Speaking with MSNBC host Rachel Maddow on Monday evening, just days after a massive $83.3 million legal victory over failed former president Donald Trump, writer E. Jean Carroll shared a description of how the ex-head of state looked at the defamation trial that concluded last week in New York.
“He is like a walrus snorting and like a rhino flopping his hands. He is not there. That was the surprising thing to me.”
Carroll admitted that she had been terrified of facing Trump in court, but her fears quickly abated when she took the stand and began testifying.
“Amazingly, I looked out, and he was nothing,” she said. “He was nothing. He was a phantom. It was the people around him who were giving him power. He himself was nothing.”
That moment of clarity, Carroll continued, gave her new insight regarding the Donald.
“We don’t need to be afraid of him. He can be knocked out.”
Others who have observed Trump over the years agreed with Carroll, suggesting that he’s just an impotent coward.
The point Carroll and her counsel were making over and over is that Trump is nothing to be afraid of. Remove the trappings and he’s just a man clawing for and trying to cling to power. https://t.co/UoVcMabXTG
— Andrew Weissmann (weissmann11 on Threads)🌻 (@AWeissmann_) January 30, 2024
EJC is giving #tRump a taste of his own medicine! This must be driving him crazy, that a woman, a few years older than him, now has the upper hand. The would-be Emperor indeed has no clothes! https://t.co/tSA6i5t0VB
Not long after a jury in New York found failed former president Donald Trump guilty of sexually assaulting writer E. Jean Carroll and then defaming her when she came forward with the accusation, a Republican senator appeared on Fox News and eagerly defended the disgraced ex-president/sex offender.
Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-TN) was being interviewed by Fox host Neil Cavuto, who asked him, “While I have you, Senator, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention, you know, former President Trump has been found liable for battery in an alleged 1996 attack on E. Jean Carroll. The jury has ruled that he has to pay her $5 million. He’s going to appeal, but this is the latest case. There are probably others. I’m just wondering whether you think that dings him as a potential presidential nominee for your party,”
Hagerty tried to deflect the question and change the subject.
“Neil, we’ve been watching this legal circus in Manhattan unfold. This is just the latest act in it. Uh, I, I don’t think this is having an impact on the American public’s viewpoint. I think the American public is very focused on what’s happening to the real economy right now. Look at what happens at our border right now. We’re about to lose Title 42. We’re about to have another, you know, increase in the crisis there. Look around the globe at the, you know, the various crises that have been precipitated by this administration. I think that’s where the focus of the American public is right now, and they’re gonna be looking for leadership to solve that,” the senator responded. “Joe Biden is not the one to deliver that leadership.”
Cavuto then inquired, “So someone like an Asa Hutchison, the former Arkansas governor running for president says that the president should step down facing all of these legal battles. He was referring first and foremost, obviously, to this earlier case. I’m just wondering whether you agree that maybe another nominee wouldn’t have as many as many burdens, whether justified or not.”
Once more Hagerty refused to utter a single word of criticism against his political lord and savior.
“No. Neil, I think we’ve seen President Trump under attack since before he became president. This has been going on for, for years, and he’s been amazing in his ability to weather these sorts of attacks. The American public has been amazing in their support for him through all of it.”
Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-TN) defends Donald Trump after he is found liable for sexual abuse and defamation:
“This has been going on for years. And he has been amazing in his ability to weather these sorts of attacks and the American public has been amazing in their support for him.” pic.twitter.com/PPqpzZZ1ti
A male staffer for the 2022 Herschel Walker Senate campaign says that CPAC chairman and longtime conservative activist Matt Schlapp sexually assaulted him as he was driving Schlapp back from a bar in October.
The Daily Beast reports that Schlapp is accused of groping and fondling the staffer’s crotch.
The staffer described Schlapp, who had traveled to Georgia for a Walker campaign event, as inappropriately and repeatedly intruding into his personal space at the bars. He said he was also keenly aware of his “power dynamic” with Schlapp, widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in national conservative politics.
Schlapp, the staffer recalled, said he had wanted to spend the evening discussing the staffer’s professional future.
“It was a public space, and I was thinking that he got the hint. I did not want to embarrass him,” he said. “But it escalated.”
The staffer, who is in his thirties, recalled the incident in great detail.
Schlapp put his hand on his leg, then reached over and “fondled” his crotch at length while he was frozen in shock, calling it “scarring” and “humiliating.” When they arrived at the hotel, the staffer said Schlapp invited him to his room. The staffer said he declined and left “as quickly as I could.”
He informed the campaign about the incident the next morning.
When the staffer got home that night, he received a call from Schlapp—shortly after midnight, according to call records the staffer shared with The Daily Beast—to confirm that the staffer would still chauffeur him to an event in Macon the next day. The staffer described the call as “short and perfunctory,” but after confirming he would drive him, the staffer “broke down.” He then recorded a series of tearful video accounts detailing the evening, which he shared with The Daily Beast as well as with two people close to him, including the staffer’s wife.
In one of the videos he recorded, the staffer says:
“Matt Schlapp of the CPAC grabbed my junk and pummeled it at length, and I’m sitting there thinking what the hell is going on, that this person is literally doing this to me.
“From the bar to the Hilton Garden Inn, he has his hands on me. And I feel so fucking dirty. I feel so fucking dirty.
“I’m supposed to pick this motherfucker up in the morning and just pretend like nothing happened. This is what I’m dealing with. This is what I got to do.”
The staffer also sent Schlapp a text message to let him know someone else would be driving him in the morning.
“I did want to say I was uncomfortable with what happened last night. The campaign does have a driver who is available to get you to Macon and back to the airport.”
Schlapp replied with texts of his own that sound like something from a lovesick teen:
“Pls give me a call.”
“If you could see it in your heart to call me at the end of day. I would appreciate it. If not I wish you luck on the campaign and hope you keep up the good work.”
A attorney for Schlapp denied the allegations, “This appears to be now the twelfth Daily Beast piece with personal attacks on Matt Schlapp and his family. The attack is false and Mr. Schlapp denies any improper behavior. We are evaluating legal options for response.”
The finale of the courtroom drama’s sixth and final season premiered on Thursday with the episode titled “The End of Everything.” In a clip widely shared online, the episode features the main character Diane Lockhart, played by Christine Baranski, meeting with Felix Staples, a flamboyant, gay provocateur who has made appearances in earlier seasons of the long-running show. In a conference room surrounded by lawyers, Staples claims that he was sexually assaulted by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who forced him to have oral sex following a CPAC conference while interning for his office.
The accusation wasn’t left unchallenged, and it soon became clear that the Felix Staples character did indeed fabricate the entire story.
Diane immediately dismisses the accusation as politically motivated “bulls—” despite Staples claiming to have DNA proof. The lawyers spend the episode gathering evidence to expose Staples for lying. He eventually confesses to fabricating the allegations to tarnish the Florida governor’s reputation, because it will put former President Trump “ahead in the polling” in 2024’s presidential race.
Of course, had a show made the same joke about a well-known Democratic contender for the 2024 nomination, right-wingers would have delighted in the idea, probably promoting it online and trying to suggest it was true.
But since DeSantis was the recipient of the jab, conservatives had a full scale conniption fit online, suggesting that putting something like that in the script of a fictional show was a preemptive hit job on the Florida governor.
Is this kind of thing legal? I realize the whole free speech thing is pretty robust, but can you just insert a real public figure into your fictional movie and make him a sex offender? https://t.co/Dd2v6kvTXs
Ron DeSantis is a public figure and subject to ridicule, even if that ridicule is disgusting. Considering the horrific shit that has been said over the years about Bill and Hillary Clinton by the political right, conservatives really need to put their outrage in neutral and stop being such blatant hypocrites.
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) may think he won’t have any trouble winning another term in the House of Representatives, but a group of survivors who say they were sexually abused by a team doctor while Jordan was an assistant wrestling coach at Ohio State University, are trying to derail the congressman’s bid for reelection.
According to WCMH-TV, the group says Jordan’s failure to report what was happening makes him unfit for any elected office.
Some survivors of sexual violence at the hands of former Ohio State University physician Richard Strauss have taken their advocacy to Ohio’s 4th U.S. House District race, where Democratic hopeful Tamie Wilson faces an uphill struggle against incumbent Republican Jim Jordan.
Abused by the team doctor under the guise of medical exams from 1978 to 1998, the survivors – some of whom donned “#MeToo Jordan Knew” T-shirts outside Ohio Stadium on Saturday during an Ohio State football game – argued Jordan’s failure to protect them from a predator makes him unfit for office.
Jordan’s Democratic challenger, Tamie Wilson, had this to say about the incumbent congressman:
“Character matters. If this guy is going to be a part of sexual abuse, he’s not going to defend the Constitution or our country.”
For his part, Jordan says any allegations against him are unfounded and not supported by some who have reached out to him.
“The number of wrestlers who have reached out to me, who’ve said this is complete baloney. We’ve got statements that have been sent to us, people willing to help and tell the truth. We’ll continue to get that information out.”
And yet, dozens of former student athletes report that Dr. Strauss, between the years of 1979 to 1996, performed medically unnecessary genital exams, which they reported to university officials, including Jordan. Yet nothing was reported by those officials and Strauss continued to molest young boys.
Strauss survivor Tom Lisy notes:
“His coverup of the OSU sexual assault is the real crime, the real slight. There’s guys I know who trained with him every day and they went through a journey together and he has completely turned his back to them.”