Trump's Primary Threats Against Conservatives Proves His Campaign Was a Farce

The Trumpkins got duped. It’s easy to rattle off a list of conservatives such as those here at RedState and those at National Review and elsewhere who warned time and time again that Donald Trump was a fraud. I’ve come back to Trump’s lack of an ideological core several times because it requires repeating. Trump lacks convictions because he has no convictions. He’s a lifetime Democrat who decided to pretend to be a Republican when it became politically expedient to do so.

All throughout the campaign, Trump sycophants such as Sean Hannity, Lou Dobbs, Ann Coulter, and Laura Ingraham spent an inordinate amount of time lecturing people like me who said we wouldn’t support Trump’s bid for the White House. The alt-right nitwits and their white nationalist superhero Richard Spencer declared themselves to be the “real” conservatives by asking idiotic rhetorical questions such as, “What have conservatives, conserved?” Politically illiterate buffoons such as Mike Cernovich (“OOG! OOG! GORILLA MINDSET, BRO!”) and Alex Jones flunky Paul Joseph Watson spent most of their time engaging in doltish conspiracy theories that Donald The Dummy would eventually repeat at his rallies in between chants of “Lock her up!”

Now that Donald Trump is President, what is he doing? Attacking conservatives and threatening to primary them and the reason? The sin of keeping their promises. By attacking House Freedom Caucus members like Jim Jordan, Mark Meadows, and Raul Labrador, Trump provides clear evidence his entire campaign was a farce. A reality show wrapped up at times with conservative jargon.

People will say, “But Jay, wait. What about Neil Gorsuch and his executive orders on coal and the Keystone Pipeline?” Great. I’m glad he did those things but does anybody believe for a moment he did because he cares? Donald Trump doesn’t care about the Supreme Court. Gorsuch was a fig leaf to conservatives. As for his executive orders, Trump’s interests are not what’s best for the country but what’s best for him. He cares more about the praise he gets from the people surrounding him after he shows off his signed executive orders than anything having to do with the policies themselves.

Here is what ‘Republican’ President, Donald Trump did this week:

Against the backdrop of crumbling negotiations over the GOP bill to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, President Donald Trump said last week he wanted to oust incumbent U.S. Rep. Mark Sanford in 2018.

The South Carolina Republican told The Post and Courier that Trump chose to convey this message through an intermediary: White House budget chief Mick Mulvaney, a former member of the S.C. congressional delegation, co-founder of the House Freedom Caucus and a friend.

“‘The president asked me to look you square in the eyes and to say that he hoped that you voted ‘no’ on this bill so he could run (a primary challenger) against you in 2018,'” Sanford said Mulvaney told him.

He added that Mulvaney made it clear he did not want to deliver the message but did so at Trump’s insistence.

“I’ve never had anyone, over my time in politics, put it to me as directly as that,” Sanford said, perhaps understating just how monumental it is for a sitting president to openly go after members of his own party.

What does President Trump think he’s going to do? Find a moderate to unseat Sanford? He won his election with nearly 60% of the vote. Who’s going to challenge him?

Chances are, President Trump is bluffing. He’s a blowhard and a bully. The problem for Trump is he forgets Sanford, Meadows, Labrador and Jordan are not his lackeys. They’re not going to respond to threats. In fact, they think so little of his empty threats, some of the are going right back at him. Look at this from Thomas Massie:

.@realDonaldTrump it's a swamp not a hot tub. We both came here to drain it. #SwampCare polls 17%. Sad! https://t.co/4kjygV2tdS

— Thomas Massie (@RepThomasMassie) March 30, 2017