Wednesday, July 15, 2020

What did Donald Trump do today?

He fired someone who deserved it, for once.

Today, Trump replaced his campaign manager Brad Parscale with his one-time White House political director, Bill Stepien. This was how he announced it on Facebook:


Of course, campaign managers aren't fired because polls are rising. It's more likely that Parscale was fired because he made the mistake of showing Trump that his polls were not rising. Absurdly, Trump threatened to sue Parscale.

In any event, whether or not Trump fully understands it, Parscale was correct. Just today, two national polls showed him trailing Joe Biden by 11 points (NBC/WSJ) and 15 points (Quinnipiac).

It's also possible that Trump fired Parscale because of an advertising campaign paid for by his political opponents aimed at manipulating him into doing just that. The Lincoln Project, a group of anti-Trump Republicans, has been targeting ads directly at Trump himself, including this one about Parscale:




Parscale now joins other former Trump campaign managers Corey Lewandowski, Steve Bannon, and convicted felon Paul Manafort.

Why should I care about this?

  • It shouldn't be this easy to manipulate a president.