Rep. Devin Nunes To Leave Congress To Be CEO of Trump Disinformation Media Company

Rep. Devin “Midnight Run” Nunes, the former House Intelligence Committee chair and Trump sycophant who tried to compromise the Trump-Russia investigation by leaking intelligence to the suspect and running interference for him, is leaving Congress so he can be a Trump sycophant full time.

The Washington Post reports, Rep. Devin Nunes to leave Congress to become Trump media company CEO:

Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), a fierce defender of President Donald Trump through his White House tenure, plans to leave his seat at the end of this month to become chief executive at Trump’s new social media company, the company announced Monday.

Nunes, who was first elected to Congress in 2002 at age 30, was reelected last year for a 10th term, which ends in January 2023. A news release Monday said Nunes would be joining the Trump Media & Technology Group as its CEO starting in January, cutting short his congressional term by about a year.

Nunes would have been in line to be chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, if the GOP takes back the House majority in 2022. [Seriously? This jackhole?] But by stepping down, he is giving up what is considered the most powerful committee gavel.

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Early drafts of California’s next map put Nunes in a less Republican district in the Fresno area, one that backed Biden by nine points. Before the announcement Monday, Republicans were watching to see whether Nunes would switch to a new seat that was safer for his party — which would have pitted him against one of his Republican colleagues.

By leaving Congress before his term ends, Nunes will set up an early 2022 special election for his seat. According to state election law, Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) must call a special election within 14 days of Nunes leaving office, and a primary must be held 18 to 20 weeks later. The top two vote-getters in the primary would head to a general election, meaning that the Nunes seat could be vacant until midsummer.

In a statement Monday, House Minority Leader “Traitor” Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said Nunes’s departure “leaves a gaping hole in this institution” but praised him as being the best prepared person “to compete head-to-head and lead an alternative to the big tech and big media cartel.”

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The Trump Media & Technology Group, which Nunes will head, has not yet released any products to the public and missed its self-imposed deadline to roll out a beta-test version of its social media service in November. It has released very little about its operations or its staffing: In documents filed on Monday with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the company identified its tech staffers only by their first names and last initials. The chief technology officer is Josh A., and the chief product officer is Billy B.

Before Nunes, the company had released the full names of just two top employees: Trump, who is described as chairman of the company, and streaming-content executive Scott St. John.

UPDATE: No surprise here. Trump’s Media Company Is Investigated Over Financing Deal:

On Monday, Digital World said regulators were investigating. The Securities and Exchange Commission has requested information about the deal, including the identities of some investors and “certain documents and communications” between the SPAC and Mr. Trump’s company, Trump Media & Technology Group.

“The investigation does not mean that the S.E.C. has concluded that anyone violated the law,” Digital World said in its filing.

If regulators find that Digital World’s filings included false or misleading statements, they could take action against the company or its backers — potentially complicating the planned merger. Hundreds of millions of dollars are at stake for Mr. Trump’s company: Last week, Trump Media announced that unidentified investors had agreed to plow $1 billion into the company — on top of the nearly $300 million that Digital World raised in its September initial public offering.

The New York Times reported in October that Trump Media’s discussion of a deal with an executive of Digital World may have skirted securities laws because the SPAC did not disclose those talks in its filings.

[As] it looks into the Trump SPAC, the Securities and Exchange Commission will most likely encounter ARC Group, a Shanghai financier that the agency has reprimanded in the past. In 2017, the S.E.C. stopped ARC’s executives from listing shares of three companies, citing “material misstatements” in their securities filings and a lack of cooperation from the executives.

ARC is also a main backer of Digital World and a key architect of the SPAC deal with Trump Media. (There is no indication that the S.E.C. is investigating ARC for its role in the Trump deal.) Founded six years ago by Abraham Cinta, who was raised in Mexico but lived in Shanghai, ARC has tried its hand at several businesses.

Now that Devin Nunes is thankfully leaving Congress, what will his famous cow do? Mother Jones reports, The Guy Who Tried to Sue a Fake Twitter Cow Is Going to Lead Trump’s Media Company:

Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), an ardent Trumper, has spent 10 terms in Congress. His main social media qualification seems to be that he likes to hold a petty grudge. During his tenure as chair of the House Intelligence Committee, he released an eponymous memo alleging that the FBI’s investigation into Trump’s ties to Russia was politically motivated. After his district’s biggest newspaper, the Fresno Bee, called him a “Trump stooge” in 2018 (they had endorsed him in every election from 1996 to that point), he waged war on them. Solid stuff—none of which stopped him from continuing to be reelected. But nothing shows that Nunes has the aggrieved mentality of the chronically online quite like the issue of a certain fake cow.

In 2019, Nunes took offense to a number of satirical Twitter accounts, including one purporting to be his cow, and sued both the platform and several individual users for defamation.

That’s the stuff.

Now, Nunes will lead Trump’s social media company, despite having no previous experience in tech. His departure from the House comes on the heels of new draft maps of California congressional districts that would have likely made his reelection campaign much more competitive.

Sounds like another Trump grift to me. Little Devin wants a piece of the action.