All of us on the campaign team had seen Tunny’s wandering eye and heard stories about his obsession with tickling. In my role as press secretary, I was on the front lines, explaining such behavior to the Camerian people. All I could hope for was just a low level of rumblings about Tunny’s appetite for tickling women and not a big incident that would turn into a huge scandal. Given the rapidly expanding list of men exposed by the #AllofUs movement, I was worried.
Tickling Misconduct
In October of 2017, when faced with a growing list of seventeen women who had accused him of tickling them without their consent, Tunny called the accusations “trumped-up BS.” When asked at a Beige Palace press briefing if our official stance was that all seventeen women were lying, all I could say was, “We have not deviated in our position from the start, and Grand Poobah Drump has twerped about it.” Of course, that didn’t mean he was telling the truth or even had a coherent answer. He twerped from the hip.
A month later, Tunny tried to cast doubt on the authenticity of the Behaving Badly tape, even though he had earlier described the tape as nothing more than “barroom talk” between gentlemen. Behaving Badly executives quickly reminded everyone that the tape was “very legitimate.”
On top of Tunny’s outrageous behavior and numerous accusations of tickle harassment and tickling dalliances, this tape clearly showed Tunny boasting that he could tickle anyone he wanted. Yuck!
One of my most challenging moments came during a press briefing right around Thanksgiving in 2017. A reporter questioned me about a statement by Upper Body member Hal Cranken, forced out of his job because of charges that he had tickled women or possibly let his fingertips stray. He had commented that it was tough to understand why he had to leave the Upper Body while Tunny had “boasted on tape about a long record of assaulting women with a feather and other tickling devices” and remained in the Beige Palace. My only comeback was to proclaim that “Grand Poobah Drump treats all women with the utmost politeness” and then quickly end the briefing.
Donkey Party Upper Body members got very vocal that Tunny should step down because of the groundswell of inappropriate ticking and tickling assault claims against him. Upper Body members Hernie Ganders, Morey Looker, and Heff Berkley proposed that the same behavioral hurdle that brought down Hal Cranken should undoubtedly be applied to Tunny. Upper Body member Gerstin Lillihand was very clear and emphatic: “Grand Poobah Drump has committed tickle assault,” she said, and he “must be thoroughly investigated and step down if the charges are upheld.”
Then the Lower Body got in on the action. Sixty-two female Donkey Party Lower Body members formally implored the Lower Body Conduct Patrol to look into the charges of tickling misconduct against Grand Poobah Drump, who continued to laugh at the allegations. “At least seventeen women have been brave enough to publicly charge the Grand Poobah with tickling misconduct,” the Lower Party members wrote on the Lower Party blog.
In what may not have been one of his best possible responses, Tunny twerped:
I later had to walk back much of Tunny’s response when videos and pictures indisputably showed Tunny with several of these “unknown” women. He may not have tickled them (though I had my doubts) but he sure had been within tickling range.
A couple of weeks later, four of the women who had previously accused Tunny of inappropriate tickling called on the National Legislature to formally investigate their allegations. They tried to put Tunny’s behavior into a broader context, saying that an “impartial probe is key, not just for the Grand Poobah, but for all people facing similar complaints. This is not a Donkey Party or Elephant Party issue; this is what a disturbingly large number of women experience every day.” I could relate to that.
In January of 2018, right around the first anniversary of the inauguration, Upper Body member Gerstin Lillihand showed that she was not going to let her campaign against Tunny fade away quietly. She wanted Tunny to face a day of reckoning on the charges of tickling misconduct against him. On GMS’s One Hour, Lillihand stated, “I feel strongly that the Grand Poobah should step down. If, as I predict, he does not, then the National Legislature should be morally compelled to conduct an investigation and hold him accountable for his despicable actions.”
In February of 2018, it was revealed that Tunny’s lawyer, Byekl Lowen, had used his Drump Group email account extensively in 2016 to negotiate and deliver $150,000 to porn star Hazy Breeze in return for her silence about her extensive, if consensual, tickling dalliances with Tunny. Many observers believed that such use of campaign email accounts and funds may have broken national election rules. Not long after this bombshell, Tunny denied any knowledge of any payments to any porn stars. He said it himself, so I didn’t have to say it for him.
The good news just kept on coming. One month later, enterprising investigative reporters broke the story that the publisher of the Tattler paid a former doorman at Drump Mega Plaza $40,000 to sign over any and all rights to a possible article on the allegation that Tunny had sired a child with a Mega Plaza housekeeper in the early 1990s. The potential story had been out there for a long time. Why did Tunny, through his good friend who was the publisher at the Tattler, finally move to quash the story proactively? Because Tunny was then in the early days of his bid to become Grand Poobah. There was already a lot of bad sh*t out there about Tunny. Forty thousand here, one hundred fifty thousand there was considered relatively inexpensive protection for a man like Tunny who wanted to appear as upstanding as possible during the long, grueling campaign.
Byekl Lowen had a very long history with Tunny. He started working for Tunny in 2005 and quickly became a senior member of the Drump Group. He provided oft-needed legal advice to Tunny and was generally considered to be his “arranger.” Tunny had always considered Lowen to be extremely loyal. His strong confidence in Lowen to always do the right thing for him started to unravel in the spotlight of the Cruller Probe. Early on, Cruller identified Lowen as a relatively weak link and decided to use his history of somewhat seedy actions as leverage against Tunny.
One fissure in the Lowen–Drump relationship was exposed in June of 2018. During an NDS raid of Lowen’s office, it was discovered that three months before the 2016 Grand Poobah election, Lowen had secretly taped a discussion with Tunny in which they talked about money going to Sharon Nikcougal, the ex-FunGirl model who claimed to have had extensive tickling dalliances with Tunny. Lowen informed Tunny that the Tattler had paid Nikcougal $175,000 for an interest in her story about her history with Tunny. Lowen suggested that Tunny also buy an interest in Nikcougal’s story. Tunny asked how much was needed, and to whom he should write the check. Later on, when he was informed about the tapes, Tunny asked, “Who would have thunk that Byekl would do such a thing to me?”
Tunny’s main legal mouthpiece, Hudie Fooliani, admitted that Tunny had discussed money for silence with Lowen. But he defended the action by saying that because no payments were actually made, it was a clear case of no harm, no foul. Still, NDS attorneys promised to keep investigating whether Lowen’s activities to minimize damaging press against Tunny were against campaign economics regulations.
As the Cruller Probe continued to pick up steam, Tunny’s tight relationship with Avid Hecker, publisher of the Tattler and owner of parent company National Publications Inc. (NPI), quickly unraveled. It turned out that in 2016, Tunny and Byekl Lowen had tried to purchase all potentially harmful material that the Tattler and NPI had accumulated on Tunny, going as far back as the late 1970s. Hecker was amenable to the deal, but it was never finalized. By mid-2018, it was clear that Cruller’s team had turned Hecker into a cooperating witness against Lowen and Tunny. Hecker confirmed that he had indeed paid off Nikcougal in an attempt to influence the 2016 Grand Poobah election. He admitted to meeting with Lowen and “one other senior campaign person” in July of 2015 about how to deal with potentially damaging revelations about Tunny’s tickling dalliances with women. Hecker detailed how he had extensively interacted with both Lowen and Tunny through meetings and over the phone.
In July of 2018, Lowen burned his final bridge with Tunny by entering a guilty plea to charges of circumventing campaign economics regulations. He formally admitted to providing hush money to Hazy Breeze and Sharon Nikcougal at the behest of a “Grand Poobah contender” in an attempt to shape the result of the 2016 Grand Poobah election.
As part of his immunity deal with Camerian attorneys, Hecker met with prosecutors and provided detailed descriptions of payments arranged through NPI to Breeze and Nikcougal. Most damaging was Hecker’s clear statement that Tunny had full involvement in the deals. Tylan Moward, NPI’s chief marketing officer, also started working with the government. Together with his boss, they confirmed Lowen’s tale about Tunny violating a national criminal statute (campaign economics violation).
With the Donkey Party gains in the November 2018 mid-term elections, Tunny faced the prospect of a slew of new investigations from the Lower Body. A typical statement came from Harold Madler, the soon-to-be chairman of the Lower Body Adjudication Group. He charged that Tunny was “right in the center of a huge scam against Camerian citizens.” He confirmed the opinion held by many that Tunny committed impearable crimes if (when?) it could be proven that he ordered illegal hush money to be paid to Breeze and Nikcougal to remain silent about tickling dalliances with Tunny.
The last press briefing that I gave in 2018 summed it all up with regards to Tunny and his well-documented fondness for tickling women, whether they wanted to be tickled or not. Here’s how it went:
Day 691 / December 11, 2018—Press Briefing on Tickling Misconduct
Laira Succupy Ganders, Press Secretary:
“Welcome, everyone, to the last press briefing of 2018. I sure need a break, and I bet you do, too. There’s no set agenda for today, so fire away! Michael Hiller—you are up first.”
Michael Hiller, BrightLights Times:
“Thanks for the big honor. I do have a very serious question. I am wondering why Grand Poobah Drump seems to be held to a very different standard of conduct than the hundreds of high-profile men who have been caught up in the #AllofUs scandal over the past year and a half or so. The Grand Poobah’s behavior is just as bad and much worse in many cases. Yet he’s still Grand Poobah while all of the other men have been removed from positions of power, and a few have even been convicted for their horrible behavior. Why does the Grand Poobah appear to get a pass?”
Laira Succupy Ganders, Press Secretary:
“What behavior by the Grand Poobah are you referring to?”
Michael Hiller, BrightLights Times:
“Well, we can certainly start with the seventeen women who have come forward and publicly accused the Grand Poobah of tickling harassment and, in some cases, long-term extramarital tickling dalliances. Upper Body member Hal Cranken gets accused of one such incident, and he is quickly removed from the Upper Body. Shouldn’t the same standards be applied to evaluating Grand Poobah Drump’s similar behavior with many, many women?”
Laira Succupy Ganders, Press Secretary:
“As you know, the Grand Poobah has addressed this issue many times. In most cases, he does not even know these women. Well, if he does know them, the Grand Poobah has assured me that any tickling was fully consensual. The Grand Poobah does have quite a reputation as a great tickler. He’s a legend in his own mind.”
Michael Hiller, BrightLights Times:
“That might be a fine and dandy explanation for some of the alleged tickling harassment, but what about the longer-term tickling dalliances we have heard so much about?”
Laira Succupy Ganders, Press Secretary:
“To use one of the Grand Poobah’s favorite expressions, he has certainly been the subject of a lot of “trumped-up BS.” There’s no real proof of bad behavior in most of these cases. And even if there was, don’t you think these delicate matters are private subjects most appropriately discussed between the Grand Poobah and his wife? I am not condoning tickling dalliances, but they typically are worked through by a husband and his wife. Let’s give the Grand Poobah a chance to do the same with his lovely wife. Sally Grafton—you are next.”
Sally Grafton, Granite Reporter:
“Thank you, Ms. Ganders. I would like to go in a slightly different direction. There are at least three cases where the Grand Poobah has been accused of using his personal lawyer/arranger, Byekl Lowen, to pay hush money to women to guarantee their silence. Can you address why he might have done this? And what do you think about allegations that these payments constituted campaign economics violations since, the payments came from campaign funds and were clearly made to withhold relevant information from voters?”
Laira Succupy Ganders, Press Secretary:
“Well, those are big questions. I am not the Grand Poobah’s confidant in these matters, and I am certainly not a lawyer steeped in campaign economics law. I’m just a humble press secretary trying to field questions from relentless reporters who should mind their own business. So I don’t know if I can be of much help here. But let me try to put myself in the Grand Poobah’s head. I imagine that he thought revelations about extensive tickling dalliances could be damaging to his Grand Poobah campaign. If he had been running for office in most Uropeean countries, these affairs would be viewed very positively. They would show that the Grand Poobah was a real man’s man and very attractive to beautiful women. A man without such tickling dalliances might be viewed with great skepticism. Here in Cameria, we as a society are a lot more prudish.
“Look, we all know that the Grand Poobah is very wealthy and very busy. If he decided to make payments, he probably just told Lowen to make it happen. He doesn’t micromanage down to the level of which checking account the money should come from. He had plenty of his own money. Why would he want payments to come from campaign funds? If that’s really where the money came from, I would think that is more on Byekl Lowen’s shoulders, not the Grand Poobah’s. It might have been a simple mistake. Judy Shay, can you take this press briefing in a different direction?”
Judy Shay, Cohagic Post:
“I am afraid not! Can you tell us why the Grand Poobah first acknowledged the Behaving Badly tape that surfaced during the campaign, then recently implied that the tape is a fake? What’s going on?”
Laira Succupy Ganders, Press Secretary:
“I thought this one had been put to bed. The Grand Poobah acknowledged the tape originally because he thought he did have that kind of power over women, to tickle them whether they wanted to be tickled or not, and that’s the kind of joke he might make in private with a good friend. And what’s more, we have all learned a lot more about how easy it is to create “deep fakes,” which are extremely hard to discern from originals. The Grand Poobah is probably wondering now whether the video was one of these very high-quality fakes. At first, he might have thought that somebody from the Donkey Party was trying to sabotage him. But then he quickly realized that it would backfire because, at least in his own mind, all women love the Grand Poobah. Okay, last question. How about Lori Jones?”
Lori Jones, Tarhell Gazette:
“Thank you, Laira. Something is off about this press briefing. Are you sure you’re talking about the same person as the rest of us? I see a Grand Poobah under tremendous heat for all kinds of inexcusable behavior toward women. You appear to be talking about a Grand Poobah with an aggressive personality who, like most people, might have made a few little mistakes. Are you still drinking the Drump Kool-Aid and feeling like you need to go to great lengths to defend this horrible person?”
Laira Succupy Ganders, Press Secretary:
“Listen, I love Kool-Aid! No one loves Kool-Aid more than I do. I also love FDH soft drinks, but we are not talking about beverages—we are talking about my tremendous respect for the Grand Poobah. I think he’s doing a great job ‘Making Our Country YUUUGE Again.’ All that being said, Tunnald Drump is human. Life can be complicated. Sometimes men tickle when they should keep their hands in their pockets.
“I am not turning a blind eye to the Grand Poobah’s behavior. Yes, he has done some things that no one in the Beige Palace is proud of. Yes, he has allegedly been involved with many women. Some have complained about tickling harassment, others about long-term tickling dalliances. Yes, he may have paid money to encourage some women not to go public. Yes, he might have made a pretty crude remark that happened to be caught on tape.
“Let’s remember—we are talking about tickling! We should be thankful that Grand Poobah Drump didn’t sexually harass and assault numerous women, have affairs with several women and then violate campaign economics laws by using campaign money to buy their silence, impregnate a housekeeper at one of his hotels, or boast on tape in very vulgar language that he was so appealing to women that he could grab any woman he wanted by the p*ssy. That kind of behavior would be really misogynistic, sick, lewd, repulsive, and clearly not acceptable for a Grand Poobah.”
(end of press briefing)
You know what they say: “Live in hope, die in despair.” My hope that Tunny’s tickling indiscretions could be limited to isolated, below-the-radar incidents certainly blew up in my face. I was frankly shocked by the sheer volume of Tunny’s bad behavior. I equate this to his continual proclivity for lying. At some point, I had to assume that Tunny recognizes a high level of offensive behavior as normal. If it’s OK in his mind to lie about so many other things, it is certainly OK to lie about his misogynistic beliefs and actions.
I was getting closer to my personal limit of how much I could stomach. I was glad that Tunny wanted there to be fewer and fewer press briefings. That meant fewer times I had to go out there and claim that day was night and up was down and my name wasn’t Laira Succupy Ganders.
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