Two-Faced McCormick Flayed As A “Chameleon,” An “Actor” Who Has “Transformed Himself Faster Than Clark Kent In A Phone Booth”

New reporting this morning on A1 of The Philadelphia Inquirer highlights how David McCormick has undergone a “makeover driven by an army of consultants” that has “at times left him looking like a supporting actor in his own carefully stage-managed production” – furthering the narrative that McCormick is nothing more than a two-faced “chameleon” who will say and do anything to help himself.

See for yourself:

The Philadelphia Inquirer: Trump’s smackdown of David McCormick shows the risks for Republicans trying a MAGA makeover
By Jonathan Tamari and Anna Orso
May 10, 2022

• McCormick has spent four months and at least $11 million of his own money advertising himself as an “America First” conservative. He aggressively sought Trump’s endorsement, courting the former president’s allies and hiring Trump aides to vaguely defined positions.

• Trump didn’t buy it.

• Instead he endorsed McCormick’s chief GOP rival, celebrity surgeon Mehmet Oz, and lacerated McCormick at a rally Friday in Southwestern Pennsylvania, undercutting the candidate’s core message less than two weeks before the crucial May 17 primary.

• Trump called him, “absolutely the candidate of special interests and globalists and the Washington establishment.”

• Trump’s rejection crystallized the eye rolls from McCormick’s rivals, who for months have scoffed at a makeover driven by an army of consultants and more than $33 million in spending by McCormick and his wealthy allies.

• Now McCormick enters the final days of a close race carrying the anvil Trump just dropped on him, unable to break away from the pack despite vastly outspending his opponents.

• He could become a cautionary tale about what happens to establishment figures who supplicate themselves before Trump, leaving their campaign identity in the hands of a mercurial leader.

• Under his watch, the hedge fund Bridgewater Associates last year raised more than $1 billion for investments in China.

• The attempts to build a Trump image around McCormick have at times left him looking like a supporting actor in his own carefully stage-managed production.

Bloomberg Businessweek: The Bridgewater CEO Who Went Full MAGA
By Joshua Green
April 6, 2022

• To the astonishment of the Bridgewater crowd, he shed his smooth, Davos Man persona and transformed himself faster than Clark Kent in a phone booth into a Trump-touting, China-bashing MAGA acolyte.

• McCormick’s former co-workers circulate his ads, horrified, puzzled, or amused at their old boss’s transformation. “Is Connecticut Dave McCormick the real one, or is Pennsylvania Dave McCormick the real one?” one asks. “Or is the real Dave McCormick a chameleon who’ll be whatever he needs to be to succeed?”

• “He’s a rich guy from Connecticut masquerading as a regular guy from Pennsylvania,” says Stuart Stevens, who… managed Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign.

New York Times: The Art of the MAGA Makeover

By Blake Hounshell and Leah Askarinam

February 23, 2022

• McCormick has been studiously trying to cast himself as a Trump-style contender.

• But this MAGA makeover hasn’t been easy.

• McCormick’s work for a hedge fund that was closely linked to China has made it difficult for him to transform into a populist.
  
  

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