memeorandum: The rise of Donald Trump and the politics of delegitimization (Orin Kerr/Washington Post)

6:00 PM ET, May 6, 2016

Top Items:

Jeb Bush / Facebook:

I congratulate Donald Trump on securing his place as the Republican Party's presumptive nominee. There is no doubt that he successfully tapped into the deep sense of anger and frustration so many Americans around the country rightfully feel today. — The tremendous anger of the current U.S. electorate …

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, Politico, CBS News, Mother Jones, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, The Week, Slantpoint, BuzzFeed, NBC News, Guardian, CBS Miami, The Atlantic, Washington Post and USA Today

Alex Pareene / Gawker:

Don't Blow This — It's Trump versus Clinton. It's a well-funded mainstream Democrat against a widely reviled demagogue who will struggle to earn the support of his party's donor base. It's a man whose every public utterance is potential negative ad waiting to be cut, versus the most cautious candidate in modern memory.

Discussion: No More Mister Nice Blog and The Stranger …

Tom LoBianco / CNN:

First on CNN: Cheney says he will support Trump — Washington (CNN)Former Vice President Dick Cheney will support Donald Trump, he told CNN Friday, an important move as the presumptive Republican nominee is encountering intense resistance from senior members of his own party.

Erick Erickson / The Resurgent:

Republicans, Apologize to Bill Clinton — Upon arrival in Washington, DC in January of 1993, Bill and Hillary Clinton found themselves in a never ending independent counsel investigation. The investigation began over a land deal that was known as Whitewater.

Discussion: Washington Monthly, Talking Points Memo and Mediaite

Jenna Johnson / Washington Post:

Donald Trump agrees to meet with Paul Ryan ‘before we go our separate ways’ … Likely Republican nominee Donald Trump disagrees with Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus's characterization of a conversation they had on Thursday about House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (Wis.) not yet being ready to support Trump.

Discussion: Politico and Mediaite

New York Times:

Sheldon Adelson Says He Will Support Donald Trump — The casino magnate Sheldon G. Adelson said on Thursday night that he would support Donald J. Trump now that he has become the Republican Party's presumptive nominee. — “Yes, I'm a Republican, he's a Republican,” Mr. Adelson said in a brief interview.

Discussion: Politico, Taylor Marsh, Fox 59, Jewish Telegraphic Agency, New York Magazine, Talking Points Memo, USA Today, Associated Press, JP Updates, Mother Jones, Hullabaloo, Outside the Beltway, The Week, Wall Street Journal, Guardian, CNN, Donald J. Trump and ABC News

Harper Neidig / The Hill:

Election analyst flips 11 states toward Democrats due to Trump — The nonpartisan Cook Political Report has shifted 11 states on its election scorecard toward Democrats since Donald Trump — became the presumptive Republican presidential nominee. — “This has been an exceedingly unpredictable year,” the analyst said.

Discussion: Politico, Hot Air, NBC News, The Cook Political Report and Balloon Juice

Nick Gass / Politico:

Priebus on Trump: 'He's trying' — Reince Priebus is a man under siege. He has a presumptive nominee who has scorched the earth. He has a House speaker so far refusing to accept the GOP's new standard-bearer. And he has knee-knocking candidates across the country worried their party is being driven off a cliff.

Discussion: RedState, Washington Post, Althouse and The Hill

Dana Bash / CNN:
Lindsey Graham won't vote for Trump or Clinton in 2016

Discussion: Townhall.com, Reuters, Washington Free Beacon, The Last Refuge, Los Angeles Times, The Daily Caller, Guardian, Hot Air and Politico

Philip Klein / Washington Examiner:
‘Dismayed’ Romney says he doesn't intend to back Trump, worried about ‘demagoguery and populism’

Discussion: Breitbart, Politico, Talking Points Memo, Hit & Run, FiveThirtyEight, Western Journalism, The Federalist, Hot Air, The Moderate Voice, Mediaite, New York Magazine, Independent Journal … and BizPac Review

Nolan D. McCaskill / Politico:
Paul Ryan's primary opponent: I'll support Trump

Discussion: The Last Refuge

William Kristol / Weekly Standard:
Neither Clinton Nor Trump

Discussion: National Review

Jesse Byrnes / The Hill:
Graham: I won't vote for Trump

Discussion: RedState

Michael Tomasky / The Daily Beast:
Yo, Hillary: Hit Donald Where It Hurts

Discussion: TIME

Caitlin MacNeal / Talking Points Memo:
Lindsey Graham Goes Full On #NeverTrump

Discussion: Raw Story

Byron York / Washington Examiner:
What does Paul Ryan want from Donald Trump?

Discussion: Hot Air

Jenna Johnson / Washington Post:
Trump tells West Virginians not to vote in Tuesday's primary

Discussion: RedState, New York Magazine, Western Journalism and BuzzFeed

Alexander Burns / New York Times:
Donald Trump Seeks Republican Unity but Finds Rejection

Discussion: Red Alert Politics, Washington Post, Chicagoist, FOX News Radio, Chicago Tribune, Western Journalism, Mashable and National Review

Nick Gass / Politico:
Trump camp suggests Ryan unfit to be speaker

Discussion: Washington Post, CNN, ABC News, Forbes, Sky Dancing and Bloomberg.com

Mary Troyan / USA Today:
Sen. Bob Corker says he'll advise Donald Trump on foreign policy

Discussion: RedState

Charles Krauthammer / Washington Post:
The ideological earthquake and the aftermath

Discussion: Power Line and Orange County Register

Matea Gold / Washington Post:
Trump turns to general election — and away from past positions

Discussion: Politico, The Week, Mother Jones, The Daily Beast, New York Times, Raw Story, zerohedge.com/fullrss2 …, CANNONFIRE and Bloomberg

Ryan Struyk / ABC News:
Reince Priebus on Donald Trump's Taco Tweet: 'He's Trying'

Discussion: The Huffington Post, Willamette Week, Guardian, Politico, NY1 News, The Atlantic, Washington Post, Trail Blazers Blog, Scott Adams Blog and Business Insider

Steven T. Dennis / Bloomberg:
Paul Ryan Spoils Trump's Victory by Withholding Endorsement

Discussion: Politico and CNN

Binyamin Appelbaum / New York Times:

Donald Trump's Idea to Cut National Debt: Get Creditors to Accept Less — One day after assuring Americans he is not running for president “to make things unstable for the country,” the presumptive Republican nominee, Donald J. Trump, said in a television interview Thursday that he might seek …

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, RedState, Washington Post, Business Insider, The Week, The Hayride, Hot Air, Zero Hedge, Vox, Western Journalism, rubber hose and Balloon Juice

Josh Marshall / Talking Points Memo:

This Is Astounding — So many stories in presidential politics, in all politics, are more sound and fury than substance. This one isn't. It's hard to overstate how big a deal it is. Donald Trump caught a lot of grief during the primaries for putting several of his companies through bankruptcies during his career.

Discussion: Mother Jones, Hit & Run, Washington Times and Arkansas Blog, Arkansas Times

Thomas E. Ricks / Foreign Policy:

A stunning profile of Ben Rhodes, the a**hole who is the president's foreign policy guru — The profile of one Ben Rhodes running in Sunday's New York Times Magazine is not unsympathetic, which makes it all the more devastating. — Perhaps the key sentence is this: “His lack …

Discussion: Heat Street, Israel Matzav, Business Insider, Liberty Unyielding, Unfogged, Washington Free Beacon, Le·gal In·sur·rec· tion, Clayton Cramer and EconLog

John Amato / Latest from Crooks and Liars:

Of All The Disgraced Reporters In All The Gin Joints, Judith Miller Takes The Cake — Disgraced and former NY Times reporter Judy Miller, who is now a paid Fox News contributor, is very worried about the state of journalism in America after reading a Ben Rhodes interview in the NY Times …

Discussion: Hullabaloo, Talking Points Memo and Washington Free Beacon

Kevin Drum / Mother Jones:
Here's How the White House Shapes Foreign Affairs Coverage

Discussion: New York Post, the daily howler, The Daily Caller and Front Page Magazine

John Podhoretz / New York Post:
White House admits it played us for fools to sell Iran deal

Discussion: The Atlantic, Rush Limbaugh, Weekly Standard, Hot Air, Mediaite, The Lid, Washington Post, Front Page Magazine, Washington Free Beacon, Israel Matzav, Instapundit and New York Times

C. Ramsey Fahs / Harvard News:

Harvard to Sanction Final Clubs, Greek Organizations — Starting with Class of 2021, members of clubs, Greek organizations will be ineligible for multiple leadership positions and fellowships — Starting with Harvard's Class of 2021, undergraduate members of unrecognized single-gender social organizations …

Discussion: Hit & Run, The Daily Caller, The TickerThe Ticker, Heat Street, Campus Reform and Associated Press

FIRE: Harvard Brings Back the Blacklist for Final Club, Fraternity, Sorority Students

Orin Kerr / Washington Post:

The rise of Donald Trump and the politics of delegitimization — Ilya Shapiro argues at The Federalist that some of the blame for the rise of Donald Trump belongs to Chief Justice Roberts' 2012 opinion in the Obamacare case, NFIB v. Sebelius. To a lot of readers, this probably sounds far-fetched.

Discussion: Balkinization and The Federalist

Andrew Prokop / Vox:

The political scientist who saw Trump's rise coming — Norm Ornstein on why the Republican Party was ripe for a takeover, what the media missed, and whether Trump could win the presidency. — In the summer of 2015, most of the political world still thought Donald Trump's candidacy was a joke.

Discussion: New York Times and Balloon Juice

Washington Post:

One killed, others injured in shootings at Md. mall, grocery store … Three people were shot in the parking lot at Westfield Montgomery Mall in Bethesda on Friday morning and authorities are investigating whether the assailant is a man believed to have shot and killed his wife outside a Maryland school Thursday evening.

Discussion: Shakesville and Washingtonian

Daniel Strauss / Politico:

Sanders accuses DNC of tipping convention toward Clinton — Bernie Sanders is accusing Democratic National Committee chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz of trying to tip the party convention in Hillary Clinton's favor, saying the chairwoman has packed the committees with Clinton supporters.