CPACtrophy

 

CPAC2023 was noticeably smaller than CPAC has been in previous years, with a half empty ballroom at the Gaylord National Resort on the shores of the Potomac in Oxon Hill, Maryland. It’s CPACtrophy.

In 2010, one of the last years CPAC was held in Washington, D.C. at the Woodley Park Marriott, 2,300 registrants voted in the CPAC presidential straw poll. CPAC’s registration kept growing, its stated reason for moving out to the Gaylord, where 3,000 registrants voted in the straw poll in 2015. After spending a few Covid lockdown years in Florida, CPAC is back at the Gaylord on the Potomac Waterfront this year.

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This year only 2,028 people took the straw poll. This is only a proxy for registration as some people may not have voted. But it is only two thirds of the number who voted in 2015.

There are fewer workshops and panels outside the main hall, and the main Potomac Ballroom is noticeably half empty, until Donald Trump gave the final speech on Saturday evening. Then 90% of the seats were full, but it was not standing room only.

A reporter acquaintance asked me about the low attendance and whether I thought it was due to the "Schlapp scandal."  I did not see this, but according to her Washington Times article CPAC chairman Matt Schlapp was chased through the halls Thursday morning by reporters asking him about a $9 million lawsuit against him for a sexual assault.

I don’t think this is why CPAC is smaller, but CPAC does seem to have a case of paranoia. Media this year seems carefully curated. I was, without being informed about it, for the first time denied a media credential - I usually just apply as a freelancer. As usual (I’ve been going to CPAC since 2007) I’d also bought a regular ticket, and at one point security searched me out and detained me in the exhibit hall, went through my possessions, physically took off my lanyard and conference badge, because being denied a media credential this year put me on a “banned” list, not illegible to even purchase admission. Security marched me back to registration where I had to ask a registration desk troubleshooter to call her supervisor, who called the CPAC general counsel, until apologies were made, my badge was returned - and best of all my ticket price was refunded. I went for free.

CPAC is something of a mom and pop company - mom and pop multinational, since there are now CPAC annual conferences in a growing list of countries including Brazil, Hungary, and Japan - under husband and wife team Matt and Mercedes Schlapp. Mr. Schlapp, who has several children, is being sued by a man who was a Herschel Walker campaign staffer assigned to drive Schlapp when he spoke at last year's Walker campaign events.  The anonymous accuser says an inebriated Schlapp aggressively groped him.  The accuser also said that he would reveal his identity if Schlapp denied the charges.  Schlapp has denied the charges and the accuser has not given up his anonymity leading many to think the charges are spurious and the accuser is simply seeking an out of court settlement. Matt Schlapp did not appear on stage much this year; Mercedes introduced speakers several times a day.

I don’t think this is why CPAC is smaller. Most people who are here are Trump loyalists, and I imagine they discount stories about Schlapp groping a man as they would stories about Trump grabbing a woman, as mainstream media lies.

What CPAC is mainly missing this year are the throngs of college students who used to register so they could vote in the straw poll for Ron Paul (who won the 2010 poll) and for Rand Paul (who won the 2015 poll), helped out by generous subsidies for their tickets and hotel rooms by Ron Paul groups like Young Americans for Liberty and the Campaign for Liberty. Forty-seven percent of the straw poll voters in 2015 were between the ages of 18 and 25.

There are no Ron Paul or Rand Paul related booths in the exhibit, and no related speakers. There are no libertarian booths of any stripe, from the Ayn Rand Institute to reason magazine, who have often been here in the past.

One irony of CPAC this year is the “early voting” on the straw poll. Trump volunteers were out encouraging people to vote (all online, using the ID number or QR code on your badge) well before Nikki Haley or Vivek Ramaswamy spoke. (Leaving the hall after Ramaswamy’s speech an older gentleman told me he liked what Ramaswamy had said, but had never heard of him before.) (Daily Wire commentator Michael Knowles joked that he was the only speaker at CPAC not running for President, because he is not yet old enough.) Matt Schlapp reappeared in the penultimate segment before Donald Trump’s speech, to announce the results of the straw poll. CPACers ranked their Vice Presidential choices as: Kari Lake (20%), Ron DeSantis (17%), Nikki Haley (10%). For President: Trump at 62% (4 points higher than he won in the last year’s straw poll), with DeSantis a distant second.

K.T. McFarland at CPAC

Another irony is that even though the libertarians are not here, their policies have triumphed. Many speakers opposed continuing involvement in the war in Ukraine and want Europeans to pay for NATO on their own. In the straw poll 79% of CPAC registrants opposed American involvement in Ukraine. Trump appointee, Kissinger staffer, and CPAC board member K.T. McFarland and others emphasized that deregulating American energy production would lower the price of fossil fuels and impoverish Russia reducing its ability to fund wars, and making U.S. military interventions almost unnecessary. Federalist editor Mollie Hemingway and many other speakers decried government censorship and surveillance and cooperation between the federal goverment and corporations to control Americans’ lives. Vivek Ramaswamy announced that his first action as President would be to abolish the Department of Education and his second act would be to abolish the FBI. A few people, including Ramaswamy, criticized free trade policies, but not globally or to protect American jobs, instead singling out not allowing trade and investment that enriches hostile totalitarian countries like China. The only aspects of the war on drugs discussed were China exporting lethal formulations of fentanyl to the U.S. or criminal cartels controlling the southern border. Seventy-four percent of CPACers in the straw poll prefered that states make laws regarding to abortion, and did not prefer a federal ban. Major speakers from Tulsi Gabbard to Donald Trump decried endless wars, profiteering war mongers, and intelligence agencies that fabricate narratives supporting war and evidence smearing those who oppose it.

Apparently, conservatives are all libertarians - or at least libertarian-leaning conservatives - now.

A version of this article was published at Bacon’s Rebellion.

Banned at CPAC

 

CPAC2023 is smaller than previous CPACs, with fewer breakout sessions or workshops parallel to what is happening on the main stage. Mainly missing are younger and libertarian-leaning attendees, though the remaining heavily Trump supporting registrants and those speaking to them seem to have adopted an America First version of the libertarian’s non-interventionist foreign policy, calling for an end to the Ukraine war with negotiated settlements, and for Europe to start paying for its own NATO defense.

The annual event started at the Woodley Park Marriot, a venue of faded elegance and rabbit warren rooms and hallways in Washington, D.C.  CPAC moved to the Gaylord National Resort down the Potomac River at Forest Heights, Maryland for larger quarters a decade ago, then moved to Florida during the Covid lockdowns, and is now back at the Gaylord in Maryland. 

Gaylord Resort Atrium

I have purchased a ticket almost every year since 2007 though some years I have also asked for and received a media credential.  One year when I was feeling in high cotton I bought a platinum ticket, which entitles one to perks like going to the VIP Reagan Dinner.  That year was a year Ron Paul was running in the GOP primaries.  As I walked to sit in the velvet-rope enclosed front row, in worn jeans with fashionable holes in them, and various “End the Fed",” anti-war, and Ron Paul buttons, an usher blocked my path - I could not belong in the VIP seating.  Then he saw my platinum lanyard and badge. "Right this way, sir."

I’ve organized both a Ron Paul booth and one for Gary Johnson.  My first time at CPAC I sat in the back of a workshop on "new media."  My slightly long hair and Armani Exchange casual wear provoked the moderator, conservative radio talker Larry O'Connor (then with Breitbart) to look at me and ask with amusement "Do we have a liberal spy here today?" 

The several times I was credentialed media I'd applied and simply said I wrote freelance for Breitbart, or the Federalist, or the Daily Caller, or even for my own blog (my blog that was actually attacked by Rachel Maddow and Chris Matthews on their MSNBC shows as well as by Jonathan Chait in New York magazine).

This year I applied for a media credential and sent samples of my more CPAC friendly writing in SpliceToday, a zany website owned by Russ Smith, a former New York journalist turned Baltimorean, who at one time owned the alternative City Papers in both Washington, D.C. and in Baltimore. Splice has a variety of writers, more libertarians and liberals than conservatives,  My own pieces in Splice are often somewhat philosophical reviews of TV shows or movies.  I also write about "gay topics" - Jussie Smollette and other gay miscreants, the Dave Chapelle tempest, "Bros," "Spoiler Alert," the "Sex and the City" revival, and that fantastic romantic gay episode of "The Last of Us."  I did not hear back from CPAC about my media credential this year, though that has happened in years past, and yet the media credential was there when I arrived.  This year as in many past I also bought a ticket for $295.  At registration I just picked up my paid ticket and didn't even try to find the media credential desk.  With a recently injured knee I decided not to wander up and down stairs and escalators and to just forgo using the media room, at least the first day. (Friends who are in the media room have since offered to bring me in with their media credentials if I need a desk.)

Thursday morning, before CPAC began, I was wandering the exhibit hall of booths and talking to groups like Hawaii Conservatives.org, Atheists for Liberty, or the Log Cabin Republicans.  When I had almost finished touring the hall, two large men in beige suits appeared and said "Bruce Majors?" One lifted my name tag to read it and he then removed my lanyard and name tag from my body, lifting it up and over my head, and grabbed my San Pellegrino bottle to see what it was.  They said I should come with them.  I asked what was up and one chuckled and said something like "You know why." I said I was going to need an explanation and my $295.  He said they were taking me to someone who would provide one.

Back at the registration desk where I’d been an hour before, a nice young woman who was a troubleshooter in the registration department said I had been denied a media credential, and anyone so denied was not allowed to buy a regular event ticket.  I asked to speak to her supervisor.  I told her I had been going to CPAC for 15 years.  She called her supervisor, and relayed that I was a long-term attendee who had had media credentials before, and they should look me up in their records.  Her supervisor then called the general counsel for CPAC.  The two Security men were joined by others as well as a Maryland State Trooper.  (State Troopers are usually at CPAC at the Gaylord National Resort, since Presidents and Congresspeople are often speakers, and many events have a lot of security.)   The troubleshooter ushered me into a side room, with all the security outside.  The General Counsel arrived.  Apologies ensued.  There was a new media team that still had some bugs, and they had made a mistake.  My lanyard and name tag were returned to me.  I shook various security people's hands (or fist bumped them) and their chief told me if it happened again (since I am still on a banned list that had already been distributed) to tell anyone who detains me to ask for "Keith."  (I've since had volunteers who worked in registration and also a State Trooper greet me and say they were glad I was back the next day and they were sorry this manhandling had occurred.)

The nice troubleshooter said she was giving me back my ticket but also refunding my $295.  Thankfully this all took less than an hour. 

But then later that day a reporter acquaintance interviewed me about the low attendance at this year's CPAC and whether I thought it was due to the "Schlapp scandal."  I did not see this, but according to her Washington Times article CPAC chairman Matt Schlapp was chased through the halls Thursday morning by reporters asking him about a lawsuit against him over a different kind of manhandling.  Schlapp, married to Mercedes Schlapp with whom he has several children, is being sued by a man who was a Herschel Walker campaign staffer assigned to drive Schlapp when he spoke at last year's Walker campaign events.  The anonymous accuser says Schlapp aggressively groped him.  The accuser also said that he would reveal his identity if Schlapp denied the charges.  Schlapp has denied the charges and the accuser has not given up his anonymity.  Does he just want to settle out of court for some portion of the $9 million he is suing for?  Or was he actually sexually assaulted?

Matt Schlapp at CPAC

I don't know the answer to that.  I don't think this scandal has affected CPAC.  Loyalists at CPAC I imagine believe all such groping charges - whether about Schlapp and a male campaign staffer or about Trump and women - are mainstream media lies.  (The only place I heard Schlapp discussed was at the Log Cabin booth, where a gay journalist from a New York paper had stopped by.)  What CPAC is mainly missing this year are the throngs of young people who used to register so they could vote in the annual CPAC presidential straw poll for Ron Paul (in 2007 and 2008) and for Rand Paul (in 2015 and 2016), helped out by generous subsidies for their tickets and hotel rooms by Ron Paul groups like Young Americans for Liberty and the Campaign for Liberty. There are no Ron Paul or Rand Paul related booths in the exhibit, and no related speakers. There are no libertarians of any stripe, from the Ayn Rand Institute to reason magazine, who have often been here in the past. (Reason actually once did a story on “gays at CPAC” using Grindr to count how many Grindr gays were within 100 feet of the main stage, and then interviewing gay attendees.)

I've since learned that other writers - like Mike LaChance from Legal Insurrection - who write for smaller center-right publications were denied media credentials. But I now wonder if this "new media department" with bugs, denied medial credentials to any applicants they did not know well, especially those who write for smaller publications.  If so apparently it didn't help, and Mr. Schlapp was still chased around the Gaylord Hotel.

The reduced numbers at CPAC, a Trump-concentrate, seem more worried about other issues. Nikki Haley could not get through her carefully constructed speech without some jeers of “RINO.” Vivek Ramaswamy had to address some choruses of “Trump, Trump, Trump!” from the crowd. Steve Bannon, in a pro-Trump stemwinder, assaulted Rupert Murdoch and FOX News for not covering Trump and not covering CPAC this year. As I drove away from the hotel listening to Bret Baier’s show simulcast on SiriusXM, some highlights of CPAC were covered. Though not Steve Bannon’s praise of Donald Trump, who spoke at the end of CPAC.

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Milo Takes Manhattan

This was published yesterday at the Daily Caller.

Waiting in a slightly chaotic line outside Milo Yiannapolous's book party on the Lower East Side last week, a rumor spread that Ann Coulter would be in attendance.  "She has a condo in Manhattan," reported one Milo fan.  When I wondered aloud if we'd see Miss Coulter dancing, a security/line minder said "She may be here but she won't be dancing."

Inside later as far as I could see there was no Coulter, dancing or otherwise, among the Milo fans, nearly a thousand of them, mainly tall, youngish, good looking, and often rather jacked.  Slightly more male than female, and probably slightly more straight than gay, with a goodly sprinkling of fans who were not white, despite critics' claim that Milo is a promoter (along with President Trump and anyone else who challenges "liberal" orthodoxy) of white nationalism.

Still, there were other celebrities-we-love-to-hate in attendance.  I had a drink with a very charming (and upbeat, despite news reports) Martin Shkreli, the multi-millionaire investor who now faces legal problems.  Shkreli, who had made a non-endorsement endorsement of Trump toward the end of last year's presidential campaign, also famously tried to donate to the Bernie campaign, only to have his check returned.  I asked Mr. Shkreli: "Trump, Bernie, but no Gary Johnson, no Jill Stein, but you dislike Hillary?"  His replies:  "I like to keep an open mind," and "My main issue is capital gains taxes.  I asked McCain, Obama, and Hillary about capital gains.  McCain said he would lower them; Obama said he would raise them a little.  Clinton talked for an hour and never answered the question."

Mr. Shkreli was worth $70 million before his legal troubles.  Miss Coulter is reported to be worth just over $8 million.  To date, the way Coulter makes her money doesn't entangle her in the web of trip wires of the regulatory state, thanks to the First Amendment, though Antifa and other rioters on the left are keeping Coulter and Milo from speaking on major college campuses.  Milo is reportedly only worth half as much as Coulter, in a way proving one of his contentions - that the gender wage gap does not exist.

Still, Milo is catching up with her.  The party began with an announcement that the first run of his new book, "Dangerous," had sold out of its first printing of 100,000, just by pre-orders.  So even though Coulter is taller, and thinner, and richer, and a natural blond, Milo is catching up.  Which is good since his new director of research, Chadwick Moore, keeps organizing these events with hundreds of guests with open bars featuring signature cocktails and handsome caterers passing out plentiful hors d'oeuvres.  The stories covering the parties are no doubt worth it as advertising, but Milo Inc. now has about 30 staffers, including a director of revenue and a chief events planner.

Milo's success is based on the same formulae that fuels Coulter's sales and Trump's electoral victory - blunt, and often comic, talk (or tweets) about topics the mainstream media, academe, and "liberal" orthodoxy say you can't speak about.  Milo does this with a certain flair calculated to excite his various fans.  His critics both misunderstand him and also want to smear him as a racist, Alt Right campaign strategist, political journalist, or media critic.  He is instead rather self-consciously Oscar Wilde touring America - though in his case he wants to become a permanent resident.  Appearing on stage at the Delancey Street book party in custom couture, a dazzling jacket that could have come from the wardrobes of Liberace or Elvis Presley, amid midgets wearing name tags identifying them as conservative writer and speaker "Ben Shapiro" (there is a feud there), and ISIS Varga girls in fishnet stockings, hijab, and black bikinis, it's clear that Milo is a performance artist first, and a political philosopher, if at all, second.

Talking to the 20-  and 30-somethings at both the book launch and at Milo's "Coming Out Conservative" party (held a few weeks before at a secret location on the Upper East Side), the modal political position of his young fans is that they are "libertarians...but" with the but usually being immigration, and sometimes abortion.  (At the second party a handsome young law student quizzes me about what publications I write for and what my politics are, and sums it up as "you are either a globalist or a nationalist.")

Milo's actual beliefs might some day turn out to surprise some of his followers, much as libertarians are sometimes reminded that one of their Nobel Laureate economists, F.A. Hayek, actually supported a small welfare state and modest redistribution of wealth, even while opposing central planning and regulation of markets.  Yiannapolous inflames the left simply by opposing identity politics and political correctness that tell people what they are supposed to believe based on their group identity, and what they are allowed and not allowed to say.  This alone makes him Dangerous to a ruling political class that sees electoral losses and falling support in polls, and doesn't want to lose its hold on the young and hip.

But if one listens closely to Milo interviews, it's not clear he goes as far as some libertarians or conservatives might, despite his support of President Trump.  In his interview with David Rubin it seems that despite his criticism of feminists, Milo is supportive of equal pay for equal work laws - which mean the State will be analyzing and classifying which jobs are equal to which.  But, this won't deter his supporters, who like Shkreli simply want the freedom to have an open mind, and cheer Milo on for breaking down any barriers erected against that.

New libertarian TV shows scheduled

Charlie Koch's Angels, three young women, one a cybersecurity expert, one a martial arts instructor, one a former homicide detective, go to work for an agency that hacks the intelligence community, disappears statist lobbyists and campaign staffers, and exposes shady dealings of establishment politicians.

To see these and other photos by Judd Weiss of the libertarian movement, go to his photo album.