Truth Social Is Doing Great
A message for my fellow shareholders of DJT.
Before we get started: Eric Edelman, Franklin Miller, and John Herbst have an important piece imploring the Biden administration to let Ukraine take the gloves off and target Russia’s munitions industry:
SINCE THE EARLY DAYS of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, American senior leaders made clear their disapproval of Ukraine’s attacks on Russian territory. Yet such attacks have increased in recent weeks as the Ukrainians have waged a campaign against both Russian oil refineries and, more recently, air bases. . . .
American reservations about Ukrainian attacks on targets (energy or military) became public in early April, when Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in response to a question about Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries, “It has been our view and policy from day one when it comes to Ukraine to do everything we possibly can to help Ukraine defend itself against this Russian aggression. At the same time, we have neither supported nor enabled strikes by Ukraine outside of its territory.” . . .
The policy of prohibiting Ukraine from doing what it needs to win for fear of Russian escalation is tactically unsound, strategically bankrupt, legally dubious, and morally squalid.
What the Biden administration seems to misunderstand is that war is dangerous and ugly. There are two ways to force Putin to cease his invasion and withdraw his occupying forces. One is to force the Russians back across the border with bullets and bombs, as Ukraine has every right to do. The second, which is mutually supporting, is to destroy key elements of Putin’s war industry, both to starve Russian forces of materiel and fuel and to contribute to the Russian anti-war movement by causing the Russian people to feel the type of pain their military is inflicting on Ukraine.
The Newsletters:
Kristol & Egger: The House GOP is a mess.
Arizona
This morning Marc Caputo got us started with a look at the Arizona Republican party’s abortion mess.
Short version: Kari Lake and Donald Trump understand that the 1864 abortion law is death for their elections. Local members of the Arizona legislature have to choose between helping Trump and pissing off their pro-life base. Bonus: The speaker of the Arizona House is running for Congress—and Trump already endorsed his opponent. So . . . no favors coming from that guy.
Read the long version here and stick around for the juicy quote from the GOP strategist warning state pols to get onboard or risk winding up in the trunk of a car.
Meanwhile: The Arizona legislature went into, and then out of, session today and declined to do anything about the abortion law.
The Tim and Ross Show
On the flagship pod, Tim sat down with the New York Times’s Ross Douthat to talk about abortion, Donald Trump, and the Republican party. It’s a banger.
🚨OVERTIME🚨
None of what follows is investment advice.
I am a proud shareholder of DJT1 and since the stock debuted on the Big Board some beautiful, historical, very special things have happened to it.
How could your favorite president’s stock be down so terribly? I’ll tell you why. It’s the socialist elites. Just like the Russia Russia Russia hoax, they’re trying to crush Trump, but it won’t work. The other day I was talking with a famous stockbroker. Very rich. Very smart. One of the biggest names in stocks. And he said to me, with tears in his eyes, “Trump stock is bigger than either the Google or the Facebook. The people need to buy it.”
It’s true, it’s true.
Helpfully, the Washington Post has spoken to other DJT shareholders about their experiences.
Jerry Dean McLain first bet on former president Donald Trump’s Truth Social two years ago, buying into the Trump company’s planned merger partner, Digital World Acquisition, at $90 a share. Over time, as the price changed, he kept buying, amassing hundreds of shares for $25,000 — pretty much his “whole nest egg,” he said.
That nest egg has lost more than half its value in the past two weeks as Trump Media & Technology Group’s share price dropped from $66 after its public debut last month to $22 on Tuesday. But McLain, 71, who owns a tree-removal service outside Oklahoma City, said he’s not worried. If anything, he wants to buy more.
“I know good and well it’s in Trump’s hands, and he’s got plans,” he said. “I have no doubt it’s going to explode sometime.”
Jerry is a big guy. Uses a chainsaw. Very big chainsaw. Maybe the biggest chainsaw ever made. And made in America. Not one of those Chinese chainsaws. Maid in Manhattan was a great film. Jennifer Lopez. J-Lo. In the movie she falls in love with Voldemort. Not a nice guy. But he has money. Perhaps he was an early investor in Truth Social. Maybe he used a time turner.
Anyway, back to the Post piece:
In an interview last month with conservative commentator Sean Hannity, the former Republican congressman [Devin Nunes] recounted a recent discussion with Trump in which the men celebrated having “opened up the internet and kept it open for the American people.”
“I’ll never forget the conversation we had,” Nunes said. “He said, ‘You know, once we’re all dead and gone, this will last forever.’”
That’s true. Truth Social will live forever. Not like the MySpaces or the Meercats or the Clubhouse. Those were very weak socials. Some would say woke socials. No power. Truth Social has so much strength. Only the strongest people buy it. Strong people like my good friend Todd.
Many of Truth Social’s investors say they’re in it for the long haul. Todd Schlanger, an interior designer at a furniture store in West Palm Beach who said Trump had been one of his customers, said he’s invested about $20,000 in total and is buying new shares every week.
Schlanger said he now watches his stock performance every day hoping for positive signs. In a Truth Social post last week, he encouraged “everyone who supports Donald Trump and Truth [Social to] buy a share everyday” and asked, “Do you think we have hit bottom?” (The stock has slid about 35 percent since that post.)
He suspects the recent drops in share price have been the result of “stock manipulation” from an “organized effort” to make the company look bad. There’s no proof of such a campaign, but Schlanger is convinced. “It’s got to be political,” he said, from all the “liberals that are trying to knock it down.”
We love Tom. He’s a great Patriot. Not many Patriots doing interior design, but Tom is one of them.
I wish all of my fellow shareholders could be like Tom. But sadly, some of them are scared.
One user who had posted “Tired of WINNING yet?” earlier this year when the stock spiked posted that the recent losses were “painful to stomach.”
“Come on DJT, every time I buy more, the price drops more,” the user @bill7718 wrote. “When will it be the BOTTOM!!” (He posted a chart Thursday showing the stock rising slightly alongside the caption, “moving!!” The price has since gone back down.)
The user @manofpeace123, who said they bought shares at $65 and that 71 percent of their portfolio was DJT stock, said on Wednesday that investing was a way of telling Trump, “I believe in you and I stand with you through good times and bad.” But a day later, the user added: “can’t help but feel sad. … feel like I’m trying to catch a falling knife.”
Knives are very hard to catch. Especially those Ginsu knives. Something about the edges. Serrated, I think. Japanese. I prefer the German knives. You’re not supposed to say that. The cancels get very mad at you for saying you like the German knives. They’ll say you like Nazis. Not true. Not true. You’re really just saying that you like the knives from countries that protected their borders from vermin.
McLain, the tree service owner in Oklahoma, said he believes the stock could “go to $1,000 a share, easy,” once the media stops writing so negatively about it and the company works through its growing pains. The company’s leaders, he said, are being “too silent right now” amid questions about the falling share price, but he suspects it’s because they’re working on something amazing and new.
McLain is an amateur trader — he invested only once before and “lost [his] butt” — and said he hasn’t talked to his family about his investment, saying, “You know how that is.” But he believes the Trump Media deal is a sign he is “supposed to invest,” he said.
In sum: Trump Social. Chainsaws. J-Lo. Meerkat. Diamond hands.
I’ve been long two (2) shares since DWAC first announced its intent to purchase Trump’s Truth Social platform and I am riding this rocket to zero.