On Saturday morning’s CNN Newsroom, co-host Victor Blackwell and guest host Amara Walker collaborated with presidential historian Douglas Brinkley and political and New York Times national security correspondent David E. Sanger to push insane conspiracy theories about President Trump. Walker suggested that Trump is committing “sedition” and Brinkley crazily declared that Trump will “create a kind of second shadow government out of Mar-a-Lago” with Rush Limbaugh.
Walker began the segment by accusing Trump of “trying to overturn the Electoral College.” How ironic coming from CNN, which joined with the Democrats in 2016 by declaring that the electoral college is “democracy's ugliest anachronism” and proposed that the U.S. “eradicate” it to “end a Trump administration." The electoral college must be back in fashion with leftists now that it produced results favorable to them.
This set up Brinkley to go on one of his typically deranged rants about Trump in which he called Trump a “tinpot dictator” and claimed that Trump will “hold a counter inaugural”:
Who would have thought that America would have ever a tinpot dictator, but that's what we have. President Trump’s living in some kind of fantasy zone. He has a philosophy of never losing, so he just will - will philosophically and emotionally refuse to believe that he lost. But at least he's going through the courts, and the courts are telling him to get lost. That he's getting no traction anywhere and as you rightfully point out, by next Tuesday, by the time Nevada comes through, there really isn't a strategy left for Donald Trump. He will probably continue to be petulant and pout. He very likely won't show up for Joe Biden's inaugural, he might even hold a counter inaugural, for all we know.
CNN reveals just how much it hates Trump by continuing to have Brinkley on. Just this year, Brinkley has made a series of psychotic statements about the President including gloating about Trump contracting COVID, comparing him to the founder of the American Nazi party, claiming that his tax returns will put him in prison, and labeling him as “an abomination.”
Blackwell enjoyed Brinkley’s crazy claim about a “counter inaugural,” as he stated that it would be “on brand” for Trump to have one.
Sanger also donned his tin foil hat and suggested that other than his lawsuits and attempts to challenge the election results through the government, that Trump may have a “Plan C” in order to “continue his defiance.”
Walker then cited a slam piece written by Sanger against Trump to suggest that Trump is attempting “sedition”:
David, you wrote about this in The New York Times and you quoted historian Michael Beschloss saying, quote, “This is a manufactured crisis, it is a president abusing his huge powers in order to stay in office after the voters clearly rejected him for reelection. This is what many of the founders dreaded” …I mean, this attempt -- this is an attempted power grab. At what point could it amount to sedition?
Sanger told her that while Trump is not conducting “sedition” yet, he may attempt “sedition” in January:
Well, my own view is it's not sedition yet because the President, as Doug pointed out, has worked within the courts so far. He's tried this political maneuver that hasn't worked. Now, if we got to the point where the electors were selected by the states, forwarded to Congress. Congress is supposed to validate that on January 6th. If he still would not at that point concede, allow transition to happen, do all of the usual things one would do after it's over, then I -- then I think you could engage that
Brinkley chimed in on the sedition question with perhaps his most demented rant yet in which he bizarrely alleged that Trump will form a “shadow government” with Rush Limbaugh:
I think that Trump’s going to push it to the very, very limit, but in the end, he has to recognize that he lost. He's simply trying to keep his followers. He has them, he's convinced over 70 percent of the Republicans that it was a fraudulent election when, in fact, it was one of the most well- run elections in U.S. history. Almost no fraud or -- or irregularities whatsoever. I think he's going to try to probably go after Joe Biden in 2024 and -- or have Don Jr. or Ivanka involved. He's going to create a kind of second shadow government out of Mar-a-Lago. He practically lives next door to Rush Limbaugh.
With the conspiracy theories that are being pushed on CNN these days, CNN viewers are just as well-off watching YouTube videos on the Illuminati.
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Read the full November 21st transcript here:
CNN Newsroom
11/21/20
10:07:16 AM
AMARA WALKER: Joining us now is national security correspondent for The New York Times and CNN political and national security analyst, David Sanger, along with Douglas Brinkley, a CNN presidential historian. Gentlemen, thank you so much for joining us this morning. Let me start with you, Douglas, because I think we all need to sit and digest the outrageousness that we are witnessing right now in plain sight, a sitting U.S. president refusing to accept the will of the people, trying to overturn the Electoral College, basically telling electors in states to ignore that Joe Biden won in their state and -- and to break the law.
DOUGLAS BRINKLEY (CNN PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN): Yeah, who would have thought that America would have ever a tinpot dictator, but that's what we have. President Trump’s living in some kind of fantasy zone. He has a philosophy of never losing, so he just will - will philosophically and emotionally refuse to believe that he lost. But at least he's going through the courts, and the courts are telling him to get lost. That he's getting no traction anywhere and as you rightfully point out, by next Tuesday, by the time Nevada comes through, there really isn't a strategy left for Donald Trump. He will probably continue to be petulant and pout. He very likely won't show up for Joe Biden's inaugural, he might even hold a counter inaugural, for all we know. But the point is Joe Biden and Kamala Harris won, and they will be ensconced in the White House, and they will be picking their cabinet officers -- officers. And you're going to see Donald Trump being an ex-president in Mar-a-Lago, trying to reinvent himself yet again.
VICTOR BLACKWELL: A counter inaugural, I had not considered that, but it is on brand. David, let me come to you. Republicans have stayed quiet for the most part during this legal fight. Just a few spoke up about the lack -- or the stall of the transition. But inviting lawmakers to the White House from Michigan and the -- the discussion of doing the same for Pennsylvania as he tries to overturn the election, I'd imagine that would be a different order of magnitude.
DAVID E. SANGER (CNN POLITICAL AND NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST): Well, one would hope, though, as you say, we've seen very few of the Republicans, at least at the federal level, come out and say anything beyond he ought to get the transition going in the off chance that Joe Biden becomes president here, which obviously looks like it is a certainty. So, what have we seen happen? As you heard in your report earlier and as Doug suggested, plan A was go to the courts and see if you could get the ballots invalidated, and that failed. It failed most spectacularly in Detroit, but he's been doing it mostly in urban areas, and of course mostly in areas where there was a significant black vote against him, though, obviously, it was much broader than just that. Plan B was, if you can't get the courts to go along, use raw political power to try to get the legislatures to send up two different competing slates of electors to Congress and make Congress figure out, where the -- where the President believes, because of the nature of the way the vote is taken, he's got an advantage. The question that we don't know, Victor, is, is there a plan C? In other words, if he loses these first two, does he then have an additional step, or does he continue his defiance, or does he just go to Mar-a-Lago and continue on along the lines that Doug suggested?
WALKER: David, you wrote about this in The New York Times and you quoted historian Michael Beschloss saying, quote, “This is a manufactured crisis, it is a president abusing his huge powers in order to stay in office after the voters clearly rejected him for reelection. This is what many of the founders dreaded.” And what's also disturbing, there's a Monmouth University poll that shows 70 percent, a huge majority of Republicans believe Biden only won because he cheated, even though there's no evidence of widespread fraud. David or Douglas, whoever wants to answer this, I mean, this attempt -- this is an attempted power grab. At what point could it amount to sedition?
SANGER: Well, my own view is it's not sedition yet because the President, as Doug pointed out, has worked within the courts so far. He's tried this political maneuver that hasn't worked. Now, if we got to the point where the electors were selected by the states, forwarded to Congress. Congress is supposed to validate that on January 6th. If he still would not at that point concede, allow transition to happen, do all of the usual things one would do after it's over, then I -- then I think you could engage that, but maybe Doug has got a different view.
BLACKWELL: Doug?
BRINKLEY: I -- I think the -- I agree with you completely. I think that Trump’s going to push it to the very, very limit, but in the end, he has to recognize that he lost. He's simply trying to keep his followers. He has them, he's convinced over 70 percent of the Republicans that it was a fraudulent election when, in fact, it was one of the most well- run elections in U.S. history. Almost no fraud or -- or irregularities whatsoever. I think he's going to try to probably go after Joe Biden in 2024 and -- or have Don Jr. or Ivanka involved. He's going to create a kind of second shadow government out of Mar-a-Lago. He practically lives next door to Rush Limbaugh. They'll create a kind of a media empire, a voice out there that simply refuses to accept anything that Joe Biden does and go on the attack. After all, the big thing we haven't mentioned is the Georgia Senate race and if Republicans picked up those two senators, it’d be the first time since 1990 -- 92 -- or actually 1988 since George Herbert Walker Bush that you had a Senate of -- of the opposite party, which might stop confirmations. Bernie Sanders might want to be labor secretary, Biden might want to offer him that, but you're going to have a blowback from the Trump Republicans on that. So, Trump and Mitch McConnell may stay as an iron fist and just try to wear down Biden. In the end, I think Trump feels he was abused during his transition over accusations of collaborating with Russia, and he's punishing Biden and Democrats, saying what's good for the goose is good for the gander, I'm not going to accept anything you Biden-ites do or -- or think of doing.
BLACKWELL: David, we heard this week from Republican Senator Joni Ernst, and she was responding to the Trump campaign's suggestion that Republicans who won were in on the rigging. Listen to what she said.
(Begins video clip)
SENATOR JONI ERNST R-IA): To insinuate that Republican and Democratic candidates paid to throw off this election I think is absolutely outrageous, and I do take offense to that.
(Cuts to live)
BLACKWELL: At some point, would you not expect that Republican members of Congress would have to speak up in the style and fashion that we're seeing from -- from Senator Ernst to protect themselves, to defend themselves?
SANGER: You would think they would. I mean, you know, for the past four years the Republicans have gone through a calculus about what it means to displease Donald Trump, and you've seen him take revenge when he thought they weren't sufficiently loyal. But at this point they all recognize he's lost. And they still feel concerned about it, and yes, they believe he'll continue to have come form of control over the party even after President-elect Biden takes office. That strikes me as -- as a somewhat remarkable calculus. You would think at some point they would -- they would decide that they really have to get with this. And you see them edging there by saying let's let the transition happen even if we haven't revolved the election, although, as Doug points out, we have.
WALKER: Wow, David E. Sanger and Douglas Brinkley, we thank you both for talking about this really disturbing but important topic. Thank you.
