It’s pretty standard ahead of presidential elections to hear public figures, including celebrities, media, types, and even some politicos, vow to leave the country if whoever the Republican nominee is gets elected.
Sadly, they rarely, if ever, follow through on their declaration because they never meant it in the first place, of course. But it sure sounded good to their followers at the time.
This year, we saw among others Barbara Streisand, Cher, and Sharon Stone say they’d make a mad dash for the border in the event Donald Trump won, but as of this writing, they remain in the United States and have provided no updates on whether they plan to pack up and leave.
Another person who pledged to leave America if Trump was elected to a second term was disgraced ex-Trump lawyer Michael Cohen, who in September said in an MSNBC interview that not only was he making plans to head out of the country but that he was also looking at possibly doing so under another name:
“I’m out of here. I mean, I’m already working on a foreign passport with a completely different name,” Cohen told MSNBC’s Nicolle Wallace when asked what he thinks will happen to him if Trump retakes the White House.“I don’t know how it’s going to work, as far as dealing with my wife and my children,” he continued. “I certainly don’t want them moving to where I’m looking to go.”
Watch:
But after Trump emerged as the winner last Tuesday, Cohen was singing a decidedly different tune in an unintentionally hilarious TikTok livestream:
“I said I was leaving and then the following day—get that through your dumb heads—the following day I turned around and I say there’s no chance in the world I’m leaving my country, thank you very much,” Cohen said during a livestream this week.“I’m not leaving anywhere, you leave,” Cohen added. “This is my country.”
Watch:
Meanwhile, the Washington Post recently touched base with other Trump critics to find out what their future plans are. The anonymous figures the paper talked to said they were getting things together just in case Trump decided engage in payback but were holding off on leaving the country for now:
A retired U.S. Army officer who clashed with senior officials in Donald Trump’s first White House looked into acquiring Italian citizenship in the run-up to this month’s election but wasn’t eligible and instead packed a “go bag” with cash and a list of emergency numbers in case he needs to flee.
A member of Trump’s first administration who publicly denounced him is applying for foreign citizenship and weighing whether to watch and wait or leave the country before the Jan. 20 inauguration.
And a former U.S. official who signed a notorious October 2020 letter suggesting that emails purportedly taken from a laptop belonging to Hunter Biden could be Russian disinformation is seeking a passport from a European country, uncertain about whether the getaway will prove necessary but concluding, “You don’t want to have to scramble.”
In an article that focused on what they believed was a plan by Trump to exact “retribution,” NBC News also talked to a few unnamed sources who were weighing their options:
For some who’ve run afoul of Trump, the election results have sparked fresh worries that he may enter office looking for retribution.[…]
Another ex-Trump administration official who has publicly derided Trump said that while they’re remaining in the U.S., others are “conferring with counsel and trying to figure things out like what are the immigration laws and policies in places they might consider going.”
“It’s unreal,” this person added. “It’s unreal that in this day and age in this country, we’re having these thoughts and concerns.
While it remains to be seen whether any of these people ultimately put their money where their mouth is (and you can best believe we’ll know it when and if they suddenly show up on MSNBC and CNN while sitting in another country after Trump’s inauguration), it’s quite fascinating to see the mainstream media suddenly so concerned over the idea that the executive branch could use its power to go after its political enemies.
Now if only they’d demonstrated that same concern over the last four years.
— Stacey Matthews has also written under the pseudonym “Sister Toldjah” and can be reached via Twitter. —
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