Wednesday, July 24, 2024

Biden, Unchained

Biden has exited the presidential primary yet remains president for the next 6 months. 
The implications are staggering.


All of the Democrat pressure, all of the insider leaks to the media, and all of the handwringing by slippery politicians, circling like vultures , have led to Joe Biden’s announcement, declaring his exit from the 2024 campaign for president. We can speculate on what finally changed Biden’s stubborn and intransigent mind to abandon his campaign, but what’s more important—and downright critical—is what Biden can do as president in the next five-plus months without the specter of having to win the upcoming election.

Now that Biden is not beholden to the moneyed interests behind his campaign yet still has the powers of the presidency, we are likely going to be exposed to some of the most radical and dangerous moves put forth by the U.S. government that would have just recently been unthinkable.

Democrats have been itching to turn America into a progressive utopia for generations, and this presents a unique opportunity to ram through a sweeping left-wing agenda without hesitation from a lame-duck president who isn’t worried about losing votes as a result.

Can you say executive actions? Will this be the way that Biden leaves his mark, gets to write his legacy, and gets his presidential library built? A library that no one will visit.

What to expect from Biden and the Deep State

We expect Deep State operatives to issue multiple layers of regulatory rules over this period in an effort to prohibit their firing or re-assignment by a Trump administration looking to reform a wildly expanded administrative state that fought the former president at every turn during his first administration.

Blanket amnesty for millions of illegal aliens is surely not off the table. Under Barack Obama, more than half a million people received DACA status without Obama having the authority to grant it. With no check on his power, like the need to win reelection, Biden could authorize a similar amnesty and might even provide a pathway for illegals to vote right before the elections in November. With the stroke of a pen, the courts be damned.

Prosecuting endless wars abroad is something Democrats have always supported, and Biden has been no different. As a lame-duck president with very little to lose, we expect our involvement in the Ukraine-Russia warbacking an anti-democratic despot and our intervention in the Israel conflict to continue and possibly escalate even further.

The border and needless wars. These are the two big issues on which Democrats are on the wrong side. And that can’t change between now and November.

And what about China? With this uncertainty in our political process, will the political astute Xi Jinping use this turmoil to finally attack Taiwan? What would a weakened Biden’s response be? A stern presidential rebuke to China from Biden? Not from China Joe; he would likely tell Taiwan to stand down and peacefully agree to be the next region of a newly expanded China. Think of the impact if the CCP has control over Taiwan’s chip-making industry. That’s a frightful proposition.

Speaking of wars, reinstating the military draft, a move to offset the disturbing lack of recruitment, is likely to include an even broader series of physical and psychological standards that would not allow for traditional deferments. We can also expect women to be drafted for roles that could include combat for the first time.

Now that the Biden presidential campaign is over, a relieved legacy media can go back to its cover-up of Biden’s mental and physical deterioration with a renewed purpose to re-position this corrupt, petty, and abusive politician as a hero and a statesman of the highest order—the man who took down Donald Trump in 2020. He will be hailed as a hero who courageously served our country with honor and distinction for over fifty years before his noble efforts took a toll on his body. We could write the headlines right now.

Actually, the fawning tributes and coverage came in almost immediately from all parts of the Democrat ecosphere, starting with former Barack Obama advisor David Axelrod, who was directly responsible for kicking Biden to the curb. In the media, we have this glowing tribute from Rachel Maddow as well as the rest of the Democrat activist mockingbirds in the Fourth Estate.

Why not? It will be up to the next administration to clean up the mess and deal with a legacy media claiming it was Trump’s administration that failed the public. Isn’t it great to be a Democrat?

The Biden Crime Family Connection

Then there are personal considerations to take into account. First and foremost are his son Hunter’s ongoing legal difficulties. He is a convicted felon—a true convicted felon—awaiting sentencing on his gun charges. Biden has said he would not pardon his son but that was when he was a supposedly viable candidate (not really) seeking reelection. Without having to run for reelection and justify such action, he is free to pardon his son.

But what about the future charges Hunter faces on tax charges with the trial scheduled to start in September? Expect the dynamics to change, and change quickly. That trial, if it starts on time in September, is unlikely to conclude before the change in administration on January 20, 2025. That might precipitate a plea agreement before the start of the trial in September, even before the start of the Democrat National Convention on August 19. If Biden is to resign like Nixon did 50 years ago, to avoid worse consequences and humiliation, his son will need to reach a plea deal in the next three weeks so he can use his presidential powers, while he retains them, to pardon his son.

And let’s not forget the corrupt activities of his brother Jim. The activities of the Biden Crime Family—the obvious influence peddling occurred while Biden was vice president and in the years during Trump’s first administration—are not subject to presidential immunity. An aggressive Trump Department of Justice would be free to justifiably prosecute Hunter, Jim, and even Joe once he’s left office.

While Robert Hur declined to prosecute an elderly Joe Biden with a poor memory, a new Attorney General, Kash Patel perhaps, might not let the Hunter, Jim, and Joe off the hook.

(We’re afraid Trump might not aggressively prosecute the Bidens, just as was the case in his first administration with regard to Hillary Clinton. But who would blame Trump if he did after the persecution of Trump by Biden’s legal weasel, Attorney General Merrick Garland, who will soon be ex-Attorney General in January and who might find himself in legal jeopardy after he leaves office as he has no immunity from prosecution?)

Biden should consider himself lucky that, with the Supreme Court’s recent ruling on presidential immunity, he is almost completely protected for his corrupt actions taken while in office.

It’s really all about power and money.

This intramural battle among Democrats since the disastrous debate performance last month has always been about two things: saving seats down ballot in Congress and preserving finances.

A lot of the pressure on Biden to end his candidacy has come from down-ballot Democrats. Before this Biden disaster, it was almost a given that the Republicans would regain control of the Senate with Joe Manchin’s retirement. Now the question is: will the Senate be split 50/50 with JD Vance being the tie-breaker vote? Or will the final composition of the Senate be 54-46 or worse in a Trump/Vance landslide in November?

The fact that Joe Biden won the Democrat primaries and drew over 14 million votes does not matter to party leaders. Those votes are collateral damage to the real intentions of Democrat Party leaders, keeping a hold on power and banking cash. That meant Joe had to go, never mind the voters’ wishes.

Democrats had hopes of retaining control of the Senate and flipping the House. But even with typical Republican ineptitude, that now seems highly unlikely. Republicans are now united, with the levers of power within the party now firmly controlled by Donald Trump.

Even with a confident and clear path to victory in November, Republicans still have five-plus months of a Democrat machine looking to inflict as much of their radical agenda as possible before they’re shown the door. Republicans should recognize that a Democrat administration that is convinced there is no path to victory in November is a dangerous animal that has been unchained by Biden’s withdrawal and is now ready to attack.



Rally coverage, On the Fringe, and more- July 24

 





Biden’s Parting Gift to the Democrat Establishment


As many have expected, Joe Biden has withdrawn from the presidential race. His timing is perfect to allow a high-stakes event at the convention next month where the party’s new candidate will be anointed (which I predicted hereherehere). All evidence suggests that he didn’t withdraw willingly, and some have even theorized that the announcement went out without his approval or knowledge. Whether the latter is true or not is largely irrelevant, because what appears certain is that Biden was the victim of a coup orchestrated by several nefarious conspirators.

The situation reminds me of an iconic scene in Frank Herbert’s Dune. After having been granted control of the highly profitable and strategically important planet of Arrakis, Duke Leto Atreides was betrayed by the former overseer of Arrakis, Baron Harkonnen, who conspired against him. Paralyzed and facing his inevitable demise as the Baron torments him, Duke Atreides bites into a fake tooth which releases a cloud of toxic gas into the room, which kills everyone in the room except the Baron.

Biden did much the same to Obama and the Democrat establishment. With the last gasp of his campaign, he emphatically endorsed Kamala Harris to replace himself on the ticket. He simultaneously ended his own political future while severely wounding the enemies who conspired against him.

Biden’s endorsement triggered a domino effect of other endorsements, most importantly from James Clyburn and Congressional Black Caucus members. But while Barack Obama praised Biden’s choice to exit the race, he and Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer have all declined to endorse Kamala Harris as of this writing.

Biden’s brain may be turning to mush, but I’d wager there’s enough of the former slippery tactician left in there to know that the Democrat establishment is also conspiring to replace him with someone other than Kamala Harris. And Biden just made that incredibly difficult for them.

Why the establishment shouldn’t want Kamala headlining the ticket isn’t difficult to understand. She is uniquely unlikeable, despite her traits which would ostensibly make her intersectional gold on the Left. This is true even among her own party, as is evident by her quick exit from the 2020 presidential campaign. Her “once promising campaign that began with an explosion of enthusiasm,” NBC reported in December of 2019, “fizzled quickly” -- but not before she was able to land some memorable haymakers on Joe Biden in the debates, framing him as a dangerous racist who rubbed elbows with segregationists and opposed racial integration of schools.

She went on to experience a similar freefall in support after becoming Joe Biden’s diversity pick for vice president. Despite enjoying a net positive approval in early 2021, by June the honeymoon was quickly over. She was mired in controversy over her inept approach to the “diplomatic mission of solving the ‘root causes’ of migration,” and fueled further by a painful interview with Lester Holt in which she bristled at his observation that she had not even been to the border.

That she was given such an undesirable and impossible task by Joe Biden may very well have been retribution for her attacks against him in the primaries and as a means of gaining some insurance for his presidency. Kamala Harris may have had some success in fashioning a persona as a high-powered female prosecutor of color, but Joe Biden undoubtedly recognized that once the spotlight is maintained on her for more than a few seconds, she’s obviously nothing more than a cackling fraud who could never be taken seriously as a president.

After June of 2021, Kamala’s approval rating inverted and never recovered. But upon announcing his withdrawal from the 2024 campaign, Biden’s team posted on X:

My very first decision as the party nominee in 2020 was to pick Kamala Harris as my Vice President. And it’s been the best decision I’ve made. Today I want to offer my full support and endorsement for Kamala to be the nominee of our party this year.

Biden and Harris have long been adversaries, so it’s difficult to imagine that Biden would genuinely endorse her so emphatically, and it would be even more difficult to imagine that Joe Biden thinks that Harris would give Democrats the best path to victory in 2024. She is a wildly unlikeable prosecutor from the failed city of San Francisco, emblematic of the uber-progressive failed state of California, and her chances of winning over the hearts and minds of voters in Midwestern swing states is next to nil. Since victory in November cannot be the reason for it, one must question Biden’s motive endorsing her.

In my opinion, Obama, Schumer, and Pelosi have been trying to replace Joe in order to prevent more moderates from fleeing the rapidly shrinking Democrat tent in droves as they have been, and Biden just pulled the pin of a political grenade inside the tent.

Opening the convention to other candidates has always presented risks. There are questions about how the Biden-Harris war chest would be spent if Biden or Harris is not the nominee, for example. The party would obviously be open to accusations of racism and sexism if Harris is replaced as the seemingly rightful successor to Biden’s position on the ticket. And there have long been suggestions by Democrats that replacing Biden is a refutation of the democratic will of the party’s voters, expressed clearly in the primary process.

All this has just become far more complicated now that Biden, the democratically chosen nominee, has given his explicit blessing to Kamala Harris.

We’re in uncharted waters, as nothing like this has ever happened before in American history. But what we do know is that Kamala is extremely unlikely to win in November, and that leapfrogging her with a white man, for example, will be seen as heresy from the woke Left.

That’s not to say they can’t do it, of course. Democrats have shown these past three presidential election primaries that they have no regard for the will of their voters, having rigged the 2016 and 2020 primaries against Bernie Sanders, and now having pressured the democratically selected candidate in 2024 to step down.

Some, like Left-leaning pollster Nate Silver, think that Democrats should run Kamala while focusing all energy and money on down-ballot races to mitigate the bleeding. That makes logical sense, but I don’t think Democrats have any interest in losing in 2024. The concern for me, as it long has been, is that they bring out the only candidate who can mitigate the cost of replacing a black woman on the ticket, who brings with her substantial name recognition, and has largely been unscathed by political attacks in these past years -- none other than Michelle Obama; it is logical we should not fully count her out.



Democrat Lies And Incompetence Make Conspiracy Theories Great Again


If the Democratic Party wanted to encourage conspiracy theories, what would it do differently? Its poobahs have obfuscated, dissembled, and outright lied about just about everything in the last few years, and they have flicked on the supercharger in the last month. In the absence of truth, something will fill the void. The wackier stuff gets labeled “conspiracy theories,” yet some of those conspiracy theories have come true. They are not conspiracy theories; they are conspiracy truths.

Now they are doing it with post-quitting Biden. They are like the Soviet Politburo without the pickled livers and the bushy eyebrows, solemnly reporting that the Supreme Leader Chairman Brezhnev is personally supervising this year’s record grain harvest while, instead, he’s in a bed with a drip of Smirnoff running into his IV line.

As of this writing (Monday afternoon, July 22nd, year of our lord 2024 A.D.), we don’t even know if our president – our alleged president – is pining for the fjords or filling a pine box. Joe – where you at? He made an announcement that will go down in history, channeling LBJ by popping smoke to escape a doomed reelection campaign, and you might have thought that he would have told the American people face-to-face. Momentous occasions are why we have the Oval Office and all the trappings of the presidency – when the Commander-in-Chief makes a big announcement, it is suitably framed. But Biden didn’t come out and tell us. Instead, he (or some minion) tweeted a picture of a bland and evasive letter, like the PR department of some big corporation caught in a scandal does. 

That’s how he quits? That’s ridiculous. This is not a hit on Twitter – I’ll never call it X – because everybody loves Elon Musk except communists and perverts. But we deserve more than a copy of a letter that he may or may not have even signed. We got a letter that may or may not have even been seen by him. How did this come about? Do we even think he knows about it right now? But this is no surprise; this is on brand for these people. Ironically, page 259 of my new book, The Attack, includes a scene where, after botching the response to a terrorist onslaught, an unnamed president who reeks of Bidenish senility is tricked into resigning by signing a proclamation for “National Ice Cream Cone Day.” Well, Biden quit on July 21, which was National Ice Cream Day. I will accept your props on my prognostication.

Where is Joe Biden? The question itself fuels the conspiracy fires. Now, he may have staggered out before the cameras between when I wrote this over a day after he quit and you read this, but he was still AWOL when it was written. What are people supposed to think? This is weird, so the explanation is going to be weird. But the really weird thing is that the ruling class does not think it needs to provide us proof of life. It never occurred to our betters that they owe the American people any kind of information about their own president.

One problem with conspiracy theories is that they tend to overlook another explanation – rank incompetence. In many ways, the kind of gross negligence our elite has shown from everything from the handling of the China virus to Afghanistan to COVID to allowing a loner misfit – assuming he was acting alone, and why should we assume that? – to get on the roof of an undefended building 150 meters from an ex-president with a rifle after normal citizens had pointed him out to the Secret Service. 

Do we actually know anything about the murder/attempted assassination yet? The alleged chief of the Secret Service went to Congress and promptly stonewalled, offended at the idea of explaining herself. Yes, “her” – she is one of those pronoun fetishists, of course. Right now, we really don’t know anything, just like we would not have known anything about the Nashville shooter without some patriots leaking the trans freak’s manifesto that the elite has tried to hide. Don’t even get started on the Las Vegas shooter. But the sordid secrets of the Secret Service are only the latest cover-up. Fauci’s crew may have helped fund the creation of COVID. The laptop was real; Russiagate was not. What really happened in Kabul, because the story the official Marine representative told to the faces of the family of the dead Marine hero I represented as a lawyer, and I was standing there listening, differs significantly from the story I later heard told under oath to Congress.

It’s all lies, it’s all deception. No wonder we have conspiracy theories. It’s not like we can look at even the most convoluted ones and think, “Nah, they would never go that far.” Then you look at how they let 10 million Third World peasants invade our country on purpose in violation of duly passed laws – Our Democracy, indeed – and you have to wonder.

So, what would they do differently if they wanted to encourage conspiracy theories? Absolutely nothing. Between their incompetence and lies, they have torched their benefit of the doubt. We just had weeks of them telling us that Joe Biden was sharp as a tack when he was as sharp as a ballon. There was a time when mostly weirdos and nuts believed in conspiracy theories because the alleged plots were so outrageously dumb. And a lot of stupid people still do believe dumb things. Polls say that 34% of Democrats think Trump faked his own shooting or was not shot at all. We now have ear truthers like Keith Olbermann and others insisting what we all saw did not happen. Those guys are idiots. But you are not an idiot if you wonder just how some incel loser got close enough to Donald Trump to nearly – by centimeters – blow his head off and plunge our country into chaos.

Put aside the idea that the Deep State programmed a patsy in order to kill Trump. I’m doubting that not because I do not think those demons would do it if they could pull it off – they would – but because I question their competence to pull it off. We’re not dealing with Ernst Stavros Blofelds here; we’re dealing with the moron criminals in those viral videos who try to rob a mixed martial arts dojo and end up getting their butts Bruce Lee’d. But is it so crazy to think that the Secret Service chose not to give Trump the security he needed because the people at the top thought, “The hell with Trump?” They refused to guard RFK, too – he defied the Democrats – even though the Kennedy family has a pretty bad track record with assassins. Maybe they just thought it was a pleasing “Screw you” to a man they despised, but is it nuts to believe that, at some level, they would not mind all that much if someone got to him? I mean, I was informed – by them – that Trump is a fascist, Hitler reborn of Papa Stalin and Mama Pol Pot, so do you imagine that they really mind all that much if he gets shot?

Tell me again why I should believe in the diligence and dedication of our government bureaucrats. After all, in my experience, diligent and dedicated people tend not to lie about things like denying additional protection and only change their story when caught lying.

What about the conspiracy theories about Joe Biden? It may be that he’s dead, or terminally ill, or perhaps he is just wandering around in circles at his million-dollar beach house muttering like Cornholio – he often walks around like a buzzed Beavis. Why shouldn’t we assume the worst? After all, these people are the worst. They have made lying standard procedure. They have made hiding the truth national policy. And now they have made conspiracy theories great again.



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Deluded Democrats Think Republicans Are Afraid of Kamala Harris - They Are Wrong, As Usual.


It is no secret that Democrats have a penchant for delusion. It is also evident that they do not understand those who oppose their politics.

However, when it comes to the Democratic Party possibly nominating Vice President Kamala Harris, some on the left have ventured deep into fantasyland, convincing themselves that Republicans are frightened at the prospect of Harris becoming the candidate to face former President Donald Trump.

Of course, they are dead wrong. But their delusion does raise an important point for Republicans: It would be unwise to underestimate Kamala Harris.

Several prominent leftists have erroneously claimed that Republicans are afraid of Harris’ potential candidacy. "The View’s" Sunny Hostin peddled this ridiculous line in a recent episode. “Republicans are clearly scared about Kamala Harris,” Hostin said.

“They know that as a senator, she represented one in eight Americas. They know that as attorney general of California, she ran one of the largest law departments in the country. They know that she was the first African-American woman to be the district attorney of San Francisco. That is a hard thing to do. She’s a three-peat winner.”

Hostin also suggested the “Supreme Court said that Donald Trump, if elected, becomes a king” and that he even has “total immunity” if he “orders the Navy SEAL team to six to assassinate a political rival.” 


Social media influencer Brian Krassenstein, in a post on X, wrote, “Republicans are scared of Kamala Harris.” 

Of course, both Krassenstein and Hostin are smoking truckloads of crack if they think Republicans are afraid of Kamala Harris. Indeed, one could make the argument that if Biden didn’t flub his debate performance and exhibit health problems, he would be a far more formidable opponent for Trump.

Now that Harris could be the nominee, it is far more likely that the GOP will make the mistake of underestimating the vice president to the point that they are lured into complacency, believing they have the election in the bag. Apparently, I’m not the only one who sees this. RedState’s Bonchie pointed out this very possibility in his response to Krassenstein’s post. 


Of course, there is every reason to underestimate Harris. She has shown herself to be incompetent on several occasions during her tenure as vice president. Even further, she has the charisma of a gnat. Her cackle alone could make one’s ears bleed if they had to listen to it for a protracted period of time.

However, despite Harris’ many flaws, it would be foolish for Republicans to breathe a sigh of relief. She still has several factors working in her favor.

For starters, her nomination would mean that Democrats no longer have to worry about the age problem. At 59 years old, there won’t be any questions or concerns about whether she is too old to do her job. Moreover, while she is prone to gaffes, the Democrats and their close friends and allies in the activist media won’t have to worry about cleaning up her mess every time she gets in front of the camera and opens her mouth.

Speaking of the media, Harris still has the press firmly on her side. Sure, they might not be as enthusiastic about backing her, as indicated by a recent column from the New York Times. Nevertheless, she would be the Democratic nominee, and defeating the Orange Man What Is Bad™ will be the top priority. They will still shill for her to the best of their shilling ability.

There is also the reality that despite Trump enjoying an immense level of support, he is still reviled by many American voters who will undoubtedly show up to the polls to make sure he does not get a second term in office. This alone should show Trump and the GOP that now is not the time to rest on their laurels. This will still be a hard-fought battle and a close race. Victory is likely but not a sure thing for the former president.



CNN: It’s ‘Wildly Irresponsible’ For Trump — Who Was Shot In The Head — To Say Secret Service Didn’t Protect Him


It’s Acosta’s insinuation that the Secret Service offered Trump adequate protection on July 13 that is “wildly irresponsible.”



CNN’s Jim Acosta claimed during his afternoon segment on Tuesday that it was “wildly irresponsible” for former President Donald Trump to accurately note that the U.S. Secret Service failed to protect him from an attempted assassination that left him with a wounded ear.

“The Biden/Harris Administration did not properly protect me, and I was forced to take a bullet for Democracy. IT WAS MY GREAT HONOR TO DO SO!” former President Donald Trump wrote Tuesday on Truth Social.

The 2024 Republican presidential nominee also pointed out shortly after U.S. Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle resigned in disgrace that she “never gave me proper protection, so I ended up having to take a bullet for democracy.”

“When you hear the former president saying something like that, what’s your reaction?” Acosta asked his guest. “I mean, obviously, the Secret Service is a professional operation. To say something like ‘they did not protect me,’ it just sounds just wildly irresponsible.”

Acosta’s insinuation that the Secret Service offered Trump adequate protection on July 13 is not only factually inaccurate, but it’s also “wildly irresponsible.”

As The Federalist’s Sean Davis reported shortly after the attempted assassination, Trump’s security detail was denied “beefed up protection and resources” by Biden’s security regime.

Secret Service Spokesman Anthony Guglielmi initially pretended that the verified reporting was “absolutely false.” Even after admitting to The Washington Post that his statement was a lie, Guglielmi’s post insisting that “added protective resources & technology & capabilities as part of the increased campaign travel tempo” remained untouched.

Further reporting about the problems that plagued the Butler, Pennsylvania, agricultural grounds revealed law enforcement did not sweep the building used by the shooter, which was left outside of the security team’s perimeter. Nor did they do anything to detain the assassin after rallygoers and police officers alike pinned him as a person of interest.

Cheatle’s resignation comes 10 days after either deliberate failures or deficiency by her agency allowed a 20-year-old shooter to take a rooftop shot at the Republican during his Butler rally. The spray of bullets that ensued not only hit Trump’s ear, but seriously injured two others, and killed beloved husband and “real-life superhero” Corey Comperatore

Even if Trump had not been hit, former Secret Service special agent Ken Valentine told The Federalist that the agency failed to accomplish its “mission and goal.”

“Prevention, Plan A. That’s the mission and the goal of the Secret Service, to prevent, to thwart, to make sure that these things don’t happen. Plan B is reaction,” he said.



Trump private security force ‘playing with fire’

 

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — President-elect Donald Trump has continued employing a private security and intelligence team at his victory rallies, and he is expected to keep at least some members of the team after he becomes president, according to people familiar with the plans.

The arrangement represents a major break from tradition. All modern presidents and presidents-elect have entrusted their personal security entirely to the Secret Service, and their event security mostly to local law enforcement, according to presidential security experts and Secret Service sources.

But Trump — who puts a premium on loyalty and has demonstrated great interest in having forceful security at his events — has opted to maintain an aggressive and unprecedented private security force, led by Keith Schiller, a retired New York City cop and Navy veteran who started working for Trump in 1999 as a part-time bodyguard, eventually rising to become his head of security.

Security officials warn that employing private security personnel heightens risks for the president-elect and his team, as well as for protesters, dozens of whom have alleged racial profilingundue force or aggression at the hands of Trump’s security, with at least 10 joining a trio of lawsuits now pending against Trump, his campaign or its security.

“It’s playing with fire,” said Jonathan Wackrow, a former Secret Service agent who worked on President Barack Obama’s protective detail during his 2012 reelection campaign. Having a private security team working events with Secret Service “increases the Service’s liability, it creates greater confusion and it creates greater risk,” Wackrow said.

“You never want to commingle a police function with a private security function,” he said, adding, “If you talk to the guys on the detail and the guys who are running the rallies, that’s been a little bit difficult because it’s so abnormal.”

Wackrow, who left the Secret Service in 2014 and is now executive director of a security company called RANE (short for Risk Assistance Network + Exchange), said if he were the lead agent at a Trump rally, “I wouldn’t allow it.” But he suggested it’s a tricky situation for the Secret Service. “What are they going to do, pick a fight with the president-elect and his advisers? That’s not a way to start a romance.”

Several past presidential nominees have used private security or, in the case of governors running for president, state police details. But the experts could not think of another example of a president-elect continuing with any private security after Election Day, when Secret Service protection expands dramatically for the winner. In fact, most candidates drop any outside security the moment they’re granted Secret Service protection.

Trump’s spending on private security, on the other hand, actually increased after he was granted Secret Service protection in November 2015.

Through the end of last month, Trump’s campaign had spent more than $1 million on private security contracting, compared with $360,000 spent by the campaign of his vanquished Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, according to Federal Election Commission reports. That’s despite the fact that every other aspect of her campaign operation dwarfed his. Overall, her campaign outspent his by nearly 75 percent.

Whereas Clinton’s security spending — like that of most presidential campaigns — went mostly to protection for her offices and payments to local law enforcement or security companies for ad hoc event security, Trump’s campaign took it to a whole different level. It built a robust private security force that traveled the country supplementing the protective personal security supplied by the Secret Service, and working to identify and remove possible protesters — or just people Trump and his allies had a bad feeling about — from his events.

The private security team has been present at each of the seven rallies on Trump’s post-election “Thank You Tour” and has removed protesters — sometimes roughly — at many stops.

That included about a dozen protesters during a rally here on Dec. 9 in a minor-league arena called the Deltaplex, where Trump mostly shrugged off the interruptions until he became impatient with a particularly disruptive protester. “Get ‘em out!” the president-elect instructed his private security. That appeared to spur Trump’s security director, Schiller, to venture away from the stage, where he arrived with Trump, and wade deep into the crowd to assist other private security personnel with the removal.

Before the end of the rally, Schiller returned to his place by Trump’s side, along with a Secret Service contingent of which he is often misidentified as a member. (Despite being — at 58 years old — significantly older than most agents, Schiller looks the part, invariably sporting a uniform of dark suits and white shirts, along with a Secret Service-issued perimeter pin, and maintaining an athletic 6-foot-4-inch, 210-pound frame.) Together, the entourage accompanied Trump back to the airport, onto his plane and back to New York. It was the same routine as Schiller and Trump repeated countless times during the campaign, and it likely will be repeated countless more times over the coming years, since Schiller is expected to follow Trump into the White House, according to multiple sources on the transition team.

In interviews with about a dozen people who interact with Trump, they said even as the president-elect’s Secret Service detail has expanded significantly since the election, he remains most comfortable with Schiller and his team. A native of New Paltz, New York, and father of two, Schiller has been director of security for The Trump Organization since 2004.

The Trump associates say Schiller is expected to become a personal White House aide who would serve as the incoming president’s full-time physical gatekeeper, though he might not be able to offer his boss the wide range of services he has in the past. For instance, federal law prohibits anyone other than law enforcement officers from bringing firearms into federal buildings, and there are even stricter rules about who can carry on the White House grounds or around Secret Service protectees. Schiller had been armed at times early in the campaign, but it’s unclear whether he continued carrying a firearm after Trump was granted Secret Service protection.

Even after the arrival of Trump’s Secret Service detail, which typically marks the end of any pre-existing security arrangement, Schiller never strayed from his boss’ side.

The associates say Schiller provides more than just security. Trump has been known to ask Schiller’s opinion on all manner of subjects. When people want to reach Trump, they often call Schiller’s cellphone and he decides who gets through to the boss.

Photos often show Schiller looming over Trump’s shoulder as he works crowds, standing sentry by the stage as Trump speaks, or ejecting protesters from rallies. He’s developed a small but avid fan base on Twitter, where Trump supporters cheer Schiller’s confrontations with protesters, pose for selfies with him at events and backstage, and praise him as a brave “American Eagle” who kept Trump “safe & sound.”

And Schiller, a registered Republican, showed signs of reveling in Trump’s campaign, creating his own Twitter account just before the first primaries to promote the campaign and chronicle his unique perspective from the trail. He occasionally channeled his boss’ attacks on rivals like Ted Cruz (“Wow Lyin Ted is becoming unhinged! So sad...,” he tweeted as Trump was clinching the GOP nomination over the Texas senator) and spread false claims about Democrats, including that 20 percent of Clinton’s campaign cash came from people who were responsible for the September 2001 terrorist attacks, that a grand jury had been convened to investigate her use of a private email server for State Department business and that Obama encouraged undocumented immigrants to vote illegally.

Yet Schiller mostly remains — as one former campaign aide put it — “the most important man no one has ever heard of.”

That influence comes from Schiller’s ability to essentially control access to Trump, acting as his liaison to everyone from staff and well-wishers to dignitaries — and even Secret Service agents.

“Keith is kind of a consigliere,” said a transition team official. “He knows all the players, all the properties. He has the confidence of Trump and of the family. To describe him as a body guy would be very, very beneath the role that he actually plays.”

A younger aide — possibly the campaign’s trip director John McEntee — likely will be tapped for the traditional body man valet-like role, while Schiller would fill a new type of a hybrid staff-security role, the official explained. “Keith knows Trump inside and out. He knows when he turns right and when it turns left,” the official said.

Yet Schiller’s tight relationship with — and protectiveness of — his boss has already complicated the Secret Service’s rigid protection protocols, say allies of the agency and independent security experts.

In March, when a 32-year-old man jumped a barricade and rushed toward the stage as Trump was speaking at a rally in Dayton, Ohio, Secret Service agents immediately descended on Trump from opposite sides of the dais, encircling him in a human shield as a handful of other agents tackled the man before he could leap onto the stage. About a second after the first two agents reached Trump, Schiller leapt onto the stage and moved to position himself between the scrum and his boss.

The response appeared tightly choreographed to the untrained eye — a phalanx of men in dark suits and close-cropped hair swarming to protect their charge.

But in law enforcement circles, Schiller’s reaction was panned as too slow and was the subject of disapproving conversation among agents, according to a law enforcement source briefed on the conversations. The source said one agent described Schiller as the “JV trying to keep up in a varsity game.”

Specifically, the source said that Schiller came from a position on the dais that the agents would have used to evacuate Trump if that were to have been necessary. “If that happened, they would have run right into Keith. He was about three seconds too late,” the source said.

Joe Funk, a former Secret Service agent who worked several presidential campaigns, said agents throughout their careers are “trained nonstop to react to different situations based on your position and distance from the protectee in what they call AOP, or assaults on the principal.” That includes intensive drilling as a detail before being deployed to protect a presidential candidate or president “to familiarize yourself with the people who you are going to be working with.”

Stressing that he wasn’t assessing the response to the Dayton incident, Funk said “without any slight to Keith or to any of the guys on his team, they just haven’t had the opportunity to go through the Secret Service training that would allow them to respond to a situation like a Secret Service agent would.”

Since retiring from the Secret Service in 2005, Funk has provided private security for presidential candidates, including Obama in the early stages of the 2008 campaign and Mitt Romney in 2012. In both those cases, he said that when the Secret Service took over, he almost immediately stepped aside. “My assignment was over. That was it.”

So Funk said that he was “very surprised,” while providing security for Jeb Bush’s 2016 campaign, to witness firsthand Trump’s “composite detail” including the Service and private security at multicandidate events during the primary. “I was under the impression that at some point this would be weeded out,” or that the private security would revert to more of a traditional staff role, said Funk, who is senior vice president at a private security firm called TorchStone Global. As for why that appears not to have occurred, Funk said “there may be a very good reason for it, but as a layperson on the outside looking in, I’m just kind of scratching my head. In my experience, this is unprecedented.”

Agents and their associates told POLITICO that Schiller and his team initially bristled at the Secret Service’s move to take the lead, and that the continued presence of the private security brigade at events has caused tension and in some cases gotten in the way of the Secret Service’s protocols.

During the campaign, Schiller and his team could be seen at rallies appearing to direct Secret Service agents, local police and employees of security companies hired for specific events.

Trump spokeswoman Hope Hicks declined to respond to a series of questions about the private security officials, who is paying them, their relationship with the Secret Service, whether they’re armed and what their roles will be after inauguration. Instead, she said in a statement, “Trump rallies are incredibly safe events and are executed with support from USSS, local law enforcement and private security to ensure the safety and enjoyment of all guests in attendance. For further details please reach out to the USSS.”

Secret Service spokeswoman Nicole Mainor issued a statement saying, “The Secret Service does not provide information regarding our protective operations,” and referring to a section of the U.S. Code that outlines the agency’s obligations to protect the president-elect. As for the agency’s relationship with Trump’s security personnel and whether the Service has asked Trump to dial back his security or whether the security carry firearms, Mainor responded only: “The individuals you are referring to are staff personnel.”

Schiller did not respond to requests for comment.

In a little-noticed video interview recorded in Trump Tower less than two months after then-candidate Trump was granted Secret Service protection, Schiller said his team had “a great working relationship” with the Secret Service. “They bring their own set of assets, which is right now, we can use everything we can get, as far as the way the world is right now, and the campaign in itself. It’s inherently a risky business every day,” Schiller said in the interview, which was posted in January of this year.

But he also noted that he had received “some dignitary protection training through the Secret Service” when he was on the New York City police force, and he touted the capacity of the private security team he oversees. “We have the best assets money can buy, I can assure you of that, as far as protecting him, his family and his property,” Schiller told the interviewer, Rich Siegel, one of his childhood buddies from New Paltz.

Schiller explained that he has “more than a dozen people” working for him. While he said that “I’m no stranger to putting my hands on people,” thanks to his days in the New York City Police Department’s narcotics units, he added, “Things are different right now. I hire big guys who do all the fighting.”

The identities and numbers of the employees who constitute Trump’s private security operation — as well as other details — are not entirely clear. That’s partly because at least some of the costs — including Schiller’s salary at one point in the campaign — appeared to be split between The Trump Organization corporate structure and Trump’s presidential campaign, and also because the campaign paid many of its security officials, including several who continued working for Trump after the election, through opaque corporate structures.

Schiller himself was paid $181,000 for campaign work from July 2015 through mid-November, according to FEC filings, with some of it coming in the form of in-kind payments, likely indicating money paid to Schiller by The Trump Organization, and possibly reimbursed by Trump personally.

The campaign also paid $50,000 for “security services” during the second half of the year to a company called KS Global Group LLC. While the company, which was registered anonymously in Delaware in October 2015, bears Schiller’s initials, neither he nor the Trump transition team would comment on who is behind it.

Another company, Black Tie Protection Services, which a Trump campaign operative said is linked to Schiller’s team, was paid more than $106,000 in the final four months of the campaign.

And the campaign paid $28,000 for security services to a company called ASIT Consulting, which is owned by a 62-year-old former FBI agent named Don Albracht, who has been known to film and occasionally taunt protesters.

But by far the biggest recipient of Trump security cash is a company called XMark LLC, which boasts on its website that its employees have expertise in surveillance, “close quarter battle” and “tactical shooting skills” and that the firm “provided all PPD [personal protection detail] for Mr. Trump’s campaign travel to include all advance work and coordination with local law enforcement agencies, in support, throughout the country, until being relieved by the United States Secret Service in mid-November of 2015.”

Yet the company continued receiving payments from Trump’s campaign after that point, with $89,000 coming after Election Day. Its officials — including president Eddie Deck and vice president Gary Uher, both of whom are retired FBI agents — were seen policing the crowds at Trump rallies throughout the campaign, as well as during the post-election “Thank You Tour.” The pair — combined with XMark and a retired New York City cop named Michael Sharkey, who also is associated with the company — have been paid nearly $579,000 and counting by the campaign.

Trump transition team sources say the thank you rallies are being funded by Trump’s campaign committee, but that Trump, as president, might headline rallies funded and organized by a still-in-the-works outside group that will be able to accept huge donations unbound by federal campaign limits.

While Trump’s Saturday rally in Mobile, Alabama, was the last one scheduled on the tour, he hinted to the crowd that he intends to resume the rallies as president. “This is the last time I’ll be speaking at a rally for maybe a while. You know, they’re saying as president he shouldn’t be doing rallies, but I think we should, right?” he said, prompting loud applause. “We’ve done everything else the opposite. Well, no, this is the way you get an honest word out, because you can’t give it to [he press] because they’re so dishonest.”

If Trump’s team continues funding the rallies using private money, it would have the right to “decide who can attend their events, including which opinions or speech they deem acceptable by attendees,” said Lee Rowland, a senior staff attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union.

She co-wrote a post in March on the ACLU’s website bemoaning that the removal of protesters of color from this year’s presidential campaign rallies is “certainly not what we want our democracy to look like.”

Nonetheless, Rowland told POLITICO that as long as Trump’s campaign or an outside group “organizes and sets the rules for a private event, and a politician, including the president, is an invited guest, then the host can decide whether and when to revoke attendees’ invitations. That would make them trespassers and allow them to be legally removed.” If the rallies were funded or organized by the government, on the other hand, then only law enforcement could identify protesters for ejection and actually remove them, and only then for breaking the law, she said.

Trump’s private security team has taken full advantage of that latitude, and Deck, who appears to be the leader of the rally security unit, has served as the point of the spear.

Deck, a buff 62-year-old who at various times took to wearing street clothes to blend into rally crowds so he could sleuth out protesters, has drawn repeated complaints about excessive force and ejecting people solely because they don’t look like Trump supporters.

At an April rally in Harrington, Delaware, Deck was captured on video calling for assistance from Delaware state troopers to remove two young African-Americans separately. When one, Anwar Dyer, protested “I didn’t say anything,” Deck responded “I don’t care. You’re leaving. You’re leaving. And if you don’t leave, you’re gonna get hooked up, and I know you don’t want to get hooked up.”

A college student who attended a Trump rally in Tucson, Arizona, in March told POLITICO that Deck “grabbed my arm and angrily pulled me through the crowd,” adding: “I genuinely believe I was kicked out because I am transgender.”

At an August rally in Charlotte, North Carolina, Deck removed an 18-year-old Indian-American Trump supporter named Jake Anantha, who Deck accused of having protested at past Trump rallies. Anantha, a registered Republican who was wearing a Trump shirt, later complained to The Charlotte Observer, “Why are all these white people allowed to attend and I’m not?”

Messages left for Albracht and at XMark email and phone numbers were not returned. And it was not clear whether they would continue working with Trump’s security team in any rallies he might do as president.

Henry Brousseau — who alleges that he was punched in the stomach by Trump supporters after shouting “Black Lives Matter” at a March rally in Louisville, Kentucky — said Trump’s security “did not seem to be interested at all in public safety. They were there to keep the rally on message. They were being speech police.”

Brousseau, who was a high school senior at the time, and two fellow protesters were ejected. And now they’re suing Trump and his campaign, as well as the convention center for failing to provide adequate security, while also claiming that Trump’s calls to “get ‘em out” were “calculated to incite violence against the plaintiffs.”

Brousseau said “it is a pattern of silencing his opponents” that is “unpresidential, undemocratic and un-American.”

Another lawsuit was filed three weeks before the election, in part by an African-American man who alleges he was punched, kicked and called racial slurs by Trump supporters at a November 2015 Trump rally in Birmingham, even after security arrived on the scene — all while Trump yelled “get him the hell out of here!” It calls on Trump’s campaign, the convention center and the city of Birmingham “to pay for damages, institute new procedures for security and issue a public apology to those who attended the rally in question and to the residents of Birmingham.”

third lawsuit alleges that Schiller, Deck, Uher and two other Trump security officers assaulted a handful of protesters during a raucous protest outside the campaign’s Manhattan headquarters in September.

In an affidavit in the case, Schiller acknowledged that he struck one of the protesters in the head. But he says that was because he felt the protester “physically grab me from behind and also felt that person’s hand on my firearm, which was strapped on the right side of my rib cage in a body holster. Based on my years of training, I instinctively reacted by turning around in one movement and striking the person with my open hand.”

The protesters’ lawyers deposed Schiller, Deck and Uher in the days leading up to the Grand Rapids rally.

The judge in June ruled that Trump would not have to provide a deposition in the case, despite the assertion by the protesters’ lawyers that “Trump has had a substantial role in bringing about violence on the part of his security guards.”