‘He does not give a RAT'S ASS': Nicolle SLAMS Trump over ballroom fixation as Americans struggle

In case you were wondering, 27 is the answer.Weeks left until the midterm elections in November.On that, The New York Times reports this, quote, They note that much can change before November, holding out hope that the days of four dollar gas and the war in Iran pass before the election.But crossing one's fingers and toes isn't exactly a political strategy, not even for MAGA.Indeed, just today, AAA revealed a new high watermark for gas prices in America since Donald Trump began the war.in Iran, nearly four dollars and 18 cents a gallon, the highest average since 2022, shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine.

And it's not over.This forecast from Politico, quote, supply of oil, especially in Europe and Asia, is dwindling and a price shock is coming.That's according to Dan Pickering, chief investment officer at Pickering Energy Partners.He said that when the summer driving season begins, there will be another gas price shock that, quote, hits people in the face.There's a day of reckoning.incoming, he said.

And understand this.Gas prices are but a single thread in a much larger economic crisis.calamity where Americans appear to feel more squeezed than at any point in decades.Gallup's annual economy and personal finance survey survey released today paints an historically bad picture.The share of Americans who say their financial situation is getting worse now stands at 55 percent, the highest figure in 25 years.I want to bring into our coverage Democratic pollster and political analyst Cornell Belcher, also joining us, political analyst, the host of The Bulwark podcast.

Tim Miller's here.I'm Cornell.How do you feel?see.How do you see this moment.

It is a unique moment on a number of fronts.Right.Where I'm struck by that gallop that gallop number.Right.It's a worse number than we have seen in the last 25 years.And Nicole, that counts into recessions when we were literally in recessions.

So you have the Americans feeling more anxious and stressed out economically.You also have a lot of polling out there around how they are feeling more anxious and stressed out about the war.And at the same time, you look at inside the polling and the Fox poll that came out the other day, and again, it's some numbers that I don't see very often because Democrats now have taken advantage on dealing with the economy, something that historically Republicans have.It baffles me why, but Republicans have historically had an advantage over the Americans, and Democrats have an advantage now of dealing with inflation in the economy.And then you just oppose that, Nicole, with what I was watching earlier today when Senator Graham was announcing that they're going to roll out how they're going to spend $400 million on the president's ballroom.And you look at the Comey stuff you've just been covering, and you wonder why Americans are upset and you wonder why Republicans are worried about the midterm elections.

Because, Nicole, they're not focusing on anything.having to do with the economic stress and angst of the vast majority of Americans.All of their policies and all of their politics right now seem to be to make happy or play to the vanity and the narcissism of one individual and not the American people.We've been talking a lot about, you know, superpower suicide over the last couple of days with historians talking about superpower political suicide.Nicole, I'm watching Republicanscommit political party suicide by following him down this rabbit hole.

how they are still doing what has worked for them, right?And so they have manu...I mean, I guess we're to think it's a coincidence that today on the day that a federal judge allowed Maureen Comey to sue DOJ, DOJ indicted Jim Comey.And it might be, I don't know.Not the coincidence arbiter in America, but I can see two dots and then say they're next to each other.But the three things that have permeated the electorate's mind, right?

Epstein.There were lies told by Donald Trump and Kash Patel and Pam Bondi, and the Epstein class is viewed to still be unknown and unrevealed.The Iran war, both the idea of a forever war and the impact on the economy that we're talking about.And the collapse, whether you internalize who Viktor Orban was or not, if you're in MAGA, He was daddy, right?He was big daddy.And Tucker went and kissed his shoes.

And Matt Schlapp went and kissed his shoes.And JD Vance went and kissed his shoes eight hours before he lost.And he fell on his face.And so whether you're telling pollsters you're going to vote for or not, there are these three seismic things which are a lot more enduring and a lot more visceral than any of the freneticism that they seem to be pushing through the information pipeline.And I wonder what you make of he's really in a very stable a stable place with the public, and it sucks.He's in the low 30s.

Yeah, stable and kind of a slow decline, you know, kind of like the green slope on a ski slope.But I think that that's right, Nicole.And think about what they've tried to do.And you mentioned the Comey indictment, which is just so laughable and so ridiculous.We can't say 8 -6 -4 -7 in the country anymore.The president's going to indict us over that.

It's absolutely preposterous, and I know that Jim Comey will fight it and succeed.But the other story lately that I think is really telling about his political standing is this ballroom.nonsense, right, that after the horrible events at the White House Correspondents' Dinner, you know, everybody gets on this message point of, oh, Trump needs a new ballroom because he's, you know, he's under attack and we need this for him to honor him and to be safe.And they did something very successfully.They've done very successfully in the past, which is marshal the entire echo chamber.You know, if you turned on Fox at all today, they were talking about the ballroom.

If you looked at a Republican politician's social media feed, they're talking about the ballroom.If you were on Twitter and following a right -wing account, they talked about the ballroom.And this is what they're good at.They're good at getting everybody on message and creating these stories out of nonsense.The other thing that they're good at is attacking their foes and smearing them, people like Jim Comey.And you can see the machine operating right now.

But it's not getting them anything.They're not gaining any ground.That machine works very well when the other side is in charge, right?And you can gin everybody up to smear them and tear them down.It works decently well if everybody's feeling good about what you're doing.And you're just now giving them this shiny object to pay attention to, to distract them from whatever little problems they have in their life.

The machine doesn't work if everybody's pissed at you.If people are like, why are we in this war?And you showed the gas prices at the beginning of this.I just saw a report, I think in the upper Midwest in particular, gas prices are about to go up a bunch in the next week or two because of issues at the refineries and shortages.And we're going to keep seeing this all the way through the summer.It's going to be $5 gas this summer.

And it already is that in some states on the coast.So if things are getting worse forpeople, and if they're not responding to the things that they care about, whether that be Epstein or the gas prices or whatever, this whole machine is just a little masturbatory.It's just like, OK, who is it for?It's for the people that are the remaining 33 % that are still on board.It's not doing anything for them.

It's not making any progress.

I also—like, can we put the picture up of Trump holding his gold ballroom?Like, I think every Democrat should make this their Twitter profile.Like, this is a guy whose population and citizenry—no, no, the one with all the gold.Trump holds it there.This should be the picture that every—this is your president at a time when 13 U .S.

servicemembers have lost their lives in a war he started with Iran.in a meeting in which his entire national security cabinet did not support going to that war.This is your president at a time when gas hits a record that it hasn't hit in a quarter century.This is what your president is doing at a time when the grift is undeniable, even to MAGA.This is what Donald Trump is doing when he loses two of the biggest mouthpieces in the MAGA media movement.He is holding a little tiny picture of a big gold ballroom.

This is worse.And I literally, I think we should go with this.And I think if he did a press conference about his news conference, it would be the one Trump event I'd be tempted to take live, because this is what he cares about.He does not give a rat's ass about a single person who voted for him to make their life better.Cornell, what do we do with this?

I don't think I think you're right.I think it's sort of self -explanatory.I mean you show that image you know up against the image of struggling you know people at the gas pump paying you know these crazy prices for gas and struggling to put food on their table.And it can't itof makes, you know, it kind of speaks for itself.Right.

And again, I am just baffled.You know, I've been in Washington politics for a long time, but I'm just baffled at the disconnect here and how all the Republicans are following him right down this rabbit hole, this pathway.It's remarkable to me.

It's like a padded gold room.I mean, I just, I just, it's like, it's like, let them all go in there.And you know, for the ones that need the padding, we'll pad it.I mean, I'll buy the donuts.Like this is their plan.

Why would you be holding press conferences talking about giving this man $400 million for a ballroom?Americans are struggling at the, at the pumps and at the grocery store.Look, Democrats should have a very good year.And again, I was not bullish on the idea of Democrats taking the Senate.I am growing more bullish on the idea that even the Senate is in play now than I was two or three months ago.

Yeah, I mean, and I think if he keeps carrying that little picture around, bullish might be the right word.

Cordell, thank you for joining us on all this today.