Raw Story

Democratic voters would like a quick word with movie star George Clooney.

Clooney, the movie star whose New York Times editorial heralded the ouster of President Joe Biden from the 2024 presidential race, was the subject of some frustration after former President Donald Trump secured the nation's highest office.

"Someone bring me George Clooney," wrote altNOAA, the veteran-led political commentator group launched in response to the Trump administration's so-called "gag order" on the Environmental Protection Agency. "We need to have a... talk."

Clooney was among a slew of high-profile Americans who urged Biden to walk away from the race after his lone debate against Trump raised concerns about the 81-year-old's ability to defeat the MAGA Republican.

Biden later claimed he had a cold, but Democratic critics such as Clooney argued that was beside the point considering the stakes if he continued — and what he said was the likelihood that another candidate could easily defeat Trump.

"We’re all so terrified by the prospect of a second Trump term that we’ve opted to ignore every warning sign," Clooney wrote. "All of the scary stories that we’re being told about what would happen next are simply not true. In all likelihood, the money in the Biden-Harris coffers could go to help elect the presidential ticket and other Democrats."

The editorial was published about two months before the Democratic National Convention on July 10. Biden stepped aside 11 days later.

At the time, Democrats such as constitutional law professor Anthony Michael Kreis questioned why a film actor had been granted a political platform as powerful as the New York Times' editorial section.

"On the one hand, every American citizen has a voice that is equal in public discourse," Kreis wrote in July. "On the other hand, what makes George Clooney qualified to occupy such a high profile space on this question? I just -- don't know."

Veteran advocate Joshua Hartley echoed these sentiments on X early Wednesday morning.

"Thank you George Clooney," he wrote.

New York Magazine editor Zach Shiffman also called out Clooney's role in the Democrats' Election Day defeat but suggested the New York Times and its readers shared culpability.

"George Clooney may have written the op-ed that got Joe Biden out," wrote Shiffman, "but we have to learn people do not give a s--- about what actors think."

That does not appear to have been a problem for conservative voters, according to a recent report from the Guardian on the limited impact of celebrity endorsements.

“I think endorsements have probably always done more for the celebrity than the person being endorsed," Laurence F. Maslon, an arts professor at New York University, told the Guardian.

"It’s a way to hitch your star to somebody who seems to be good for you, and maybe there’s a certain kind of reflected glory in that."

“There’s probably not a Republican candidate for any office in the last 20 years who didn’t append the word liberal before the word Hollywood when speaking about it...People like George Clooney and Robert De Niro, I mean, who cares, frankly?”

Donald Trump’s promise to tear down the federal bureaucracy could deliver major consequences for public health organizations across the United States, but his efforts will simultaneously expose how “resilient the deep state really is,” which a columnist argued Monday is “actually much more benign” than the president-elect believes.

While there “really is a deep state” operating within the federal health agencies, the reality is it is a much more rational one than how Trump has portrayed it, Nicholas Florko wrote Monday in The Atlantic.

“And he might not be able to easily tear it down,” according to Florko, who added that the deep state was on full display in blocking Trump’s decisions in the early days of the pandemic.

ALSO READ: What Trump's win really means for America

“Public-health officials didn’t buck Trump to sabotage him. They did so because both measures were scientifically unsolid,” he wrote. “Many scientists, lawyers, and doctors are involved in each and every decision that federal-health agencies make, because the decisions must be evidence-based. Arbitrary decisions based on conspiracy theories or political whims can, and will, be challenged in court.”

Florko continued his piece by writing that threats of mass firings at the FDA by Trump and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. – “presumably to install loyalists” – should be taken seriously. He added that Trump’s next term “will be one of the biggest challenges facing our federal health system.”

“No president in modern history has been so intent on bending health agencies to his will, and he seems even more emboldened to do so now than in his first go-around,” Florko concluded. “Trump will likely have some successes — some people may be fired, and some important policies may be scrapped. America is about to find out just how resilient the deep state really is.”

Donald Trump's presidential transition is already at work, with speculation underway about how it may circumvent the U.S. Senate's "advise and consent" rule.

Reports surfaced Monday that Trump is looking into ways that they can use recess appointments to ensure some of his people can be appointed regardless of controversy.

MSNBC host Nicolle Wallace asked former Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO) why Trump would need to use all of these tactics given he has Republican control in the Senate.

Also read: Retired judge grades Trump's appointees —and finds some have 'lost their way'

"You've got me. I can't figure it out," McCaskill confessed.

Her only thought is that Trump will say, "I'm going to pick people that are so bad my own party won't support them."

"Which is essentially what he's saying," said McCaskill. "He's going to have a minimum of 52 senators. Maybe he's going to pick such crazy people he thinks he can't get Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) and Susan Collins (R-ME) and maybe one or two others."

She said Trump could also buck the norm, assuming that the Constitution doesn't apply to him.

"But the Supreme Court has spoken on this," said McCaskill, explaining that recess appointments only apply for a "limited period of time."

"If he has some idea he can just blow up the Constitution over the role of confirmation, advice, and consent, he is not talking to real lawyers, which, of course, he has a habit of doing," said McCaskill.

The Supreme Court also decided in July: "The nature of Presidential power entitles a former President to absolute immunity from criminal prosecution for actions within his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority. And he is entitled to at least presumptive immunity from prosecution for all his official acts."

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Former Donald Trump adviser and short-lived communications director Anthony Scaramucci triggered his ex-boss enough that he took time out of his busy pre-inauguration schedule to lash out on TruthSocial.

Trump shared an appearance of Scaramucci on CNBC last week, during which Squawk Box host Joe Kernen asked if he was "embarrassed or at least humbled about how wrong you were."

The ex-Trump adviser said that he “immediately put out a congratulatory tweet. They won, we lost." It was a stark contrast to those who refused to accept the 2020 election results.

Also read: Why Trump was the worst boss ever — according to 12 of his top White House officials

“What would you like me to do? Do you want me to get on bended knee before you?” Scaramucci asked the host. “We have a violent disagreement about lots of things related to Trump’s personality. You like Trump — I was close to Trump, I got to see the ugliness of what he is. And by the way, Joe, it’s not just me.”

Kernen lashed out, saying that "The Mooch" has benefited considerably from his short time with Trump. The response led Scaramucci to tell the host to "calm down."

"Why don’t you calm down a second, Joe,” Scaramucci told him. “We know each other a long time. Are you saying that you and I can’t disagree on somebody’s personality? Is that what you’re saying?”

The exchange prompted Trump World to cheer on Kernen, claiming Scaramucci got owned.

Trump quickly followed, calling his former hire "a major loser who was fired from the Administration after only 11 days for his insane 'brother from another mother' interview with Chris Cuomo, then with CNN!"

Donald Trump is being urged by some advisers to declare victory before votes have been tallied, according to new reporting in the Guardian.

Several Trump aides think if the former president gets an early lead in critical battleground states like Pennsylvania, he should grasp it and claim the win, the Guardian reported, citing people close to Trump.

“The consensus view is that Trump has nothing to lose by claiming he has won if he has a several-hundred-thousand-vote advantage in Pennsylvania or if his internal pollsters think a victory is plausible even if the results are not fully confirmed on Tuesday night,” the report states.

The wild factor, according to the Guardian, remains the candidate himself.

ALSO READ: 'Bloodbath': Inside the MAGA playbook for mayhem after Election Day

“His aides concede that if Trump decides he wants to declare, he will do as he pleases, and his travel-weary team might have little appetite and influence to dissuade him,” it states.

Notably, Vice President Kamala Harris’ team has said they already have a plan of attack if Trump makes an early announcement declaring himself the winner. According to the Guardian, Trump will hold a private watch party at his Mar-a-Logo club while his campaign’s official watch party will be held at a West Palm Beach, Florida convention center.

“Whether Trump will double down on any victory claim at the convention center party remains unclear," the Guardian said. "Trump’s aides have suggested if he does decide to announce himself as the winner, he will motorcade over from Mar-a-Lago and, if not, he might not make an appearance at all.”

A polling place in DeKalb County, Georgia is being evacuated due to another bomb threat, according to local reports.

"We're hearing of another bomb threat at a polling place in DeKalb County where the fire department is waiting for the police to clear the building," reported Atlanta News First's Brendan Keefe. "The FBI says the previous threats originated from Russian email domains."

DeKalb County is a heavily-Black community in the Atlanta metropolitan area, and a huge reservoir of Democratic votes in most Georgia elections. Polling is due to end in the state at 7 p.m. ET.

Those previous threats targeted other polling places around the Atlanta metropolitan area, also Black polling places. Some of them are set to remain open for extended hours to compensate for the disruption.