OPINION: Team Trump can’t lose sight of the real threat

I found myself wondering over the weekend whether anyone in Trump Tower was sincerely surprised when Hillary Clinton — the crown princess of pay-to-play — went back on her promise to honor the election results and joined Jill Stein’s quixotic election recall effort.

Quixotic probably doesn’t do Stein’s effort justice, Save Jerseyans.

Even if Clinton somehow prevailed on recounts in Wisconsin and Michigan, she’d need to find more than 68,000 votes to change the results in Pennsylvania, a nearly impossible feat. Remember: for perspective’s sake, recall how the 2000 Florida recount took George W. Bush’s margin from 1,784 on Election Night down to 537 at the end of an extensive recount effort. Hillary would need approximately 57-times more votes than the Florida recount uncovered. Good luck, ladies!

Impossible is the better descriptor.

But changing the November 8th result isn’t the actual goal. Never was. The recount is primarily designed to delegitimize the incoming Trump Administration. A goal which was totally foreseeable.

That’s what the President-elect and his team gets for doing the noble, patriotic thing and pledging to forgo a criminal prosecution of Hillary Clinton, a decision announced by Trump campaign manager and New Jersey’s own Kellyanne Conway mere days before Hillary and her team threw in behind Stein’s recount effort.

Romney-ClintonBack to my original question: was anyone in Trump Tower surprised? 

It would be hard to believe. Donald Trump is famously suspicious of anyone not named Trump (like his children) or married to a Trump (like son-in-law Jared Kushner). He once explained to Megyn Kelly how he’s a counter-puncher, someone who doesn’t let opponents get the best of him without weathering a rainstorm of blows from the hard-nosed Manhattan developer. And, not to put too fine a point on it, but he’s dealing we’re talking about Hillary Clinton here. The woman who along with her infamously lecherous husband would (and has) done just about anything for power. Her embattled foundation’s donations have fallen dramatically. An animal is most dangerous when backed into a corner….

Trump should’ve anticipated all of this and gone for the proverbial jugular and prosecuted her, as he promised. Magnanimity as a political virtue went out the window when the two major parties nominated a reality star and an international criminal as their respective standard bearers. You can’t rely on a faithless person to help you unite a country. Heck; the Clintons started the culture wars. They’re the cause behind much of what ails this nation. They ARE the manifestation of problem. Removing the Clintons from the halls of power is central to any solution.

I digress.

This next part is the reason why we’re here. While Team Trump appeared relatively united on the plan to let Hillary off the hook, they seem to be at war with one another over what to do with Mitt Romney, that most vocal of all #NeverTrump critics who is now apparently under consideration for Secretary of State.

Kellyanne Conway
Conway

Conway appeared to be speaking for herself this time around, not the President-elect, when she did the Sunday morning talk circuit over the weekend and slammed Romney, expressing grave personal concerns with his potential elevation to a coveted cabinet position.

War within the Tower walls?

A coordinated strategy to knock Romney down a peg after he already privately turned the job down?

Or is Kellyanne simply (and genuinely) upset over this single issue?

It’s typically hard to make heads or tails of palace intrigue. It’s usually pointless to try for that very reason, Save Jerseyans.

I’ll say this much: Team Trump needs to keep its eye on the ball here.

Love him or hate him, Mitt Romney spoke for many of us back during the primary season. I ultimately made a different decision on Election Day than he did, but with a statesman like Romney who’s spent his life taking pay cuts to serve his faith and his country, past need not be prologue if President-elect Trump is serious about public service and building a team of rivals to unite the opposition to big government Leftism. The last thing our next Commander-in-Chief needs is a yes man or another ideologue with designs on establishment whack-a-mole hunting. He needs the best available men and women to turn our national ship around before it slams into the iceberg.

Hillary, and Jill Stein, their corrupt, shadowy financiers, the protesters supporting cop killers in our streets and the billionaires donating millions to national pacs designed subvert our democratic process?

Those are Trump’s true opponents over the next 4-to-8 years. The real, present and dangerous existential threat to Americanism, republicanism and our way of life.

Not Mitt Romney.

Revolutions over-focused on protecting the revolution often lose the war after it’s already won.

Trump lost the popular vote by 2 million plus votes. That hardly makes him illegitimate; it does send a clear signal to the next president and his transition officers that uniting the Right, and building a stronger party, remains essential to future successes.

Let’s hope the President-elect and his team don’t lose sight of that reality in the critical weeks and months to come. Everything hinges on it.

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Matt Rooney
About Matt Rooney 8405 Articles
MATT ROONEY is SaveJersey.com's founder and editor-in-chief, a practicing New Jersey attorney, and the host of 'The Matt Rooney Show' on 1210 WPHT every Sunday evening from 7-10PM EST.