The Stream

The Brew: Vance Rises, RFK Jr. Finally Gets Secret Service Protection, Trump-Supporting Rapper Hits #1 With Defiant ‘You Missed’

By Al Perrotta Published on July 16, 2024 •

Al Perrotta

Happy Tuesday!

Don’t you just hate those slow news weeks in the dog days of summer?

Seriously, today’s Brew needs to be an energy drink to keep up with all the latest developments.

And the Running Mate Is … J.D. Vance

I guess Donald Trump doesn’t mind beards after all. The former president has selected freshman Sen. J.D. Vance from Ohio as his running mate. Both were officially nominated last evening. Read all about it in “And the Running Mate Is … Ohio Senator J.D. Vance.”

Tucker Carlson summarized the pick this way: “Every bad person I’ve ever met in Washington was aligned against J.D. Vance.”

Certainly the odds were aligned against Vance growing up. It’s fascinating to watch an interview he did seven years ago with Megyn Kelly, after his book Hillbilly Elegy became a bestseller and he returned to Ohio after being a venture capitalist in Silicon Valley.

Watch this and tell me if you think having the Left call him names will be harder than what he’s already been through in life.

Trump Calls for RFK Jr. to Get Secret Service Protection as Questions Mount … and Mayorkas Finally Agrees

As investigators try to figure out how in the world Donald Trump could be left as vulnerable to an attack as he was on Saturday, the mystery remains why the Secret Service has refused Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.’s repeated requests for Secret Service protection over the last few months. We need the truth because it’s too easy to conclude the answer to both questions is the same: that the Biden administration wants his rivals out of the way. We pray this is not the case, but malice or thirst for power has to be considered along with the more likely reasons of incompetence and indifference.

Yesterday, Trump called on the Secret Service to immediately grant protection to the Independent candidate. He posted on Truth Social: “In light of what is going on in the world today, I believe it is imperative that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. receive Secret Service protection — immediately. Given the history of the Kennedy Family, this is the obvious right thing to do!”

Homeland Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas must have been listening … or holding his finger to the winds. After months of denying RFK Jr. protection, the Biden administration finally caved on Monday and gave it to him.

The Dumpster Fire of the Secret Service

Meanwhile, the same guy who insisted for three years that the border was closed and secure says it is “unequivocally false” that the Department of Homeland Security rejected the Trump campaign’s requests for more protection. Mayorkas also expressed his “full confidence” in Secret Service chief Kimberly Cheatle and the leadership of the agency. Really?

His statement is all the more troublesome considering the Secret Service spokesperson is blaming local cops for Saturday’s shooting. Spokesman Anthony Gugliemi told The New York Times that the building from which Thomas Crooks fired upon Trump was supposed to be covered by local police since it was outside the official perimeter. Yeah? If that’s the case, then who determined the perimeter and put that obvious threat potential outside it? Who would be overseeing the local law enforcement efforts? Dan Bongino’s sources say the Secret Service spotted Crooks with the rifle, but lost track of him — leading Bongino to ask, “Why was President Trump even on the stage at that point?”

It’s not just the former Secret Service agent who is asking these questions. One of the eyewitnesses who had been trying to alert authorities to Crooks wondered the same thing at the time.

And don’t try to say there wasn’t enough time to stop the shooter. This amazing — if disheartening — side-by-side video shows two full minutes passing from the time witnesses started noticing Crooks and alerting authorities to when the shots rang out. Two minutes.

Meanwhile, ABC News reports that very same roof from which Crooks fired had been used by local police as a staging area for the former president’s rally. And nobody stayed on it?!

Mayorkas has “full confidence” in leadership that as journalist Christopher Rufo noted lists “diversity” as one of its top three priorities.

Why does it seem that the more we learn, the more we see that Mayorkas isn’t interested in securing the homeland, but in helping secure its demise?

“You Missed”

Actor-singer Jack Black is getting raked over the coals for the sick sentiments of his bandmate during a Tenacious D show in Australia. Black gave Kyle Gass a birthday cake and asked him to “make a wish.”

Gass replied, “Don’t miss Trump next time.” There are no words for how egregious this is.

On the other side of the coin, the number one song on iTunes yesterday was “You Missed” from rapper Tom MacDonald. The powerful, passionate track was written and recorded after Saturday’s attack. “Trump got shot,” MacDonald tweeted, “I fired back.” Indeed. (Warning: Mild language.)

Borders are open to people with felonies, Biden can’t stop ’em, he don’t have the energy
Y’all wanna kill the man trying to fight for a better tomorrow by making him Kennedy?
I tried to give y’all a chance, like “maybe the left isn’t nuts”, I was wrong
Y’all are exactly as crazy as every conservative person I know said you were all along
Wanna protest? Go hard
Wanna burn flags? Go off
But y’all are so triggered that you’re pulling triggers at presidents, y’all the terrorists when you’re armed.

…

There’s no one else you can blame
Tried to lock him up in a cage
Now you tryna kill what you hate
B**** you missed!

The track has a fury and intensity that rings familiar. In June 1968, the day after the murder of Robert F. Kennedy, Sr., the Rolling Stones rewrote a song they’d been working on and recorded the searing “Sympathy for the Devil.”

Along The Stream

John Zmirak writes “The Left Wants to Take Our Guns and Leave Us Defenseless. Ask Yourselves Why? Donald Trump Knows the Answer.”

Dr. Michael Brown asks, “Could Trump Become the Great Unifier?”

 

Al Perrotta is The Stream’s Washington bureau chief, coauthor with John Zmirak of The Politically Incorrect Guide to Immigration, and coauthor of the counterterrorism memoir Hostile Intent: Protecting Yourself Against Terrorism.

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