A red-state Democrat test-drives a 2028 message: From the Politics Desk
In today's edition, Alexandra Marquez files a dispatch from the not-so-subtle 2028 shadow primary campaign trail. Plus, Jonathan Allen explores what the Jeffrey Epstein files fight reveals about the future of the MAGA movement — and Donald Trump's role in it.
— Adam Wollner
A red-state Democrat test-drives a 2028 message
GREENVILLE, S.C. — In an early preview of a potential 2028 presidential campaign, Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear hit the road across South Carolina this week, testing a message focused on how to grow the Democratic coalition.
Beshear laid out a blueprint for the party to win back rural voters, union voters, independent voters and even Republicans — music to the ears of Democrats still feeling the sting of 2024's losses and eager to hear about how the party can rise again.
'The actions of the Trump administration are providing a huge opportunity for Democrats to go out and regain the trust of the American people to be the party of common sense, common ground and getting things done,' Beshear, 47, told union members gathered at the South Carolina AFL-CIO convention in Greenville.
'When we deliver and make people's lives better, they're willing to vote in different ways. They're willing to support different people, and that's where we've got to be,' added Beshear.
Red-state credentials: At stop after stop, Beshear noted that he knows how to win voters in traditionally Republican areas. After all, he's done it twice.
The first time was in 2019, when he won his first gubernatorial election by less than half a percentage point, beating GOP Gov. Matt Bevin. In 2023, Beshear improved his margins, beating then-state Attorney General Daniel Cameron, a Republican, by 5 points.
Meanwhile, President Donald Trump won Kentucky by almost 26 points in 2020 and by over 30 points in 2024.
South Carolina focus: Though he insisted that his travel to South Carolina came about partly because of his son's baseball tournament near Charleston, Beshear hasn't been coy about his presidential aspirations before arriving in the state that voted first in last year's Democratic presidential primaries.
In an interview with 'Meet the Press' just days before he arrived in South Carolina, Beshear said he would ' take a look ' at launching a presidential campaign in 2028. He's at least the fourth Democratic elected official to publicly visit the state this year, arriving just a week after California Gov. Gavin Newsom and several weeks after Govs. Wes Moore of Maryland and Tim Walz of Minnesota. Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., also has an event planned in the state later this week.
Analysis by Jonathan Allen
Whatever is in the Jeffrey Epstein files, Americans haven't learned much about the content because the Justice Department hasn't released them and appears to be in no rush to do so. But the fight over them has told the public a lot about the future of the MAGA movement and President Donald Trump's place in it.
The truth that grows more glaringly obvious with each passing day is that Trump is a temporary leader of a modern Republican base that fashioned itself in his image. But countless elected officials and right-wing influencers hope to remain prominent once Trump has exited the presidency. Their timeline simply isn't the same as his.
These folks, from Turning Point USA's Charlie Kirk to megabroadcasters Tucker Carlson and Alex Jones, simply can't afford to alienate the hardcore MAGA base that is calling for transparency on a matter that speaks directly to their antipathy for powerful institutions and players.
That's the most logical explanation for echoing criticism of Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi. It's not that Trump's longtime allies don't support his presidency — Kirk went so far as to say this week that pushing the Epstein issue is done out of love for Trump — but they aren't about to risk their own credibility with his voters.
Trump, who watched some of his most prolific backers distance themselves from him on arming Ukraine and bombing Iran, can expect more of the same as his second term progresses. Over time, ambitious figures in the MAGA wing of the GOP are sure to cling tighter to the base than to Trump.
That's the new reality for a president who faces a constitutional bar to running for another term. The lesson for him is that despite being the most powerful person in the world, his political capital will continue to diminish each time he picks a fight with his own movement.
The Epstein files represent the first major MAGA rift of his second term. If he's not careful, it won't be the last.
DOJ fires Maurene Comey, daughter of James Comey and a prosecutor in Sean Combs' and Ghislaine Maxwell's cases, by Ryan J. Reilly, Jonathan Dienst, David Rohde and Zoë Richards
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The Independent
an hour ago
- The Independent
Mike Johnson shuts Congress for summer to avoid dealing with Trump handling of Epstein files
House Speaker Mike Johnson on Tuesday ground the House of Representatives to a screeching halt in order to block Democrats from bringing up amendments calling for the release of files related to sex trafficking financier Jeffrey Epstein. The speaker's decision to virtually shut down procedure in the House of Representatives — a week before Congress' summer break — comes as President Donald Trump continues to receive criticism from all sides for his handling of the promised release of all government files related to Epstein. But Johnson's early recess could also impact the House's ability to keep the government open when they return and allow political crises to mushroom when members go back home to face their constituents. The move to halt the action of the House Rules committee came after Democrats repeatedly tried to introduce amendments to force the disclosure of files related to Epstein, who was found hanged in his New York prison cell in 2019. Johnson expressed his frustration over what he described as the Democrats' attempts to weaponize the Rules process, at times pounding his fist on the podium talking about Epstein, attacking the minority for their supposed hypocrisy for covering for former President Joe Biden's diminished state in the second half of his administration. 'We're not going to allow them to engage in that charade,' Johnson told reporters during his weekly press conference. 'They controlled the Department of Justice for the last four years. Has anyone forgotten they had all these files the entire time?' Republicans have hoped to shift the conversation more toward touting the merits of their 'One Big, Beautiful Bill' legislation that Trump signed into law on July 4. But the party fell into bedlam this month after the Justice Department in conjunction with the FBI released a two-page memo that determined that Epstein had no client list and that no ' further disclosure would be appropriate or warranted.' That came despite the fact that many officials who would join the Trump administration such as Attorney General Pam Bondi, FBI Director Kash Patel and Deputy FBI Director Dan Bongino pledged they would release additional information about Epstein. Republicans came into further chaos when last week The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump allegedly sent a bawdy 50th birthday card message to Epstein, his former friend who he broke with before the feds began investigating him publicly. The president vehemently denied that he sent it and filed a $10 million federal lawsuit against the paper, its parent company News Corp and its founder Rupert Murdoch. House Majority Leader Steve Scalise and Johnson insisted that Trump wanted to get to the bottom of the story. 'Trump's in the courts right now trying to get a lot of that information unsealed so the American public can see it,' Scalise said. But Trump only announced he would ask Bondi to release grand jury transcripts after the WSJ reported its story. Trump himself has called the Epstein conspiracy theories over which he once fanned the flames a 'hoax' and now says 'my PAST supporters have bought into this 'bullshit,' hook, line, and sinker.' The halting of votes for the House Rules Committee means that the House will not be able to tee up votes to pass many of the spending bills that Congress hoped to pass before the August recess, when members break to go back to their districts. When it returns, Congress must pass its spending bills by the end of September to avoid a government shutdown. But Johnson might not then be able to avoid a vote on Epstein. Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) teamed up with Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) to pass a discharge petition, which allow them to circumvent the committee process to bring a vote on releasing files related to Epstein to the floor. So far, many Republicans have joined onto the petition and every Democrat will likely sign on, much to the chagrin of Johnson. 'We're not going to play political games with this,' Johnson said. 'You have to allow the legislation to ripen, and you also have to allow the administration the space to do what it is doing.' Discharge petitions need seven legislative business days to ripen. The House broke late on Thursday evening into Friday morning last week and its last legislative day before the recess will be on Wednesday, meaning the petition will be kicked into when the House reconvenes in September. But even if the House were to pass Massie and Khanna's legislation, it would need to face a vote in the Senate, where it would face a more significant challenge. On Tuesday afternoon, Bill Gates, the multibillionaire co-founder of Microsoft who was a friend of Epstein, was roaming the basement of the Senate. He did not respond to questions from The Independent about disclosing files related to Epstein.
Reuters
an hour ago
- Reuters
Political brawl over Epstein files sends US House into early summer recess
WASHINGTON, July 22 (Reuters) - The top Republican in the U.S. House of Representatives said on Tuesday he would send lawmakers home a day early for a five-week summer recess to avoid a political fight over files on disgraced financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. The move averts a push by Democrats and some Republicans for a vote on a bipartisan resolution to require the Justice Department and FBI to release all government documents on Epstein, who died by suicide in prison in 2019. "What we refuse to do is participate in another one of the Democrats' political games. This is a serious matter. We are not going to let them use this as a political battering ram," House Speaker Mike Johnson, of Louisiana, told reporters. Many of President Donald Trump's supporters who embraced a slew of conspiracy theories surrounding Epstein saw their hopes raised when the administration vowed to release a slew of new documents on the case, only to backtrack and say it had concluded that there was no evidence to support the theories. That opened a rare breach between Trump and parts of his Make America Great Again base of support. Majorities of Americans and Trump's Republicans say they believed the government is hiding details on the case, according to Reuters/Ipsos polling. On Monday, Democrats sought to use a House Rules Committee meeting to force a vote on the Epstein resolution introduced by Republican Representative Thomas Massie and Democratic Representative Ro Khanna. The panel serves as gatekeeper for floor-bound legislation. Republicans instead suspended the hearing, preventing the panel from approving bills for floor consideration this week. The House had been expected to hold the week's final votes on Thursday. But House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, the chamber's No. 2 Republican, told reporters there would be votes on Tuesday and Wednesday for less important legislation considered under suspension of the rules. A subcommittee of the House Oversight Committee voted to subpoena Ghislaine Maxwell, a British socialite and Epstein's longtime girlfriend, who is serving a 20-year prison sentence after being convicted of sex trafficking in 2021. Under mounting pressure from Trump supporters for the release of material, Attorney General Pam Bondi has asked a federal judge to unseal grand jury transcripts in the cases of both Epstein and Maxwell, who was convicted in 2021 of five federal charges related to her role in Epstein's alleged sexual abuse of underage girls. (This story has been refiled to fix the day of the week in paragraph 1)
Reuters
an hour ago
- Reuters
Greek police arrest Moldovan tycoon Plahotniuc on Interpol notice
ATHENS, July 22 (Reuters) - Greek police have arrested a Moldovan tycoon and a former political leader wanted for allegedly participating in a criminal organisation, money laundering and fraud, police said on Tuesday. Vladimir Plahotniuc, considered one of Moldova's richest men and a former lawmaker, was arrested at the Athens airport on an Interpol notice on Monday evening. He has been accused in connection with a $1 billion fraud against Moldovan banks in 2014-2015, a case known locally as the "theft of the century". He has denied wrongdoing. Police also arrested former Moldovan lawmaker Constantin Tutu, 38, who is wanted by Russia for allegedly trafficking drugs internationally, police officials said. Both suspects had an Interpol red notice issued against them. Moldova's General Inspectorate of Police confirmed that Plahotniuc, who was the leader of the Democratic party from 2016-2019, and Tutu had been arrested. Plahotniuc, 59, is suspected to have fled Moldova in 2019. Following a tip-off, Greek police launched an investigation which found that Plahotniuc was living with his partner in a luxurious villa in the southern suburbs of Athens. Tutu also lived in the same residence, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity due to the confidentiality of the probe. In 2023, the European Union imposed sanctions on seven people from Moldova, including Plahotniuc, for actions that it said destabilised and undermined the territorial integrity of Moldova and neighbouring Ukraine. Since 2023, Plahotniuc has lived in 22 countries, changing residence regularly to avoid detection, the Greek police officials said. The two men, carrying only backpacks, were arrested at the Athens airport after boarding a flight to Dubai. They will appear before a prosecutor on Wednesday to respond to charges. Moldova is expected to request his extradition, the country's General Prosecutor's office said.
