Sarah Palin, now making a comeback political run for the House, revealed in a new financial disclosure form that she earned a whopping $211,529 from personalized videos on the app Cameo in 2021, Insider reports.
That’s $37,529 more than the annual salary of a House member.
“Donald Trump has found a new way to milk his ex-presidency — and test another — hitting the lucrative motivational speaking circuit with more fervor than any other active U.S. politician in history,” Axios reports.
“It’s a way to build support for a possible 2024 presidential bid while potentially pocketing large speaking fees as many of his iconic properties are struggling.”
“Trump stands to benefit on both ends. He headlines a rally-type event with a third party footing the bill, and stands to gets a hefty payout for his time.”
“Barack and Michelle Obama’s time with Spotify is coming to an end,” Bloomberg reports.
“The former first family’s production company, Higher Ground, won’t be signing a new deal with the audio platform… The company is instead talking to other distributors about a deal worth tens of millions of dollars, among the most-lucrative in the podcasting business.”
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Consulting fees for campaigns pursuing an endorsement from former President Donald Trump can run in the $10,000 per month range, the Washington Post reports.
Wall Street Journal: “Two years after the Covid-19 pandemic tore into the global economy, business leaders have had to confront another crisis that left them racing to protect staff, untangle supply-chain snarls and revamp operations around the world. It has also required each company to rethink its future in Russia, a country of 150 million people and vast natural resources, whose army is now waging a bloody war.”
“This time, companies were more prepared. The pandemic had given leaders a crisis playbook. Years of corporate activism on issues such as climate change and racial discrimination had trained them to respond to a range of issues. The invasion took many by surprise, but they reacted quickly to what was a potentially fatal threat to their employees and also a reputational threat to their businesses.”
A growing number of real estate companies are advertising themselves to conservatives, “saying they can take them out of liberal bastions like Seattle and San Francisco and find them homes in places like rural Idaho,” the AP reports.
“Jared Kushner has toured Persian Gulf monarchies with a pitch for his new $3 billion fund: Get a piece of deals made possible by Trump administration diplomatic initiatives such as the Abraham Accords, which forged Israeli relations with several Arab states,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
Rudy Giuliani is selling signed 9/11 t-shirts for $911.00.
Evan Osnos: “Spend several months immersed in American talk radio and you’ll come away with the sense that the violence of January 6th was not the end of something but the beginning. A year after Trump supporters laid siege to the U.S. Capitol, some of his most influential champions are preparing the ground for his return, and they dominate a media terrain that attracts little attention from their opponents.”
“As liberals argue over the algorithm at Facebook and ponder the disruptive influence of TikTok, radio remains a colossus; for every hour that Americans listened to podcasts in 2021, they listened to six and a half hours of AM/FM radio… Talk radio has often provided more reliable hints of the political future than think tanks and elected officials have.”
Washington Post: “Since Trump returned from his New Jersey club to Palm Beach, Fla., this fall, Mar-a-Lago has become a hotbed for Republican fundraisers, with candidates jockeying to line the former president’s pockets in hopes of winning his endorsement, get a photo with him or simply give donors a chance to be in his presence.”
“The surge in business at his private club spotlights the unparalleled way in which Trump has personally profited from his presidency and his popularity in the GOP — a revenue stream that began during his time in the White House and has only strengthened since he left office. Rather than hosting fellow Republicans, Trump is charging them for the privilege of using his venues.”
Michael Cohen plans to list his former prison badge as a nonfungible token during the upcoming Miami Art Week, Page Six reports.
Axios: “Treasury secretaries seen as being friendly to Wall Street — think Robert Rubin, Larry Summers or Tim Geithner — invariably exit to multimillion-dollar salaries in the financial sector. Steven Mnuchin has managed to do even better for himself.”
“Mnuchin has raised $2.5 billion so far for a private equity fund, including from Saudi Arabia, a country toward whom he was notably friendly while in office. If the fund is structured with a standard 2% management fee, that’s $50 million per year right there for Mnuchin and his colleagues, before they make a single penny from investment returns.”
Washington Post: “The eight generals who commanded American forces in Afghanistan between 2008 and 2018 have gone on to serve on more than 20 corporate boards… Stanley McChrystal is the runaway corporate leader.”
Paul Krugman: “You don’t hear much these days about ‘economic anxiety.’ Most observers acknowledge that the rise of the Trumpist right was driven by racial and social antagonism, not economic populism.”
“Yet there is an economic element to political extremism, just not what you’d think. Right-wing extremists, and to some extent even more mainstream conservative media, rely on financial support from companies selling nutritional supplements and miracle cures — and that financial support is arguably a significant factor pushing the right to become more extreme. Indeed, right-wing extremism isn’t just an ideological movement that happens to get a lot of money from sellers of snake oil; some of its extremism can probably be seen not as a reflection of deep conviction, but as a way of promoting snake oil.”
Stacey Abrams announced she’s going on a paid speaking tour around the country this fall.
Former Senator Al Franken (D-MN) announced on Twitter his “The Only Former U.S. Senator Currently on Tour Tour” with 15 events scheduled for later this year.
Said Franken: “My promise is that you’ll laugh, you’ll think, and you’ll leave hopeful about our future. Unless I’m in a bad mood that night.”
The 2020 Trump campaign accounted for up to 3% of all credit card fraud claims in the entire country, the New York Times reports.
Wall Street Journal: “Values-based investing options for conservatives have lagged behind those available to investors concerned about climate change, diversity and animal rights. Now conservatives are taking a page from liberal investors when it comes to their escalating criticism of technology companies that have banned former President Donald Trump and others from their platforms.”
“The fund boycotts Facebook Inc., Apple Inc., Google parent Alphabet Inc. and roughly 20 other companies that it views as overly progressive in their corporate politics.”
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Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.