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.”

Fox News stopped airing the House Oversight Committee’s hearing opening the “impeachment inquiry” into President Joe Biden approximately 49 minutes into it, opting instead to run an interview with Florida Gov Ron DeSantis to talk about who cares, the Daily Beast’s Justin Baragona reports.

New York Attorney General Leticia James on Thursday released a list of fact witnesses to be called to the stand in the upcoming bench trial trial on her $250 million civil fraud lawsuit against disgraced former President Trump’s corrupt business empire, revealing she seeks “the Big Guy” himself, his three idiot kids, Don Jr, Ivanka, and Eric, former lawyer-turned-antagonist Michael Cohen, a number of other current Trump Organization employees, and executives at Trump’s former accounting firm Mazars USA and a number of other firms involved in Trump’s dealings.

Already under federal indictment for lying about his drug abuse on a gun permit application, President Hunter Biden now faces the political consequences of his dealings with questionable foreign entities as the House Oversight Committee opens its inquiry to determine whether he committed impeachable offenses. This historic first step in the process is not being taken lightly by Chairman James Comer, who will point-by-point outline grave allegations of corruption that will the basis for potential articles of impeachment. Thursday will likely ultimately spell the end of the Hunter Biden Administration as his conviction and removal after a Senate trial are a near certainty.

A newly-published set of results from last week’s NBC News registered voter survey finds 56 percent of respondents saying the House GOP shouldn’t launch this stupid impeachment inquiry while 39 percent say they should. Among independents, the number is “six in 10” opposed (but we don’t have the percentage since NBC didn’t post a PDF of the toplines) to 29 percent in favor.

An even more interesting finding was on the question of whether their Congressworm voting yes or no it would affect a respondent’s support for that House member. Overall 31 percent said supporting the evidence-free inquiry would make them less likely to vote for their member to 18 percent more likely, with the remainder saying no difference. There was a gap between self-identified Dems and Republicans on support, with 62 percent of Dems saying less likely to only 35 percent of GOP voter respondents saying more likely, possibly indicating a galvanizing effect for Democrats. Among independents there was also a 25 to 14 percent delta between less likely and more likely to vote for a pro-impeachment Congressnazi, though the vast majority (60 percent) were indifferent.

An October 2019 NBC News survey found 50 percent of respondents were in favor of impeaching and removing fat then-President Trump from office for trying to torpedo Joe Biden’s ultimately successful 2020 campaign with the same stupid bullshit allegations we’ll see in 20 minutes.

A completely sincere advertisement during Wednesday night’s GOP primary debate starring, real former border law enforcement officials from the totally real advocacy group the “Border Security Alliance,” warned that the Biden Administration’s plan to ban menthol cigarettes would fuel an illicit cross-border trade that would further enrich and empower violent Mexican drug cartels.

Well one of the guys is a former CBP officer. The other is retired military intel. But the “Border Security Alliance” is definitely a real advocacy group. They have a website. The logo’s pretty cool too. Much better graphic design job for an American bald eagle than ours. And yeah it’s totally imaginable that a ban on menthols would fuel an illegal cross border trade because people might be too lazy to roll their own filtered cigarettes and use a menthol spray on them. Or just chew gum while smoking regulars. And the cartels could be thinking like “Hey maybe let’s just make less money and take up more volume in our trucks to smuggle cartons of menthols instead of heroin and coke.”

We could sort of imagine that happening. Still, we’re not totally sure who might be funding this “Border Security Alliance.” It doesn’t say it on their website. And what’s weird too is that their Twitter feed seems to mention smoking and vaping a lot more than you would think a organization focused on preventing cross-border drug and human trafficking would be. But they seem really concerned that the FDA banning menthols would be more trouble than it’s worth. What do you guys think?

At least one each of the people holding up the signs saying “Auto Workers for Trump” and “Union Members for Trump” signs at the fat bastard’s Wednesday night cult rally in a non-union machine shop admitted to the Detroit News that they were not in fact an auto worker or a union member, respectively. Neither of the two Trump fans would give their names after acknowledging this.

Not terribly surprising since the host, parts manufacturer Drake Enterprises, is not a union shop and was just the first (apparently only) such business in the Detroit area that was willing to provide a venue for the Orange Autocrat. On Tuesday the company’s president, Nate Stemple told Fox and Friends that “some of our colleagues that we do business with reached out to us” to tell him Trump was looking to hold a rally, confirming our “Four Seasons” theory of how this came together. “We were more than willing to do so,” Stemple continued. When asked how the shift to electric vehicles would affect Drake’s bottom line, Stemple said “Oh, it would put us out of business. If electric vehicles took over today across the board, we’d be completely out of business.”

“Governor” of Arizona Kari Lake told the Wall Street Journal she is indeed for real launching a campaign for the Senate seat currently occupied by useless “independent” Kyrsten Sinema.