Jenga Ellis
Jenga. A game where if you pull out one piece wrongly from the teetering tower, it risks all falling down.
As if Jenna Ellis pleading guilty and flipping, and Michael Cohen testifying in the New York fraud trial wasn't a bad enough day for Trump, then came the ABC News story that Mark Meadows was granted immunity and has told the Special Counsel warned Trump that the claims of election fraud were false. And that he saw no evidence of election fraud and agreed with the government assessment that 2020 was the most secure election in U.S. history. (All of which contradicts what he wrote in his book, making that nothing more than a grift.)
And then there’s the House Republicans winnowing their nine Speaker candidates down to one, Tom Emmer, the GOP Whip – who was later called a RINO by Trump, lost even more support, and dropped out of the race.
It was just a really awful day for Republicans. And that’s an incredibly high standard to pass these days. That means we are now in Day 22 without a House Speaker and Congress not being open.
So, which story to go with today? Of course, you could throw a dart, have it land anywhere and not go wrong.
What I’m choosing is Jenna Ellis pleading guilty, the third Trump lawyer to do so in the Georgia RICO case, and fourth person overall to do so. Not necessarily because it’s bigger than the Meadows story, but mostly because…well, it’s so weepy. And disingenuous. And deeply self-serving. And very damaging for Trump. And important for D.A. Fani Willis’s RICO case.
Besides which, there’s video.
Ellis agreed to be sentenced to five years of probation, pay a fine of $5,000 and perform 100 hours of community service. She also has already written the required (and now obligatory) letter of an apology letter to the citizens of Georgia. And -- she agreed to cooperate fully with prosecutors in the case.
Bad as this is for Trump, and it’s truly awful, it might be worse for Rudy Giuliani, with whom she worked closely, side-by-side.
But it’s Ellis's plea statement that leaps out for being weepy garbage. How awful and disingenuous was it? After playing a brief clip, MSNBC host Nicolle Wallace said, “My only hope is that SNL was watching that.”
But still she piles it on, going for the “Place in Heaven” gambit and hoping no one will notice in the beatific light all the crimes she committed – and is pleading guilty to – underneath.
“As an attorney who is also a Christian,” she began, snuffingly, not only invoking the piety button right at the start, but impressively doing so without genuflecting, “I take my responsibilities as a lawyer very seriously and I endeavor to be a person of sound moral and ethical character in all of my dealings. In the wake of the 2020 presidential election, I believed that challenging the results on behalf of President Trump should be pursued in a just and legal way. I endeavored to represent my client to the best of my ability."
But of course, if this was even remotely true, Ms. Ellis wouldn't have had to just plead guilty. Being a Christian not only doesn't mitigate her guilt one scintilla, it shines a light on how significantly she transgressed from her professed beliefs. But worse, it also insults all lawyers who aren't Christians as if suggesting that they – not being Christian – would not have taken their responsibilities as a lawyer as seriously as she did. To which it should be noted that, unlike the Christian Jenna Ellis, they (like, for instance, Trump’s White House lawyer Eric Herschmann) haven’t had to plead guilty in this case, but also haven’t been indicted.
“I failed to do my due diligence,” she later stated amid her tears (lest anyone think this is too harsh, keep in mind that she tried to help stage a coup and overthrow the government -- and got off with probation, community service and a $5,000 fine. And a “Gee, I’m sorry” letter of apology). “I believe in and I value election integrity. If I knew then what I know now, I would have declined to represent Donald Trump in these post election challenges.”
I often suspect that when someone like Jenna Ellis who did Trump's dirty work for so long with no compunction says, "If I knew then what I know now," the part that's "what I know now" isn't that "I realize now how wrong it was" but rather "that I didn’t cover my illegal actions well enough, would be indicted and have to plead guilty."
I mean, seriously, now. “I failed to do my due diligence”??? Hey, she could have just listened to the all the sane, confirmed lawyers (like the Attorney of the United States and Trump's appointed White House lawyer) and officials (like Trump’s campaign manager Bill Stepien) in the room who were saying that there was no election fraud and the plans to challenge were not only crazy but illegal. That’s not “failing to do my due diligence,” that choosing not to listen. Or she could have used Google and just searched for “Election fraud 2020 reality.” And not doing any of that, most likely, because it would have meant no longer keeping her cushy job attached to White House.
This was a statement that’s almost trying to justify her illegal actions, not admit that what she is pleading guilty to for what she did was wrong. In fact, given that she was with Trump a long time, and saw him in action from the inside, it’s hard to imagine what she could have known now that she didn’t know then – other than that Trump wouldn’t pay her legal bills, and she’d have to go to a crowdsourcing website to raise money for herself.
Further, keep in mind that what she says is that if she knew then what she knows now, she would not have participated in her election fraud crimes. Not a word of regret, though, for all the reprehensible actions she took on behalf of Trump before the election. In fairness, none of them were illegal – well, at least she hasn’t been charged with anything – but that doesn’t make them irresponsible, none of which she’s apparently sorry for. Just the things to overthrow democracy she got caught at.
The only thing I might agree with what Jenna Ellis said is that part about “to the best of my ability.” After all, she’s the same lawyer who sent a “cease and desist” letter to threaten CNN that they retract a story they reported about a poll that had low numbers for Trump.
Still, in the end, as bad as Jenna Ellis’ day was – and it was bad (though, for all her weeping, she got a great deal without any prison time) – Trump’s was much worse. And Rudy Giuliani’s, too.
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