Opinion - Is Steve Maviglio the Donald Trump of the Sacramento Lobbyist Corps?

July 3, 2017 |

Even though Democratic Party power broker and lobbyist Steve Maviglio is one of the most influential members of the Sacramento lobbyist corps, in at least one case he seems to be taking his behavioral cues for dealing with the media and people in general from Republican President Donald Trump.

So just what cue is Maviglio taking from Trump?

Bullying.

One definition of a bullying says it is to "use superior strength or influence to intimidate (someone), typically to force him or her to do what one wants."

For Trump, the list of people he has bullied is long and well documented. Decades before he became President and was just a billionaire New York City businessman, Trump regularly bullied those with less influence, which was pretty much everyone.

One of Trump's favorite bullying tactics is to intimidate someone with the threat of a lawsuit, of which he frequently follow through with. Given his superior financial resources against almost every defendant, notwithstanding the merit of the suit, Trump often times prevailed with or without the suit.

Students of history will appreciate that Trump picked this habit up very early in his business career from none other than the unscrupulous Roy Cohn. As a legal aide for the infamous Red-baiting Senator Joseph McCarthy, Cohn found a bright-eyed protege in Trump who eagerly took those lessons and frequently bludgeoned and bullied others with lawsuits.

Of course Trump has consistently bullied the media, often via Twitter these days, for presenting stories he considers unflattering, or in his words, fake. And as we have recently seen, Trump likes to imply violence against those individuals and organizations, especially the media.

Which brings us back to Maviglio. It seems a recent piece written and originally posted on CapitalWatchdog.org and subsequently re-posted on this site, didn't tickle the fancy of the high-powered political operative.

Much like the President's late night Twitter tirades, Mavigilio took to a contact form on this site at 1:30 a.m. to let us know that he did not like the content from the original author