Weekly Mind Dump: Team of Felons

Trump is planning to make America into a rogue criminal state.

Week of 11/24-11/30, 2024:

“I’m going to surround myself with the best and most serious people...we want top of the line professionals,” said Donald Trump, convicted felon.

Eleven top allies of and advisers to Trump have been convicted or pled guilty in recent years to various offenses, with their total sentences amounting to about 30 years of imprisonment.

The number of people in Trump’s orbit who have been convicted of crimes in recent years is so great, The Washington Post has described it as a “remarkable universe of criminality” surrounding the former president. That was five years ago. Consider it merely a preview of coming attractions.

“With Lincoln, they had a team of rivals,” Presidential historian Douglas Brinkley told USA Today. “With Trump, you have a team of felons.”

The following list of Trump henchmen charged with crimes does not include many others who resigned and were not indicted. Moreover, several of his lawyers have been disbarred or had their licenses suspended:

1. Donald Trump, Jr.

2. Eric Trump

3. Allen Weisselberg

4. George Papadopoulos (pardoned by Trump)

5. Michael Flynn (pardoned by Trump)

6. Elliott Broidy (pardoned by Trump)

7. Tom Barrack

8. George Nader

9. Rick Gates

10. Michael Cohen

11. Paul Manafort (pardoned by Trump)

12. Roger Stone (pardoned by Trump)

13. Steve Bannon (pardoned by Trump)

14. Peter Navarro

15. Sidney Powell

16. Jenna Ellis

17. Mark Meadows

18. Jeffrey Clark

19. John Eastman

20. Kenneth Chesebro

21. Boris Epshteyn

22. Christina Bobb

23. Rudy Giuliani

24. Waltine Nauta

25. Carlos de Oliveira

Add to this rogues’ gallery: Charles Kushner, Jared’s father, a convicted felon sentenced to two years in prison on 18 counts of filing false tax returns and campaign finance reports and retaliating against a witness. Kushner had hired a prostitute to seduce his brother-in-law, arranged to record a sexual encounter between the two, and had the tape sent to his sister. Trump has just nominated him to be U.S. ambassador to France. Like their Capo, many of these consiglieri, made men/women and wise guys are recidivist career criminals for whom breaking or skirting the law is a matter of habit. Trump advisor Boris Epshteyn, for example, was revealed last week for shaking down prospective cabinet nominees for thirty-to-a-hundred grand for access to the Boss.

Then there’s Matt Gaetz, failed nominee to be attorney general whom the Justice Department investigated for allegedly sex trafficking an underage girl in 2017 and illegal drug use; and Pete Hegseth, who settled out of court a sexual assault case in 2017, mishandled funds of two veterans groups he headed and whose squalid personal behavior includes intoxication on the job, sexual harassment and storming the stage at a Louisiana strip club, behavior that would make Sonny Corleone and Paulie Walnuts blush.

This track record portends what is to come. After declaring “I am your retribution,” “Don” Trump and his MAGA crew are frantically laying the foundations to put in place a “stato di vendetta” — a vengeance state to go after “the enemies within.” As capo di tutti capi, Trump plans to turn the United States into a rogue criminal state controlled by oligarchs and cartels who will bleed Americans of their hard earned money and transfer it up the chain for each capo to get his cut. To make this work, he will strongarm politicians who balk at confirming his sordid nominees, just as Michael Corleone did with Senator Geary. He also intends to impose controls to suppress dissent, ranging from sham investigations and indictments of adversaries to employing violence by invoking the Insurrection Act. Those who hesitate to cooperate or back off will be made “offers they can’t refuse.” His top enforcer will be AG Pam Bondi, modeling Godfather consigliere Tom Hagen. Thuggish “Border Czar” Tom Homan will take care of non-white immigrants, inspired by hitman Luca Brasi.

Trump’s candidate to be FBI director Kash Patel, channeling Joe Pesci’s enforcer character in Goodfellas, Tommy DeVito, has laid it all out in chilling terms: “We will go out and find the conspirators, not just in government but in the media. Yes, we’re going to come after the people in the media who lied about American citizens, who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections — we’re going to come after you.”

But crime gangs never last very long. Their overweening greed, vicious infighting, treachery and rampant stupidity eventually do them in. And justice eventually catches up with them.

Gambino Family underboss Sammy “The Bull” Gravano was spot on: “Sometimes, no matter how smart you are, you can’t avoid getting tripped up.”