Press: The evidence is mounting: Cozying up to Trump is poison

Any other time, it would have been a big deal — when former Donald Trump adviser Peter Navarro was found guilty of contempt of Congress. Not this time. Instead of banner headlines about a top White House official breaking the law, the general reaction to Navarro’s guilty verdict was: “Ho hum. Yet another former Trump ally charged with a crime.”  

 After all, Navarro is hardly the first former Trump aide to get in trouble with the law. He’s just the latest in a string of dozens of hangers-on who’ve lost their reputation, career or freedom because they made the fatal mistake of cozying up to Donald Trump.    

 It started with Trump’s 2016 campaign manager Paul Manafort, who was sentenced to 120 months in prison for tax and bank fraud and illegal lobbying and served 23 months before being pardoned by Trump. Manafort’s deputy Rick Gates, also convicted, spent 45 days in jail. Next up: Trump’s longtime personal attorney Michael Cohen, sentenced to prison for three years in 2018 for what one judge called a “veritable smorgasbord of crimes,” including arrangement of hush payments from Donald Trump to two women with whom he allegedly had affairs.   

 Like Navarro, President Trump’s chief political adviser Steve Bannon was convicted of contempt of Congress and sentenced to four months in prison. He remains free, pending an appeal. Not so fortunate was Allen Weisselberg, longtime chief financial officer of the Trump Organization, who served four months in Rikers Island jail after being convicted for his role in decades of tax fraud by the Trump business operation.  

 Perhaps no one has fallen more in public grace from his association with Donald Trump than Rudy Giuliani. According to a recent CNN poll, after serving as Trump’s lawyer, Giuliani’s seen his popularity sink from 76 percent in the days after Sept. 11, when he was celebrated as “America’s Mayor,” to 16 percent today. He’s named an unindicted co-conspirator in Donald Trump’s Jan. 6 indictment. He was indicted in Georgia for his actions in the same plot. He’s been found liable for defaming two Georgia election workers. For his role in claiming fraud after the 2020 election, he’s been suspended from practicing law in New York state and recommended for disbarment in Washington, D.C. And he’s reportedly broke. Thank you, Donald.   

 The list goes on and on. Add former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, indicted in the Georgia election fraud case, together with former Trump attorneys John Eastman, Sidney Powell, Jenna Ellis, Ray Smith, Kenneth Chesebro and Robert Cheeley — and former Trump campaign official Mike Roman and Justice Department worker Jeffrey Clark. Also indicted along with Trump in the Mar-a-Lago presidential documents case were Trump aides Walt Nauta and Carlos De Oliveira.   

The Trump crime wave began much earlier, while he was still in the White House. In addition to the aforementioned Paul Manafort, Rick Gates, Michael Cohen and Steve Bannon, those hit with criminal charges include: fundraiser Elliott Broidy, for illegal lobbying; former national security adviser Michael Flynn, for lying to the FBI about his contacts with Russia; George Nader, for sex crimes with minors; George Papadopoulos, for lying to the FBI; and Roger Stone, for lying to Congress. Flynn, Stone and Papadopoulos were pardoned by Trump.     

 Clearly, as many have learned the hard way, getting close to Donald Trump means getting burned. And not just individuals, but the nation, too. America embraced Trump in 2016 and is now fighting to save its soul. There’s an important warning therein for 2024.  

Press hosts “The Bill Press Pod.” He is the author of “From the Left: A Life in the Crossfire.”