What do these guys have in common?
Being friends with Donald Trump isn’t just bad for your reputation. It’s also bad for your wallet. You’d think pals of the four times indicted, twice impeached rapist “billionaire” wouldn’t have any trouble paying their lawyers. But they do. And Donald Trump, who loves his money more than anything else, has absolutely no intention of helping them out with their legal fees. Hell, Trump doesn’t even like paying his own lawyers.
But that’s what Steve Bannon, Rudy Giuliani and (the MyPillow guy) Mike Lindell all have in common. They are all now so broke they can no longer afford their own lawyers. So their lawyers have suddenly grown consciences and decided to represent them pro bono. Nah, I’m just kidding. Their lawyers left them high and dry, too. Just like Trump did.
Somebody once noticed that “MAGA” stands for “Making Attorneys Get Attorneys.”Of course, among those three only Rudy is a lawyer. Maybe “Making Assholes Get Attorneys” is more like it in their case. Yeah, that’s the ticket.
Only attorneys cost cheddar, and those three little blind mice are now all out of cheese. So off they go, scurrying around in a panic, wondering what the hell they’re going to do.
Trump’s base is no help, they have all raided their coffee cans on top of their kitchen cupboards and given all their cider money to their saviour Donald Jesus Trump. Nothing is left over for Rudy, Stevie and Mickey, I’m afraid. As they say, Steve, Rudy and Mike are so broke they can’t pay attention.
Steve Bannon has a court appeal slated for November. That’s for his criminal conviction last year (pending a four-month jail sentence) for obstructing Congress by spurning a subpoena from the House January 6 committee. And he got indicted for that because he followed Donald Trump’s advice not to show up.
Bannon also faces a criminal trial next May in New York related to state fraud, conspiracy and money-laundering charges because he bilked donors in a Mexican wall project, dubbed “We Build the Wall.” Bannon stole the money intended for the wall, money that he raised from stupid MAGA donors. You know, the wall Mexico was supposed to pay for? That one.
Meanwhile, Rudy Giuliani was charged in August with 13 criminal counts in Georgia by the Fulton county district attorney, Fani Willis. Pressures on Giuliani escalated in October when three other ex-Trump lawyers he worked with to varying degrees all agreed to plead guilty and cooperate with prosecutors. Nobody seems to want to cut a deal with poor old Rudy. And Rudy is running out of money. The private jet he rode down to his arraignment was provided by a friend. “America’s Mayor” is now America’s joke.
MyPillow guy Mike Lindell is fighting $2 billion worth of defamation lawsuits brought by electronic voting machine firms he claims rigged the 2020 election against Trump. So far that claim, that he’s making entirely without evidence, has cost him millions of dollars in legal fees, fees that he owes to a Minneapolis law firm. In October, that law firm formally asked the court to allow it to withdraw from representing Lindell in all his cases, citing nonpayment of millions of dollars owed.
All three are full of grievances against the powers that brought the charges and the suits. They still haven’t worked it out that the source of all their troubles is Donald Trump.
They’re slow, because they’re stupid, but give them time. One day they’ll figure it all out, that everything Donald Trump touches turns to shit. No friend of Trump’s ever escapes the evil karma Trump drags around with him. And, as ever, ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, comrades and friends, stay safe.
Robert Harrington is an American expat living in Britain. He is a portrait painter.