The 'cult-like devotion' of Trump's yes-men will ultimately be his undoing: analysis

In an analysis published at Business Insider this Friday, Kieran Corcoran says that if President Trump is expecting a fast, clean acquittal in his Senate impeachment trial, those expectations "are beginning to evaporate."

That's thanks to a recent interview Lev Parnas, an associate of Trump's lawyer Rudy Giuliani, gave to MSNBC's Rachel Maddow this Wednesday, where he described his part in a plot to pressure Ukraine to investigate Trump's political rivals -- a plot Parnas said was orchestrated with Trump at the helm.

Speaking to Maddow, Parnas used a word that many Trump critics use to describe the culture that surrounds the current administration: it's a "cult."

"This cult-like devotion in those who surround Trump is not unique to Parnas," Corcoran writes. "Michael Cohen, Trump's former fixer and attorney, also described a fanatical dedication to the president."

The "cult" analogy was also made by Trump former personal lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen, Corcoran notes, and that cult mentality "led Cohen to unquestioningly make an illegal payment of hush money to the porn star Stormy Daniels, for fear of her going public about her relationship with Trump (which Trump denies) in the fractious 2016 election campaign."

Parnas is yet another former Trump cultist-turned informant, and his recent revelations have made the Republican unity when it comes to defending Trump "shaky."

"Three Republicans in toss-up seats seem willing to side with Democrats to defy Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and call witnesses to testify in the trial," Corcoran writes. "A fourth would make it a reality."

According to Corcoran, Trump has so far shown himself impervious to scandal, but that is becoming "less and less tenable if credible and damaging information is brought into the public domain and chips away at his support within the GOP."

Read the full piece over at Business Insider.