All posts tagged "rick wilson"

GOP Senate 'surprise' predicted by ex-insider as party rides Trump 'all the way down'

A former Republican operative signaled that midterm elections could deliver a major wake-up call for the GOP.

Rick Wilson, co-founder of the anti-Trump organization The Lincoln Project, described in a Substack video conversation with journalist Wajahat Ali how Republicans and President Donald Trump might soon confront a new reality.

"They're going to get blown out in the House," Wilson said. "Now, is it going to be a 40-seat blowout? It's probably not. The other redistricting s--- has given them a few of those seats. But I think you're going to see a lot of seats that are going to end up being much bigger."

"You're going to see some real surprises as the map expands," Wilson explained. "You're going to see some states where the Democrats have no business performing like they do. And I'm going to take a very counterfactual point from a lot of establishment folks right now. I think El-Sayed is going to blow it out in Michigan."

Backlash against Trump, and the GOP leaders who have supported him, could spur that shift.

"People who have decided they're going to imitate Trump, even in very red states and districts, and try to be a mini-Trump, eventually run into a wall," Wilson said.

"They're going to ride Trump all the way down," he said.

And although it's unclear what exactly might happen in the Senate, it might be closer than Republicans want to admit, Wilson added.

"I'm not going to say that we're going to get it, but we're going to tie it. And I'll take a tie ballgame at this point," he said.

Trump and MAGA Double Down on Death and Disaster with Rick Wilson by Rick Wilson

A recording from Rick Wilson and THE LEFT HOOK with Wajahat Ali's live video

Read on Substack

'Do not be fooled': Ex-GOP strategist calls Marco Rubio's public loyalty to Vance an act

A former GOP strategist is calling a bluff by Secretary of State Marco Rubio and said he's playing Vice President JD Vance.

During an episode of the Against All Enemies podcast, Rick Wilson said that Rubio was lying when he reportedly told Vance and other insiders that he won't be running for president in 2028.

"It's bull—," Wilson said. "I've known Marco a very long time. He's completely full of sh—. They are planning his run."

Wilson said he knows "the guys that worked for Marco at that level," and they're already talking to the people who can help organize his presidential campaign.

"They are all talking to the money people. They are all talking to the press. They are all talking to political power brokers in the various early states," Wilson said. "They are planning a run. Do not be fooled for a single minute."

Wilson's co-host, progressive podcaster David Pakman, said, "Rubio supposedly told Vance, 'I won't run against you,'" but Wilson said it's a bluff that shouldn't be believed.

"He will come out and go, 'While I did not want to run against my friend JD Vance, I believe it is time for new leadership,'" Wilson said, predicting Rubio's announcement. "I can see the speech in my head because I've written it a thousand times."

On top of that, Wilson said that former MAGA congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene hinted that she could be planning "a movement" with far-right podcaster Tucker Carlson and outgoing Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY).

"It smells and looks like a political party that is going to be for those of you for whom MAGA is not crazy enough. 'Let's have something more crazy!'" Wilson said, adding that he predicted "there will be a lot of people" in the 2028 presidential race.

"This will be a very big field," Wilson said. "You are going to get Rubio and Vance and Ted Cruz and Ron DeSantis and Nikki Haley. They're going to have a cast of thousands in this fight."

'Uniquely poisonous' platform could doom Trump-backed candidate: ex-GOP strategist

A MAGA candidate is doomed by a 'uniquely poisonous' issue that will bite him in an upcoming election, an ex-GOP strategist warned.

In Florida, Republican gubernatorial candidate Byron Donalds has the endorsement of President Donald Trump and three-quarters of the Republican caucus in the state House, Rick Wilson noted in a recent Substack piece. However, he'll likely suffer from his reputation as "the data center guy," Wilson predicted.

"The data center issue is uniquely poisonous here, in a way that transcends the usual red-blue map," Wilson wrote. "That's what makes it so dangerous."

Donalds is closely tied to data centers because his donors come from AI, according to Wilson. He raised $90 million with the backing of a super PAC seeded by OpenAI's founders and "the usual tech broligarchs," Wilson wrote.

According to Wilson, Donalds has been shown on camera calling for Florida's "still pristine" land to be used for data centers. Donalds said he'd rather construct a data center "or four" and demanded "build out that stuff," Wilson noted.

"He said the quiet part into a microphone," Wilson wrote. "In a state where 'pristine' means the Everglades, the springs, the longleaf pine woods, and the vanishing farmlands along the central spur of Florida from Hendry to Lake counties."

Concerns about data centers' water consumption and quality of life are worrying Floridians, and Donalds' opponents are "hammering" the image of him as wanting to build "thousands" across the state, according to Wilson.

"Data centers have managed to unite Floridians across every line we normally see dividing them, and they've united them against the position Byron Donalds was bought for," Wilson wrote. "He might as well have a QR code on his forehead."

'Civil war' breaks out in 'reddest of red states' as MAGA coalition implodes: ex-insider

A former GOP operative warned on Monday that Republicans in red state Florida have a serious problem on their hands as November approaches.

Rick Wilson, the co-founder of the anti-Trump group The Lincoln Project, spoke with veteran politics reporter Scott MacFarlane for a Substack live video about the growing divide among the GOP as midterms approach.

"Florida is shocking people right now because a year ago, everybody thought it was the reddest of red states, that it was Alabama with better beaches," Wilson said. "And what's happened to the Republican coalition here is absolutely shocking. You've got a civil war going on on the DeSantis wing of the party. Half of the Republican Party hates Byron Donalds. Half of them wants Byron Donalds."

The split among GOP leaders comes as Democrats in the traditionally Republican-led state make gains while two Republicans face off in the gubernatorial race.

"The David Jolly campaign for governor has been running like nobody could imagine it would work," Wilson said. "Alex Vindman is moving very quickly into being one of the most financially competitive Democrats in Florida in a long time for the U.S. Senate race against Ashley Moody. You've got a bunch of great congressional candidates out there. And the MAGA coalition in Florida has really collapsed in part because in South Florida, which was a real bastion for them, Trump decided he was going to follow Stephen Miller's lead and take away TPS status for Cubans, Venezuelans, Dominicans, Haitians. And folks down there are really angry."

The question around AI data centers has garnered more division in Republican circles.

"The problem for Byron Donalds is this is his campaign money is funded by AI companies, data center builders, developers of properties that are going to be used for data centers," Wilson said. "And the super PAC that's been supporting his campaign — guys like Marc Andreessen and Peter Thiel types from Silicon Valley. So Donalds is really in a hole on this."

Jolly's campaign has attacked Donalds for this, and Republican pollsters are warning this "may be the issue that kills the party in Florida because everyone hates data centers," Wilson added. "We saw Pensacola, which is Escambia County, one of the most conservative parts of the state, banned data centers. Titusville this week, very red area of the state, banned data centers."

Trump's growing unpopularity has also impacted the party.

"Although he's still more popular in Florida than a lot of other states, independent voters, who were about 60 percent of the electorate in Florida, are now about two to one against Trump, and that's starting to bleed out onto Republican candidates," Wilson said.

Trump's Political Crisis Deepens - Live with Scott MacFarlane & Rick Wilson by Rick Wilson

A recording from Rick Wilson and Scott MacFarlane's live video

Read on Substack

Trump 'very physically diminished' during primetime speech: ex-GOP operative

A former GOP operative flagged how Trump's latest speech showed that his health has clearly diminished.

During an episode of The Lincoln Project Podcast, Rick Wilson pointed out the signs of Trump's physical decline that showed during his Thursday night speech.

"I've been an anthropologist of Trump for over a decade," Wilson said. "He did not read that speech, and I don't even think he, in a lot of ways, can internalize large complex speeches anymore."

Wilson explained that Trump appeared to be reading from a teleprompter the whole way. Looking at Trump's eyes during the speech, Wilson noted how "you could see the reading back and forth" because "he had not read that speech, had not internalized it."

That wasn't all that caught Wilson's attention. Trump "was clinging to that podium for dear life," Wilson continued. "His mouth was dry. He was huffing when he was going through the speech."

Trump is "running on empty," he said.

"If you were a person who actually cared about Donald Trump, you'd say, 'Hey, let's get you a couple days off,'" Wilson said. "'Let's get you to the doctor.'"

However, "no one does" actually care about Trump, Wilson said. Even if anyone did care, "that physicality of Trump, the decline is so marked that people almost lose track of it," Wilson said.

"The guy from 2015 and 16 had this sort of swagger, big burly physical presence on the stages and loomed behind Hillary [Clinton] and Jeb [Bush]," Wilson remembered. "That guy's gone. He's a very physically diminished man. He's a very, very physically diminished man."

DOJ whistleblower torches 'staggering' Trump move that gave fraudster a 'second chance'

A Justice department whistleblower on Saturday tore into President Donald Trump for what she described as a "staggering" decision to give a fraudster a "second chance."

During an episode of The Lincoln Project Podcast, former DOJ pardon attorney Liz Oyer argued that Trump's pardons were "fundamentally different" from others made in the past.

"He has pardoned quite a few individuals who committed fraud involving government programs, including Medicare and Medicaid," Oyer said. "He's also pardoned all manner of white collar frauds, including those that involve stealing money from investors."

Host and former GOP strategist Rick Wilson described the beneficiaries of Trump's "pay-to-play" pardons as "assertively terrible people who have exploited Americans."

Oyer went on to say, "The most staggering example is this man named Trevor Milton," the former Nikola Motors CEO, who defrauded investors with a clean energy truck that didn't work.

"Trevor Milton's investors lost almost $700 million in the process," Oyer explained. "And Milton got a full pardon from Donald Trump at the start of his second term in office after making a couple million dollars in political donations."

Milton is "already back in business" since his pardon, according to Oyer, who said the convicted fraudster has "now got a new startup in which he's trying to build autonomous aircraft." Milton's return to business is "really galling," Oyer added.

"This is a scam artist who's gotten a second chance at life thanks to Donald Trump," Oyer said. "One of the things that Milton has told the media that Trump said to him is, 'Trevor, you're cleaner than a baby's bottom now.' It just sounds insane, absurd, but this is the caliber of person that Donald Trump is pardoning."

Oyer, who was fired from the DOJ after refusing to recommend the reinstatement of actor Mel Gibson's rights to gun ownership, suggested that Trump "sees something of himself in these rich folks who have been prosecuted for committing frauds."

Trump made enemy whose revenge is 'going to be quite, quite sweet': ex-GOP strategist

A former GOP operative described how he is looking forward to the revenge of an enemy President Donald Trump made in the Senate.

During an episode of The Lincoln Project Podcast, Rick Wilson spoke about the feuds Trump started with senators, but in particular, he relished the revenge plot that Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) is suggesting.

"If you follow his Twitter feed lately, you know he is planning a beautiful set of 'F— yous' for Trump," Wilson said, sharing screenshots of posts by Cornyn.

The posts Wilson showed in his video mentioned the filibuster and anti-terrorism bills. According to Wilson, the posts hint that "the revenge is going to be quite, quite sweet."

Cornyn lost the Republican runoff in May to keep his seat in the Senate after Trump backed Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton shortly before the election. However, Cornyn isn't alone, as Wilson noted that Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA) reportedly got into a shouting match with Trump during a closed-door meeting.

"I would pay so much money for a video of that," Wilson said about Cassidy and Trump's fight. "Glorious."

Wilson described a Republican caucus in the Senate featuring both Cornyn and Cassidy who "hate" Trump "with the fire of a billion suns." He included Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC), Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), and Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) in that caucus as well.

"Not one of these Republican senators can go home and look their voters in the eye and say, 'I'm fighting for you every day trying to do something about this inflation, trying to do something about these fuel prices, trying to do something about grocery prices, trying to do something about corruption in Washington,'" Wilson said. "They can't do it. He has boxed them. They have bought this entire package. And you don't just get to wear the hat. You got to wear the whole clown suit if you're with Trump."

Noem's husband chased 'one last hoo-ha' with mistress as bombshell story broke: report

The husband of former Trump cabinet secretary Kristi Noem asked his dominatrix for "one last hoo-ha" as stories about his scandal broke, the model said.

The Daily Mail reported earlier this year that Bryon Noem carried on a years-long relationship with dominatrix Shy Sotomayor, who performs under the name Raelynn Riley. In a recent interview with former GOP strategist Rick Wilson, Sotomayor spilled more tea about her relationship with Bryon and how he reacted after their secret relationship was exposed.

The bombshell report published photos and messages detailing how Bryon enjoyed "bimbofication" at the hands of highly paid sex workers while his wife was the head of the Department of Homeland Security and the South Dakota governor before that. Bryon didn't deny messaging models and sending photos when The Mail reached out to him while his wife's spokesperson said she was "blindsided."

Sotomayor said that after she tried cutting off contact with Bryon, she "never heard from him," until the scandalous story broke.

"A day later, the news pops up. So he was still talking to me as people were like reporting on him and submitting like screenshots," Sotomayor told Wilson. "I think he was trying to get one last hoo-ha, you know, out of it."

She estimated that her contact with Bryon dropped off around "early May, April."

The Daily Mail exposé came out in late March. Noem was ousted as DHS secretary in March.

White House's silence on Trump's health disturbs ex-GOP analyst: 'Hiding something'

The White House still has not released the results of President Donald Trump's three-hour medical and dental exam this week at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, as political and medical experts have raised questions about whether the Trump administration has concealed information about his current health, according to NBC News.

Trump, 79, was scheduled for the appointment on Tuesday, and a White House official anticipated "a readout in the next day or so." This was his third visit to the medical center since his inauguration, NBC reported.

Questions were raised over the length of time he was with medical professionals amid skepticism over the president's claims that he was in "perfect" health. He also canceled a rare trip to Camp David on Tuesday after returning from the exam, with bad weather cited as the reason for the last-minute change.

After the visit, Trump posted on his Truth Social platform.

"Just finished my 6-month physical at Walter Reed Military Medical Center. Everything checked out PERFECTLY. Thank you to the great Doctors and Staff! Heading back to the White House," Trump wrote.

Past administrations have shared the results of medical exams, according to NBC.

"There’s no constitutional or legal requirement that a president release his medical records, but it’s been a consistent practice for most modern presidents, including Joe Biden, Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, George H.W. Bush, George W. Bush and Ronald Reagan," NBC reported.

Rick Wilson, a former Republican strategist and co-founder of the anti-Trump group The Lincoln Project, suggested Wednesday that it "looks like he's hiding something." He suggested in a Substack post this week that White House insiders have been trying to conceal Trump's declining health.

Raw Story reached out to Wilson for comment.

""The reason they’re not releasing anything is that every statement about Trump's health is a screaming lie from top to bottom," Wilson told Raw Story.

Stephen Miller dealt 'hard punch in the mouth' by uncensored Dems: Ex-GOP operative

Former Republican strategist Rick Wilson described how a social post knocked down one of President Donald Trump's longest and closest advisers — and sent MAGA into a rage this week.

The co-founder of the anti-Trump group, The Lincoln Project, revealed in a Substack post Thursday that, after Miller delivered a bigoted attack on Democratic Texas Senate hopeful Rep. James Talarico, the Democrats swung back.

The moment stung for Trump's MAGA coalition — and Miller — becoming a "hard punch in the mouth that that soft-handed sadist Stephen Miller has obviously needed since middle school."

"The official Democratic Party account looked at Stephen Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff, the architect of ICE thugs murdering American citizens in our streets, the Grima Wormtongue of the Trump White House immigration policy, the majordomo of white nat modern apartheid fantasies, and told him, in five tidy words: 'shut up, you ugly ----,'" Wilson wrote.

"That’s it. That’s the tweet. Five words. No policy. No nuance. No 14-part thread with a land acknowledgment quote bolted onto the front, nothing soft or nurturing or politically correct," Wilson wrote.

He called the Democrat's clapback moment "the sight of a man who built an entire political religion around the public performance of cruelty to others discovering through the glorious avenue of social media that cruelty has a return address."

"And reader, I want you to enjoy the rich, full-bodied irony of what happened next, because it is a clarifying moment in American politics, one on par with the invention of the hot mic," Wilson added. "Stephen Miller’s feelings got hurt."

Miller might be used to just firing off insults or brutal comments, Wilson said, but this time it was different.

"For once, the Democrats brought a gun to the gunfight," Wilson wrote.