The Lincoln Project is finished. Don’t let their Twitter activity suggest anything otherwise. They’re just posting stuff with a total lack of self-awareness. You can’t claim to be principled when you whored out for Democrats. You certainly can’t say so when your co-founder, John Weaver, was allegedly predating younger men for years through communications that were way outside the realm of anything appropriate or professional. It’s bad enough that Weaver was reportedly offering job opportunities for sex. It’s worse than some of these men were allegedly underage when he first reached out. Now, these communications were not explicit in nature, but the FBI did launch an investigation into them regardless. It’s all bad. Most of the original crew is gone. The work environment was reportedly toxic, but these were the good character squad, which was one of the many things they supposedly despised about Trump: he lacked such qualities.
Good @AP exposé proving what what was already obvious:
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) February 11, 2021
1) @ProjectLincoln lied when it denied knowing of complaints about John Weaver’s sexual misconduct;
2) It was a massive financial scam to enrich its founders at the expense of gullible liberals.https://t.co/k6lFrgqzS4 pic.twitter.com/U6RRKIEPdO
Some $90 million were given to this swamp operative project. The New York Post did an excellent piece about its shady inner-workings, which snowballed once the Weaver allegations broke. And after that occurred, the liberal media turned on them. It’s not hard to figure out why we’re learning about this crew and their shady deeds. The liberal media hated Trump. They found a group of despicable people who called themselves Republicans who hated Trump, so it was just another round in the magazine for them. Drew Holden is the master of keeping receipts on stuff like this and he compiled a helluva thread that explains how this group’s actions were shielded until the bottom gave out. In the end, the operation used the liberal media and their contacts within it expertly to pull off quite a heist:
??THREAD??
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
Today we learned more about how awful @ProjectLincoln is.
If you’re wondering how these guys survived for so long, it’s because tons of people in the media & beyond boosted this pack of no-good grifters.
And I’ve got the receipts to remind them.??
After @ProjectLincoln got started, tons of media poured endless attention into them because they said mean things about Trump.
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
Places like @CNN were happy to hype the group up without pausing to consider if they might be awful. pic.twitter.com/TagrjIJo7N
@Acosta could’ve been confused for @ProjectLincoln press secretary there for awhile. pic.twitter.com/Ivn1JTg2hS
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
@ProjectLincoln got a lot of truly fawning coverage. This first story from @washingtonpost is indicative of the broader pattern.
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
I mean, seriously? Their plan “for preserving the union”? pic.twitter.com/rvf8zfmEWw
The most egregious was probably this @NewYorker story from @williams_paige (it was a front page feature!) that made these guys out to be heroes.
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
I mean, c’mon! pic.twitter.com/RLNc2axB1x
It wasn’t just print. Members of @ProjectLincoln were on @MSNBC all the time. This, of course, is how grifts get normalized.
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
And MSNBC didn’t bother to bring up any of their scandals even after they were fully public knowledge. pic.twitter.com/tcTYYO9DCF
Perhaps their biggest fan was @JoyAnnReid. Here’s just a smattering of her praise for the group and it’s exploits.
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
Which, of course, never materialized. You’ll remember that @ProjectLincoln was so effective against Susan Collins that she won in a landslide. pic.twitter.com/CSMSXXb35K
Hell, @60Minutes even had them on (although this interview was a little tougher than normal for @ProjectLincoln). pic.twitter.com/3VXAdq8KId
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
I wanna pause here to drive home the point that, despite raising tens of millions of dollars, @ProjectLincoln didn’t actually make any impact, based on data about the performance of the ads themselves and voting patterns for those the ads targeted. pic.twitter.com/NyD4xxdh3T
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
Okay, back to the regularly scheduled programming. Here’s a piece from @politico that just enormously missed the mark. Again, pure wishcasting.
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
At right was the actual review of the ads after the fact. pic.twitter.com/R58Qf9KAbw
Even the overseas media got involved. Here’s @guardian.
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
Again. No evidence to suggest they did *anything* against Trump or down the ballot. pic.twitter.com/d53q0dQUBF
So many people desperately wanted @ProjectLincoln to be successful, so much so that they tried to wish it into existence.
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
Perhaps none more so than top @ProjectLincoln reply guy - you guessed it! - @JRubinBlogger. pic.twitter.com/4npktINrT9
Unsurprisingly, all the NeverTrump Republicans joined the bandwagon for @ProjectLincoln. Here’s @BillKristol.
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
Also, still cackling about the poll. pic.twitter.com/E3Ar3II7au
@clairecmc was apparently a big fan. pic.twitter.com/bY1V6lRSE2
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
I’m running out of space and patience but here are some gems from:@AVindman (remember him?) @SteveKerr (??)@ananavarro (quickly becoming a thread favorite) and@JoeNBC (go figure)
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
But in the cloud of Orange Man Bad, countless people in the media and among the chattering class wanted to root for a group of mean-spirited grifters and didn’t stop to consider if they were the mark.
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
Turns out, they were, and they fell for @ProjectLincoln - hard.
And I mean, cmon. Forget that these guys haven’t won an election for a GOP candidate since I was in diapers. They helped cheer on forever wars and built a GOP so out of touch with its base that Trump got elected in the first place.
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
Didn’t it seem a little too rich? Anyone?
Also, I’m sure that any big time supporter of the Lincoln Project agrees with their guilt-by-association worldview so, needless to say, it’s time to pay the toll.
— Drew Holden (@DrewHolden360) March 9, 2021
All your favorite big political brains in this thread. https://t.co/RPLaWOVJGV
— Briahna Joy Gray (@briebriejoy) March 9, 2021
“In the cloud of Orange Man Bad, countless people in the media and among the chattering class wanted to root for a group of mean-spirited grifters and didn’t stop to consider if they were the mark. Turns out, they were, and they fell for Project Lincoln – hard,” Holden wrote.
“Forget that these guys haven’t won an election for a GOP candidate since I was in diapers. They helped cheer on forever wars and built a GOP so out of touch with its base that Trump got elected in the first place. Didn’t it seem a little too rich? Anyone?” he added.
He offers one parting message:
Anyway, the lesson here should be clear: often times, collections of bad people, openly acting like bad people, are, in fact, bad - in ways you see and in many ways that you don’t see right away.
Maybe next time political grifters strike it rich we can keep that in mind.
I wish we could say this is a one-and-done thing, but somewhere along the line, another operation like this will pop up and the liberal media will fall for it all over again. It’s DC. It’s the swamp. And a lot of bad people are going to capitalize on that never-ending cycle.
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