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It wasn’t long after Donald Trump’s classified documents scandal broke when the former president and his allies concocted a series of flawed defenses. Among the worst was the “everybody does it” line, rooted in the idea that many former presidents did effectively the same thing that Trump did.
The principal problem with the defense was that it was ridiculous: The circumstances surrounding the Republican’s alleged felonies made his controversy unique.
Nearly two years later, it was odd to see Sen. Lindsey Graham roll out a similar argument in response to Trump’s ongoing criminal trial in New York. Rolling Stone reported on the South Carolina Republican’s latest interview with CNN’s Dana Bash:
When Bash asked Graham about former National Enquirer publisher David Pecker testifying he used to “catch and kill” potentially damaging stories about Trump to help his presidential run, Graham brushed it off as a common media strategy. “You know, apparently a lot of people do this: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Tiger Woods,” Graham said.
By all appearances, the senator wasn’t kidding.
To be sure, this line of defense isn’t entirely new. About a year ago, before Tucker Carlson parted ways with Fox News, the anchor told his audience, “In this case, you can believe whatever side you want to believe. But paying people not to talk about things, hush money, is ordinary in modern America.”
Just to quickly recap, based on the evidence already filed by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office, a relatively straightforward picture has emerged. As Election Day 2016 approached, Trump and his political operation were concerned about the public learning about his alleged extramarital sexual encounter with a porn star who goes by the name Stormy Daniels. With those fears in mind, the then-candidate and his team created a shell company, which Trump’s fixer, Michael Cohen, used to pay off Daniels, effectively buying her silence.
Soon after, Trump, according to prosecutors, falsified business records while incrementally making payments to Cohen, reimbursing the lawyer for the scheme, even from the White House. These are the same payments that ultimately helped send Cohen to prison.
To think such schemes are “ordinary” in modern American life is obviously bonkers, but what about Graham’s argument? Haven’t other celebrities been caught up in similar messes?
Perhaps, but — and this is the important part — those other celebrities didn’t seek the nation’s highest office.
And yet, there was Graham — on the heels of Trump’s latest anti-Graham harangue — peddling the line on national television as if it were credible. It was not.
In the same interview, the South Carolinian added that he would “absolutely” support the presumptive nominee in the fall, even if Trump is a convicted felon by Election Day.