering why the Republicans have suddenly discovered a bit of backbone, allow me to explain.Trump this week has engaged in a fresh purge of elected Republicans who have crossed him.He's taken down some big names while also demonstrating the stranglehold he still enjoys over his Make America Great Again followers.Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, he voted to impeach Trump on incitement to insurrection charges five years ago.And Congressman Thomas Massey of Kentucky, he accuses the White House of covering up the president's ties to Jeffrey Epstein and vigorously criticizes the war on Iran.Both of them lost primary challenges this week after Trump decreed their deselection.

Now he's trying to do the same to another senator, John Cornyn of Texas.These are moves that infuriate and terrify Republicans in Congress.They worry that by endorsing America first mini -me's in states across the country, Trump is going to deliver control of Congress into the hands of the Democrats in November.And there were other events this week that led to further thoughts about whether the president is perhaps going overboard with the Dr. Evil routine.

I want to take a look at the complexity.These are all different rooms down here.They're building a hospital.They're building...It's a military hospital.

President Trump on Tuesday giving reporters a tour of the busy and noisy White House construction site where he is building, well, not, it turns out, only a ballroom.

And the ballroom is really a shield and protecting all of the things that are built here.

The ballroom is really a shield, it turns out, for a massive impenetrable military fortress.He has dug six stories below ground and plans to equip the facility with state -of -the -art munitions and an on -site military force.They'll have a hospital down there, secure communications rooms, a scientific research lab, which seems odd given this administration's complete antipathy towards science.Above ground, the Secret Service and the military will be given a new promontory from where they will enjoy 360 -degree views of the entire city laid out before them.A titanium fence is going to surround a complex that will be equipped with anti -drone technology and snipers' nests, just in case the White House ever comes under attack.The more he talked, the more it sounded like he is building exactly the kind of compound in which a president who one day decides not to leave power could hole himself up protected by loyal members of the military.

What you don't see are the floors that are beneath here.And they have very, very important rooms down there, the most important.This was the one opportunity for the military to do something.We're right on budget.We're right on plan.The only budget change would be that we double the size.

At the request of the military, we doubled the size.

Oh, you just doubled the size.It was only supposed to be three stories below ground, but you just kept digging.It's all right, we've all done it.But all that garbage...him and his mates paying for everything and the facility not costing the taxpayer a penny is nonsense he now wants a billion dollars in public money to construct a James Bond style lair that he or any of his successors could use for who knows what purpose any minute now the acting Attorney General adopting his best Tom Jones routine will be along to belt out another chorus of it's not unusual.I want to finish this week with a tip of the hat to Stephen Colbert, whose last edition of The Late Show aired on CBS on Thursday night after its new owners Paramount prostrated themselves before Trump and got rid of him.

But also with Barney Frank, the veteran Democrat from Massachusetts.He died this week at the age of 86.

The effort to increase health care to the Nazis, my answer to you is, as I said before, it is a tribute to the First Amendment that this kind of vile contemptible nonsense is so freely propagated.Ma 'am, trying to have a conversation with you.would be like trying to argue with a dining room table.I have no interest in doing it.

For more than 30 years, Barney Frank served in Congress and was there at the very birth of the lurch to the right by so -called Tea Party Republicans during the Obama era that eventually delivered the country into the hands of Donald Trump.He was the first gay member of Congress voluntarily to disclose his sexual identity.He co -authored laws overhauling the banking industry after the 2008 financial crash.He was combative and pugnacious, but he was also very entertaining.

Going before an audience of people who expect you to be funny is tough.Going before an audience that expect you to be boring and then being a little funny is much easier.I prefer easier.

At a time when the country definitely doesn't feel particularly amusing, Barney Frank's death this week and Stephen Colbert's departure from the airways both reminded people that sometimes, whatever happens here, you've got to laugh.