Things are grim for Republicans right now.
Gas prices are rising, and the economy is on the brink of collapse thanks to President Donald Trump’s idiotic war in Iran, which has sunk him to new approval rating lows.
So you’d think that Republicans would try to do some popular things to avoid brutal midterm elections, in which their House majority and Senate majority are both at risk. But instead, they’re sinking to a new level of stupidity and evil: Supporting a pardon of Jeffrey Epstein associate and convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell.
Audrey Strauss, acting U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, points to a photo of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, during a news conference in New York on July 2, 2020.
Audrey Strauss, acting U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, points to a photo of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell in 2020.
Politico reported Thursday that some House Oversight Committee Republicans are open to Trump granting Maxwell clemency—which would end her 20-year prison sentence—in order to secure Maxwell’s testimony in their sham of an Epstein probe.
Republicans called Maxwell to testify, but she said that she’ll only talk if she’s pardoned.
Politico asked House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer if he thinks that would be a fair deal.
“A lot of people do,” he replied, suggesting that multiple of his fellow Republicans support a pardon. “My committee’s split on that. I don’t speak for my committee.”
But Comer said that he personally is against it. Still, there are 25 other Republicans on the committee, many of whom defend Trump no matter how awful his actions.
Trump, for his part, has said that he’s considering pardoning Maxwell. Indeed, his administration has already rewarded Maxwell with a prison upgrade after she claimed that Trump wasn’t involved in Epstein’s crimes.
And last week, Maxwell’s attorney told Politico that there’s “a good chance and for good reason that she would get a pardon.”
But it’s truly hard to fathom a less popular move.
Related | House Democrats refuse to attend GOP’s sham Epstein hearing
An Economist/YouGov poll from July—when Trump first brought up the possibility of pardoning his former pal—found that just 4% of Americans think that Trump should pardon her.
To get a better idea of just how unpopular that is, 14% of Americans approved of former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem killing her dog.
What’s more, if Trump does pardon Maxwell, that would once again put the Epstein scandal back into the news. And that’s bad for Trump, as Americans overwhelmingly disapprove of his handling of the Epstein files.
But maybe Trump does want to lose the midterms.