Copyright newrepublic
In recent days, President Trump has approved millions and millions of dollars in disaster aid for a number of states. He’s also denied disaster aid to a number of other states. You’ll be shocked to hear that the states that got aid voted for him in 2024, and the states that didn’t get aid did not vote for him in 2024. But a funny thing has happened in this saga. In the process of trying to screw democratic states, it appears Trump has also screwed at least two counties that heavily voted for him. This captures something essential about MAGA. Trump’s agenda is often sold to his voters explicitly as something that will hurt Democrats, yet it’s actually also hurting them. MSNBC’s Steve Benen has been writing well about Trump’s ugly efforts to punish states that don’t support him. So we’re talking to Steve about what all this means today. Good to see you, Steve. Steve Benen: Greg, it’s great to be back. Thanks for having me. Sargent: So the basics here are that in recent days, Trump approved big disaster declarations for Nebraska, North Dakota, Missouri, a nd Alaska. In two of his social media posts announcing this, he went out of his way to declare that he had won those states.
