What If Trump Is Trying To Break the GOP?
By: A.B. Stoddard - The Bulwark
The future of the Republican party is an endless series of loyalty tests and Trump family vendettas.
Good luck.
There are now two Republican Parties:
- Mitch McConnell's "Serve and Obey the Rich",
- Donald Trump's "Serve and Obey Trump"
They have been allies until now, but the 2020 election showed us the limits.
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
It's hard for Republicans to think straight these days. Stop the count, no, wait—do a recount. Elections are rigged and fraudulent. But the January 5 Georgia runoff will be legit, so GOP voters need to psyche up and turn out.
And in their confusion, Republicans seem not to have noticed the new dynamic which is emerging. The combination of the "Stop-the-Steal" ragers and the fear of the silent Republican establishment types are mothers milk to Trump.
Angry and afraid people fighting— over him— is the very top of his hierarchy of needs. It's his version of self-actualization. And while he may be forced to give up the office of the presidency, he will not give up being at the center of this storm. Republicans don't seem capable of understanding where this eventually leads. So let me spell it out for them:
Donald Trump is going to destroy their party.
Not because he wants to or even because he's trying to. But because the destruction of the GOP will be required in order to fill his psychological needs.
Trump started his Saturday morning on a RINO hunt, tweeting about a Washington Post report revealing only 25 Republicans in Congress—of 249 queried—would admit that Joe Biden had won the election. His reaction:
25, wow! I am surprised there are so many. We have just begun to fight. Please send me a list of the 25 RINOS. I read the Fake News Washington Post as little as possible! https://t.co/cEBM0bYuQ9
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 5, 2020
In the afternoon he asked Georgia's Republican governor to overturn the election which had already been certified in his state. Hours later Trump flew to Georgia for a rally that was supposed to be about boosting the two Republican Senate candidates, but was mostly about lying that he won Georgia. Trump insisted that he really did win Georgia, despite it being "rigged," and warned about the runoff that "they're going to try and rig this one, I'm sure."
Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, who rebuffed Trump's demands hours earlier took a beating at the rally. Trump said that Kemp should be ashamed of himself and openly suggested that Rep. Doug Collins should primary him in two years.
Here's the problem with living in Trump's conspiracy world: There is no way for Trump partisans to get revenge against the shadowy forces who "stole" the election that Trump lost by a historic margin.
But now that Trump has demanded that specific elected officials break the law on his behalf, there will be a list of officeholders Trump's people can mobilize against.
You can't vote out Dominion. But you can go after Brian Kemp and Brad Raffensberger and Doug Ducey and any (and every) other Republican who refused to steal the election on Trump's behalf.
And that's where the anger that Trump is stoking in Republican voters is going to be channeled in the coming months. Because it's literally the only place it can flow.
Between Governor @DougDucey of Arizona and Governor @BrianKempGA of Georgia, the Democrat Party could not be happier. They fight harder against us than do the Radical Left Dems. If they were with us, we would have already won both Arizona and Georgia…
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 5, 2020
Rudy Giuliani, has also put Republicans on notice, because while he won't be taking the blame for the fruitless hunt for fake fraud, someone has to. Last week he raged on Twitter at Republican state legislators who he said have let America down by not trying to overturn their states election results.
Republican Legislature let down America.
I'm ashamed of them.
They completely misled the President and me.
All of us Republicans let them know what we think of them.
— Rudy W. Giuliani (@RudyGiuliani) December 4, 2020
Who does Giuliani mean when he says "Republicans"? That label doesn't mean much these days. After all, Trump wasn't a Republican before he ran for president.
Jared Kushner bragged to Bob Woodward, Trump "basically did a full hostile takeover of the Republican Party" because his resonance with voters was less about policy and more about "attitude."
And that sounds about right. Which means that after the 2020 election, the definition of who is a "real" Republican will be made by simple binary answer: Were you with Trump in his attempt to steal a "rigged" election, or against him? Are you in, or out, of the Trump personality cult?
It's amusing to watch conventional Republicans try to cling to the idea that Trumpism is about policy, or ideology, or something other than Donald Trump and his "attitude." These people were happy to be complicit in Trumpism so long as they got their judges and nobody demanded that they break the law on Trump's behalf. Now some of them find themselves up against the wall while guys like Ted Cruz look on nervously hoping that they can act butch enough that Trump won't demand a loyalty test of them the way he has of Kemp and Ducey..
Meanwhile, Trump's true believers—the sometimes drunk and always-viral misfit toys—have pledged to die for the cause of Trump's fake fraud, called for martial law and suspension of the Constitution, and the shooting of a high ranking former Homeland Security official.
What Mitch McConnell and company don't seem to understand is that this is the endgame: The MAGA cult no longer sees Democrats and the media as Enemy Number One. The Republicans who aren't legally permitted to deny reality are now the big threat. And Trump is going to spend the next two—or four—years at war them.
As Trump pretends he's running for president in 2024, he will batter the Republican party. A Politico story this week quoted a donor who said he would immediately contribute to Trump's new PAC, and noted that most donors would feel pressure to do the same, just to avoid his wrath. Jon Thompson, a former Trump campaign aide was quoted saying "If he starts holding grudges against sitting officeholders and donors who decline to throw their support behind him, it is going to put Republicans in a bind."
Duh.
In the coming war Republicans wanting to win elections and hold power will do battle with Trumpkins who can't win swing voters, but dominate primaries, fundraising, and the Parlersphere. Georgia won't see the only toxic primary in 2022. Lara Trump could run against Rep. Mark Walker in North Carolina, and the fight to fill retiring Sen. Pat Toomey's seat in Pennsylvania should be a doozy as 75 of the state's Republican state legislators signed a letter this week to the state's congressional delegation calling for them to dispute the 2020 election results in Congress.
This gives Democrats the upper hand in all those races, should Trumpkin candidates prevail in primaries. Republicans will no longer benefit from MAGA devotees Trump mobilized in 2016 and 2020—but notably not in 2018—while the party loses swing voters by fashioning Trump into an eternal victim of a "stolen" election. And all of this—every bit of it—was foreseeable.
As Jonathan V. Last wrote on October 8: "Go write this down: After November 3, the price of admission to GOP politics is going to be an insistence that, actually, Donald Trump did win the election and/or would have won if it hadn't been stolen/rigged."
Republicans will soon notice that Trump won't give a hoot about judges, just fighting. Trump is telling aides and allies that he's doing all of this because his supporters need to see him fighting a Biden victory. He will keep fighting Biden and the Democrats and the media but he will also pound any Republicans who do not bend the knee. Relentlessly. No policy or posture or line of propaganda will be pleasing enough to him. They can expect frequent put downs, pressure to flatter him and demands that they flout reality.
Without the bully pulpit and the power of the presidency Trump will bully harder.
Behavior and conduct within the Constitutional order is unacceptable to Trump. As Charlie Sykes asks: Will Vice President Mike Pence be attacked as a "cuck" if he attends Joe Biden's inauguration? Almost certainly, yes. Which will mean that Pence will—again, almost certainly—decline to attend. Just another loyalty test to stay in the good graces of the cult leader.
Michael Gerson wrote about the danger Trump's assault on democracy inspires:
"Trump is not merely claiming instances of election fraud. He is alleging that the American system of democratic government has failed, which implies a right to revolution. By demanding specific, unlawful acts to overturn results in a fair election, he is urging authoritarian solutions to his political problems."
What awaits Trump, after the season of election fraud TV ends on January 20, is serious legal exposure. He will make sure the GOP pays a price at each twist and turn of his coming prosecutions for various and sundry crimes. From obstruction of justice, to tax fraud, and so much more. Trump's legal morass will be a chronic story in the years to come. Republicans will be asked to comment on each sordid discovery and ruling, and anyone unwilling to zealously defy the facts and fight back will be punished.
He will imply a right to revolution.
Republicans will have to soon accept Trump isn't actually trying to be president again, or lead or unite a party. He simply intends to dominate and there is never enough submission. The next few years for Trump will be all about scalps.
Republican scalps.
A.B. Stoddard is associate editor and columnist at RealClearPolitics.
Tags
Who is online
119 visitors
I do not think Trump is out to kill the R party. It is simply collateral damage of his narcissistic campaign to lie his way out of defeat (at least in his mind).
I agree.
But the objectives of the two Republican Parties are ferociously opposed.
Donald Trump is going to destroy their party.
It looks more and more likely. They seem and determined to lose those Senate seats also
Yup
I don't think he cares one way or the other about the republican party. IMO, it's all about him and nothing else. If the Republican senators and congressman stood up to him they may save their party. It seems that one of the few with a set of balls is Adam Kinzinger.
True...
... but Trump's ego will run contrary to McConnell's needs...
A.B. Stoddard is a brilliant political analyst and I have valued her opinion for many years. She is inevitably correct and I think that this article is thoughtful and very well-informed.
This is the underlying danger to his post election tantrums. He is trying to turn the election into his very own (Reichstag, Alamo, Pearl Harbor, Lusitania.... there are others scattered throughout history, pick any one) event to focus peoples anger and goad them to violence.
Trump just wants to be king and doesn't understand the golden rule.
If you want a friend, you have to be a friend.
I am trying to look at this in a positive light. Sometimes in order for something to be fixed it has to be broken. I'm super pumped that we will see a resurrection of the republican party that actually had a principled platform and believed in compromise. It may happen if led by those who came together to form the Lincoln Project.
Nobel thoughts, but that will never happen as long as Supply Side Economics and Citizens United continues to live and breathe.
McConnell has to go. If you want to kill the beast you have to cut off it's head. Then we can work on the others.
I agree... but I doubt that he'll go quietly.
That's why Georgia is so critical.
IMNAAHO, the Republican Party you're thinking of died long before the advent of Donald Trump. Trump is the best-known example of Republican turpitude, but there are dozens of others.
There may be a few remaining Ed Brooke Republicans, but they're not making enough noise for even a newsaholic like me to know they exist.
I can't think of a single "well-known Republican" who doesn't support Trumpism... many of them since long before Trump came on the scene.
Maybe. I think even after Trump leaves whether he's found a way to pardon himself or not and whether he pardons his family and friends, Congress needs to continue putting all the pieces together on what this Administration has done that may have been improper or illegal. Even if they cannot be held accountable their actions need to be exposed to the American people. It may also reveal some improper and unethical behavior by some house and senate representatives. That information should also be exposed.
If these last 4 years are swept under the rug I will be furious.
Half of Congress condoned, or even abetted, Trump's turpitude. I doubt they'll suddenly sprout moral consciences.
I agree that Trump's outright crimes must be pursued; otherwise, we're accomplices. I'm not sure what agency is best suited.
I have said before, the republicans now have to deal with the monster of their own making.
After they sat back and let it all happen, just so they could sit judges and get more of extreme policy through. Now it is biting them in the ass.
I can only shake my head as I believe if more of them would have spoken up, more of them challenged him as the deranged person that he is, they wouldn't be in as bad a position as they are.
Instead they sat back and let him do whatever he wanted. They themselves were part of their own undoing.
Yup
Both parties are too entrenched now with their power structures, organization, fundraising, and so on. I don't see anybody destroying them. In a couple of months, this Trump chaos will be over and the Republican party will get back to its regular business.
I dream of the day of no parties. None.
Party pooper.
Gone but not forgotten. True Americans will never forget what republicans allowed these past four years, never.
What did they allow?.
It would save us both time if you were to tell us what republicans did to stop trump from shitting all over the presidency and our democratic republic. Go ahead.
"Trump breaking the GOP." ? ?
Nah. Trump breaks everything he touches. His only priority is himself. The danger he presents for this 'new GOP' is the fact that he knows to much about them and the money behind them. And those issues lie with the GOP itself. Besides, anybody heard anything from the NRA lately? There is something there and the GOP is arseholes and elbows in it.
I suspect Trump will start a third party, since mainstream Republicans have rejected him
I dunno.
IMHO, we haven't really seen much rejection. OTOH, once he's out of the White House, Trump will have to "deal" with other politicians (McConnell, Cruz, ...), rather than just give orders, and we know that he isn't in fact very good at making deals.
There's been talk about starting a cable "news" network. I wonder if he has the investment money. If he needs backers, then he'll have to share power with them... and he's not very good at that, either.