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The New York Times on Thursday obtained an internal memo by David McIntosh, the president of the anti-Trump Club for Growth, concluding that their expensive ad campaign to turn GOP primary voters on to another candidate has failed and resistance is futile. Some clips of their findings:

“Even when you show video to Republican primary voters – with complete context – of President Trump saying something otherwise objectionable to primary voters, they find a way to rationalize and dismiss it,” and yeah, no shit. It’s a cult. “Every traditional postproduction ad attacking President Trump either backfired or produced no impact on his ballot support and favorability. This includes ads that primarily feature video of him saying liberal or stupid comments from his own mouth.”

“Broadly acceptable messages against President Trump with Republican primary voters that do not produce a meaningful backlash include sharing concerns about his ability to beat President Biden, expressions of Trump fatigue due to the distractions he creates and the polarization of the country, as well as his pattern of attacking conservative leaders for self-interested reasons,” McIntosh wrote.

He then gets into the ads that did at least kind of work, writing they disarmed “the viewer at the opening of the ad by establishing that the person being interviewed on camera is a Republican who previously supported Trump… otherwise, the viewer will automatically put their guard up, assuming the messenger is just another Trump-hater whose opinion should be summarily dismissed.”

A new Politico/Morning Consult poll finds 51 percent of respondents overall respondents and saying they want disgraced former President Trump disqualified from running again in 2024 under Section III of the the 14th Amendment barring from public office those who have engaged in rebellion or insurrection against the government, with 34 percent opposed and the remainder saying they don’t know. Among independents, it was 49 percent support for disqualification.

The survey also found that “just under a quarter of Republicans agree” and Politico cautions that although “Trump’s yawning margin in most primary horse race polls, the seemingly high percentage of Republicans calling for Trump’s disqualification may overstate his intraparty opposition, although few other public surveys have asked about the 14th Amendment push yet,” meaning that most of the Republican respondents will probably drop their opposition if Trump is the GOP nominee.

Florida Republican Congressman not accused of child sex trafficking (as far as we know) Byron Donalds got called out in realtime by New York Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez for fraudulently editing a text exchange between an obviously strung-out Hunter Biden and his uncle Jim, the President’s brother.

Donalds only featured the second half of a discussion the pair had in which Hunter sounded hopeless about his family and financial situation, and his uncle attempting to be supportive, saying he would work with Hunter’s father to resolve some issues:

At a protest against a planned statue of a Conquistador in northern New Mexico, a man wearing a trademark red MAGA hat pulled out a gun and opened fire on the crowd, wounding one man, the Associated Press reports.  Prior to the shooting, the suspect identified himself to a local newspaper photographer, who took a harrowing picture of the suspect firing.

According to witnesses, 23-year-old Ryan Martinez of Sandia Park, wearing a MAGA cap, went to the protest organized by Native American advocacy group The Red Nation to stop the relocation of a statue of conquistador Juan de Oñate to outside an official county building and was confronted by a man at the periphery of the group.  A scuffle ensued, leading to Martinez hopping over a barrier and then pulling a gun, firing one shot and hitting a Native American man in the torso.

Martinez fled the scene in a white Tesla, but was soon apprehended by sheriff’s deputies.  It’s unclear if he’d been charged.  A Facebook page reportedly belonging to Martinez–it features photo of the man matching his description standing in front of a white Tesla and flashing a holstered handgun–featured in the bio, “Fuck The Chinese Communist Party and Fuck Joe Biden. TRUMP WON. (pre-law major).”

Skeezy British tabloid site Page Six reports something we probably all understood already but couldn’t confirm:  Former third First Lady Melania Trump renegotiated her pre-nuptial agreement with Donald recently, making sure the deal was done before her ersatz husband started facing trials in his multiple criminal and civil cases.

It was a smart move for the one-time soft-core model and incubator for Trump’s third acknowledged son, who secured value prior to a series of judgments against Trump that could disperse the scant remaining cash and assets he possesses.  Trump’s real estate empire is also heading into murky waters given the New York State civil decision against Trump in his financial fraud case.

David Wolfe, one of the two lawyers representing Rudy Giuliani in the Fulton County, Georgia racketeering trial concerning Donald Trump’s efforts to disenfranchise millions of Georgia voters in a vain attempt to maintain power, has left the case, a filing to the court announced.

It’s unknown if Giuliani has paid his legal fees:  a $100,000 per plate fundraiser held for him at Trump’s Bedminster golf course raised an unknown amount of money; it’s unknown if Trump took his typical 90% cut of funds raised.  During an interview earlier this month on CNN, Wolfe blew up at the announcer when asked who was paying his fees.  Giuliani’s sole remaining lawyer in the Georgia case is Brian Tevis, who is reportedly being assisted by Manhattan attorney John Esposito

Washington Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal told Talking Points Memo that it’s going to cost titular Speaker Kevin McCarthy a lot if he wants Dems to help save his ass during an expected motion to vacate brought by the MAGA assholes in his caucus, but save him they will if the price is right.

The Progressive Caucus chief says if there “was any kind of a deal to be made, it would need to be written into the rules of the House. We would need to codify power-sharing because that’s the only way we can trust him… There are things we can do in codifying the rules of the House that would give Hakeem Jeffries, our leadership, real power over the floor, over committees, etc,” adding that a power-sharing agreement would be necessary “because of what happened with the debt ceiling. It’s because of what happened with the Biden impeachment. It’s because of the fact that he’s, depending on the day, either turned the gavel over to Marjorie Taylor Greene or to Matt Gaetz.”

In very related news, the Washington Post reports next week is when the ultra-MAGA hammer falls on McCarthy, with the palace coup plotters looking to replace him with majority whip Tom Emmer.

Talk about an accounting error:  According to documents filed by a real estate appraiser hired by Trump’s Mar-a-Lago supper club in Florida in 2020, Donald Trump’s official valuation of the facility was $27 million at the time, significantly less than the $1.8 billion touted by Trump and his spawn this week.

CBS News reports that a Palm Beach County assessor put the value of Mar-a-Lago at $18- and $27 million in estimates through 2021; that became the basis used by the New York State judge overseeing his state civil financial fraud case to determine Trump overvalued the property, a figure Trump mocked… but a value statement signed by the Trump-hired appraiser concurred with the range in 2020, while Trump was in the White House, after first filing a challenge.

The challenge is interesting because in White House financial statements from 2017 to 2020, Trump listed the value of the property at “over $50,000,000,” putting Trump’s financial statement at odds with tax documents Trump knew valued the property less.

Fat former President Trump on Thursday sued former British spy Christopher Steele, author of the infamous “Steele Dossier” which the chunky orange man has been obsessed with for years after the Marco Rubio/Hillary Clinton paid oppo research alleged Donald had watched Russian hookers – really don’t want to have to write this and everyone knows it already so we’ll just skip ahead – in a Moscow hotel room and the Russians had been threatening to release it, the Independent reports.

Notably the case was filed in a British court, not an American one. Aleksej Gubarev, one of the Russians named in the dossier, had sued Steele for libel in 2017 but the case was tossed in 2020.

Disgraced former President Trump’s Georgia legal team on Thursday informed Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee they won’t be trying to remove the fat bastard’s RICO indictment trial for his post-2020 election coup attempt from state to federal court, a somewhat surprising shift considering that, even if it was very unlikely to work, it could have caused a delay.

“President Trump now notifies the Court that he will NOT be seeking to remove his case to federal court. This decision is based on his well-founded confidence that this Honorable Court intends to fully and completely protect his constitutional right to a fair trial and guarantee him due process of law throughout the prosecution of his case in the Superior Court of Fulton County,” they wrote.

If we had to guess, maybe it had something to do with Mark Meadows’s effort to do the same being likely doomed and that, since Meadows testified, Donald feared having to take the stand too.

CBS News political correspondent Robert Costa writes in a Washington Post op-ed that ultra-rich GOP donors are planning a secret meeting where they’ll come up with a strategy to convince affable suburbs-friendly “Diet MAGA” Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin to run for president in 2024.

They’re calling it the “Red Vest Retreat” and holy shit that is so sad and depressing. The LL Bean fleece vest being Youngkin’s signature and his desperate stans in the “establishment” GOP endlessly pursuing this fantasy are bad enough on their own, but goddamn it they actually have to theme it around his goddamned vests? Fuck. This is actually more embarrassing by proxy than Kevin McCarthy’s skiing motivational speech from a few weeks ago and that was such brutal cringe.

Like the Youngkin fanboys at Axios reported this week, everything hinges on the Virginia GOP’s performance in this November’s legislative elections, that if they go well then Youngkin’s more likely to throw in. They better pray they get their asses kicked so their dude doesn’t politically immolate himself trying to take down Trump like Ron DeSantis is in the process of doing right now. Already the Fat Orange Hitler’s stormtroopers are warning the vest guy to don’t even fucking think about it.

Pregnant patients who get the coronavirus vaccine pass along some of the immune system protections to the fetus, giving the newborn child some antibodies against the disease, CBS News reports.  In its Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, the CDC found the pass-along vaccination 54% effective in preventing hospitalizations, with effectiveness dropping to about 35% in infants 3- to 5-months old.

Scientists have long understood the ability of a pregnant patient to pass along vaccine protections to fetuses and thus, to newborns.  Doctors recommend pregnant patients get vaccinated for things like whooping cough and RSV to boost the offspring’s systems.

Hospitalization rates have increased in all age groups since mid July. Hospitalization rates remain highest in older adults and in young infants, less than six months of age,” the CDC’s Dr. Fiona Havers said, noting that “most children under 5, hospitalized with COVID-19 illness, have no underlying medical conditions.”

The New York State Supreme Court on Thursday tossed disgraced former President Trump’s bid to delay the the upcoming bench trial in New York Attorney General Leticia James’s $250 million civil fraud lawsuit against Donald’s corrupt business empire, yet another defeat for the fat bastard.

“A petition having been filed with this Court on September 14, 2023, seeking a writ of mandamus (1) directing that respondent The Honorable Arthur F Engoron render a determination as to the scope of the claims to be tried in the underlying action entitled People v Trump et al, and (2) finding that said respondent’s decision to proceed with the trial in said action, without taking certain steps that are alleged to be necessary to comply with the decision and order of this Court entered on June 27, 2023, is in excess of Supreme Court’s jurisdiction, And petitioners having moved for a stay of the trial in the underlying action, pending the hearing and determination of the aforesaid proceeding, Now, upon reading and filing the papers with respect to the motion, and due deliberation having been had thereon, It is ordered that the motion for a stay of trial is denied; the interim relief granted by a Justice of this Court entered on September 14, 2023, is hereby vacated,” the judges wrote.

In very much related news, The Messenger reports that Trump’s tax consultant in 2020 told Palm Beach County officials that Donald “agreed” with the county’s $26.6 million valuation for Mar-a-Lago, an obvious contradiction with the meltdown he’s had over its worth the last few days.

Creepy future mass shooter Georgia state Senator Colton Moore, famous for trying and failing to get Governor Brian Kemp to impeach Fulton County District Attorney after she indicted Moore’s Lord and Savior Donald Trump and 18 of his allies last month, tells Breitbart he was expelled from the party caucus on Thursday, claiming it was because of his tantrum over the indictment.

We have no idea if this is the real reason why. He did make some not very subtle threats of violence after the fat fuck was charged and apparently seriously pissed off Governor Brian Kemp. We’ll buy it if we see some independent MSM reporting, but in absence of that we’re a little guarded. Just a hunch that may not be the cause he’s getting out ahead of it by claiming it’s retribution for being a “Trump patriot,” while in reality and that there may soon be reporting that Moore sexually harassed an intern or something worse. Probably worse. Our spider-sense isn’t always right. It just often is.

President Joe Biden will deliver an address in Arizona warning of the forces arrayed against American democracy, all centered upon the fat orange predator that seeks to destroy it all.

A House GOP staffer tells The Messenger’s Congressional reporter Steve Neukam that their party’s performance in the impeachment hearing isn’t going over well with the rest of the caucus, at all, saying “Comer and staff botched this bad,” adding the that their team’s case has been “confusing” while Democrats are “on message,” asking aloud “How can you not be better prepared for this?”

Worse yet is that the full House GOP don’t even have the bandwidth for it with the shutdown looming, with another aide telling Neukam “spending spending spending” is overshadowing the hearing. So maybe that’s actually a good thing for Republicans, in a way. If they had already passed a spending bill then more people would be paying attention to this fucking disgraceful failure.

Claiming they “must research and address issues of extreme constitutional import that require careful analysis and briefing” before their fat slob client goes on trial for criminally conspiring to overturn the results of a free and fair election, disgraced former President Trump’s lawyers on Thursday asked DC Circuit Judge Tanya Chutkan for a 60-day extension to the October 9th deadline for them to submit further pretrial motions to claim immunity and accuse Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith’s team of misconduct. The MAGA lawyers indicated in their filing that Smith opposes any extension, probably correctly assuming that the assholes would just use the opening to try to buy more time to get the trial delayed as long as possible while Trump runs for reelection.

“Defense counsel advises that it requires the Requested Extension to finalize several of its expected motions, including, for example, motions to dismiss relating to executive immunity [lol], failure to state a claim, and improper conduct by the Special Counsel during the grand jury process and in charging decisions [emphasis theirs], motions for 17(c) subpoenas, potential motions to compel discovery, etc. Each of these motions will be extensive. Although counsel has been working diligently to meet the existing motion deadline, it is now clear that President Trump will require the Requested Extension to fully address the complex questions raised by the unique legal issues in this case. Additionally, President Trump believes that his pretrial motions will be more efficiently and appropriately considered sequentially and on a rolling basis – as all motions have thus far been considered – rather than in a single burst before an arbitrary motion deadline,” they wrote.

The “prosecutorial misconduct” one is new – to this case at least. The Mar-a-Lago documents case is the one where we have that really weak and lame attempt by Team Trump to turn an exchange between Walt Nauta’s lawyer Stan Woodward and DOJ prosecutor Jay Bratt over a judgeship Woodward was seeking into a thing. Would be hilarious if it was the same thing, like they would literally use that actual incident in the Florida case to try to claim it matters in DC.

Your reckless spending poured gasoline on the inflation fire, turbocharging the rising costs that are hurting the American people.

When I'm the nominee, I'll make you climb out of your basement, accept responsibility, and defend your failed record, @JoeBiden.

And when I'm… https://t.co/O1L33xArAa

— Ron DeSantis (@RonDeSantis) September 28, 2023

The end of DeSantis’s meltdown was cut off but he continued with: “And when I’m President, I will put an end to this bloated spending that is shutting down the American Dream.”