I’m getting weary of writing about Trump so much, but I go to sleep and wake up and there’s always a fresh all-you-can-eat buffet set up. Over here are the donuts:
A knowledgeable Republican source told CNN that some of Trump’s campaign staff — even campaign manager Paul Manafort — “feel like they are wasting their time,” given Trump’s recent comments…
…Two Trump insiders said Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus has talked to Trump several times in recent days, conveying the dismay among senior party leaders and donors.
It has been relayed to Trump hat he is losing what tenuous support he has in the party establishment, and that already skeptical donors are heading for the exits or telling the senior team can’t count on serious progress when he looks so toxic.
“(Manafort) has made clear no one can help him if no one believes he will do what it takes to win,” said a senior trump aide.
And over here are the scrambled eggs:
Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump escalated his war with his own party’s leadership Tuesday by refusing to endorse House Speaker Paul D. Ryan or Sen. John McCain, two of the GOP’s highest-ranking elected officials, in their primary campaigns…
…Trump praised Ryan’s underdog opponent, Paul Nehlen, for running “a very good campaign” and said of Ryan: “I like Paul, but these are horrible times for our country. We need very strong leadership. We need very, very strong leadership. And I’m just not quite there yet. I’m not quite there yet.”
And over here are some bagels and cream cheese:
Meg Whitman, the Hewlett-Packard chief executive who ran unsuccessfully for governor of California in 2010, will back Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, joining other prominent Republicans troubled by Donald Trump’s candidacy.
“As a proud Republican, casting my vote for president has usually been a simple matter. This year is different,” Whitman wrote on Facebook. “Donald Trump’s demagoguery has undermined the fabric of our national character.”
Whitman, a major GOP fundraiser whose net worth is about $2 billion, also told the New York Times that she planned to raise money for Clinton.
And there’s a nice selection of fresh fruit and fruit juices:
Former Donald Trump campaign manager and CNN contributor Corey Lewandowski on Tuesday night suggested that President Obama did not release his Harvard transcripts in order to hide that he was not born in the United States.
And I can’t forget about the sausage and bacon:
Donald Trump on Tuesday defend his claim that the election will be rigged, offering no actual evidence but saying he hears and feels things.
“Well, I’m talking about at the voter booth,” Trump told CBS12 in Florida. “I mean, we’ve seen a lot of things over the years. And now without the IDs, you know the voter IDs, and all the things that are going on. And some bad court cases have come down.”
Asked if he had any reason to believe something illegal was going on, Trump offered the answer, “I just hear things, and I just feel it.”
I may get to some of these stories in more detail throughout the day, but I gorged myself on an entirely different buffet yesterday, writing about the president’s evisceration of Trump, the first iteration of his theory that the election will be rigged, pressure that Republicans feel to un-endorse him, and how there’s still so much dirt in his history that hasn’t even been discussed.
Tomorrow there will be a new buffet set up.
It’s exhausting for political writers, but I think it’s having an even more enervating effect on the Republican Party establishment.
More on that, next.
