Opinion

WASINGER: ‘The Mooch’ Joins The Traitor Caucus

REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

Robert Wasinger Contributor
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The “traitor caucus” is a lonely group, consisting of two former Trump hangers-on who share a narcissistic desire to be on television at any cost: Anthony Scaramucci and Omarosa Manigault.

The president has undoubtedly had his critics before. The entire Democratic Party has spent the last four years afflicted by Trump Derangement Syndrome. The establishment losers of the Republican Party, left behind by the populist revolution Donald Trump led, have their ridiculously ineffectual “Never Trump movement.”

“Mooch” and Omarosa are something different, though, somehow more pathetic and embarrassing even than the Never Trumpers. This pair of attention-hungry ingrates’ crowning life achievement was to work with Donald Trump. They blew that shot, and now they’re frustrated at their inability to parlay that 15 minutes of fame into meaningful post-White House careers. (RELATED: KASSAM: Anthony Scaramucci — An Expert On Losing)

Omarosa was a nobody whose only notable achievement was appearing on The Apprentice. Her career then went nowhere fast until Trump brought her on his campaign in 2016, after which she famously declared, “Every critic, every detractor, will have to bow down to President Trump. It’s everyone who’s ever doubted Donald, whoever disagreed, whoever challenged him. It is the ultimate revenge to become the most powerful man in the universe.”

Scaramucci, for his part, was a relatively unknown financier who backed Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, called Donald Trump a “hack,” and spent the better part of 2015 and 2016 ripping into virtually every policy position of the MAGA revolution. Scaramucci’s recent assertion that Trump “is a clear and present danger to the American society” could just as easily have been delivered when he was still backing Hillary.

Scaramucci was already wealthy, but he evidently wanted the public spotlight so badly that he switched sides at the last minute, buying his way into the Trump Campaign and then lobbying for months until he finally got his shot at the big time as White House Communications Director.

Everyone knows how that went — all 11 days of it. The “Mooch” had a public meltdown and left the White House in disgrace.

After the two of them were unceremoniously fired, they each tried to revive their reputations in different ways.

Mooch tried, and failed miserably, to become a MAGA cheerleader. He got some television appearances and wrote some pro-Trump op-eds, but none of the president’s real supporters ever bought his self-serving act, not even when he wrote a whole book gushing about how he still loved Trump — all of nine months ago.

Omarosa, conversely, tried to make it as a #Resistance grifter, briefly becoming a left-wing cable news hero on a Wednesday in August 2018. But her comeback didn’t have legs. The Justice Department filed suit against her for financial improprieties while serving — briefly — in the Trump White House.

So why are the two teaming up now?

Omarosa certainly doesn’t have any new insights to add to the gossip and lies she included in last summer’s Unhinged. She’s just piggy-backing on the attention Scaramucci has gotten in a desperate bid for relevance.

As for the Mooch, his apparent disavowal of the pro-Trump case that he laid out over the course of 304 pages just nine months ago has nothing to do with him having a change of heart.

In both cases, it has to do with the fact that no one cares what either of the disgraced former employees have to say about President Trump one way or the other.

Scaramucci, like Omarosa, craves the spotlight, and he’s engineered his sudden turn back to the anti-Trump camp to maximize media attention. If you had any doubt of that, consider who he’s teaming up with as well: arch-Never Trumper Bill Kristol.

Kristol may be the only person with less credibility in the Republican Party than Anthony Scaramucci, having spent the past four years waging a personal vendetta against Donald Trump. Kristol is the undisputed leader of the Never Trump movement, and also a complete failure as a political strategist. In 2016, he backed David French as an alternative to Trump. No one cared. For 2020, he’s got Bill Weld. Once again, no one cares. Meanwhile, Kristol’s rabidly anti-Trump stance managed to drive the once-venerable Weekly Standard into oblivion.

Scaramucci and Omarosa want people to think they represent a larger movement, but they’ve made it abundantly clear that they’ve only ever been out for themselves. Their new “traitor caucus” is a farce that won’t even make it into the footnotes of the history books.

Robert Wasinger (@RobertWasinger) served in senior advisory and liaison roles on President Trump’s campaign and transition team.


The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of The Daily Caller