Lawrence: Trump knows he's losing his 'slush fund' and his ballroom

Well, Washington agrees on something.It is officially a slush fund.That is the agreed upon Washington term for Donald Trump's fund for paying people who committed crimes for Donald Trump.Democrats started calling it a slush fund right away, but now Republicans are calling it a slush fund.Former Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell called it a slush fund today.Mitch McConnell, who is the senior senator from Kentucky, can now be counted as a no vote on Donald Trump's slush fund when it comes to a vote in the United States Senate.

Sometimes it's difficult to find the right word, the right phrase, the right label for the latest Trumpian madness, the latest Trumpian crime against sanity.But now Republicans and Democrats agree it's a slush fund.We will soon have polling on Donald Trump's slush fund.But as of now, every new poll that comes out already shows Donald Trump at new lows in that poll.Imagine how much lower Donald Trump is going to go in the next round of polls that begin next week or later when the slush fund finally gets factored into the polls.Senator Mitch McConnell's official statement today was simple.

So the nation's top law enforcement official is asking for a slush fund to pay people who assault cops.Utterly stupid, morally wrong.Take your pick.The answer is, of course, both.You don't have to pick.The answer is utterly stupid and morally wrong.

That's Donald Trump.Republican Senator Tom Tillis is now the best Republican phrase maker opposing Donald Trump's slush slush fund, calling it a quote, pay out pot for punks and stupid on stilts.and tyranny.

I think it's stupid on stilts.Why?Because it will invariably put us in a position where your taxpayer dollars and my taxpayer dollars could potentially compensate someone who assaulted a police officer, admitted their guilt, got convicted, got pardoned, and now we're going to pay them for that?That's absurd.The American people are going to reject this out of hand.When you take money from me to give to a purpose that I vehemently disagree with, that's tyranny.

Other Republican senators willing to speak publicly against Donald Trump's fund already include Senator Bill Cassidy, who recently lost his reelection primary to a Trump -endorsed opponent, and Senator Lisa Murkowski.The Democrats would only need four Republicans to join them to defeat the Trump slush fund in the United States Senate, and it appears tonight as if they clearly have those four votes already and possibly many more Republican votes in the Senate against the Trump slush fund.And the Republican votes matter because it's the Republican votes that will kill the slush fund.The Democrats don't have enough votes to kill the slush fund, but with the Republicans, they can do it.And today, At the closed door luncheon of Republican senators, almost half of them reportedly opposed the slush fund.Punchbowl News reports, quote, more than 20 senators spoke out against the administration's fund.

It's rare for more than a handful of Republicans to speak up at those gatherings.When I worked in the Senate on the Democratic side and was one of the very few staffers allowed into the Senate Democratic luncheons, I'm not sure there was a single day where there were 20senators speaking on an issue, even the most important issues of the day.One news account quoted anonymous sources from inside the room, calling it a quote, well, not exactly a quote, calling it a crap show.And I cleaned that one up.It is very clear now that the United States Senate with Democratic and Republican votes is going to vote to kill the Trump slush fund.

And Republican Senate Leader John Thune is doing absolutely nothing to save it.In fact, today, he did everything he could to kill it by simply closing up the Senate and sending everyone home.From the start, John Thune said publicly that he was not a fan of the Trump slush fund.That was his phrase, not a fan.Majority leaders are very, very careful about every word they choose.And when a majority leader is trying to pass a bill, the leader is relentlessly positive about it in every word.

If a majority leader says he's not a fan of a bill, that means he's not only willing to see senators oppose that bill, but it means he's actually trying to create a stampede against it.And today, John Thune did the worst thing you could possibly do to a bill that is in trouble.He sent the Senate on recess.Major holidays are used as important levers in the Senate to force votes.The Republican Senate has been trying to pass a reconciliation bill, which means it needs only 51 votes to pass, which means 50 Republican senators to vote for it with the vice president, then breaking the tie, and that would pass it.That's all it takes.

A reconciliation bill should be theeasiest possible thing for the Republican Senate to pass now.And what makes it even easier to pass is when you back it up against an important scheduled recess, like the Memorial Day recess, which will allow senators to leave town for a week.Some of them have foreign trip schedules.Some of them have family vacation schedules.Some of them have important graduations to attend.

Some of them may have weddings to attend, and they all desperately want to leave town.And when senators desperately want to leave town, majority leaders like to use that pressure to force them to cast a vote before they leave town, an important vote, especially controversial votes, especially the difficult votes.John Thune had the power to force that vote, but he also knows how to count.And he didn't force the vote because he knew he didn't have the votes to force.And so rather than see Donald Trump's slush fund go down in defeat, John Thune decided to let the senators go home without voting.They were supposed to be voting right now, tonight.

And then, if they were lucky, leave town tomorrow.There's only one thing that happens when you let senators leave town on a recess Without casting that difficult vote, there's only one thing that happens.The vote only becomes more difficult.During their week away from the Senate, the Trump slush fund will only become more and more and more unpopular every single day.And when senators come back from their recess, having heard from their constituents whose tax money would pay for the Trump slush fund to pay criminals, there will be far more than four Republican senators opposed to Donald Trump.slush fund, and John Thune knows that.

John Thune is sending Republican senators home knowing that they will come back even more opposed to Donald Trump's slush fund than they were today.Donald Trump knows he's losing.Donald Trump knows the Republican -controlled Senate now has the momentum to defeat his slush fund and to defeat Trump.his ballroom.Today, Donald Trump flip -flopped once again on the Strait of Hormuz and said that he is considering allowing Iran, for the first time in history, to charge tolls for ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz.Donald Trump has said that he is absolutely opposed to Iran charging tolls, and now he says he's thinking about it.

He is simply the worst public negotiator in the history of American politics at any level, from president down to city councilor.Or it might be that Donald Trump's cognitive decline is so sharp now that he doesn't even know what he's saying when he's asked today about Iran charging tolls in the Strait of Hormuz.

Iran is negotiating with Oman to set up a formalization of charging tolls in the Strait of Hormuz.Is that acceptable to you?Well, we're looking at it.We hear about it.

They've negotiated.They've had a relationship with them before.And we'll see.We have total control of the Strait of Hormuz, as you know, with our blockade.

We're looking at it.He was totally opposed to it.Now his line is, we're looking at it.We're considering allowing Iran to charge tolls in the Strait of Hormuz.something that has never happened in history, something that no president has ever allowed.And in the same response, Donald Trump claims, we have total control of the Strait of Hormuz.

And again, let's just consider how addled his brain has to be for him to say, we have total control of the Strait of Hormuz.If he has total control of the Strait, Why hasn't he reopened the strait to free shipping that has existed during his entire lifetime until Iran closed it down because of Donald Trump's war?Donald Trump has finally, finally found something.He's found one thing that he thinks maybe he shouldn't do during his Iran war because it would be inappropriate.Donald Trump has played golf 14 times during his war.Donald Trump spent two weekends at his, of his war, at golf tournaments, two weekends.

Donald Trump went to the ultimate fighting championship performance, where he had a lot of fun with Joe Rogan and other fans for hours on end.But now, finally, in the 82nd day of Donald Trump's war, Donald Trump is concerned with appearances and says he will get killed this weekend if he does not at least pretend to be paying attention to his war, and by killed.Of course, Donald Trump doesn't mean killed.It's a very bad choice of words for the warmonger president who started a war he doesn't know how to win and doesn't know how to end.He used the word killed to mean he'd be criticized.Suddenly, Donald Trump

claims to be afraid of being criticized.The man who is being criticized by Republicans as utterly stupid and morally wrong for his slush fund claims he doesn't want to do anything this weekend that would get him criticized.And this is his reason for maybe not going to his son's wedding.

He'd like me to go but it's gonna be just a small little private affair and I'm gonna try and make it I'm in the midst.I said, you know, this is not good timing for me. I have a thing called Iran and other things That's what I can't win on if I do attend I get killed if I don't attend I get killed by the fake news Of course, I'm talking about no, but he's got a very, a person who I've known for a long time, and hopefully they're gonna have a great marriage.