This weekend, Senator Chuck Schumer announced that the Senate will no longer enforce a formal dress code—and Republicans have been losing their mind ever since.
In particular, Republicans are mad that Senator John Fetterman’s casual fashion sense is officially acceptable. The Pennsylvania senator has become known for forgoing the suit and tie worn by his colleagues and wearing shorts and sweatshirts instead.
On Sunday, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene took to X, formerly known as Twitter, to lambaste the change in the Senate’s dress code as a “disgraceful” attempt to “appease Fetterman.”
The Senate no longer enforcing a dress code for Senators to appease Fetterman is disgraceful.
Dress code is one of society’s standards that set etiquette and respect for our institutions.
Stop lowering the bar!
— Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene🇺🇸 (@RepMTG) September 17, 2023
“Dress code is one of society’s standards that set etiquette and respect for our institutions,” Greene wrote. “Stop lowering the bar!”
In response, Fetterman reminded everyone that it was actually Greene who’d lowered the bar.
“Thankfully, the nation’s lower chamber lives by a higher code of conduct: displaying ding-a-ling-pics in a public hearing,” he wrote in a post on X, referring to MTG’s decision to hold up poster-size prints of Hunter Biden’s nude photos during a House Oversight Committee hearing this summer.
But Greene isn’t the only Republican making a stink.
On Monday morning, former Trump political adviser Stephen Miller took a break from his new career of filing lawsuits against Pop-Tarts and M&Ms to also criticize the new dress code.
The legacy of @SenFettermanPA will be making the Senate of the United States adopt the dress code of a kindergarten class. Except five-years olds actually know how to wear pants.
— Stephen Miller (@StephenM) September 18, 2023
Fox News has similarly been quick to pick up the supposed controversy. In an interview on Fox Business on Sunday, Oklahoma Senator Markwayne Mullin was asked about the change in Senate dress code and called Fetterman’s outfits “completely disrespectful.”
“There’s a side of me that’s super excited about it because I hate wearing a tie, and I’d rather be in blue jeans and a pair of boots and a white T-shirt,” Mullin admitted in surprising detail. “But the fact is, that you do dress for the job. And we need to be respectful of the position we hold,” he added.
When asked if the change in dress code was Schumer’s attempt to appease Fetterman, Mullin replied, “Of course it is. Hundred percent.”
Last week, Representative Matt Gaetz also freaked out about Fetterman’s clothes. In an interview with Steve Bannon, Gaetz remarked, “That is the best-dressed we have ever seen John Fetterman.”
“His shirt had both buttons, and the entire pant was not elastic. There were elastic features, but it was not exclusively elastic,” Gaetz said.
Fetterman had this to say to Gaetz: “Instead of crying about how I dress, how about you get your shit together and do your job, bud?”
As the government hurtles toward another shutdown, it’s good to know that Republicans have more interest in fashion commentary than governing.
Donald Trump has once again doomed his legal defense, this time by placing himself at the center of the plot to overturn the 2020 election and saying in a new interview that it was entirely his decision.
Trump was indicted in Washington for trying to overthrow the presidential election. He faces charges for conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to corruptly obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction of and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding, and conspiracy against the right to vote. The indictment, one of four, hinges in part on the argument that Trump knew he had lost the election but still actively worked to overturn the results.
In a Sunday interview with NBC, Trump revealed that multiple legal advisers had told him the election was legitimate. When anchor Kristen Welker asked why he chose not to listen to them, Trump replied, “Because I didn’t respect them.”
“I respected many others that said the election was rigged,” he continued. “You know who I listen to? Myself. I saw what happened.”
Welker then asked if Trump was ultimately “calling the shots.”
“As to whether or not I believed it was rigged? Oh, sure,” Trump replied. “It was my decision.”
WATCH: Kristen Welker asks former President Trump to clarify if he was listening to his lawyers’ advice or his own instincts after he lost the 2020 election.
Trump: “It was my decision.” pic.twitter.com/ib4D5rKfqN
— Meet the Press (@MeetThePress) September 17, 2023
Trump’s biggest defense so far has been that he genuinely believed he had won the election and was following his lawyers’ advice. Yet he and his legal team continue to undermine his own defense strategy. When he was arraigned for the January 6 indictment in August, Trump’s lawyer Alina Habba also undercut their main argument.
“I think that everybody was made aware that he lost the election, but that doesn’t mean that that was the only advice he was given,” Habba told reporters outside the courthouse. “There are a numerous amount of advisers and politicians and lawyers, not just one or two, that are giving you advice and telling you what they believe is true.”
“The president has the right, as every one of us do, to listen to several opinions and make their decision.”
The thing is, Trump is legally allowed to say the election was rigged as much as he wants. But he is not allowed to act on that belief, as he now admits to doing. As The New Republic’s Matt Ford pointed out, there is no constitutional right to organize a coup.
Donald Trump marked Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year, by threatening American Jews.
Trump shared a graphic on Truth Social Sunday night detailing everything that he did supposedly in support of Jewish people. This included moving the U.S. Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv and recognizing Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights and settlements in the West Bank. All of these moves were highly controversial and widely decried when Trump announced them.
“Just a quick reminder for liberal Jews who voted to destroy America & Israel because you believed false narratives!” the image was captioned. “Let’s hope you learned from your mistake & make better choices moving forward! Happy New Year!”
Seven in 10 American Jews identify with or lean toward the Democratic Party, according to polling from the Pew Research Center.
For someone who says he is incredibly pro-Israel, Trump has a habit of threatening Jewish people in his own country. In October, he accused American Jews of failing to praise his Israel policies enough.
“No President has done more for Israel than I have. Somewhat surprisingly, however, our wonderful Evangelicals are far more appreciative of this than the people of the Jewish faith, especially those living in the U.S.,” he wrote on Truth Social. “U.S. Jews have to get their act together and appreciate what they have in Israel—Before it is too late!”
Then, just two months later, he criticized Jewish leaders for their lack of “loyalty” toward him, despite the fact that he had just had dinner with neo-Nazis Nick Fuentes and Kanye West.
“Jewish Leaders forgot that I was the best, by far, President for Israel,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “They should be ashamed of themselves. This lack of loyalty to their greatest friends and allies is why large numbers in Congress, and so many others, have stopped giving support to Israel.”
In the nearly a year since that now-infamous dinner, Trump has yet to condemn Fuentes or West for their open embrace of Nazi beliefs, admiration of Hitler, and Holocaust denialism.
Special Counsel Jack Smith and his team are seeking a gag order against the former president to limit what he says in the run-up to his trial on charges that he participated in a plot to overturn the 2020 election.
To that end, Smith has asked a federal judge in Washington, D.C., to impose a “narrowly tailored” order limiting Trump—who is famous for saying literally anything that sluices through his brain at any particular moment—from making public statements that could “present a serious and substantial danger of prejudicing” the trial.
A copy of the government filing was released on Friday—and it is unsparing in its criticism of Trump.
Smith’s office is accusing Trump of engaging in a “disinformation” campaign and of intimidating witnesses, prosecutors, and the court itself.
“As set forth in the indictment, after election day in 2020, the defendant launched a disinformation campaign in which he publicly and widely broadcast knowingly false claims that there had been outcome-determinative fraud in the presidential election, and that he had actually won,” federal prosecutors wrote in their filing. “In service of his criminal conspiracies, through false public statements, the defendant sought to erode public faith in the administration of the election and intimidate individuals who refuted his lies. The defendant is now attempting to do the same thing in this criminal case—to undermine confidence in the criminal justice system and prejudice the jury pool through disparaging and inflammatory attacks on the citizens of this District, the Court, prosecutors, and prospective witnesses.”
Trump has been indicted in four separate cases—and he has repeatedly attacked witnesses, co-defendants, and prosecutors involved in
