You don’t have to like him or pretend he’s not a menace to the country to acknowledge that he’s one of the world’s great trolls, if not the greatest.

Besides, Democrats have it coming in this case. After they stooped to intervening in GOP primaries to take out electable anti-Trump Republicans, the least they deserve is King Troll wreaking a little havoc in their own.

The first candidate to land the Trump “endorsement” last night on Truth Social was lawyer Dan Goldman, who’s running in a crowded field in the Democratic primary for New York’s newly redrawn 10th District. You may not know Goldman’s name but you’ve probably seen his face: He was lead counsel in the Democrats’ first impeachment of Trump in 2019, even questioning witnesses in some of the televised hearings.

Congratulations to Dan on joining Doug Mastriano, Kari Lake, and many other election deniers as the official choice of MAGA Nation!

Goldman is a newbie candidate but Trump reserved two more endorsements for Democratic dinosaurs. Jerry Nadler and Carolyn Maloney are competing to be the nominee for New York’s new 12th District but they face surprisingly stiff competition from newcomer Suraj Patel. Patel is literally half the age of the seventysomething Nadler and Maloney and is calculating that, with the two of them splitting the majority of Democratic voters, he might be able to sneak through and pull an upset. If you believe his internal polling, the race is tight — Nadler and Maloney are tied at 31 apiece and Patel is right behind them with 25 percent. Assuming that’s true, he’s one small nudge away from knocking off not one but two local political legends.

Did he just get that nudge from Trump?

I laughed. But wait — we haven’t gotten to the truly funny part yet.

The funny part is that Patel and Goldman’s opponents are trying to sincerely weaponize these trollish endorsements to damage Goldman, Nadler, and Maloney. They’re not treating them as a joke. They’re treating them as a way to turn unsavvy Democratic voters against the candidates Trump “endorsed.” Patel lunged:

I’m proud that Donald Trump has nothing positive to say about me because he knows how much more effective a new generation of diverse, energetic Democrats will be in stopping his agenda. https://t.co/C7WYqpux2x

— Suraj Patel (@surajpatelnyc) August 17, 2022

So did Mondaire Jones and Yuh-Line Niou, both of whom are running against Goldman:

My opponent Dan Goldman is endorsed by Donald Trump.

Trump says he's backing Goldman because he wants progressives to lose and because Goldman failed to hold him accountable the first time. New York should not send this man to Congress. pic.twitter.com/OfEk9e3GZc

— Mondaire Jones (@MondaireJones) August 17, 2022

Donald Trump just endorsed my multi-millionaire opponent, in case you needed a reminder of what the stakes are. #NY10, choose your fighter. pic.twitter.com/DB6xIUKoNw

— Yuh-Line Niou (@yuhline) August 17, 2022

Not only did Jones tweet about Trump’s endorsement, he sent out a fundraising email about it. And then he made a point of bringing it up during a televised debate with Goldman: “It was horrifying that on our way to this very debate, Donald J. Trump endorsed Daniel Goldman, who is on this stage right now, saying that he’s the best chance that we’ve got in this primary to defeat progressives like myself and others on this stage. He also cited Mr. Goldman’s inability to successfully prosecute the first Trump impeachment as a staff person on the Hill.”

The only way this can get more amusing is if Goldman, Nadler, and Maloney all lose and the winners in their races thank Trump publicly in their victory speeches on election night.

Nadler has been silent about the Trump “endorsement” but Goldman and Maloney are doing what they can to disavow it:

I’m coming for you, Donald. pic.twitter.com/qCxxykBBRJ

— Daniel Goldman (@danielsgoldman) August 17, 2022

He should be more concerned about the investigation I’m leading as Chair of the Oversight Committee into the storage of his classified documents at Mar-a-Lago.

Thanks, but no thanks. I’ll pass. #NY12

— Carolyn B. Maloney (@CarolynBMaloney) August 17, 2022

If they end up losing, Trump should issue a mocking statement: “I guess my track record on endorsements isn’t perfect after all!”

I didn’t realize it but it turns out that he’s used this anti-endorsement endorsement tactic successfully once before. Although in that case, the target was a moderate Republican:

Worth noting tonight, as @TimAlberta reported in his great book American Carnage, that Trump deliberately endorsed a moderate Republican incumbent in 2018 on Twitter in order to hurt his re-election chances in a swing suburban district pic.twitter.com/iGLX1uO6jU

— Ben Jacobs (@Bencjacobs) August 17, 2022

Paulsen ended up losing by 11 points to Democrat Dean Phillips in 2018 after winning easily in his previous five elections. Maybe Trump should try endorsing AOC and the Squad this year too. Let’s see what happens!

I’ll leave you with this repulsive donation appeal from Adam Schiff, who’s trying to make a buck by pretend-mourning the political demise of Republicans who stood up to Trump after his party plowed hundreds of thousands of dollars into Peter Meijer’s race to take out a pro-impeachment GOPer. Dems helped light a political fire in Michigan and now they’re asking for their voters’ hard-earned money to try to put it out.

It's hard to overstate the cynicism.

First, @dccc funds a Trump puppet in Michigan to beat one of the few Republicans who stood up to Trump.

Then, @AdamSchiff says Democrats needs your money, because one of the only Republicans "who dared to stand up to" Trump has lost. pic.twitter.com/D6VuxDI9cc

— Peter Savodnik (@petersavodnik) August 18, 2022