LEVIN REPORT

TRUMP TWO WEEKS AWAY FROM CLAIMING HE SAW BIDEN SELLING DRUGS OUTSIDE THE WASHINGTON MONUMENT

The president claims he’s hearing the Democratic nominee is doping.


Donald Trump speaks to reporters as he leaves Washington for Florida July 31.
Donald Trump speaks to reporters as he leaves Washington for Florida July 31.YURI GRIPAS/ABACA/BLOOMBERG VIA GETTY IMAGES

As you’ve probably noticed by now, Donald Trump has spent the entirety of his presidency saying certifiably insane, 100% made-up stuff, including but not limited to suggesting he invented the word “caravan”; claiming you need an I.D. to buy cereal; insisting a hurricane was going to hit Alabama when it definitely wasn’t; telling people that wind turbines give you cancer; dubbing himself the greatest environmentalist president in more than 100 years; and repeatedly talking about a nonexistent commercial flight filled with “thugs” who apparently used their frequent-flier miles to get a deal on a red-eye to Washington. With fewer than two months until the election, these statements have only gotten more absurd and have focused nearly completely on his opponent, Joe Biden. In the last few weeks, the president has claimed his opponent is controlled by “people that are in the dark shadows,” that he’s fine with children being “slaughtered,” and that if he’s elected, you’ll have to flee your home in the middle of the night. On Thursday, Trump took his Biden commentary to its next “logical” conclusion, claiming in an interview that the Democratic nominee has gained an edge in the polls by using...performance-enhancing drugs.
“I think there’s probably—possibly—drugs involved,” Trump told Fox News host Jeanine Pirro in an interview that will air on Saturday night. “That’s what I hear. I mean, there’s possibly drugs. I don’t know how you can go from being so bad where you can’t even get out a sentence.”
Notice that even in the fog of his pathological lies and dementia, a teeny-tiny part of Trump knows that he’s full of shit, hence the hedging that the Democratic nominee for president of the United States is “probably,” “possibly” on drugs. Still, that doesn’t stop him from floating the idea that there’s no other explanation for Biden performing well on the campaign trail than perhaps that he’s juicing. This, as a reminder, is coming from a guy who struggles with simple words in the English language, whose demeanor makes people think he might have had a stroke, and who, just this week, pronounced the words “from among” like this:
But hey, that’s where we are in 2020: the president of the United States accusing the Democratic nominee of doping, which means we’re probably just one interview or rally away from him claiming he saw Biden dealing drugs outside the Washington Monument or that he died eight years ago and was replaced by a body double. At this point, there’s a non-zero chance that Trump will demand Biden be tested for steroids before the debates. Just kidding: he already did that. (“We're going to call for a drug test, by the way, because his best performance was against Bernie,” Trump told the Washington Examiner last month. “It wasn't that he was Winston Churchill because he wasn't, but it was a normal, boring debate. You know, nothing amazing happened. And we are going to call for a drug test because there's no way — you can't do that.” Trump also said he wanted Hillary Clinton tested in 2016, because he didn’t suddenly lose his mind overnight.)
Meanwhile, in other presidential batshittery over just the course of the last 24 hours:
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Silicon Valley is preparing for Trump to claim he won before the votes are actually counted

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No word on who’s preparing for him to barricade himself in the Situation Room screaming, “You can’t make me leave!” on Inauguration Day 2021. Per the Washington Post:
Twitter announced it would label or even remove tweets by candidates declaring victory before the Nov. 3 election results are certified. Google says it will prioritize election results from the Associated Press and Democracy Works, a nonpartisan nonprofit organization that provides information on how to vote, according to company executives…. Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg said if any campaign tries to declare victory before they should, the company will add a label directing people to “the official results.” He said the platform is partnering with Reuters and the National Election Pool to provide authoritative information.
As the Post notes, most companies have long touted their policies and then failed to enforce them, particularly when it comes to politicians, and especially when it comes to one politician in particular so, y’know, maybe don’t take his word for it on election night.
Everything Trump touches turns to shit, part 928,532
File this under another reason having a blowhard, pathological liar in charge during a global crisis wasn’t the best idea:
A roster of celebrities including Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson endorsed it. A corporate coalition led by Microsoft rallied tens of thousands of recovered coronavirus patients to donate their blood plasma, rich in antibodies, to help treat others. Federal taxpayers bankrolled the initiative with at least $340 million. But when President Trump politicized and overhyped his administration’s authorization last month of convalescent plasma to treat COVID-19, he spawned confusion about the treatment and triggered a political backlash that specialists say has stifled an expected spike in demand.
Now leaders of the effort to expand use of convalescent plasma are scrambling to reassure the public that the treatment does have merit, while fending off unfavorable comparisons to Trump’s previous pet coronavirus treatment, hydroxychloroquine. Under similar pressure from Trump, the Food and Drug Administration authorized emergency use of hydroxychloroquine early in the pandemic only to withdraw the order in June when rigorous clinical trials proved the drug was ineffective.
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“There’s an increasing worrying concern on the part of the public that things are getting rushed and overly hyped,” Arthur Caplan, a medical ethics specialist, told the Post. “Some people say, ‘I trust the president, and it’s good,’ and other people say, ‘If he says it works, I’m not touching it.’” Which, given the president’s penchant for suggesting people inject their veins with bleach, doesn’t seem that unreasonable.
The president’s supporters happy to let Darwin do his thing
Elsewhere!
U.S. coronavirus data is “disturbing,” Dr. [Anthony] Fauci says, disputing Trump’s claim that U.S. is “rounding the corner” (CNBC)
California Governor Gavin Newsom Surveys Fire Zone, Rips “Ideological BS” Around Climate Change & “Absence Of National Leadership” (Deadline)
A Top Prosecutor in FBI Russia Probe Resigns Amid Push by Barr (Bloomberg)
Wisconsin Ballot-Access Legal Battle Could Screw Up Voting by Mail (Intelligencer)
Peter Thiel Met With the Racist Fringe as He Went All In on Trump (BuzzFeed)
Tech Shares Roil Market as Stocks Fall for Second Week (WSJ)
TikTok Won’t Just Disappear After Trump’s Deadline for a Sale (Bloomberg)
Phillies pitcher Zack Wheeler injures finger while putting on pants (UPI)
Louis Vuitton Launches $961 COVID Face Shields (Vanities)
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