Trump Played Supporters for Chumps – and They Paid for It
Trump is a crook – we all know that (at least normal people do); he played his supporters from chumps and they fell for it. A television game show host who wears heavy makeup, a weird hair weave, and has 5 kids from 3 wives, is accused of 2 dozen incidents of sexual assault, has 4,000 lawsuits against him and who’s being investigated by the NY AG, NYC DA, and the feds for everything from financial fraud, to tax fraud, to cooperating with foreign powers, and even inciting insurrection is not the ideal guy to lead the free world. His followers, though, were actual chumps and we all paid for it with economic disaster, half a million pandemic deaths, and being labeled a pariah on the world stage.
As bad as all that is, it actually hit Trump’s supporters directly in the wallet, and I’m not talking about just the economy. During the 2020 campaign, Trump’s fundraising actually grifted his most loyal followers. Trailing far behind the Dems in fundraising, Trump’s campaigned CHANGED the giving option on its website to default to recurring rather than one time. What that meant was that if a donor wasn’t paying attention, whatever donation they made to Trump, the same amount was charged each week until the election, draining thousands of people’s bank accounts and running up credit card bills. The only way to opt out was to wade through all the fine print and then check the box for one time donation. That’s right, folks, Trump actually drained the bank accounts of supporters, using the money to pay for his campaign.
AND, if it’s even possible, it got worse. Late in the campaign, the opt out box was made more opaque, and even buried another pre-checked box that DOUBLED the contribution. This scheme snagged scores of people including retirees, military veterans, and people couldn’t afford to donate thousands of dollars to anything, much less Trump. One veteran donated $900, only to have his account drained by $8,000.
The effort was clearly intentional. Trump grifted money from loyalists in the waning days of the campaign to prop up his spending. Even worse, after his election loss, Trump’s disinformation campaign where he falsely claimed massive election fraud raised tens of millions of dollars that he then used to refund the money to donors he had defrauded before the election. The total he had to refund? Over $122 million.
As if anyone needed more evidence of Trump’s criminality and utter disregard for anyone but himself, this is it. By deception, Trump shook down his unwitting loyalists for over $122 million to fund his own charade to cling to the presidency. I’m just thankful the effort ultimately failed.
The really sad thing is that the Trumpistas claim the bitter almond flavoring makes the Kool-Aid(r) taste better…
1The GOPs and the flying @$$monkeys got what they paid for…
2If it opened a few of their eyes, I’m glad it happened. Otherwise, this is just one more scam he needs to be held legally accountable for. Well, in any event, that goes without saying. Lawsuits, jail…whatever.
3STOOPID should be painful-and expensive.
4None of this is a surprise. Trump has been a conman all his life. If his supporters haven’t figured that out by now, they deserve to be fleeced. And Trump deserves to be in jail.
5El Jefe says:
“…This scheme snagged scores of people including retirees, military veterans, and people couldn’t afford to donate thousands of dollars to anything, much less Trump….
By deception, Trump shook down his unwitting loyalists for over $122 million to fund his own charade to cling to the presidency. I’m just thankful the effort ultimately failed.”
Bullshit!
Damn it, I’m NOT thankful/happy that the Grifter-in-Chief was caught and had to -refund- $122Mil+ to those sucker losers. It’s a damned shame that any of them got a mofoing effing dime back.
Goddamn it, the US’s biggest group of ‘personal&financial responsibility’ QOP Rethuglican assholes should have been allowed to choke themselves into poverty due to their pisspoor ‘life choice’ decisions, like forking over any of their [likely] meager assets to the world’s best-known conman.
They should all have had to eat, and fully digest, that tRump shitburger they were so eager to gobble down.
With this kind of mollycoddling, those hordes of MAGAotty sonsabitches will have learned absolutely nothing. And they will continue to feverishly support the Rufous Ratbastard, the tRump Crime Org, and his Party of QOP thieves and perverts until they die [either of, which can’t happen too soon imo].
6When people let their biases, prejudices, emotions and refusal to look at what is instead of what they want it to be, getting a proverbial 2×4 between the eyeballs is the least of what often is needed to get their attention.
7I have no empathy for these people because they had ample warnings over years as to the character of trump and his acolytes and they made a free will choice.
At least they got off easy; about 400k others died of Covid because of trump’s intentional negligence and malfeasance.
I agree with Sandridge – you save these stupids from themselves – they will just do it again. Better to just let them deal with results of their stupidity.
8A cash gift to Trump, is the gift that keeps on taking.
9This is why I do not respond to emails for financial support even from sources that I know are legit. I just don’t want ot break in a new habit that could actually kill me.
10Stupid is as stupid does. These people got what they deserve. I hope the publicity about what Trumpf did to his supporters will lead to more of them wanting their money back. My guess is his campaign will not have the money cuz they spent it fraudulently already. I read today that they refunded about 10% of what was raised, so there’s lots of other stupid supporters that may want their money back.
11I hate to admit it, but my first reaction was mixed. These people’s prejudices and screwed up worldviews have been cultivated for decades by a system that aggressively demonizes any source that doesn’t support and reenfoce itself. Media, science, family, whatever. Isolation to the point where the only community some of them get is Facebook. Can’t imagine how QAnon got a a foothold in that scenario, right?
12But the only authoritarian state they currently live in is one they’ve chosen. Whether through masterful manipulation or not, they’ve chosen it of their own free will. And like van heldorf points out, they’ve had years to see the truth.
And they choose not to look, actively doing the equivalent of a child covering their ears chanting na na na na na!
So looking at it big picture, yeah a lot of them will be hurt badly in the short term.
Tough shit.
Hopefully it’ll be a lesson for others, if only a few.
But should the fleeced folks get the actual governmental system they’ve been supporting, they (and the rest of us) will find out what an actual authoritarian state is in America.
So,
Sandridge, tell it brother.
On a different note, a happy Easter to everyone at the Beauty Shop!
13@Sandridge: Don’t beat around the bush. Tell us what you REALLY think!
@Katherine: Thank you and the same to you. We had an absolutely beautiful day in DC and hope everybody in the Beauty Shop had the same perfect day.
14Mahalo nui loa to all the Saloneers here. I forgot to wish a Happy Easter to y’all earlier, especially our gracious hostess.
.
It’s too easy to get riled up on any news involving any of ‘them’.
Here’s another take [/s] on it:
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2021/4/4/2024405/-NYT-Says-3-of-All-Credit-Card-Fraud-Claims-in-2020-Were-Against-Trump-Campaign
“NEWS: The Trump operation refunded $122 million — more than 10% — of what it raised online in 2020.
…
The 2020 Trump campaign accounted —for up to 3% of all credit card fraud claims in the entire country—, the New York Times reports.”
The scale of it is mindboggling. And the Rufous Ratbastard has never been convicted of -anything-, let alone been indicted [glossing over two impeachments]. ‘Murikan justice…
15Thanks, Katherine. 44 degrees and sunny this afternoon in Anchorage. The six inches of ice in the streets is beginning to slushify, with channels of meltwater running through. High avalanche danger in Hatcher Pass. In other words, it’s finally spring in Alaska. Happy Easter!
16I think this is particularly emblematic of how Trump operates:
“In effect, the money that Mr. Trump eventually had to refund amounted to an interest-free loan from unwitting supporters at the most important juncture of the 2020 race.”
He always did brag about using other people’s money.
17tRump the ***king moron proving exactly who he was prior to 2016 – a racist fraud. Though all the distractions focus needs to be maintained on the biggest QOP fraud of all, Morton C. Blackwell who not only accepted the fraud Donnie as a candidate but anointed the SOB. Find a player in the QOP, and see a graduate of Mort’s academy of conservative fascism, the Leadership Institute. Ask Moscow Mitch. Ask the former Vice Poodle Pence. Hell, waterboard Reince Priebus for the details.
18But I’ve read that it’s not over, that McCarthy and other Rs like the company trump used, “WinRed”, and mean to use it themselves. Trump’s the symptom, not the disease.
19If it’s any comfort to those of you who are happy with letting the GQPers suffer (and I’m not saying you’re wrong), the $122 mil was apparently only about 10% of the grift, and my bet it that it didn’t go to those most in need. The orange shitgibbon knows who to pay off.
20I’m trying to imagine the pearl-clutching and screams of outrage if a Democrat pulled a grift like this.
21