Trump made this ridiculous comment in the debate this week:
I don’t know if somebody went to Wall Street. You’re the one that takes all the money from Wall Street. I don’t take it. You have raised a lot of money, tremendous amounts of money. And every time you raise money, deals are made. I could raise so much more money. As president and as somebody that knows most of those people, I could call the heads of Wall Street, the heads of every company in America, I would blow away every record. But I don’t want to do that because it puts me in a bad position. And then you bring up Wall Street? You shouldn’t be bringing up Wall Street. Because you’re the one that takes the money from Wall Street, not me. I could blow away your records like you wouldn’t believe.
He’s repeating this absurdity at his rallies now, as a way of excusing the fact that the bottom has fallen out of his fundraising. It could not be a bigger lie. In fact, it’s a laie that requires a major audit of all federal spending and contracts should the Democrats win.
On a Friday evening in late September, President Trump huddled with high-dollar donors, lobbyists and corporate executives in a private room at the hotel he owns in Washington, where attendees took turns pitching the president on their pet issues.
Trump was there to raise big money for his reelection effort. The price of admission: as much as $100,000 per person to get in the door.
For his guests, it was a chance to make the most of what has emerged as a signature feature of Trump’s Washington: the ability of wealthy donors to directly lobby the president.
One talked to him about solar panels; another about business loans, according to two people who participated and, like others interviewed for this report, spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe private interactions. At least one guest was told by Trump to follow up with White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, conveniently seated nearby.AD
One attendee’s plea on behalf of an obscure railway project in Alaska in need of federal approval appeared to get immediate results.
Just after midnight, mere hours after the campaign fundraiser, Trump tweeted that it was his “honor to inform you that I will be issuing a Presidential Permit for the A2A Cross-Border rail.”
“Congratulations to the people of Alaska & Canada!” he added, noting that the state’s congressional delegation was supportive of the move. The presidential permit was officially issued three days later.
Trump’s rapid action after the Sept. 25 fundraiser — one of dozens of high-dollar donor events he has headlined while in office — emblemizes how much he has abandoned his 2016 pledge to “DRAIN THE SWAMP.”
In the closing weeks of that election, Trump led cheering supporters in chants of that slogan, promising that he would completely disrupt the culture of Washington. He warned of the power of lobbyists and political donors who he said effectively bought off elected officials. He told voters he was uniquely prepared to take on the issue, because he knew personally as a contributor how the system worked.AD
“When you give, they do whatever the hell you want them to do,” he told the Wall Street Journal in 2015.
But during his four years in office, Trump has taken few steps to clean up Washington. He has instead presided over a norm-shattering expansion of private interests in government.
The government has had to spend money at Trump’s private hotels as his family has traveled around the globe. Trump sidestepped rules that had been designed to prevent nepotism, allowing his son-in-law to serve in a top government role. He has touted companies run by supporters and allies who received government contracts. His administration has allowed former lobbyists to serve in jobs in which they have oversight of policies that affect their former employers.
Among the five pledges Trump made to “drain the swamp” and curtail the influence of lobbyists in a major campaign speech in October 2016, a Washington Post review found that he sought to address only two, through an executive order in January 2017 — which contained a major loophole.
Craig Holman, a lobbyist for the government watchdog group Public Citizen, had initially expressed cautious optimism about Trump’s ethics pledge in 2017. He now says the president has worsened Washington’s profiteering culture in nearly every way.
“The whole administration has taken Trump’s tone — self-dealing, self-enriching, enriching your friends and families — that’s smart, if you listen to Trump,” he said.
This next is important. I tried to convince people of this from the get but the media kept believing that Trump was talking about corruption and cronyism when he talked about “The Swamp.” No.
Judd Deere, a White House spokesman, said in a statement that the president has followed through on his promises, casting “the swamp” as those who have opposed Trump’s agenda.
“President Trump has fought tirelessly in his effort to make Washington accountable to the American people — that can be seen not only in his government ethics reforms, but also in his push to drain the swamp of its tired, failed, recycled ideas, such as working to end endless wars, tearing up disastrous trade deals that shipped our jobs overseas, rolling back burdensome regulations and expediting permit approvals, and putting an end to uncontrolled immigration,” he said. “And that is why the Swamp has fought so hard against this President every step of the way.”
“The Swamp”, The Deep State” it’s all the same thing: anyone who opposes Trump and believes in the rule of law. I would have thought that was obvious. In fact, I wrote about it a bunch of times. Here’s one Salon piece about all of his corrupt practices with foreign governments alone:
Those are just a few examples out of dozens in the Trump era that prove his promise to “drain the swamp” was preposterous. What we now understand is that what he and his administration meant by that was not to root out corruption but rather to root out career federal officials who refused to break the law or betray the country on behalf of Donald Trump.