In the annals of American political sleaze, few figures are quite as remarkable as Paul Manafort, the former lobbyist, campaign operative and chair of Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential bid. Given the ignominy of Manafort’s fall and the extraordinary scale of his corruption, one might have thought even Trump wouldn’t want to touch him with a 10-foot pole.
But apparently, Trump wants to involve Manafort in the 2024 campaign. The Washington Post reported that discussions are underway for Manafort to have a role advising the former president as he seeks to take back the White House. (The Post’s report has not been independently verified by MSNBC or NBC News.) Four anonymous sources “described the hiring as expected and said Trump was determined to bring Manafort back into the fold.”
Given the ignominy of Manafort’s fall and the extraordinary scale of his corruption, one might have thought even Trump wouldn’t want to touch him with a 10-foot pole.
Perhaps Trump is motivated by nothing more than a firm belief in the possibility of redemption. But I doubt it. It’s not as though Manafort is such a brilliant strategist that no other GOP operative could match his insights and skill. And with the inevitable bad press that will accompany Manafort’s hiring, what does Trump have to gain?
There may be private reasons we can’t determine, but one thing is clear: Hiring Manafort would be a provocation, a way to simultaneously tweak Trump’s enemies (including the media) and signal his supporters that he is unconstrained — by rules, laws or even shame. If and when Trump does hire Manafort, his supporters will treat the resulting criticism not as legitimate questions about Trump’s judgment but as proof of his greatness. Because as Trump has shown again and again, shamelessness is a kind of superpower.
While a complete description of Manafort’s misdeeds could fill volumes, a brief reminder is in order. Long before the Trump campaign, Manafort was known as a leader of the “torturers’ lobby,” representing a series of brutal foreign dictators looking for influence in Washington. Among his clients: the spectacularly corrupt Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, who eventually was ousted and fled to Russia.
It was in Ukraine where Manafort formed a relationship with a Russian intelligence operative to whom he would pass internal Trump campaign polling information, which no doubt would have been of use to the Kremlin’s efforts to subvert the 2016 election on Trump’s behalf. Manafort would later plead guilty to a variety of tax fraud and bank fraud charges, as well as witness tampering and conspiracy to defraud the United States. While concealing money from tax authorities, he was living a lavish life that included spending $849,000 at a single men’s clothing store in New York. Manafort received a seven-year prison sentence, but in the final weeks of tenure, he — and many other cronies and unrepentant criminals — received a presidential pardon.
When Trump brings a man like that back to occupy a prominent position in his campaign, he sends several messages. The first is that there is no depth of corruption that Trump will not approve of. We knew this already, to be sure, but over the last few years, the whole Republican Party has come to a new understanding of this issue. Its foundation is that there is no objective standard of self-dealing or exploitation of public resources for private gain; any depth of corruption will be defended, so long as it’s committed by a Republican.
No one could deny that if Supreme Court Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan had accepted private jet flights, luxury vacations and tuition payments for relatives from a wealthy liberal with interests before the Supreme Court, Republicans would lose their voices screaming about corruption and impeachment. But when it was Clarence Thomas, the GOP united in insisting Thomas’ conduct was just fine. Because he’s on their team.
Nor could anyone deny that Trump’s pledge to “drain the swamp” meant little more than replacing the existing occupants of important positions in Washington with his own loyalists, no matter how corrupt they might be. (Recall the avalanche of scandals that engulfed his Cabinet, including Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke spending $139,000 on office doors and Environmental Protection Agency administrator Scott Pruitt’s extravagant travel habits.) And if there is no standard of integrity beyond “Our side is good, the other side is bad,” then why not bring back a scoundrel like Manafort?
The lack of ethical standards is not the only reason Manafort might find a home yet again in Trump’s inner circle. Hiring Manafort is a kind of troll aimed at liberals and the news media.
The criticism will only reinforce the conception among Trump’s supporters that their leader is a man of thrilling power. He gets to do whatever he wants, and the more it drives his enemies crazy, the better. This was always part of Trump’s appeal: He is a man unconstrained by ordinary rules and norms, and for people who chafe at the limitations the world puts on them, nothing could be more appealing. He cheats on his taxes, because “that makes me smart.” He goes into court and demands immunity for crimes past and future, and even if he doesn’t get it, the sheer gall of him expecting it only adds to his allure.
The vision of a particular kind of power — embodied in the leader and filtered down to the members — is at the heart of every authoritarian cult. That power will be exhilarating, the cult promises, and it will return to you what you have lost or give you what you never had but always felt you deserved. And that power will be wielded against those you despise; as Trump has promised, “I will be your retribution.”
Getting behind Trump promises his supporters a little taste of that lack of constraint in their own lives. Trump’s shamelessness may repel millions of Americans and flummox the media, who don’t know quite how to describe it. But his followers know exactly what it means.
