Trump scam explodes into the open - Another Day - Brian Tyler Cohen

[TexasTowelie]

BTC: Trump gets people off their screens by cheating them out of the phones they paid for. This is just another day.
It's no secret that Donald Trump likes to put his name on things. Buildings, steak, water, his FBI director's face right before an important congressional hearing. Sorry, Kash, but you shouldn't have blacked out in the Oval Office. You know what a prankster the president can be. All to say, it came as no surprise when a year ago, Trump enlisted his two failiest fail sons to slap the family name on another piece of merch.

[cut to video from MS NOW]
Donald Trump, Jr.: Today, we're here to introduce Trump Mobile.

Eric Trump: Making phones in America. It's about time we bring products back to our great country.

[cut to video from The Benny Show]
Donald Trump, Jr.: We're going to be uh having call centers for Trump Mobile uh in St. Louis, so we're keeping our data on shore.

[cut to video from MS NOW]
Eric Trump: We plan to build phones in America. Um all of our customer support is in America. A lot of people are getting ripped off to say the least because they don't pay attention to our cell phone plans. Uh so I think we can do it better.

[cut to studio]
BTC: To be clear, when this naked mole rat says we can do it better, he means the ripping off part, not the mobile plan. Because yesterday we found out this.

[cut to video from NBC News]
Host: It's been nearly a year since the announcement of this new wireless service called Trump Mobile, but so far it seems like customers have been left on hold. This this venture, if you will, spearheaded by the president's two older sons, Don Jr. and Eric initially. They touted the roll out of this gold colored phone. It's set to be sold for just under 500 bucks. So, it rolled out. People were asked to put down a $100 deposit if they wanted one. But since then, the release date has been delayed. The phones still have not shipped. It is not clear when or if, in fact, they ever will.

[cut to studio]
BTC: What? What the hell did you say? Are you trying to tell me that the same bullshit Trump has been openly pulling for decades of extracting people's money and/or labor, then refusing to compensate them? Are you saying that in this case Trump is again behaving in the manner to which we have become accustomed? Are you? Because if you're saying that a person's past behavior should be a predictor of future behavior, if that's what you're saying, then yeah, no, that makes total sense.

But look, this was such an obvious grift. There's no way that any substantial number of people could have possibly fallen for it, right?

[cut to video from The Beat]
Ari Melber: Well over 500,000 people each paid a $100 deposit to get in on the planned and promised Trump phone.

[cut to studio]
BTC: 500,000 people, meaning Trump's family just made 59 million bucks without delivering a single product. At this point, buying stuff from the Trumps is like getting a lap dance. It feels promising in the moment, but you're going to wind up painfully unsatisfied with only yourself to blame.

Still, there has to be some legal recourse for customers who get screwed, right?

[cut to video from NBC News]
Brian Cheung: There's some interesting new language on the website in their terms and conditions that was updated in April as part of a broad redesign of the website.

And it says, "A pre-order deposit does not guarantee that a device will be produced or made available for purchase." So, it seems like the terms and conditions themselves seem to acknowledge that this phone might not exist now, and it might not even exist ever.

[cut to studio]
BTC: Oh, I see. So, this was less of an exchange of goods for money and more of a straw poll. Like, if we were going to create a mobile service, would you be interested? And instead of answering the hypothetical question with words, or a show of hands, or corn kernels in a mason jar, you answer with $100 that you'll never get back.

Here's what I don't get. If Trump is going to go to the trouble of building a whole business, why not just make the fucking phones? There had to have been some unforeseen obstacle that was out of Trump's control, right?

Maybe onerous tariffs are to blame? Okay. Uh maybe a totally unnecessary war disrupted the supply? Okay. Uh maybe delivery was all but impossible because someone defunded the post? You know what? Fine. Uh I give up. What are the obstacles?

[cut to video from The Beat]
Ari Melber: The company's selling point was that this somewhat gilded device would be made in America. You heard that in some of those clips. Now they say it will be proudly American. It will be designed with American values in mind.

[cut to studio]
BTC: Ah, I see. American values in mind. So, Chinese people will be making the phones, but they'll be wearing American flag bikinis while they do it. Cool.

For Trump, politics is something that he does with the time left over when he's not reposting QAnon, or tending to the much more lucrative occupation of licensing his name. And he's not the only one treating the Executive Branch like a minor side hustle. Take Transportation Secretary and not so former reality star Sean Duffy, whose true vocation was on full display this week.

[cut to video from Good Morning America]
Voiceover: This morning, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy defending his seven-month side project.

Sean Duffy: Put your seat belts on. [reality video snip with his children]

Voiceover: The one time the Real World star is returning to reality TV in a five-pa t series called The Great American Road Trip following Duffy, his wife, Fox News anchor Rachel Campos Duffy, and their children traveling to iconic American places. President Trump featured in the first moments of the newly released trailer.

Sean Duffy: So, the motto is to love America is to see America.

[cut to studio]
BTC: You know, it's funny. A lot of reality TV stars use the exposure on reality TV as a springboard to a better life. But I guess Sean Duffy prefers to use it as a springboard to more reality TV. You know, Sean, if your true passion is making reality shows, you're working a lot harder than you need to. What's next? You go to medical school just so you can make the great American colonoscopy.

But what bugs me about Sean Duffy's extracurriculars isn't just that they take time away from the transportation department at a critical moment when it kind of seems like we could use it. What bugs me is stuff like this.

[cut to video]
Voiceover: The show's nonprofit production company, Great American Roadtrip, Inc. lists 17 sponsors on its website, including Boeing and United Airlines, which are companies regulated by the Department of Transportation.

[cut to studio]
BTC: Companies he regulates are paying for his show. I don't want to be cynical. I don't want to assume that he compelled them to foot the bill for him, his wife, and his nine children to travel cross country, but honestly, do you know how much it costs to take a family vacation with nine children? I'm not sure it's possible without corporate sponsorships.

Look, I know the majority of Trump administration officials have spent most of their career in the private sector, but they seem to think that public service jobs are jobs where the public serves them and it would be one thing to watch them raid the federal government's coffers to get their nut if the American people were also getting ours. But that's not what's going on.

[cut to video from ABC News]
Host: The April inflation report shows inflation at its highest level in 3 years.

[cut to studio]
BTC: 3.8%. Inflation is now higher than when Joe Biden left office. It's the reason Americans voted Biden out of office. That and the fact that he said this on stage.

[inset video]
President Biden: Look, if we finally beat Medicare.

[cut to studio]
BTC: Needless to say, we did not beat Medicare. And here's what Trump had to say back then a month before he was reelected.

[cut to video at Detroit Economic Club]
Trump: Think of it. Within one year, you're going to have electric bills and energy bills and your gasoline for your car. It's going to be 50, 50% cheaper than it is right now. That's a big thing.

[cut to studio]
BTC: Trump was elected on the promise that things would get better and they have for him and his family and the people who work for him. He's used the power of his office not to improve our lives, but to double his own net worth and play designer with Washington DC like it was his own personal dollhouse. The ballroom, the reflecting pool, the victory arch and he does all that because not even money is enough. He needs to make sure that we won't forget him when he's gone. Like a dog peeing on every tree. But jokes's on him because his corruption and greed, not his shitty aesthetic, will be his legacy. And you know what that is?

[inset video]
Trump: That's a big thing.

BTC: It is, but not in the way that you want it to be.