Southern Strategy

With a cheery drawl and an expression somewhere between exhausted and dead-eyed , Lindsey Graham spent a Sunday morning in November rattling off the greatest hits of GOP impeachment conspiracy theories before most Americans had finished their second cups of coffee .
“ When you find out who the whistleblower is , I ’ m confident you ’ re going to find out it ’ s somebody from the Deep State , ” the South Carolina senator insisted during Fox News ’ 10 a.m. block .
Graham , a former Trump foe who has become the president ’ s chief @ @ @ @ @ @ @ into attacking Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff , the House Intelligence chair and now lead impeachment manager .
“ If you think Schiff is looking for the truth , ” Graham snarled , “ you shouldn ’ t be allowed to drive anywhere in America , because that ’ s a ridiculous concept.
” The appearance capped off what could only be described as a banner week of bullshit from Graham—though from his point of view , the Democrats were the ones spouting nonsense .
“ I think this is a bunch of BS @ @ @ @ @ @ @ he wouldn ’ t read witness testimonies released by Schiff ’ s committee .
As for the House ’ s “ sham ” impeachment proceedings , which Graham would soon inherit : “ I ’ ve written the whole process off.
” A day later , Jaime Harrison , Graham ’ s likely Democratic opponent this fall , entered the tiny , cinder block–walled dining hall at Clinton College , a small , Christian , historically black school in Rock Hill , South Carolina .
Wearing gray dress pants and a black V-neck @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Harrison stood before a row of square laminate bistro tables , where two dozen students , mostly from the school ’ s student government , drum line , and cheer team , sat waiting to hear him speak .
But when the 44-year-old Harrison did , he made scant mention of his opponent .
Instead , as the smell of greasy breakfast hung in the air , Harrison asked the students about their passions and majors , encouraging them to find mentors who could help yoke the two together into a career .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ national politics , alighting on it for only a few minutes as he connected the dots between voting , policy in Washington , and the student loan burdens many in the room would soon carry .
“ Part of my thing is taking advantage of the opportunity , ” Harrison tells me afterward in his baritone Southern lilt .
“ It ’ s not every day [ that students meet ] a younger politician who understands the same trials and tribulations that these kids are going through.
” At first blush , Harrison @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a misstep when running against such a prominent—and lately notorious—DC figure .
Over three terms in the Senate , Graham had cultivated a reputation as a staunch conservative who delivered bipartisan agreements on immigration and climate change—part of his identity as self-described “ political wingman ” to Arizona Sen. John McCain .
( McCain had affectionately referred to his close ally as “ Little Jerk.
” ) But three years into the Trump presidency , Graham , who said during the 2016 election that he wished Republicans had kicked Trump out of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ president ’ s main sycophants .
The reversal has earned him a particularly brutal impersonation from Saturday Night Live ’ s Kate McKinnon , whose sweaty Graham explains in a recent sketch that “ even my bodily fluids are trying to distance themselves from me.
” There ’ s a method to Graham ’ s about-face .
Surfing political trends is part of it : As the Republican base gravitated toward Trump , Graham followed suit .
But maybe it ’ s more about Graham ’ s desire to remain close to power @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to a “ pilot fish ” in Rolling Stone— “ a smaller fish that hovers about a larger predator , like a shark , living off of its detritus.
” Put more generously : “ It ’ s better to be at the table than on the table , ” says Matt Moore , former chair of the South Carolina Republican Party .
But Graham is also contending with a South Carolina that ’ s tinging bluer .
And Trump ’ s presidency has seen a spate of Democratic wins and near-misses in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ gains that relied on a formula of increasingly blue cities , party-flipping suburbs , and turnout of black voters .
Harrison , a longtime Democratic operative and current Democratic National Committee associate chair , advised Democrat Doug Jones ’ successful Senate campaign in Alabama .
Now it ’ s Harrison ’ s turn to put his own strategies to the test .
“ I think [ the Democratic spirit ] is alive and well all across the South .
The real question is getting people to believe that it ’ s possible here @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have a little sliver of hope , and now it ’ s important for me to take that sliver and turn it into a roaring flame.
” Sixteen-year-old Patricia Harrison gave birth to Jaime on February 5 , 1976 ; his father was never around much , and fully disappeared when Jaime was 10 .
Raised mostly by his grandparents in their mobile home in Orangeburg , South Carolina , a majority-black city about 45 minutes outside of Columbia , Harrison spent part of his childhood on food stamps , and some of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ t have much , but they raised me right , ” Harrison said in his video campaign announcement .
Television delivered Harrison his model for an ideal life : The Cosby Show ’ s Huxtable family .
He wanted what they had : “ A middle class life—a nice house , a beautiful wife who ’ s a lawyer who spoke Spanish—that ’ s what I wanted.
” None of his caretakers had finished high school .
But “ when [ Denise ] went off to college , I wanted to go @ @ @ @ @ @ @ were bolstered by real mentors .
There was Ms. Fersner , the guidance counselor who Harrison worked for as a personal assistant and who taught him about the fee waivers that would let him take the SAT for free .
There was Ms. Harrold , the AP calculus teacher with whom Harrison , a self-described nerd , chose to spend most of his lunch periods .
Harrold also advised the school ’ s chapter of the National Honor Society and encouraged Harrison to run for president of the group ’ s regional board @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Harrison met his future political mentor , James Clyburn , who ’ d just been elected to the US House—the first black South Carolinian elected to federal office in almost 100 years .
“ I told him I wanted to work in his office one day , ” Harrison recalls .
“ He kind of laughed and said , ‘ Well , you ’ ll need to go to college.
’ ” Harrison ended up at Yale , and then as a law student at Georgetown in 2003 , he found his way @ @ @ @ @ @ @ when Clyburn became leader of the House Democratic Caucus , he made Harrison executive director—the caucus ’ s youngest ever .
And the next year , when Clyburn became the Democrats ’ whip , Harrison ran vote counting for the party .
The day after Harrison ’ s appearance at Clinton College , I drive him from Denmark Technical , another historically black college , to Charleston , while he runs through the personalities he contended with in Congress .
“ We had Rahm [ Emanuel ] , we had Steny [ Hoyer @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Pelosi , ” he says , “ and we had a large freshman class.
” There were the influential subgroups , like the fiscally conservative Blue Dog Coalition , the Congressional Black Caucus , and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus .
“ Any group could tank a bill , ” Harrison says .
“ One thing I ’ m proud of : We never lost a party-line vote on the floor .
It may not have been the bill everybody wanted , but it was the best we could do for a very diverse @ @ @ @ @ @ @ votes gave him an “ old , pragmatic ” way of looking at the political process .
“ I ’ ve never seen a bill that started one way and looks exactly the same coming out , ” he says .
“ It just doesn ’ t happen.
” He brings the same gimlet eye to the Democratic presidential primary .
“ In the end , all of these proposals that candidates are talking about—none will look the same way once it goes through the process , ” Harrison says .
He ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ progressives to replace incumbent Democrats with more liberal members .
“ Why spend your resources fighting with someone who agrees with you 97 percent of the time and not use those resources to go after a Peter King in New York or a Jim Jordan in Ohio ?
” After five years in Clyburn ’ s office , Harrison left to join the Podesta Group , where his lobbying clients read like a progressive “ most wanted ” list : Walmart , the biotech giant Amgen , the pro-coal American Coalition for Clean @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Boeing .
His tenure there might not earn him accolades from the rising left , and when I mention this , his amiability wanes , and he takes a serious tone .
“ There ’ s nobody who can out-progressive me in terms of understanding the hardships of poverty , ” Harrison says .
“ I ’ ve known it , I ’ ve seen it , I ’ ve touched it , I ’ ve tasted it , I ’ ve eaten it my entire life .
And when I go into @ @ @ @ @ @ @ me and say , ‘ Jaime , I would be so blessed if I can raise my kids and they grow up to do the things you ’ ve been able to do.
’ ” Harrison won ’ t disclose how much he earned at the Podesta Group , but he used his salary to pay down $ 160,000 in student loan debt and take care of his mother ’ s bills .
“ This purity test—it ’ s a fictional , made-up thing , ” Harrison says .
“ We get so @ @ @ @ @ @ @ we forget about the reality of life in these communities.
” He repeats an example he often gives on the stump : “ We talk about a $ 15 minimum wage , and that ’ s great .
But I had a conversation once with my cousin , and he said to me , ‘ Jaime , I hear Democrats talking about that , and yeah , I would love to make that .
But how can a brother just get a job ?
’ ” Harrison ’ s campaign tries to directly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with retail politics under its “ Harrison Helps ” initiative .
The candidate , staff , and volunteers plan to travel around the state hosting events such as resume workshops and seminars for homebuyers .
In August , Harrison ’ s team assembled 400 backpacks full of school supplies for students in his hometown of Orangeburg .
The week before Christmas , volunteers served meals to families at the Ronald McDonald House in Charleston .
Harrison ’ s grassroots campaign echoes the 1988 presidential primary race run by Jesse Jackson , who has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
“ Jaime seems to be the first candidate who has found a way to merge the sort of corporate Democratic Party support and the grassroots support , ” says Moore , the former South Carolina Republican Party chair , who counts Harrison as a good friend .
On the trail , Harrison generally tries to avoid what he calls a “ DC-oriented frame ” of Democrat vs. Republican and instead talks about right vs. wrong .
“ I always say , interests live in your head , your values live in your @ @ @ @ @ @ @ says .
Accordingly , you won ’ t hear him talk much about Graham .
“ We can use the fire of the anti-Lindsey [ sentiment ] , but you can only use that to an extent , ” Harrison tells me .
“ I always believe Democrats win when we can be hopeful and aspirational , not just tearing somebody down.
” The most mention of Graham I heard was in front of a group of Charleston-area Democrats .
They ’ re obsessed with Graham ’ s antics , Harrison says .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ mostly white audience erupted into laughter and applause when Harrison mentioned his campaign is selling novelty Lindsey Graham flip-flops . )
The campaign ’ s focus groups have found that white women in South Carolina are skeptical of Graham because of his “ continuous extreme flip-flopping on issues.
” They were especially turned off by his tepid defense of McCain after the president ’ s postmortem attacks .
Harrison ’ s campaign announcement video , titled “ Character , ” contrasted clips of Graham calling Trump a “ race-baiting , xenophobic , religious @ @ @ @ @ @ @ opposite .
“ Here ’ s a guy who will say anything to stay in office , ” Harrison says to the camera , accusing Graham of having “ traded his moral compass for petty political gain.
” In the summer of 2017 , DNC Chair Tom Perez called Harrison for advice .
Harrison , coming off four years as chair of the South Carolina Democratic Party , had lost his bid to lead the national party earlier that year .
But Perez had given him a meaty consolation prize—an associate chair position @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Southern strategy .
Harrison ’ s first test would be helping Doug Jones , a former US attorney who had been at the helm of some of Alabama ’ s most important civil rights victories , and who was running in a special election to replace Sen. Jeff Sessions .
Perez , who overlapped with Jones at the Justice Department , knew he had a good candidate in him , and , thanks to congressional Republicans ’ incessant attempts to repeal the Affordable Care Act , also had a favorable political landscape .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ child molestation against Republican candidate Roy Moore . )
Jones has a contentious relationship with the Alabama Democratic Party and Joe Reed , a powerful black political leader who ’ d long been among the party ’ s key power brokers .
He needed a strategy to turn out black voters ( above and beyond courting Reed ) , who account for more than a quarter of Alabama ’ s population but whose votes had been particularly depressed by voter-ID requirements and felon disenfranchisement .
Harrison and a few DNC staffers went down @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with a blueprint he ’ d tested during a House special election in South Carolina .
“ I talked about the divisions within the African American community—and not so much divisions , but the different groupings , the older African Americans , African American women , younger African Americans , and the things that motivate them , ” Harrison says .
“ He emphasized how important it was to work alongside local folks who really understood that black voters aren ’ t a monolith , ” Doug Turner , a senior adviser for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ advice proved crucial : Jones narrowly won , largely due to black voters , whose almost 30 percent turnout rate eclipsed previous Alabama Senate elections .
“ The votes are here , ” Harrison says .
“ The question is , can we change the mentality ?
” Other models from across the South also give Harrison confidence .
Last November , Democrat Andy Beshear defeated Kentucky Gov .
Matt Bevin , who ’ d hitched his wagon to Trump in a state the president had won by 30 points .
“ Tonight @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Harrison said in a statement after Beshear ’ s victory , “ prove that a New South is truly rising.
” But can Harrison replicate that magic back home ?
In 2018 , attorney Joe Cunningham flipped a South Carolina congressional seat blue for the first time in nearly 40 years .
A lot went into Cunningham ’ s victory—a climate change platform informed by Charleston ’ s near-weekly tidal flooding ; his promise to deny Pelosi the House speakership ; a far-right GOP challenger sidelined by a car accident—but especially recent transplants @ @ @ @ @ @ @ than 80 percent of the state ’ s population growth comes from people moving from out of state , according to Charleston ’ s Post and Courier .
The population ’ s racial makeup has stayed stagnant , but its generational makeup has changed considerably : The senior population in South Carolina is among the fastest-growing in the nation .
“ Can Jaime Harrison do statewide what Joe Cunningham was able to do in the 1st Congressional District ?
They both have appeal in suburban areas and the benefit of going up against @ @ @ @ @ @ @ right , ” says Gibbs Knotts , who teaches political science at the College of Charleston .
“ I ’ m not one who thinks things are shifting way left , but there is a lot of opportunity with the changing demographics in the state.
” There ’ s “ definitely a reconfiguration and scrambling of the winning coalition , ” says Joe Trippi , a longtime Democratic strategist who worked on Jones ’ campaign .
Fiscally conservative voters , college Republicans , and Republican women are all more willing to give Democratic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , a moderate like Harrison : “ The more that Lindsey Graham becomes part of the big fight of everyone going to their corners , those women and those younger Republicans are looking for someone to bridge the polarization .
That ’ s where there ’ s an opening for someone like Jaime.
” During the last months of 2019 , Harrison ’ s campaign says it raised more than $ 3.5 million , a record quarter for any candidate in South Carolina history .
In December , a poll showed Harrison only @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Trump won the state by 14 points , and another state poll shows Trump trouncing any hypothetical Democratic opponent there in 2020 .
Harrison may have ended the year with a massive fundraising haul , but his total raised during 2019 is still at least $ 5 million behind Graham ’ s .
“ To characterize this as a long shot would be accurate , ” Knotts says .
Harrison ’ s biggest hurdle is a lack of name recognition .
His “ job is to make sure that he becomes a household @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a fellow South Carolina DNC member and Clyburn alum , “ or at least a name that most people would recognize.
” To achieve that , Harrison plans to follow a prescription he got from former Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams .
“ Stacey ’ s advice to me was , ‘ Jaime , you got ta go everywhere .
You can ’ t give up on anybody , ’ ” Harrison tells me .
“ You can win in the South , but in order to win , you have to invest @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have such large pockets of African American voters , and the big thing is you have to persuade them that an election is important enough for them to come out and vote .
”

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.
With a cheery drawl and an expression somewhere between exhausted and dead-eyed, Lindsey Graham spent a Sunday morning in November rattling off the greatest hits of GOP impeachment conspiracy theories before most Americans had finished their second cups of coffee. “When you find out who the whistleblower is, I’m confident you’re going to find out it’s somebody from the Deep State,” the South Carolina senator insisted during Fox News’ 10 a.m. block. Graham, a former Trump foe who has become the president’s chief defender in the Senate, then shifted into attacking Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff, the House Intelligence chair and now lead impeachment manager. “If you think Schiff is looking for the truth,” Graham snarled, “you shouldn’t be allowed to drive anywhere in America, because that’s a ridiculous concept.”
The appearance capped off what could only be described as a banner week of bullshit from Graham—though from his point of view, the Democrats were the ones spouting nonsense. “I think this is a bunch of BS,” Graham told reporters, saying he wouldn’t read witness testimonies released by Schiff’s committee. As for the House’s “sham” impeachment proceedings, which Graham would soon inherit: “I’ve written the whole process off.”
A day later, Jaime Harrison, Graham’s likely Democratic opponent this fall, entered the tiny, cinder block–walled dining hall at Clinton College, a small, Christian, historically black school in Rock Hill, South Carolina. Wearing gray dress pants and a black V-neck sweater, his head shaved bare, Harrison stood before a row of square laminate bistro tables, where two dozen students, mostly from the school’s student government, drum line, and cheer team, sat waiting to hear him speak.
But when the 44-year-old Harrison did, he made scant mention of his opponent. Instead, as the smell of greasy breakfast hung in the air, Harrison asked the students about their passions and majors, encouraging them to find mentors who could help yoke the two together into a career. Harrison didn’t say much about national politics, alighting on it for only a few minutes as he connected the dots between voting, policy in Washington, and the student loan burdens many in the room would soon carry.
“Part of my thing is taking advantage of the opportunity,” Harrison tells me afterward in his baritone Southern lilt. “It’s not every day [that students meet] a younger politician who understands the same trials and tribulations that these kids are going through.”
At first blush, Harrison’s meet-them-where-they-are approach might look like a misstep when running against such a prominent—and lately notorious—DC figure. Over three terms in the Senate, Graham had cultivated a reputation as a staunch conservative who delivered bipartisan agreements on immigration and climate change—part of his identity as self-described “political wingman” to Arizona Sen. John McCain. (McCain had affectionately referred to his close ally as “Little Jerk.”)
But three years into the Trump presidency, Graham, who said during the 2016 election that he wished Republicans had kicked Trump out of the party, has become one of the president’s main sycophants. The reversal has earned him a particularly brutal impersonation from Saturday Night Live’s Kate McKinnon, whose sweaty Graham explains in a recent sketch that “even my bodily fluids are trying to distance themselves from me.”
There’s a method to Graham’s about-face. Surfing political trends is part of it: As the Republican base gravitated toward Trump, Graham followed suit. But maybe it’s more about Graham’s desire to remain close to power; a Republican strategist recently likened him to a “pilot fish” in Rolling Stone—“a smaller fish that hovers about a larger predator, like a shark, living off of its detritus.” Put more generously: “It’s better to be at the table than on the table,” says Matt Moore, former chair of the South Carolina Republican Party.
But Graham is also contending with a South Carolina that’s tinging bluer. And Trump’s presidency has seen a spate of Democratic wins and near-misses in the unlikeliest corners of the South, gains that relied on a formula of increasingly blue cities, party-flipping suburbs, and turnout of black voters. Harrison, a longtime Democratic operative and current Democratic National Committee associate chair, advised Democrat Doug Jones’ successful Senate campaign in Alabama. Now it’s Harrison’s turn to put his own strategies to the test.
“I think [the Democratic spirit] is alive and well all across the South. The real question is getting people to believe that it’s possible here,” Harrison says. “People have a little sliver of hope, and now it’s important for me to take that sliver and turn it into a roaring flame.”
Sixteen-year-old Patricia Harrison gave birth to Jaime on February 5, 1976; his father was never around much, and fully disappeared when Jaime was 10. Raised mostly by his grandparents in their mobile home in Orangeburg, South Carolina, a majority-black city about 45 minutes outside of Columbia, Harrison spent part of his childhood on food stamps, and some of it homeless. “My grandparents didn’t have much, but they raised me right,” Harrison said in his video campaign announcement.
Television delivered Harrison his model for an ideal life: The Cosby Show’s Huxtable family. He wanted what they had: “A middle class life—a nice house, a beautiful wife who’s a lawyer who spoke Spanish—that’s what I wanted.” None of his caretakers had finished high school. But “when [Denise] went off to college, I wanted to go to college.”
Those fictional role models were bolstered by real mentors. There was Ms. Fersner, the guidance counselor who Harrison worked for as a personal assistant and who taught him about the fee waivers that would let him take the SAT for free. There was Ms. Harrold, the AP calculus teacher with whom Harrison, a self-described nerd, chose to spend most of his lunch periods. Harrold also advised the school’s chapter of the National Honor Society and encouraged Harrison to run for president of the group’s regional board.
At an Honor Society event, Harrison met his future political mentor, James Clyburn, who’d just been elected to the US House—the first black South Carolinian elected to federal office in almost 100 years. “I told him I wanted to work in his office one day,” Harrison recalls. “He kind of laughed and said, ‘Well, you’ll need to go to college.’”
Harrison ended up at Yale, and then as a law student at Georgetown in 2003, he found his way back to Clyburn. In 2006, when Clyburn became leader of the House Democratic Caucus, he made Harrison executive director—the caucus’s youngest ever. And the next year, when Clyburn became the Democrats’ whip, Harrison ran vote counting for the party.
The day after Harrison’s appearance at Clinton College, I drive him from Denmark Technical, another historically black college, to Charleston, while he runs through the personalities he contended with in Congress. “We had Rahm [Emanuel], we had Steny [Hoyer], we had [Nancy] Pelosi,” he says, “and we had a large freshman class.” There were the influential subgroups, like the fiscally conservative Blue Dog Coalition, the Congressional Black Caucus, and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus. “Any group could tank a bill,” Harrison says. “One thing I’m proud of: We never lost a party-line vote on the floor. It may not have been the bill everybody wanted, but it was the best we could do for a very diverse caucus.”
Harrison says his time whipping votes gave him an “old, pragmatic” way of looking at the political process. “I’ve never seen a bill that started one way and looks exactly the same coming out,” he says. “It just doesn’t happen.” He brings the same gimlet eye to the Democratic presidential primary. “In the end, all of these proposals that candidates are talking about—none will look the same way once it goes through the process,” Harrison says. He’s equally wary of the efforts among progressives to replace incumbent Democrats with more liberal members. “Why spend your resources fighting with someone who agrees with you 97 percent of the time and not use those resources to go after a Peter King in New York or a Jim Jordan in Ohio?”
After five years in Clyburn’s office, Harrison left to join the Podesta Group, where his lobbying clients read like a progressive “most wanted” list: Walmart, the biotech giant Amgen, the pro-coal American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, General Dynamics, and Boeing.
His tenure there might not earn him accolades from the rising left, and when I mention this, his amiability wanes, and he takes a serious tone. “There’s nobody who can out-progressive me in terms of understanding the hardships of poverty,” Harrison says. “I’ve known it, I’ve seen it, I’ve touched it, I’ve tasted it, I’ve eaten it my entire life. And when I go into communities, poor black folks look at me and say, ‘Jaime, I would be so blessed if I can raise my kids and they grow up to do the things you’ve been able to do.’” Harrison won’t disclose how much he earned at the Podesta Group, but he used his salary to pay down $160,000 in student loan debt and take care of his mother’s bills.
“This purity test—it’s a fictional, made-up thing,” Harrison says. “We get so caught up in the politicking, and we forget about the reality of life in these communities.” He repeats an example he often gives on the stump: “We talk about a $15 minimum wage, and that’s great. But I had a conversation once with my cousin, and he said to me, ‘Jaime, I hear Democrats talking about that, and yeah, I would love to make that. But how can a brother just get a job?’”
Harrison’s campaign tries to directly address those issues, integrating community service with retail politics under its “Harrison Helps” initiative. The candidate, staff, and volunteers plan to travel around the state hosting events such as resume workshops and seminars for homebuyers. In August, Harrison’s team assembled 400 backpacks full of school supplies for students in his hometown of Orangeburg. The week before Christmas, volunteers served meals to families at the Ronald McDonald House in Charleston. Harrison’s grassroots campaign echoes the 1988 presidential primary race run by Jesse Jackson, who has voiced support for Harrison’s efforts.
“There’s nobody who can out-progressive me in terms of understanding the hardships of poverty,” Harrison says.
“Jaime seems to be the first candidate who has found a way to merge the sort of corporate Democratic Party support and the grassroots support,” says Moore, the former South Carolina Republican Party chair, who counts Harrison as a good friend.
On the trail, Harrison generally tries to avoid what he calls a “DC-oriented frame” of Democrat vs. Republican and instead talks about right vs. wrong. “I always say, interests live in your head, your values live in your gut and your heart,” he says.
Accordingly, you won’t hear him talk much about Graham. “We can use the fire of the anti-Lindsey [sentiment], but you can only use that to an extent,” Harrison tells me. “I always believe Democrats win when we can be hopeful and aspirational, not just tearing somebody down.” The most mention of Graham I heard was in front of a group of Charleston-area Democrats. They’re obsessed with Graham’s antics, Harrison says. (He’s right: The mostly white audience erupted into laughter and applause when Harrison mentioned his campaign is selling novelty Lindsey Graham flip-flops.)
The campaign’s focus groups have found that white women in South Carolina are skeptical of Graham because of his “continuous extreme flip-flopping on issues.” They were especially turned off by his tepid defense of McCain after the president’s postmortem attacks. Harrison’s campaign announcement video, titled “Character,” contrasted clips of Graham calling Trump a “race-baiting, xenophobic, religious bigot” with Graham later declaring the opposite. “Here’s a guy who will say anything to stay in office,” Harrison says to the camera, accusing Graham of having “traded his moral compass for petty political gain.”
In the summer of 2017, DNC Chair Tom Perez called Harrison for advice. Harrison, coming off four years as chair of the South Carolina Democratic Party, had lost his bid to lead the national party earlier that year. But Perez had given him a meaty consolation prize—an associate chair position tasked with developing the party’s Southern strategy.
Harrison’s first test would be helping Doug Jones, a former US attorney who had been at the helm of some of Alabama’s most important civil rights victories, and who was running in a special election to replace Sen. Jeff Sessions. Perez, who overlapped with Jones at the Justice Department, knew he had a good candidate in him, and, thanks to congressional Republicans’ incessant attempts to repeal the Affordable Care Act, also had a favorable political landscape. (This was before the accusations of child molestation against Republican candidate Roy Moore.)
Jones has a contentious relationship with the Alabama Democratic Party and Joe Reed, a powerful black political leader who’d long been among the party’s key power brokers. He needed a strategy to turn out black voters (above and beyond courting Reed), who account for more than a quarter of Alabama’s population but whose votes had been particularly depressed by voter-ID requirements and felon disenfranchisement.
Harrison and a few DNC staffers went down to Alabama that July and presented Jones with a blueprint he’d tested during a House special election in South Carolina. “I talked about the divisions within the African American community—and not so much divisions, but the different groupings, the older African Americans, African American women, younger African Americans, and the things that motivate them,” Harrison says.
“He emphasized how important it was to work alongside local folks who really understood that black voters aren’t a monolith,” Doug Turner, a senior adviser for Jones’ campaign, recalls. The advice proved crucial: Jones narrowly won, largely due to black voters, whose almost 30 percent turnout rate eclipsed previous Alabama Senate elections. “The votes are here,” Harrison says. “The question is, can we change the mentality?”
Other models from across the South also give Harrison confidence. Last November, Democrat Andy Beshear defeated Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin, who’d hitched his wagon to Trump in a state the president had won by 30 points. “Tonight’s big Democratic wins,” Harrison said in a statement after Beshear’s victory, “prove that a New South is truly rising.”
But can Harrison replicate that magic back home? In 2018, attorney Joe Cunningham flipped a South Carolina congressional seat blue for the first time in nearly 40 years. A lot went into Cunningham’s victory—a climate change platform informed by Charleston’s near-weekly tidal flooding; his promise to deny Pelosi the House speakership; a far-right GOP challenger sidelined by a car accident—but especially recent transplants to Charleston from bluer states. More than 80 percent of the state’s population growth comes from people moving from out of state, according to Charleston’s Post and Courier. The population’s racial makeup has stayed stagnant, but its generational makeup has changed considerably: The senior population in South Carolina is among the fastest-growing in the nation.
“Can Jaime Harrison do statewide what Joe Cunningham was able to do in the 1st Congressional District? They both have appeal in suburban areas and the benefit of going up against candidates who have steered hard to the right,” says Gibbs Knotts, who teaches political science at the College of Charleston. “I’m not one who thinks things are shifting way left, but there is a lot of opportunity with the changing demographics in the state.”
There’s “definitely a reconfiguration and scrambling of the winning coalition,” says Joe Trippi, a longtime Democratic strategist who worked on Jones’ campaign. Fiscally conservative voters, college Republicans, and Republican women are all more willing to give Democratic candidates a second look—especially, Trippi says, a moderate like Harrison: “The more that Lindsey Graham becomes part of the big fight of everyone going to their corners, those women and those younger Republicans are looking for someone to bridge the polarization. That’s where there’s an opening for someone like Jaime.”
During the last months of 2019, Harrison’s campaign says it raised more than $3.5 million, a record quarter for any candidate in South Carolina history. In December, a poll showed Harrison only two points behind Graham. Still, Trump won the state by 14 points, and another state poll shows Trump trouncing any hypothetical Democratic opponent there in 2020. Harrison may have ended the year with a massive fundraising haul, but his total raised during 2019 is still at least $5 million behind Graham’s. “To characterize this as a long shot would be accurate,” Knotts says.
Harrison’s biggest hurdle is a lack of name recognition. His “job is to make sure that he becomes a household name,” says Clay Middleton, a fellow South Carolina DNC member and Clyburn alum, “or at least a name that most people would recognize.” To achieve that, Harrison plans to follow a prescription he got from former Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams. “Stacey’s advice to me was, ‘Jaime, you gotta go everywhere. You can’t give up on anybody,’” Harrison tells me.
“You can win in the South, but in order to win, you have to invest,” he adds. “You have such large pockets of African American voters, and the big thing is you have to persuade them that an election is important enough for them to come out and vote.”


motherjones--2020-02-18--Lev Parnas Wants to Be a Resistance Hero

Last month , Lanny Davis placed a call to Joseph Bondy .
Bondy ’ s legal client , Lev Parnas , had just appeared on the Rachel Maddow Show , and Davis was calling to dispute a claim that Parnas had made about him .
But the topic of conversation soon shifted , and Davis offered some advice .
“ I said to Bondy , ‘ You made the right decision , ' ” Davis recalls , referring to the cable news appearances in which Parnas—who was indicted on campaign finance charges last year—alleged that President Donald Trump was fully @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Rudy Giuliani dig up dirt on Joe Biden .
Davis was speaking from experience .
Beginning in 2018 , he represented Michael Cohen , the Trump fixer and personal attorney now serving a three-year prison sentence after pleading guilty to tax fraud and campaign finance charges .
Like Parnas , Cohen was prosecuted by the US attorney ’ s office for the Southern District of New York .
And like Parnas , Cohen eventually abandoned his dogged loyalty to Trump , publicly denouncing the president ’ s misdeeds while offering to assist investigators @ @ @ @ @ @ @ during their phone call that he admired Davis ’ handling of Cohen ’ s case and “ learned a lot ” from it .
Asked about the conversation , Bondy said in an email that he had actually “ watched very little of the Cohen matter , ” and he sought to draw distinctions between the two cases .
He noted that Parnas offered to cooperate with prosecutors far more quickly than Cohen had .
“ I also believe our legal defense and PR efforts to be very different , ” Bondy said @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Michael Cohen.
” Regardless , Parnas is now attempting , as Cohen did before him , to use damaging disclosures about Trump and his allies to salvage his own reputation and , perhaps , to gain a measure of legal protection .
To this task , Parnas brings an apparent aptitude .
He seems good at getting people to trust him—even when they should perhaps know better .
In 2011 , a Florida couple , Dianne and Michael Pues , sued Parnas for stiffing them on a $ 350,000 loan he claimed was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ conned us from day one , ” Dianne Pues told the Tampa Bay Times last year .
Parnas also won the companionship of Giuliani , who now says Parnas “ misled ” him .
And he convinced wealthy businessmen around the world to finance travel activities and , allegedly , political contributions that gave him direct access to top Republican officials .
Now , having broken with his former patrons in the GOP , Parnas has turned his charms on the anti-Trump resistance .
In TV appearances , in press conferences , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Capitol building during Trump ’ s impeachment trial , Parnas has lobbed an array of accusations at the president and his top confidantes .
He ’ s shared documents with various publications and turned over troves of messages to House Democrats .
Some of Parnas ’ allegations are backed by evidence .
An iPhone recording of a 2018 dinner with Trump at the president ’ s hotel , for instance , suggests that Trump lied when he claimed not to know Parnas .
Other explosive charges remain unsubstantiated , such as Parnas @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , Attorney General William Barr , Secretary of State Mike Pompeo , former Energy Secretary Rick Perry , former national security adviser John Bolton , and Sen. Lindsey Graham ( R-S.C. ) were aware of Parnas ’ efforts to dig up phony material on Biden .
Parnas and Bondy are betting that Parnas ’ new status as a sort of celebrity exposer of presidential malfeasance will help him as he prepares for his upcoming trial and fends off attacks by Trump and his minions .
Parnas , that is , hopes attention from @ @ @ @ @ @ @ benefit .
This is a risky legal strategy .
And it ought to invoke profound skepticism .
Bondy has coined a hashtag , “ LetLevSpeak , ” in an effort to pressure members of Congress to allow Parnas to share what Bondy has described as “ his truth.
” But Parnas has already done plenty of speaking , and he leaves a lot out .
He has stayed silent about the source of funds he used to for the massive campaign donations that won him access to powerful GOP politicians .
He has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Russian businessman prosecutors say financed his efforts persuade Nevada legislators to alter marijuana laws .
Neither Parnas nor Bondy have answered Mother Jones ’ questions about those subjects .
Prosecutors have also said that Parnas misled them about a host of matters , including his alleged efforts to secretly advance the interests of “ at least one Ukrainian government official ” — reportedly Yuriy Lutsenko , the country ’ s former chief prosecutor—by smearing former US ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch .
Parnas denies acting as an agent for Lutsenko or other Ukrainian @ @ @ @ @ @ @ about the Ukraine scandal have shifted wildly , has also denied that he tried to cause Yovanovitch ’ s removal . )
In December , prosecutors sought unsuccessfully to have Parnas ’ bail revoked over his alleged concealment of a $ 1 million transfer that a lawyer for Ukrainian oligarch Dmytro Firtash sent last year to an account in Parnas ’ wife ’ s name .
Parnas claimed the money was a loan and denied misleading investigators about it .
Prosecutors have also accused Parnas of refusing to share his passwords for electronic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ slowing down the investigation .
Government lawyers have said they are likely to bring additional charges against Parnas and Igor Fruman , another Giuliani associate who allegedly conspired with Parnas in the campaign finance scheme .
While Bondy asserts he is prepared to go to trial , chances remain good that Parnas will eventually plead guilty and seek leniency in exchange for cooperation , perhaps by helping investigators look into Giuliani ’ s activity in Ukraine .
But SDNY prosecutors are known to dislike dealing with publicity-seeking defendants .
Given these factors , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of information about Giuliani—has drawn confusion and criticism from other defense attorneys .
He appears to be giving away whatever leverage he might have to bargain for a good deal—and likely pissing off the US attorney ’ s office to boot .
“ I wouldn ’ t even attempt to explain what Mr. Bondy is doing , ” said one attorney involved in the case .
“ It ’ s inexplicable , ” said John Dowd , a former lawyer for Trump who represents Fruman and briefly represented Parnas before Bondy took over @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Dowd because Dowd had pressured him to take a fall to protect Trump .
Dowd denies this . )
Bondy says he has a plan .
He told Mother Jones in November that he hoped lawmakers would grant Parnas immunity for statements he makes in potential congressional testimony .
“ I ’ d like to be able to arrive at some sort of understanding that is good for the republic , ” Bondy said .
But that looks unlikely .
Despite Bondy ’ s publicity tour , House Democrats have so far shown @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to appear publicly before them .
Parnas was not even among the impeachment witnesses Senate Democrats unsuccessfully pushed Republicans to call .
Congress has the power to grant witnesses limited immunity , meaning that prosecutors would be unable to use information from that congressional testimony in court .
But Congress would normally consult with the Justice Department on such a deal , and there ’ s little prospect the DOJ would want to complicate its case against Parnas by agreeing to that .
Lawmakers , too , are hesitant to deploy this power—a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of Reagan aide Oliver North in the Iran Contra scandal , due to Congress ’ decision to grant him immunity .
Bondy has said that , if Parnas is eventually convicted , he hopes his client will receive credit for the cooperation he has already given the House Intelligence Committee by turning over text messages and other records .
“ A reduction in the sentencing guidelines is possible from assisting with a congressional inquiry , ” Bondy told Politico last month .
Bondy also appears to have a broader public relations plan .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ by distributing material to select media outlets .
Trump ’ s acquittal in the Senate may mean that Parnas ’ ability to attract media attention—as well as the value of that attention—will soon decline .
But Bondy remains optimistic .
He has repeatedly teased Parnas ’ retention of a large stash of newsworthy material .
“ Over the past several months , it has been revealed that Lev Parnas is a prolific collector of photos and videos , ” Bondy told CNN recently .
“ Contrary to what one might expect , Mr. @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , he has preserved them .
The universe of subject matter is yet to be publicly revealed but is of interest in matters well beyond the impeachment inquiry.
” Bondy and Parnas ’ leaks have indeed covered topics that go well beyond Ukraine .
CNN reported this month on photographs provided by Bondy that showed Parnas and Giuliani in Spain with a Venezuelan man , Alejandro Betancourt , who hired Giuliani in connection with a sprawling money laundering investigation .
Betancourt has not been charged in the case .
Parnas ’ recording of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ indicated that Trump had misled the public about his relationship with Parnas .
But it also revealed major donors using their access to lobby the president on a wide range of policies affecting their industries .
Bondy ’ s efforts , while unconventional , are hardly unprecedented .
His brash , cable news-ready approach invokes Michael Avenatti , who parlayed representation of porn star Stormy Daniels into resistance hero status .
( Bondy appeared alongside Parnas on CNN and MSNBC , but said little . )
Avenatti even floated a White House bid @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for attempting to extort payments from Nike and for fraud and identity theft for allegedly stealing about $ 300,000 from Daniels .
Avenatti was convicted in the Nike case on Friday .
He has pleaded not guilty to the other charges .
But Bondy ’ s Parnas strategy seems even more similar to the course Davis helped to chart for Cohen , who delivered high-profile testimony against Trump before the House Oversight Committee less than a year ago .
Cohen hurled a laundry list of allegations , while claiming to “ regret all @ @ @ @ @ @ @ given the real estate mogul-turn-president since joining the Trump Organization in 2007 .
“ I am ashamed that I chose to take part in concealing Mr. Trump ’ s illicit acts rather than listening to my own conscience.
” Cohen said .
“ I am ashamed because I know what Mr. Trump is .
He is a racist .
He is a conman .
He is a cheat.
” Cohen has a GoFundMe account , which says it has raised $ 217,000 to help him and his family “ as he goes forward @ @ @ @ @ @ @ about Donald Trump.
” And since his testimony , Cohen has repeatedly touted his assistance to congressional Democrats investigating Trump while asking them to intervene in his criminal case .
So far , it hasn ’ t worked .
Cohen , who was disbarred last year , is serving out his full-term and is likely worse off due to his failure to secure a formal cooperation deal with prosecutors , as other former Trump aides did .
Davis argues that Cohen was treated harshly because SNDY prosecutors were angered when Cohen publicized evidence @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 2016 hush money payoff to Daniels .
Davis says this move was necessary to defend Cohen against Trump ’ s smears , but it didn ’ t keep Cohen out jail .
That ’ s one more piece of advice that Davis has for Bondy : Media attention may help improve Parnas ’ “ credibility [ and ] his reputation , but it doesn ’ t help him get a deal with prosecutors , ” Davis told Mother Jones .
Bondy counters that his client has a stronger bargaining position than Cohen did @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
“ He possesses a strong defense to the charges for which he is under indictment , ” Bondy told Mother Jones .
“ His information is of far greater significance , and involves a variety of individuals.
” With Parnas set to go on trial in October , he may soon find out if that ’ s enough to keep him out of prison .

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.
Last month, Lanny Davis placed a call to Joseph Bondy. Bondy’s legal client, Lev Parnas, had just appeared on the Rachel Maddow Show, and Davis was calling to dispute a claim that Parnas had made about him. But the topic of conversation soon shifted, and Davis offered some advice.
“I said to Bondy, ‘You made the right decision,'” Davis recalls, referring to the cable news appearances in which Parnas—who was indicted on campaign finance charges last year—alleged that President Donald Trump was fully aware of Parnas’ efforts to help Rudy Giuliani dig up dirt on Joe Biden.
Having broken with his former patrons in the GOP, Parnas has turned his charms on the anti-Trump resistance.
Davis was speaking from experience. Beginning in 2018, he represented Michael Cohen, the Trump fixer and personal attorney now serving a three-year prison sentence after pleading guilty to tax fraud and campaign finance charges. Like Parnas, Cohen was prosecuted by the US attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York. And like Parnas, Cohen eventually abandoned his dogged loyalty to Trump, publicly denouncing the president’s misdeeds while offering to assist investigators.
According to Davis, Bondy said during their phone call that he admired Davis’ handling of Cohen’s case and “learned a lot” from it. Asked about the conversation, Bondy said in an email that he had actually “watched very little of the Cohen matter,” and he sought to draw distinctions between the two cases. He noted that Parnas offered to cooperate with prosecutors far more quickly than Cohen had. “I also believe our legal defense and PR efforts to be very different,” Bondy said. “Lev Parnas is certainly no Michael Cohen.” Regardless, Parnas is now attempting, as Cohen did before him, to use damaging disclosures about Trump and his allies to salvage his own reputation and, perhaps, to gain a measure of legal protection.
To this task, Parnas brings an apparent aptitude. He seems good at getting people to trust him—even when they should perhaps know better. In 2011, a Florida couple, Dianne and Michael Pues, sued Parnas for stiffing them on a $350,000 loan he claimed was for a movie deal. “He conned us from day one,” Dianne Pues told the Tampa Bay Times last year. Parnas also won the companionship of Giuliani, who now says Parnas “misled” him. And he convinced wealthy businessmen around the world to finance travel activities and, allegedly, political contributions that gave him direct access to top Republican officials.
Now, having broken with his former patrons in the GOP, Parnas has turned his charms on the anti-Trump resistance. In TV appearances, in press conferences, and even in remarks as he walked to the Capitol building during Trump’s impeachment trial, Parnas has lobbed an array of accusations at the president and his top confidantes. He’s shared documents with various publications and turned over troves of messages to House Democrats.
Some of Parnas’ allegations are backed by evidence. An iPhone recording of a 2018 dinner with Trump at the president’s hotel, for instance, suggests that Trump lied when he claimed not to know Parnas. Other explosive charges remain unsubstantiated, such as Parnas’ claims that Vice President Mike Pence, Attorney General William Barr, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, former Energy Secretary Rick Perry, former national security adviser John Bolton, and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) were aware of Parnas’ efforts to dig up phony material on Biden.
Parnas and Bondy are betting that Parnas’ new status as a sort of celebrity exposer of presidential malfeasance will help him as he prepares for his upcoming trial and fends off attacks by Trump and his minions. Parnas, that is, hopes attention from Rachel Maddow fans will redound to his benefit. This is a risky legal strategy. And it ought to invoke profound skepticism.
Bondy has coined a hashtag, “LetLevSpeak,” in an effort to pressure members of Congress to allow Parnas to share what Bondy has described as “his truth.” But Parnas has already done plenty of speaking, and he leaves a lot out. He has stayed silent about the source of funds he used to for the massive campaign donations that won him access to powerful GOP politicians. He has yet to reveal the identity of a Russian businessman prosecutors say financed his efforts persuade Nevada legislators to alter marijuana laws. Neither Parnas nor Bondy have answered Mother Jones’ questions about those subjects.
Prosecutors have also said that Parnas misled them about a host of matters, including his alleged efforts to secretly advance the interests of “at least one Ukrainian government official”— reportedly Yuriy Lutsenko, the country’s former chief prosecutor—by smearing former US ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch. Parnas denies acting as an agent for Lutsenko or other Ukrainian officials. (Lustenko, whose claims about the Ukraine scandal have shifted wildly, has also denied that he tried to cause Yovanovitch’s removal.)
In December, prosecutors sought unsuccessfully to have Parnas’ bail revoked over his alleged concealment of a $1 million transfer that a lawyer for Ukrainian oligarch Dmytro Firtash sent last year to an account in Parnas’ wife’s name. Parnas claimed the money was a loan and denied misleading investigators about it. Prosecutors have also accused Parnas of refusing to share his passwords for electronic devices seized by law enforcement, thereby slowing down the investigation.
“I wouldn’t even attempt to explain what Mr. Bondy is doing.”
Government lawyers have said they are likely to bring additional charges against Parnas and Igor Fruman, another Giuliani associate who allegedly conspired with Parnas in the campaign finance scheme. While Bondy asserts he is prepared to go to trial, chances remain good that Parnas will eventually plead guilty and seek leniency in exchange for cooperation, perhaps by helping investigators look into Giuliani’s activity in Ukraine. But SDNY prosecutors are known to dislike dealing with publicity-seeking defendants. Given these factors, Parnas’ PR offensive—including his public disclosure of information about Giuliani—has drawn confusion and criticism from other defense attorneys. He appears to be giving away whatever leverage he might have to bargain for a good deal—and likely pissing off the US attorney’s office to boot.
“I wouldn’t even attempt to explain what Mr. Bondy is doing,” said one attorney involved in the case.
“It’s inexplicable,” said John Dowd, a former lawyer for Trump who represents Fruman and briefly represented Parnas before Bondy took over. (Parnas claimed that he replaced Dowd because Dowd had pressured him to take a fall to protect Trump. Dowd denies this.)
Bondy says he has a plan. He told Mother Jones in November that he hoped lawmakers would grant Parnas immunity for statements he makes in potential congressional testimony. “I’d like to be able to arrive at some sort of understanding that is good for the republic,” Bondy said. But that looks unlikely. Despite Bondy’s publicity tour, House Democrats have so far shown little interest in Parnas’ stated wish to appear publicly before them. Parnas was not even among the impeachment witnesses Senate Democrats unsuccessfully pushed Republicans to call. Congress has the power to grant witnesses limited immunity, meaning that prosecutors would be unable to use information from that congressional testimony in court. But Congress would normally consult with the Justice Department on such a deal, and there’s little prospect the DOJ would want to complicate its case against Parnas by agreeing to that. Lawmakers, too, are hesitant to deploy this power—a federal judge famously threw out the conviction of Reagan aide Oliver North in the Iran Contra scandal, due to Congress’ decision to grant him immunity.
Bondy has said that, if Parnas is eventually convicted, he hopes his client will receive credit for the cooperation he has already given the House Intelligence Committee by turning over text messages and other records. “A reduction in the sentencing guidelines is possible from assisting with a congressional inquiry,” Bondy told Politico last month.
Bondy also appears to have a broader public relations plan. He has kept Parnas in the news by distributing material to select media outlets. Trump’s acquittal in the Senate may mean that Parnas’ ability to attract media attention—as well as the value of that attention—will soon decline. But Bondy remains optimistic. He has repeatedly teased Parnas’ retention of a large stash of newsworthy material. “Over the past several months, it has been revealed that Lev Parnas is a prolific collector of photos and videos,” Bondy told CNN recently. “Contrary to what one might expect, Mr. Parnas has not destroyed any. Rather, he has preserved them. The universe of subject matter is yet to be publicly revealed but is of interest in matters well beyond the impeachment inquiry.”
Bondy and Parnas’ leaks have indeed covered topics that go well beyond Ukraine. CNN reported this month on photographs provided by Bondy that showed Parnas and Giuliani in Spain with a Venezuelan man, Alejandro Betancourt, who hired Giuliani in connection with a sprawling money laundering investigation. Betancourt has not been charged in the case. Parnas’ recording of his dinner at Trump’s hotel indicated that Trump had misled the public about his relationship with Parnas. But it also revealed major donors using their access to lobby the president on a wide range of policies affecting their industries.
Bondy’s efforts, while unconventional, are hardly unprecedented. His brash, cable news-ready approach invokes Michael Avenatti, who parlayed representation of porn star Stormy Daniels into resistance hero status. (Bondy appeared alongside Parnas on CNN and MSNBC, but said little.) Avenatti even floated a White House bid, which collapsed when he was indicted for attempting to extort payments from Nike and for fraud and identity theft for allegedly stealing about $300,000 from Daniels. Avenatti was convicted in the Nike case on Friday. He has pleaded not guilty to the other charges.
But Bondy’s Parnas strategy seems even more similar to the course Davis helped to chart for Cohen, who delivered high-profile testimony against Trump before the House Oversight Committee less than a year ago. Cohen hurled a laundry list of allegations, while claiming to “regret all the help and support” he had given the real estate mogul-turn-president since joining the Trump Organization in 2007. “I am ashamed that I chose to take part in concealing Mr. Trump’s illicit acts rather than listening to my own conscience.” Cohen said. “I am ashamed because I know what Mr. Trump is. He is a racist. He is a conman. He is a cheat.”
Cohen has a GoFundMe account, which says it has raised $217,000 to help him and his family “as he goes forward on his journey to tell the truth about Donald Trump.” And since his testimony, Cohen has repeatedly touted his assistance to congressional Democrats investigating Trump while asking them to intervene in his criminal case.
So far, it hasn’t worked. Cohen, who was disbarred last year, is serving out his full-term and is likely worse off due to his failure to secure a formal cooperation deal with prosecutors, as other former Trump aides did. Davis argues that Cohen was treated harshly because SNDY prosecutors were angered when Cohen publicized evidence of Trump’s involvement in a 2016 hush money payoff to Daniels. Davis says this move was necessary to defend Cohen against Trump’s smears, but it didn’t keep Cohen out jail. That’s one more piece of advice that Davis has for Bondy: Media attention may help improve Parnas’ “credibility [and] his reputation, but it doesn’t help him get a deal with prosecutors,” Davis told Mother Jones.
Bondy counters that his client has a stronger bargaining position than Cohen did and has been more forthcoming with investigators. “He possesses a strong defense to the charges for which he is under indictment,” Bondy told Mother Jones. “His information is of far greater significance, and involves a variety of individuals.”
With Parnas set to go on trial in October, he may soon find out if that’s enough to keep him out of prison.


motherjones--2020-02-18--Inside the Fight to Topple Lindsey Graham—and Trump’s Senate Majority


motherjones--2020-02-19--Why Mark Zuckerberg’s Plea for Regulation is an Enormous Cop Out

In October , when the Trump campaign began running a slew of ads spreading falsehoods about then-Democratic presidential frontrunner Joe Biden and his son ’ s business dealings in Ukraine , Facebook opted to do nothing , citing policies allowing politicians to include false claims in political ads that they pay the platform to spread .
Since then , the company has repeatedly suggested that it would like to take action against such content , but won ’ t until the government steps in and offers regulations that would be uniform across the industry .
On Saturday , company CEO @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Munich Security Conference , saying that “ we don ’ t want private companies making so many decision-balancing social equities without democratic processes .
I do think that there should be regulation in the West on harmful content…there ’ s a question about which framework you use.
” The argument neatly fits a longstanding pattern of technology companies wading into new , potentially destructive areas seeking revenue , only to follow up by saying that they ’ ll punt on making difficult ethical decisions that could hurt their bottom line until governments step @ @ @ @ @ @ @ last year Twitter banned all political advertising , and Google banned targeted political advertising , just last month , Facebook reiterated that it would not follow those major rivals , and would continue to let politicians lie in political advertisements .
At the time , Rob Leathern , Facebook ’ s director of product management , explained the company ’ s reasoning : “ Ultimately , we don ’ t think decisions about political ads should be made by private companies , which is why we are arguing for regulation that would apply @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
“ Frankly , we believe the sooner Facebook and other companies are subject to democratically accountable rules on this the better.
” While its deeply ironic the platform says that it ’ s interested in being “ democratically accountable ” as it has created an apparatus so powerful that it has in effect become its own digital government whose rules are subject to no vote and accountable to no constituency , the company isn ’ t the first tech giant to pursue profit while largely outsourcing responsibility .
In December 2018 , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ wrote a post acknowledging the potential for his company ’ s facial recognization products to exacerbate discrimination and erode privacy and asking the government to step in .
“ We don ’ t believe that the world will be best served by a commercial race to the bottom , with tech companies forced to choose between social responsibility and market success , ” he wrote .
Uber , Lyft , and Airbnb pioneered an aggressive version of this playbook by strong-arming their way into new cities , ignoring existing taxi and hotel laws @ @ @ @ @ @ @ off regulators .
Only after that would they typically agree to work with cities on some type of regulatory agreement .
The strategy lets technology companies get away with committing a sort of regulatory arbitrage where they figure out how to make money by using technology to circumvent laws in ways that were extremely difficult for policymakers to anticipate back when the existing legal frameworks were created .
Uber has created urban traffic congestion , dragged its feet on background checks for its drivers ( which might have contributed to it missing drivers @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and figured out how to pay its workers effectively below minimum wage .
The mess that Facebook is making and asking lawmakers to clean up isn ’ t all that different from Uber blowing past municipal regulations and then leaving lawmakers figure out how to address all of the new issues it created .
But instead of messing with urban planning , Facebook has enabled the flow of disinformation and misinformation , giving anyone who wants to new means to mislead and manipulate people .
Of course , governments have enough to do @ @ @ @ @ @ @ dollar corporations off-loading new public problems onto them .
To be fair , sometimes this is inevitable with new technologies .
But companies like Uber , Facebook , and Microsoft have made it a part of their business models : do whatever you want and leave regulators to work out the potential kinks .
It ’ s possible to strike a balance between asking for regulation and making difficult , principled decisions in the meantime .
After Microsoft asked for the government to step in on federal regulation it denied at least one @ @ @ @ @ @ @ use facial recognition software in cars and body cameras .
Twitter and Google ’ s recent actions show that companies can make changes to political advertising policies while waiting for lawmakers to come through on their promises of regulating them .
If government does move toward greater regulation of online political advertisement , it ’ s not as though Facebook is going to sit back and just watch the democratic process play out .
It will send its army of well-paid lobbyists to shape the policy .
This way , Facebook still likely @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , but gets to say that it let the government do it .
Facebook can also rest assured that the government ’ s hands will be more tied than its own : lawmakers would have to contend with constitutional restrictions that Facebook , as a private company , could ignore .
Facebook , whether unintentionally or intentionally , gave a deeper glimpse into its rationale behind sticking to its current positions last month when Facebook vice president Brian Bosworth said in a memo leaked to the New York Times that not changing Facebook @ @ @ @ @ @ @ well ” lead to Trump winning the 2020 presidential election .
Knowing this , he said , “ I find myself desperately wanting to pull any lever at my disposal to avoid the same result , ” but that he wouldn ’ t out of a sense of responsibility to be fair and impartial .
What Bosworth , and maybe all of Facebook , fails to realize that inaction to maintain the status quo is a form of partiality .
Specifically , in the context of political advertising , it ’ s a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ side that is more willing to lie and use other underhanded tactics—a side that , in 2020 , is easy to identify .
Putting aside his campaign , in the last presidential election Trump alone told some version of a lie or “ untruth ” every 3.25 minutes according to analysis conducted by Politico in 2016 .
While Facebook has championed transparency as a tool to mitigate the worst effects of harmful political ads , by leaving its political ad targeting tools intact , groups can spread misleading or outright false information on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Stamos , Facebook ’ s former chief security officer , disagrees with Facebook ’ s inaction and has explained the problems with its transparency alone stance in an interview with the Columbia Journalism Review ’ s Mathew Ingram .
“ In theory , the transparency efforts by a handful of companies should reduce the impact of micro-targeting , since those ads are no longer secret from the opposing party and media , ” Stamos said .
“ In practice , we are likely to see tens of thousands of A/B tested and programmatically @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in 2020 and the ability for the media or his opponent to correct the record when each is only seen by a tiny number of people is limited.
” In other words , no matter how much transparency Facebook provides , the zone will be so flooded that most ads , deceptive or not , will never be parsed .
Wanting regulation is fine , but doing nothing in the meanwhile isn ’ t the same as being impartial .
It ’ s tipping the scales and impeding the mechanisms of “ democratic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to maintain .

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.
In October, when the Trump campaign began running a slew of ads spreading falsehoods about then–Democratic presidential frontrunner Joe Biden and his son’s business dealings in Ukraine, Facebook opted to do nothing, citing policies allowing politicians to include false claims in political ads that they pay the platform to spread.
The company isn’t the first tech giant to pursue profit while largely outsourcing responsibility.
Since then, the company has repeatedly suggested that it would like to take action against such content, but won’t until the government steps in and offers regulations that would be uniform across the industry. On Saturday, company CEO Mark Zuckerberg reinforced this stance at the Munich Security Conference, saying that “we don’t want private companies making so many decision-balancing social equities without democratic processes. I do think that there should be regulation in the West on harmful content…there’s a question about which framework you use.”
The argument neatly fits a longstanding pattern of tech companies wading into new, potentially destructive areas seeking revenue, only to follow up by saying they’ll punt on making difficult ethical decisions that could hurt their bottom line until governments step in and force them to.
Though last year Twitter banned all political advertising, and Google banned targeted political advertising, just last month, Facebook reiterated that it would not follow those major rivals, and would continue to let politicians lie in political advertisements. At the time, Rob Leathern, Facebook’s director of product management, explained the company’s reasoning: “Ultimately, we don’t think decisions about political ads should be made by private companies, which is why we are arguing for regulation that would apply across the industry,” he wrote. “Frankly, we believe the sooner Facebook and other companies are subject to democratically accountable rules on this the better.”
While its deeply ironic the platform says that it’s interested in being “democratically accountable” as it has created an apparatus so powerful that it has in effect become its own digital government whose rules are subject to no vote and accountable to no constituency, the company isn’t the first tech giant to pursue profit while largely outsourcing responsibility.
In December 2018, for example, Microsoft President Brad Smith wrote a post acknowledging the potential for his company’s facial recognization products to exacerbate discrimination and erode privacy, and asking the government to step in. “We don’t believe that the world will be best served by a commercial race to the bottom, with tech companies forced to choose between social responsibility and market success,” he wrote.
Uber, Lyft, and Airbnb pioneered an aggressive version of this playbook by strong-arming their way into new cities, ignoring existing taxi and hotel laws and reshaping the business environment while fending off regulators. Only after that would they typically agree to work with cities on some type of regulatory agreement.
If government does move toward greater regulation, it’s not as though Facebook is going to sit back and just watch.
The strategy lets technology companies get away with committing a sort of regulatory arbitrage where they figure out how to make money by using technology to circumvent laws in ways that were extremely difficult for policymakers to anticipate back when the existing legal frameworks were created. Uber has created urban traffic congestion, dragged its feet on background checks for its drivers (which might have contributed to it missing drivers who have sexually assaulted riders), and figured out how to pay its workers effectively below minimum wage.
The mess that Facebook is making and asking lawmakers to clean up isn’t all that different from Uber blowing past municipal regulations and then leaving lawmakers to figure out how to address all the new issues it created. But instead of messing with urban planning, Facebook has enabled the flow of disinformation and misinformation, creating new means to mislead and manipulate people.
Of course, governments have enough to do, and don’t need multibillion-dollar corporations offloading new public problems onto them. Sometimes this is inevitable with new technologies. But companies like Uber, Facebook, and Microsoft have made it part of their business models: Do whatever you want and leave regulators to work out the potential kinks.
It’s possible to strike a balance between asking for regulation and making difficult, principled decisions in the meantime. After Microsoft asked for the government to step in on federal regulation, it denied at least one law enforcement agency’s request to use facial recognition software in cars and body cameras. Twitter’s and Google’s recent actions show that companies can make changes to political advertising policies while waiting for lawmakers to come through on their promises of regulating them.
If government does move toward greater regulation of online political advertisement, it’s not as though Facebook is going to sit back and just watch the democratic process play out. It will send its army of well-paid lobbyists to shape the policy. This way, Facebook still likely gets a strong say in what happens, but gets to say that it let the government do it. Facebook can also rest assured that the government’s hands will be more tied than its own: Lawmakers would have to contend with constitutional restrictions that Facebook, as a private company, could ignore.
Inaction to maintain the status quo is a form of partiality.
Facebook, whether intentionally or not, gave a deeper glimpse into its rationale behind sticking to its current positions last month when Facebook Vice President Andrew Bosworth said in a memo leaked to the New York Times that not changing Facebook’s current policies “may very well” lead to Trump winning the 2020 presidential election. Knowing this, he said, “I find myself desperately wanting to pull any lever at my disposal to avoid the same result,” but that he wouldn’t out of a sense of responsibility to be fair and impartial.
What Bosworth, and maybe all of Facebook, fails to realize is that inaction to maintain the status quo is a form of partiality. Specifically, in the context of political advertising, it’s a form of partiality that clearly benefits the side that is more willing to lie and use other underhanded tactics—a side that, in 2020, is easy to identify. Putting aside his campaign, in the last presidential election Trump alone told some version of a lie or “untruth” every 3.25 minutes according to analysis conducted by Politico in 2016.
While Facebook has championed transparency as a tool to mitigate the worst effects of harmful political ads, by leaving its political ad targeting tools intact, groups can spread misleading or outright false information on the platform without anyone noticing. Alex Stamos, Facebook’s former chief security officer, disagrees with Facebook’s inaction and has explained the problems with its transparency in an interview with the Columbia Journalism Review’s Mathew Ingram. “In theory, the transparency efforts by a handful of companies should reduce the impact of micro-targeting, since those ads are no longer secret from the opposing party and media,” Stamos said. “In practice, we are likely to see tens of thousands of A/B tested and programmatically generated ads out of the Trump campaign in 2020 and the ability for the media or his opponent to correct the record when each is only seen by a tiny number of people is limited.” In other words, no matter how much transparency Facebook provides, the zone will be so flooded that most ads, deceptive or not, will never be parsed.
Wanting regulation is fine, but doing nothing in the meanwhile isn’t the same as being impartial. It’s tipping the scales and impeding the mechanisms of “democratic accountability” that Facebook claims it wants to maintain.