Donald trrump

For years, in both sympathetic and unsympathetic parts of the press, DeSantis has been hyped as “Trump without the baggage,” “Trumpism without Trump,” “Trump without the brains.” But the first few days have proved these formulations to be, at best, oversimplifications, and perhaps even mischaracterizations. In an especially smart Washington Free Beacon column, Matthew Continetti argues that DeSantis’s launch event, once it got past the embarrassing glitches, demonstrated that the clash between Trump and DeSantis over the GOP nomination “is also a struggle between two concepts of the New Right, pitting the former president’s MAGA populism against the Florida governor’s institutional culture war.

The battle is joined! Welcome to the inaugural edition of the new Spectator newsletter, THUNDERDOME.  Loyal readers will know this has been the name of my columns covering presidential election coverage for years. It was always a tribute to the late great Tina Turner, such an incredible icon and the star villain of the classic Mad Max movie where “two men enter, one man leaves.”  I’ll be writing it once a week, and you can sign up to receive future editions direct to your inbox here. Please sign up today!

This week’s Durham report is as close as we’ll get in our lifetimes to proof that the Deep State, working in concert with the mainstream media, exists.  The final 306-page report was written by former US attorney John Durham, who was chosen in the aftermath of the Mueller report to examine the FBI probe known as “Operation Crossfire Hurricane.” Durham in this final report provides the only comprehensive review of what came to be called “Russiagate” and shows how close our democracy came to failing at the hands of the Deep State.  We now know the FBI took disinformation produced by the Russians and used that to justify spying on the Trump campaign.

Well, well, well. That is to say, I told you so. Finally, at last, it was about time, scary-looking special counsel John Durham has delivered his report on the stinking, corrupt, lying, no-good partisan machine that is the FBI and the Department of Justice. Just as I and the rest of the non-Hillary commentariat told you, what he showed was that the Deep State’s investigation into possible collusion (remember that once-ubiquitous word?) between Donald Trump and the Russkies was a partisan witch hunt fabricated by Team Hillary.  The report is full of the antiseptic bureaucratese that specialists recommend to their insomniac patients. The FBI “failed to uphold their mission of strict fidelity to the law,” yada, yada, yada.

America’s border security was stretched to breaking point this week. US Customs and Border Protection chief Raul Ortiz said this morning that border patrol has averaged around 10,000 arrests a day as midnight last night, and the end of Title 42, approached. On Wednesday, Ortiz said that an estimated half a million “gotaways” have made it into the US since the start of the fiscal year in October.  Officials had expected a surge of migrants after the expiry of Title 42, the pandemic-era regulation that made it easier for authorities to deport arrivals. For now, reporting from the border suggests the new rules have been met with a lull in activity. That is a sorely needed reprieve for a system that has proven unfit to handle the influx in recent weeks.

What does Mike Pence, a family man, a devout Christian, occupant of the top spot on Donald Trump’s enemies list ever since January 6, 2021, and rival of his old boss in the race for the 2024 Republican nomination, think of the fact that the former president has been found by a jury to be “civilly liable” for the sexual abuse of E. Jean Carroll?  Asked by NBC for his reaction, he sidestepped: “I really can’t comment on a judgment in a civil case,” he said. “It’s just one more story focusing on my former running mate that I know is a great fascination to members of the national media, but I just don’t think it’s where the American people are focused.”  Vivek Ramaswamy cried foul play.