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Post by the Scribe on Jan 23, 2021 14:03:03 GMT
New Rule: Hello, Douchebags! | Real Time with Bill Maher (HBO)
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Post by the Scribe on Jan 28, 2021 19:21:41 GMT
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Post by the Scribe on Jan 31, 2021 17:32:40 GMT
'It's endemic': state-level Republican groups lead party's drift to extremismwww.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/30/republicans-radical-extreme-state-parties
Kelli Ward, center, was re-elected as chair of the Arizona Republican party and is among the most unabashed promoters of Trump’s election lies. Photograph: Jonathan J Cooper/AP
Despite national failures at the ballot box, radicalised state parties are fighting for Trump’s election lies and defending QAnon followers
David Smith in Washington @smithinamerica Sun 31 Jan 2021 02.00 EST
1,333 In Arizona and Oregon, they rebuked opponents of Donald Trump’s assault on democracy. In Hawaii, they defended followers of the QAnon conspiracy movement. And in Texas, they adopted a slogan with dark historical connotations: “We are the storm.”
To understand the future of the Republican party, start with the army of increasingly radicalised foot soldiers who shape it at state level. www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/01/25/trump-departs-his-extremes-live-state-gops/
Far from responding to the loss of the White House to Joe Biden by tacking to the political centre, local parties appear to be racing to the extreme right by giving safe harbour to white nationalism, QAnon – an antisemitic theory involving Satan-worshipping cannibals and a child sex trafficking ring – and “the big lie” that the presidential election was stolen by Democrats. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/24/donald-trump-big-lie-american-democracy
“The central story of American politics right now is that one of the two parties is ‘radicalizing against democracy’ in front of our eyes,” tweeted Chris Hayes, an author and host on the MSNBC network. “There are tons of other stories as well, but they all come after that, I think.”
Republicans do battle: Trump ally whips up Wyoming crowd against Liz Cheney Read more www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/29/republicans-trump-matt-gaetz-wyoming-liz-cheney-impeachment
The Republican party has been drifting towards rightwing populism for years, with notable examples including the Tea Party movement, the nomination of Sarah Palin for vice-president and the total capitulation to Trump. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jun/09/donald-trump-republican-party
Moderate Republicans hoped that Trump’s failures at the ballot box – he was the first president since 1932 to lose re-election, the House and the Senate – might generate an “autopsy” similar to that which followed Mitt Romney’s defeat eight years ago and a reset aimed at broadening its appeal. www.documentcloud.org/documents/624581-rnc-autopsy.html
But recent evidence suggests that state parties are embracing Trumpism with renewed zeal, along with the fantasies of the far-right fringe. The most explosive demonstration came on 6 January, when a violent mob stormed the US Capitol in Washington in a bid to overturn Trump’s election defeat while displaying the Confederate flag, a sweatshirt that said “Camp Auschwitz” and “Q” shirts and “Q” banners. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/06/trump-mob-capitol-clash-police-washington
The evidence is overwhelming that local parties across the country are radicalized
Tim Miller, Republican Voters Against Trump
Tim Miller, former political director of Republican Voters Against Trump, said: “The evidence is overwhelming that local parties across the country, in blue states and red states, are radicalized and support extremely far outside the mainstream positions like, for example, ending our democratic experiment to install Donald Trump as president over the will of the people. thebulwark.com/author/tim-miller/
“They believe in insane Covid denialism and QAnon and all these other conspiracies. It’s endemic, not just a couple of state parties. It’s the vast majority of state parties throughout the country.”
In the internal battle between conservatives and extremists, the extremists appear to be winning. The state party in Oregon recently condemned Liz Cheney and nine other House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump over the Capitol insurrection. It cited a groundless conspiracy theory that the riot was a “false flag” operation staged to discredit the president’s supporters. www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2021/01/26/oregon-republican-false-flag-capitol/
A protester shouts in agreement with the Republican representative Matt Gaetz as he gives a speech during a rally against Representative Liz Cheney on Thursday. Photograph: Michael Cummo/AP
In Hawaii, the party’s official Twitter account claimed that QAnon followers were merely displaying misguided patriotism and “largely motivated by a sincere and deep love for America”. QAnon has been identified by the FBI as a domestic terrorism threat. (Following a backlash, the state party’s vice-chairman, Edwin Boyette, resigned and the tweets were deleted.)
In Minnesota, Jennifer Carnahan, the state party chairwoman, suggested that Mike Lindell, the chief executive of MyPillow and a Trump ally and election denier, should run for governor. In Michigan, Meshawn Maddock, who joined a pro-Trump rally near the US Capitol a day before the riots, is set to become party co-chair. www.startribune.com/mypillow-s-mike-lindell-is-trump-s-choice-vs-walz-in-2022/572550651/
In Kentucky, Republicans in Nelson county voted to censure Mitch McConnell, the Senate minority leader, over his statements on the Senate floor criticising Trump for his role in the Capitol violence. In Pennsylvania, Republican leaders “are all-in for Trump more than ever”, the New York Times reported, noting that they “have made loyalty to the defeated ex-president the sole organizing principle of the party”. www.nytimes.com/2021/01/28/us/politics/pennsylvania-republicans-trump.html
Then there is Arizona, where last weekend Republicans voted to censure Governor Doug Ducey, who certified Trump’s defeat in the state, as well as the Trump critics Jeff Flake, a former senator, and Cindy McCain, the widow of Senator John McCain. The state party also re-elected its chair, Kelli Ward, a self-described “Trump Republican” who is among the most unabashed promoters of his election lies. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/24/arizona-republicans-censure-mccain-flake-ducey-trump
Arizona has become an election battleground that narrowly flipped from Trump to Biden last November with the help of young Latinos, newcomers to the state and growing suburban communities. A Republican shift to the far right is therefore seen by many as electoral suicide.
Mark Salter, who was a close friend and adviser to McCain, said: “Trump lost re-election because because minority voters turned out in greater numbers than they did in 2016 and because the suburbs, especially suburban women, turned decisively against him.” www.simonandschuster.com/authors/Mark-Salter/428469660
Extremists screw up elections. If you're a Republican seeking power, you've got to do something about these people Mark Salter, adviser to John McCain
Ward and other extremists “screw up elections” for Republicans, Salter added. “So if you’re a Republican who’s interested in power and exercising it and advancing whatever your policy principles are, you’ve really got to do something about these people.” www.theguardian.com/us-news/republicans
Texas is another example with huge electoral implications. The party chairman is now Allen West, a former Florida congressman who in 2014 described Barack Obama as “an Islamist” who is “purposefully enabling the Islamist cause”. When the supreme court threw out Trump’s challenge to the election, West hinted at secession, arguing that “law-abiding states should bond together and form a union of states that will abide by the constitution”. www.texasgop.org/about-chairman-allen-west/
Under West, the state party posted a tweet urging people to follow it on Gab, a social media app known to be used by white supremacists, and adopted the provocative slogan: “We are the storm”.
Steve Schmidt, a founder of the Lincoln Project, an anti-Trump group, noted that the term echoes both the Sturmmann (storm troopers) and der Stürmer (the Stormer) newspaper of Nazi Germany. “So the idea of being the storm is deeply embedded in the mythology of the extremist Nazi fascistic ideologies of both past and present,” he said. twitter.com/SteveSchmidtSES?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor
More recently “the storm” is also a phrase used by devotees of QAnon predicting an apocalyptic showdown between Trump and his foes. Schmidt added: “In every state party there are QAnon adherents. Some state parties are being consumed by them. You can certainly say four – Texas, Oregon, Arizona and big parts of California – at a minimum and it’s likely to be more. www.npr.org/sections/inauguration-day-live-updates/2021/01/20/958907699/the-qanon-storm-never-struck-some-supporters-are-wavering-others-steadfast
“There will be more candidates who subscribe to the theories of the movement in 2022 and beyond. It will continue to metastasise to some degree. Shutting off the Twitter account, while a good thing, is just another game of Whac-a-Mole that puts it deeper underground where more extreme and virulent strains emerge in various places. The river flows to the ocean.”
Some local parties insist that it is possible to express solidarity with Trump while rejecting QAnon. Republicans in Palm Beach county in Florida are “pretty united” in support for the former president, said chairman Michael Barnett, who does not blame him for the sacking of the US Capitol. “I don’t get any kind of sense that there was any upset or anger with the president whatsoever. www.sun-sentinel.com/news/politics/elections/fl-ne-trump-palm-beach-county-republican-barnett-20201212-qqfgap2t5bfy7kz35qmx3mdita-story.html
A man in a QAnon T-shirt walks among Trump supporters as they wait for Donald Trump to arrive and visit Mariotti Building Products in Old Forge, Pennsylvania, in August. Photograph: Jacqueline Larma/AP
“We have a lot of Trump supporters on the ground, a grassroots movement that wave signs and knock doors and are very active locally, who are waving Trump 2024 signs. They want him to run for re-election.”
Barnett confirmed that he has seen evidence of QAnon’s presence but it has not come close to taking over the state party. “Some of them have run for office but they don’t have any influence on what we do as a county party and certainly not what the state party does, as far as who we support for elections, our policies, our platform or anything like that.”
He added: “They are a fringe and I wish they would go away. We have nothing to do with QAnon and we want nothing to do with QAnon or their supporters. I have served seven years as the first Black chairman of the Republican party of Palm Beach county and anybody you speak to knows that we don’t tolerate or put up with any of that racist nonsense.”
Trump was the avatar for this radicalisation that was already happening in various offshoots of the Republican voter base Jared Holt, Right Wing Watch
Trump himself, however, has repeatedly failed to condemn QAnon while bragging that its supporters “like me very much”. Experts suggest that it is not clear where fealty to Trump ends and fealty to the extremist ideology begins. The process of Republican radicalisation has been going on for years, according to Jared Holt, an investigative reporter at Right Wing Watch. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/aug/19/trump-qanon-praise-conspiracy-theory-believers www.rightwingwatch.org/post_author/jared-holt/
“These far-right beliefs embodied themselves in a candidate which was Trump,” he said. “He was the avatar for this radicalisation that was already happening in various offshoots of the Republican voter base. To some degree Trump was a leader and a coalescing figure for these far-right ideas and movements but I don’t think that those ideas are necessarily unique to Trump.”
Parkland survivors call for GOP extremist Marjorie Taylor Greene's resignation www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/28/marjorie-taylor-greene-parkland-david-hogg
The grassroots trend is manifesting itself in Washington. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a freshman congresswoman from Georgia, has previously endorsed QAnon, approved calls for the execution of Democrats and harassed a survivor of a school mass shooting. She is now calling for Biden’s impeachment. Yet she has been rewarded with a seat on the House education committee. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/27/marjorie-taylor-greene-republican-no-action-pelosi-execution
The New York Times reported this week that Congressman Paul Gosar of Arizona visited the Oath Keepers, a rightwing militia group that believes America is already fighting a second civil war. Gosar and a handful of other Republican House members have “ties to extremist groups who pushed violent ideas and conspiracy theories and whose members were prominent among those who stormed the halls of Congress”, the paper said. www.nytimes.com/2021/01/29/us/republicans-trump-capitol-riot.html
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a Democratic congresswoman from New York, has warned that white supremacist sympathisers now sit at the heart of the Republican caucus. “This is extremely dangerous, an extremely dangerous threshold we have crossed because we are now away from acting out of fealty to their president that they had in the Oval Office, and now we are talking about fealty to white supremacist organizations as a political tool,” Ocasio-Cortez told Hayes on MSNBC. www.newsweek.com/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-house-gop-legitimate-white-supremacist-sympathizers-1565039
Trump’s continued grip on the party was evident this week when 45 out of 50 Republican senators, including McConnell, voted to dismiss his impeachment trial before it began, implying that his eventual acquittal is guaranteed – likely to provide him with fresh political momentum. It was a final surrender of the Republican establishment: whatever senators’ private thoughts, few dare defy the state parties’ cult of Trump. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/26/trump-impeachment-republicans-senate-vote-to-dismiss
Miller, a writer-at-large at the Bulwark website, said: “I didn’t ever think that there was any momentum to convict him because I looked at what the local Republicans were saying. I remember saying to folks in the days after January 6, ‘Compare the statements that are coming out from Republican state parties to what the senators are saying’ – and there was a big disconnect. thebulwark.com/
“The state parties were in defence of Trump. They were advancing conspiracy theories about how it was really Antifa in disguise. They were the canary in the coalmine for me as far as the fact that these senators were not going to to convict Trump. Everybody represents their own constituency. What’s notable is that the state parties are closest to the constituents so they know what the constituents want. What the constituents want is fealty to Trump.” www.nytimes.com/2021/01/28/opinion/republican-lies.html
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Post by the Scribe on Feb 1, 2021 9:23:58 GMT
Duh! The GOP has endorsed, condoned and accepted Conservative Media gaslighting its base, turning them into a fringe element that has finally caught up them in the worst way. Trump is the perfect example of a willing gaslighted Republicon. I guarantee you if you read a Trump tweet or listen to his rhetoric at a rally you will find the same talking points were on conservative media (especially FOX) the day before. Not that hard to put 2 + 2 together. And now with FOX conservative media spinoffs like OAN and Newsmax the fringe cons are now ruling that party. And they are masters at election theft. If they are ever allowed to take power again in their current "crazy state of mind" then expect some major internal conflicts, possibly a civil war happening. The Dems and honest Americans had better get their ass in gear and stop this madness before it is too late. If elections are fair and free of voter suppression, voter purging and other shenanigans and they are AUDITED then we should have nothing to worry about. Unfortunately that is not the case.Ex-GOP congresswoman says party is on the way to being ‘fringe’ within ‘three or four years’www.yahoo.com/news/ex-gop-congresswoman-says-party-202908037.html Oliver O'Connell Sun, January 31, 2021, 1:29 PM
Susan Molinari pictured here in 2018 when she was vice president of public policy at Google (AFP via Getty Images)
Susan Molinari, a former Republican representative for New York, says that she no longer recognises the party she belongs to and predicts that the GOP as we know it may not be around in a few years. www.independent.co.uk/topic/republican
In an appearance on The Sunday Show on MSNBC, Ms Molinari, who served three terms in Congress in the 1990s, blamed leadership for the path the party is currently on, citing the apparent failure to rein in freshman representative Marjorie Taylor Greene. www.independent.co.uk/topic/msnbc www.independent.co.uk/topic/marjorie-taylor-greene
She told host Jonathan Capehart of her disappointment and concern, saying: “I think actually the Republican Party can become the fringe party, the party that we won't recognise in the next three or four years unless some aggressive leadership steps forward. I think it's that serious.”
Ms Molinari believes the problems in the party are not just the fault of one or two rogue individuals.
“It's not just Marjorie Taylor Greene,” she said. “It's serious. How [House Minority] Leader Kevin McCarthy deals with this will tell us a lot.”
“When we look at the GOP in Arizona, a GOP legislator who just introduced a piece of legislation saying they should be able to overturn electoral results by the legislature. Saying what happened in the Capitol was not really happening,” she continued. “When we look at what's happening in the South Carolina GOP wants to censure — it's not just Marjorie Taylor Greene, it's a disease flowing through the Republican Party.”
Ms Molinari has not yet given up on the GOP and sees hopeful signs for a possible future from stances taken by several prominent party members.
“I'm not going to leave the party yet because I want to stand up as long as Liz Cheney and Mitt Romney, Adam Kinzinger are being brave," she said. www.independent.co.uk/topic/kevin-mccarthy
“Me sitting in my living room feels like I owe them time to see that they can re-establish this Republican Party and back them up in any way that I can.”
However, she conceded that at the moment things do look bleak for the party she once knew: “I'm not sure, and I never thought I would say this, I'm not sure the Republican Party as we know it will be around in a few years.”
Ms Molinari gave a video address at the 2020 Democratic National Convention, becoming one of the first politicians from an opposing party to do so. She was a keynote speaker at the 1996 Republican National Convention. www.independent.co.uk/topic/2020-democratic-national-convention
After leaving Congress, Ms Molinari worked as a lobbyist on a number of issues and later became vice president for public policy at Google from 2012 to 2018.
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Post by the Scribe on Feb 6, 2021 0:00:28 GMT
VIEW PAC, we endorsed Marjorie Greene's male opponent, who is a brain surgeon. You know, we could have had a brain surgeon instead of crazy woman here, so that was tragic. Barbara Comstock On The Future Of The GOPwww.npr.org/2021/02/05/964380379/barbara-comstock-on-the-future-of-the-gop February 5, 20217:10 AM ET Heard on Morning Edition 6-Minute Listen ondemand.npr.org/anon.npr-mp3/npr/me/2021/02/20210205_me_gop_fight_over_identity_post-trump.mp3?orgId=1&topicId=1014&d=392&p=3&story=964380379&dl=1&siteplayer=true&size=6288240&dl=1
Transcript Do Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and Rep. Liz Cheney both represent the Republican party? NPR's Noel King speaks to former Republican congresswoman Barbara Comstock, about the GOP's future.
NOEL KING, HOST:
This week, Republican lawmakers had to decide who represents their party. Is it Liz Cheney, who voted to impeach Donald Trump, or is it Marjorie Taylor Greene, who has promoted QAnon conspiracy theories and political violence and says Trump sparked her interest in politics? In the end, they appear to have chosen both. The full House voted to remove Greene from her committee assignments yesterday, but only 11 Republicans voted to do so. Before the vote, Greene said she no longer believes the lies she spread.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE: These were words of the past, and these things do not represent me. They do not represent my district, and they do not represent my values.
KING: She did not apologize, though. Meanwhile, Liz Cheney survived a vote and kept her position in Republican leadership. On the line with me now, Barbara Comstock, a former representative from Virginia. Good morning.
BARBARA COMSTOCK: Good morning. Good to be with you.
KING: Only 11 House Republicans voted to remove Greene from her committees. Were you surprised it was so few?
COMSTOCK: Well, I certainly was disappointed. I thought more representative of the caucus overall was the strong 70% support, you know, landslide for Liz Cheney when the Freedom Caucus, people like Jim Jordan and Matt Gaetz, had said it was going to be 115 against her, and they could only have 61. So clearly, they were bluffing. And she called their bluff, and she asked for that vote and did very well. I think if Marjorie Greene - if that - we should have - Republicans should have done not on their own. And if that had been a secret ballot, it would have been overwhelmingly against her. And I do expect in the future that she will probably have to be disciplined by the Republicans themselves and even kicked out of the party.
KING: You just said...
COMSTOCK: And I hope she will be.
KING: ...Something really interesting. You said that if Republicans didn't have to put their names to the vote - if they were allowed to do this in kind of a secret ballot, you think more of them would have voted against Marjorie Taylor Greene.
COMSTOCK: Yes. And I think that's why it's unfortunate that leadership didn't just take the action either themselves to avoid the vote altogether or have that same type of secret ballot and say, you know, we're going to do this. Now, I certainly wish people would stand up and do it, also, because I do agree that she's a cancer on the party, not representative of the future. I think people like Liz Cheney, Adam Kinzinger, Ben Sasse, who came out with a fabulous video last night kind of speaking truth to Republicans that conspiracy theories aren't conservative - you know, defying the results of an election are not conservative - that's where the future of the party is going. And...
KING: Let's talk if...
COMSTOCK: ...I think Marjorie Greene will flame out quickly.
KING: Let's talk about current leadership. You brought him up. This week, Representative Kevin McCarthy said he doesn't even know what QAnon is. Now, this is striking because he should. How much of a problem is Republican leadership saying they are ignorant about crucial and well-known facts?
COMSTOCK: Well, I - that was very unfortunate, and I think we have to deal with QAnon head-on. I think people should be on the House floor denouncing it, explaining what it is and calling it out at every turn. QAnon has no place in Republican politics. It has no place in the body politic. It is conspiracy theories. You know, FBI has gone through this and explained that. People are now kind of getting out of it like a cult, and I think we need to take it head-on. And that is why Marjorie Greene, I think, will be, in my opinion, very short lived. I don't think she was sincere. She clearly did not apologize. And I think she will continue to make incendiary and dangerous remarks. I understand why people wanted her removed. I think her remarks are dangerous and are fueling those kind of conspiracy theories.
KING: Congresswoman Greene says she has raised more than $335,000 in the last three days as a result of this furor. More than a quarter of a million people voted for her in November. Does that really seem, to you, like someone who's going to flame out?
COMSTOCK: Well, I think Adam Kinzinger has highlighted that this really is about the money - right? - and this is something that she is, you know, kind of just wanting to be a celebrity. But I think what Marjorie Greene may forget is there is redistricting that's going to be going on before 2022. And as you saw, the strong Republican figures in Georgia who stood up to the president, I don't think they're too pleased to have somebody like Marjorie Greene represent Georgia. So when they - when Republicans, who will get to redistrict in Georgia, do it, I think they might have an eye on how they can be rid of this cancer in their party.
But I think already there's buyer's remorse from many of her voters. And if somebody - I certainly would encourage anybody - any strong, good, conservative Republican there who is sane to stand up because this isn't conservative versus moderate, this is conservative versus QAnon. This is conservative versus crazy. And we can have a strong conservative who isn't an embarrassment and a cancer on our party from Georgia. And I think Georgia Republicans are just the people to do that.
KING: Conservative versus crazy versus people saying they just have no idea what's going on - that seems important to note because that is happening at the leadership level. You've been pushing for years for a bigger Republican tent with more diversity and especially with more women lawmakers. How do you reconcile this?
COMSTOCK: Well, I point out the two PACs that I am associated with, Republican women PACs - we specifically didn't support Marjorie Greene or Lauren Boebert from Colorado. And in fact, VIEW PAC, we endorsed Marjorie Greene's male opponent, who is a brain surgeon. You know, we could have had a brain surgeon instead of crazy woman here, so that was tragic. We highlighted all of these things that people are hearing now. And so this was a mistake. And we, you know, tried to ring the bell loudly on this. I think we did very well in getting a lot of other women elected. What I'm distressed at is that is that people like Young Kim in California, first Korean American woman; Michelle Steel, also one of the first Korean American Republican women...
KING: Some interesting names that I wish we knew more about, but we will have to leave it there.
Former Republican Congresswoman Barbara Comstock of Virginia. Thanks so much.
COMSTOCK: Thank you.
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Post by the Scribe on Feb 6, 2021 0:13:48 GMT
Trump's gone, but the GOP's conspiracy theory cesspool is here to staynews.yahoo.com/trumps-gone-gops-conspiracy-theory-133600133.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly9zZWFyY2gueWFob28uY29tLw&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAMfQLWNh-AFJo-66b1nIfbsxTGPydWq_5n5biWJIFPFmD1x3ZnFXapcn2b8PjOrh70mEgHicM4NGYruvOTsQiYTJUVXy4VxeuyUYTJWQGLFMYeXXbtT3X94TPP_eRYNdyJLyTlNA4WUmORNUlNc8-nzwbqfKiqtDWrAzu0iJJGiX Anthony L. Fisher January 27, 2021
Fox News' Tucker Carlson defended the QAnon conspiracy theory Monday, and told viewers that the government is trying to control what people believe Fox News
Trump hasn't even been gone a week, but conspiracy theory culture is still clearly the base of the GOP.
State Republican parties have been tweeting in support of QAnon, Holocaust deniers, and spreading "false flag" lies about the Capitol siege.
Rand Paul pushed election fraud lies on national TV, and Tucker Carlson implied that QAnon criticism is a Democratic attempt at mind control.
This isn't the "fringe." This is the new GOP normal.
This is an opinion column. The thoughts expressed are those of the author.
Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.
Trump, the disgraced ex-president facing a second impeachment trial in the Senate, hasn't even been out of office for a week.
It's only been three weeks since the day Trump incited an attempted insurrection at the Capitol and the loudest bullhorn in the world - Trump's Twitter account - was permanently silenced. www.businessinsider.com/arrest-trump-directly-incited-deadly-violence-free-speech-first-amendment-2021-1?utm_source=yahoo.com&utm_medium=referral
But we already have clear evidence that the deranged conspiracy theories that came to define Trump's presidency and the Republican base that worships him as a demigod aren't going anywhere. www.businessinsider.com/right-wing-conspiracy-theories-qanon-fueled-capitol-siege-instigate-violence-2021-1?utm_source=yahoo.com&utm_medium=referral www.businessinsider.com/donald-trump-dangerously-gullible-uncle-facebook-antifa-conspiracy-theory-2020-9?utm_source=yahoo.com&utm_medium=referral www.businessinsider.com/trump-violent-capitol-siege-maga-mob-republican-party-disband-gop-2021-1?utm_source=yahoo.com&utm_medium=referral
Ditch the GOP elephant, it's Q MAGA Party time
The conspiracy vice-grip on the GOP isn't just coming from the top. A bunch of State Republican parties ought to just do away with the charade, ditch the elephant as its logo, and replace it with a regal Q or a stout MAGA hat.
Arizona's GOP this week censured former Sen. Jeff Flake, current Gov. Doug Ducey, and Cindy McCain for their disloyalty to Emperor Trump. Among their alleged treasons were not endorsing Trump for president and correctly certifying the results of an election Trump lost. www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/01/25/flake-cindy-mccain-ducey-arizona-gop-censure/
The Arizona GOP's Twitter account last December gave a clue of just how dangerously literal and serious hardcore Trump supporters were getting with their "civil war" talk, when it asked its followers if they willing to die for the cause of overturning Trump's electoral loss. www.cbsnews.com/news/arizona-republican-party-overturn-election-results-death/ www.businessinsider.com/capitol-siege-take-trumps-violent-rhetoric-seriously-literally-riot-maga-2021-1?utm_source=yahoo.com&utm_medium=referral
Not to be outdone, Oregon's GOP released a resolution calling the Capitol attack "a 'false flag' operation designed to discredit President Trump, his supporters, and all conservative Republicans; this provided the sham motivation to impeach President Trump in order to advance the Democratic goal of seizing total power."
www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2021/01/26/oregon-republican-false-flag-capitol/
The Hawaii GOP's official Twitter account promoted both QAnon and a video conversation with a Holocaust-denying podcaster. www.stopantisemitism.org/antisemitic-incidents-64/hawaii-gop apnews.com/article/donald-trump-hawaii-ab9eff7fe4a56d29b19dd4571a8ef3e8
Couching themselves in the sober tone of the reasonable rational centrist, the account tweeted: "It is good to periodically step outside the 'bubble' of corporate commentators for additional perspective." (The tweets promoting the video were deleted and blamed on a lone employee exercising poor judgment.) www.chron.com/politics/article/Texas-GOP-slogan-qanon-criticism-15896409.php
We could go on about how Texas' Republican Party last summer adopted an actual QAnon mantra - "We are the Storm" - as its slogan. But you get the idea. www.chron.com/politics/article/Texas-GOP-slogan-qanon-criticism-15896409.php
One of these things could be seen as an aberration, maybe two. But even without presidential power and without Twitter, Trumpism lives on as conspiracy theory culture.
And now this culture is the Republican mainstream.
SALEM, OREGON, USA - MAY 2: The Q-Anon conspiracy theorists hold signs during the protest at the State Capitol in Salem, Oregon, United States on May 2, 2020. Demonstrators protested Oregonâs economic-closure efforts aimed at minimizing the lethal impact of novel coronavirus (COVID-19). One of many rallies nationwide that have been linked to Republican and right-wing operatives of the Trump administration. Photo by John Rudoff/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
QAnon is normie culture now
QAnon is such a fact and logic-bereft con job that Alex Jones - famous only for being a conspiracy theory-pushing con man - forcefully denounced QAnon, and mocked them as gullible saps.
www.texasmonthly.com/politics/alex-joness-attorneys-defamation-suit-argue-no-reasonable-person-believe-says/
And yet Fox News opinion host Tucker Carlson - not in any way an intellectual idiot, and who openly mocked Trump's legal team's hapless failure to prove election fraud - is now contorting himself to come to QAnon's defense. Carlson's tortured logic is that media criticism of this deeply disturbing and violent phenomenon is equivalent to government-enforced control of minds and consciences. www.cjr.org/the_profile/tucker-carlson.php www.cnn.com/2020/11/21/media/tucker-carlson-fox-news-traitor/index.html
That's right.
The smart MAGA TV guy is telling a mass-delusion movement - which believes in the government is run by a cabal of murderous, mind-controlling Democrats - that the Democrats are trying to control their minds.
Freshman Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene's internet footprint is dotted with QAnon and other asinine but dangerous conspiracy theories. And a recent report details her history of "liking" posts which alluded to killing elected Democrats. www.cnn.com/2021/01/26/politics/marjorie-taylor-greene-democrats-violence/index.html
To get even more mainstream, Trump's loyal golfing sidekick, Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky went on ABC's "The Week" on Sunday and continued to peddle the lie of massive fraud in the 2020 election - a lie that was born of Trump and stoked online by QAnon supporters. abcnews.go.com/Politics/sen-rand-paul-continues-making-false-claims-2020/story?id=75446712
Paul, a doctor, is also not an unintelligent person. He's fully aware that every Trump challenge to the election was laughed out of court. As host George Stephanopoulos told Sen. Paul: "There are not two sides to this story."
More polished Trumpists like Jeanine Pirro might be embarrassed by the cartoonish "freaks" who violently stormed the Capitol, but the ideas that brought those people beyond the edge of madness are not fringe, at least not anymore in the Republican Party. www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/jeanine-pirro-slams-freaks-in-pro-trump-mob-who-stormed-capitol
Republicans uncomfortable with being in league with toxic lies need to forcefully, and repeatedly, denounce it. They need to confront their colleagues who continue to play footsie with maniacal fabulists. Or they should just abandon the GOP to MAGA and start a reality-based right-leaning party.
Until then, it's still Trump's party, built on a paranoid conspiracy theory culture.
Read more:
I was in DC for the inauguration. The overwhelming security state felt disturbingly similar to the worst parts of the post-9/11 response. www.businessinsider.com/dc-inauguration-capitol-siege-domestic-terror-security-state-911-response-2021-1?utm_source=yahoo.com&utm_medium=referral Rep. Rashida Tlaib on why she's rallying progressives to fight back against calls for sweeping new government surveillance powers after the Capitol attack www.businessinsider.com/rashida-tlaib-squad-opposes-expanding-security-state-after-capitol-attack-2021-1?utm_source=yahoo.com&utm_medium=referral The right-wing conspiracy theories that fueled the Capitol siege are going to instigate more violence www.businessinsider.com/right-wing-conspiracy-theories-qanon-fueled-capitol-siege-instigate-violence-2021-1?utm_source=yahoo.com&utm_medium=referral The Capitol siege proves it's finally time to take Trump and other politicians' violent rhetoric both seriously and literally. www.businessinsider.com/capitol-siege-take-trumps-violent-rhetoric-seriously-literally-riot-maga-2021-1?utm_source=yahoo.com&utm_medium=referral Read the original article on Business Insider www.businessinsider.com/trump-qanon-maga-paranoid-conspiracy-theory-tucker-carlson-rand-paul-2021-1
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Post by the Scribe on Feb 7, 2021 1:50:55 GMT
American Reckoning – A PBS NewsHour Special Report 1,071,251 views•Jan 15, 2021
PBS NewsHour 2.47M subscribers Following the aftermath of the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol, “American Reckoning – A PBS NewsHour Special Report” looks at the economic and racial history that led to a political divide between Americans, the impact of President Donald Trump’s rhetoric throughout his presidency and the next steps for the nation to heal from the recent attack on American democracy.
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Post by the Scribe on Feb 7, 2021 2:00:44 GMT
Column: How often have tax cuts for the rich trickled down to the rest of us? Neverwww.yahoo.com/finance/news/column-often-tax-cuts-rich-213207007.html Michael Hiltzik Fri, February 5, 2021, 2:32 PM
Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., speaks at a Get Out the Caucus Rally at Simpson College in Indianola, Iowa, Sunday, Feb. 2, 2020. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) proposed a wealth tax during her presidential campaign in 2020. (Associated Press) We can probably stipulate that almost no one really believes that tax cuts for the rich are good for the economy.
The claim has become so closely identified with Republican ideologues and their patrons — that is, the rich themselves — that it no longer has much purchase in public debate.
It's still GOP orthodoxy, however, so a new study published by the London School of Economics debunking it with hard data is useful. eprints.lse.ac.uk/107919/1/Hope_economic_consequences_of_major_tax_cuts_published.pdf
The effect size of major tax cuts for the rich on real GDP per capita is close to zero and statistically insignificant.
David Hope and Julian Limberg
Its authors, David Hope of the LSE and Julian Limberg of King's College London, examined tax cuts enacted by 18 developed countries, including the United States, over the 50-year span from 1965 to 2015.
Their conclusion was that tax cuts for the rich succeeded in increasing the wealth of the top 1% and achieved absolutely nothing in terms of spurring growth or reducing unemployment.
"The effect size of major tax cuts for the rich on real GDP [gross domestic product] per capita is close to zero and statistically insignificant," they write.
The Hope-Limberg paper is especially important in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. While the pandemic has damaged the financial health of middle- and working-class American families — and things would be much worse if not for the relief packages passed by Congress — it has affected the top 1% not at all.
Indeed, as determined by Americans for Tax Fairness, the wealth of the nation's billionaires has grown by more than one-third during the pandemic. americansfortaxfairness.org/issue/net-worth-u-s-billionaires-soared-1-trillion-total-4-trillion-since-pandemic-began/
That points to one way of funding further relief, including the $1.9 trillion in assistance proposed by President Biden: Raise taxes on the wealthy. Indeed, Hope and Limberg proposed exactly that in mid-December.
"Given the damage the pandemic has done to economies," they wrote, "the notion of getting the most affluent to help foot the bill is one that has many supporters .... Higher taxes on the rich could help to fund the substantial and potentially long-lasting expansion of government spending and social protection seen during the pandemic. They could also help address health and economic inequalities, which have only been exacerbated by COVID-19 and its economic fallout." theconversation.com/footing-the-covid-19-bill-economic-case-for-tax-hike-on-wealthy-151945
The authors' survey doesn't encompass the massive U.S. tax cut enacted in December 2017 by the Republican-controlled Congress and signed by then-President Trump. But their findings conform with other research that does cover the 2017 cut, such as that of UC Berkeley economists Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman.
As they pointed out in their 2019 book "The Triumph of Injustice," the 2017 cut finally brought the U.S. to the point where the 400 highest earners in the U.S. paid lower tax rates than the working class. "This looks like the tax system of a plutocracy," they wrote.
Hope and Limberg, like Saez and Zucman, observe that cutting taxes for the rich not only increases economic inequality, but delivers ever more political power into the hands of the affluent while increasing their incentive to lobby for even more tax breaks. (Tax cuts enable them to keep more of their income gains.)
"There is a large political science literature on the power of rich voters and organized business interests to shape public policies in their favor," Hope and Limberg write. "Lower taxes on the rich encourage high earners to bargain more forcefully to increase their own compensation, at the direct expense of those lower down the income distribution."
Within their sample countries, they found, the economic effects of tax cuts were consistent. They tended to increase the GDP share of the top 1% by 0.8 percentage points within five years of the cuts.
The lack of any discernible impact on economic growth or unemployment, moreover, debunks "supply-side theories that suggest lower taxes on the rich will induce labor supply responses from high-income individuals (more hours of work, more effort etc.) that boost economic activity."
This is the essence of the trickle-down theory and the lionization of rich people as "job creators." At best, Hope and Limberg write, statistics show "very slight indications of a flash in the pan effect ... on unemployment," but those indications are "neither statistically significant nor robust."
In fact, they write, their findings match those of other research indicating that "income tax holidays and windfall gains do not lead individuals to significantly alter the amount they work." Rather, "our analysis finds strong evidence that cutting taxes on the rich increases income inequality but has no effect on growth or unemployment."
The rising tide of economic inequality in the U.S. spurred Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) to call for a wealth tax during her campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination last year, in essence taking back some of the handouts the rich received from Republicans under Trump. The evidence is clear that gifting the rich with more money does no good for the economy or workers.
Making them pay their fair share of the cost of living in a society, however, could do a lot of good.
This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times. www.latimes.com/business/story/2021-02-05/tax-cuts-for-rich-dont-trickle-down
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Post by the Scribe on Feb 10, 2021 8:28:51 GMT
GOP registration drop after Capitol riots reflects growing trendnews.yahoo.com/gop-registration-drop-capitol-riots-001549556.html Keydra Manns Mon, February 8, 2021, 5:15 PM
‘I totally understand why people are frustrated and want to leave the party,’ said DeFrancis. ‘I’ve had that feeling for 4 years’
Long time Republicans are ditching the political party after the January 6th Capitol riots left a bad taste in some GOP members’ mouths. However, a new study shows the trend has been actually growing for years.
Read More: Rep. Omar calls out GOP colleagues for ‘whitewashing’ after comparison to Greene thegrio.com/2021/02/03/rep-omar-comparison-taylor-greene/
“The Republican Party as I knew it no longer exists. I’d call it the cult of Trump,” said, previous Undersecretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence in the Bush administration, Jimmy Gurulé, according to Reuters. www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-republicans-exclusive/exclusive-dozens-of-former-bush-officials-leave-republican-party-calling-it-trump-cult-idUSKBN2A1275
In January, 12,000 Republicans in Pennsylvania removed the “R” from their voter registration. According to reports, Arizona followed suit with about 9,200, and in North Carolina, about 8,000 left the party.
The change is notable because Republicans are losing supporters at a faster rate than Democrats. The publication also points out that just because a person is registered to a party does not mean they always support its candidates.
“If it continues to be the party of Trump, many of us are not going back,” said a former Treasurer of the U.S. under Bush, Rosario Marin. “Unless the Senate convicts him, and rids themselves of the Trump cancer, many of us will not be going back to vote for Republican leaders.”
Protesters Gather At State Capitols On Presidential Inauguration Day Photo by Michael B. Thomas/Getty Images
There also seems to be a correlation between education level and those leaving the Republican party. Support from those with a college degree has decreased by 5 points. But support from those with just a high school diploma has increased by 7 points.
However, the publication notes the educational data is not related to intelligence. It also adds that within the last ten years of the GOP, the population of adults without higher education is shrinking.
Some Republicans say they understand why folks are leaving the party but someone needs to stay and repair what Donald Trump left behind.
Suzy DeFrancis, who served during the Richard Nixon and George W. Bush administrations, voted for President Joe Biden in November. She says the Republican party needs restructuring back to its original pillars like personal responsibility, limited government, and strong national defense.
“I totally understand why people are frustrated and want to leave the party,” said DeFrancis to Reuters. “I’ve had that feeling for 4 years.”
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The post GOP registration drop after Capitol riots reflects growing trend appeared first on TheGrio.
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Post by the Scribe on Feb 10, 2021 8:48:38 GMT
The New York Times 'Its Own Private Army': How the GOP Allied Itself With Militias David D. Kirkpatrick and Mike McIntire Tue, February 9, 2021, 6:32 AM Mike Shirkey Ryan Kelley
LANSING, Mich. — Dozens of heavily armed militiamen crowded into the Michigan Statehouse last April to protest a stay-at-home order by the Democratic governor to slow the pandemic. Chanting and stomping their feet, they halted legislative business, tried to force their way onto the floor and brandished rifles from the gallery over lawmakers below.
Initially, Republican leaders had some misgivings about their new allies. “The optics weren’t good. Next time tell them not to bring guns,” complained Mike Shirkey, the state Senate majority leader, according to one of the protest organizers. But Michigan’s highest-ranking Republican came around after the planners threatened to return with weapons and “militia guys signing autographs and passing out blow-up AR-15s to the kiddies on the Capitol lawn.”
“To his credit,” Jason Howland, the organizer, wrote in a social media post, Shirkey agreed to help the cause and “spoke at our next event.”
Following signals from President Donald Trump — who had tweeted “LIBERATE MICHIGAN!” after an earlier show of force in Lansing — Michigan’s Republican Party last year welcomed the support of newly emboldened paramilitary groups and other vigilantes. Prominent party members formed bonds with militias or gave tacit approval to armed activists using intimidation in a series of rallies and confrontations around the state. That intrusion into the Statehouse now looks like a portent of the assault halfway across the country months later at the U.S. Capitol.
As the Senate on Tuesday begins the impeachment trial of Trump on charges of inciting the Jan. 6 Capitol rioting, what happened in Michigan helps explain how, under his influence, party leaders aligned themselves with a culture of militancy to pursue political goals.
Michigan has a long tradition of tolerating self-described private militias, which are unusually common in the state. But it is also a critical electoral battleground that draws close attention from top party leaders, and the Republican alliance with paramilitary groups shows how difficult it may be for the national party to extricate itself from the shadow of the former president and his appeal to this aggressive segment of its base.
“We knew there would be violence,” Rep. Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., said about the Jan. 6 assault. Endorsing tactics like militiamen with assault rifles frightening state lawmakers “normalizes violence,” she told journalists last week, “and Michigan, unfortunately, has seen quite a bit of that.”
Six Trump supporters from Michigan have been arrested in connection with the storming of the Capitol. One, a former Marine accused of beating a Capitol Police officer with a hockey stick, had previously joined armed militiamen in a protest organized by Michigan Republicans to try to disrupt ballot counting in Detroit.
The chief organizer of that protest, Meshawn Maddock, on Saturday was elected co-chair of the state Republican Party — one of four die-hard Trump loyalists who won top posts.
Maddock helped fill 19 buses to Washington for the Jan. 6 rally and defended the April armed intrusion into the Michigan Capitol. When Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., suggested at the time that Black demonstrators would never be allowed to threaten legislators like that, Maddock wrote on Twitter, “Please show us the ‘threat’?”
“Oh that’s right you think anyone armed is threatening,” she continued. “It’s a right for a reason and the reason is YOU.”
The lead organizer of the April 30 armed protest, Ryan Kelley, a local Republican official, last week announced a bid for governor. “Becoming too closely aligned with militias — is that a bad thing?” he said in an interview. Londa Gatt, a pro-Trump activist close to him was named last month to a leadership position in a statewide Republican women’s group. She welcomed militias and Proud Boys at protests, posting on the social media site Parler: “While BLM destroy/murder people the Proud Boys are true patriots.” Prosecutors have accused members of the Proud Boys of playing a leading role in the Jan. 6 assault.
Two weeks after the Statehouse protest, Shirkey, the Republican leader, appeared at a rally by the same organizers, onstage with a militia member who would later be accused of conspiring to kidnap Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.
“Stand up and test that assertion of authority by the government,” Shirkey told the militiamen. “We need you now more than ever.”
After the riot in Washington, some argue such endorsements endanger the future of the party. “It is like the Republican Party has its own domestic army,” said Jeff Timmer, a former executive director of the Michigan party and a vocal Trump critic.
A Long History
A quarter-century before the mob rampaged through the U.S. Capitol, a paramilitary leader from Michigan sat in the same building and delivered an early warning shot.
Norman Olson, founder of the Michigan Militia, appeared in June 1995 before a Senate committee investigating the growth of the anti-government movement after the Oklahoma City bombing that April. Dressed in military fatigues with a “Commander Olson” patch on his shirt, he spoke with contempt.
“We stand against oppression and tyranny in government,” Olson said, “and many of us are coming to the conclusion that you best represent that corruption and tyranny.”
For many Americans, it was jarring to listen to self-appointed defenders of the Constitution justify taking up arms in a paranoid vision of government overreach. But back in Michigan they were used to it.
Roughly a dozen to 18 armed groups are scattered across Michigan in mostly rural counties, their membership fluctuating with political and economic currents. Estimates of active members statewide are generally in the hundreds.
The state’s lenient gun laws — it is permissible to openly carry a firearm in public — also make it a welcoming place for other armed extremists. Members of the Proud Boys or Boogaloo movement routinely showed up at protests in Michigan last year and sometimes got into fights with Black Lives Matter activists.
For many of the more traditional militias, socializing is often as much a priority as drilling. Firearms training is mixed with camping and family outings. Last fall, members of the Southeast Michigan Volunteer Militia gathered for a picnic in a park where children tossed beanbags, mothers grilled cheeseburgers and AR-15 rifles leaned against lawn chairs. Some have websites where they sell T-shirts and carry ads for gun shops.
But woven through Michigan’s militia timeline is a persistent strand of menace. In the early 20th century, the Black Legion, a paramilitary group that included public officials in Detroit and elsewhere, began as an offshoot of the Ku Klux Klan and was linked to numerous acts of murder and terrorism.
Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, who killed 168 people in the Oklahoma City bombing, were reported to have associated with militia members in Michigan, though Olson said they had been turned away because of their violent rhetoric. In the aftermath, militias were largely exiled to the fringes of conspiracy politics, preparing for imagined threats from the New World Order.
But in recent years, as the Republican Party has drifted further to the right, these groups have gradually found a home there, said JoEllen Vinyard, an emeritus professor of history at Eastern Michigan University who has studied political extremism. Much of their cooperation is centered on defending gun ownership, she said.
“I think there is a fair amount of sympathy in the Republican Party for these people that wasn’t there in the past,” Vinyard said. “It’s a much closer relationship now.”
The COVID-19 Revolt
If Michigan Republicans and militant groups had increasingly found themselves sharing the same ideological space, their common ground became literal last year, as an escalating series of events drew them together for protests and rallies. They began with objections to the governor’s lockdown orders.
Republicans have controlled both houses of the Michigan Legislature for a decade and held the governor’s mansion for the eight years before Whitmer took office in 2019. Trump’s brash nationalism had alienated moderate Republicans and independents while pushing the party to the right.
By last April 1, COVID-19 had killed more than 300 people in Michigan, primarily in Detroit, and Whitmer ordered all nonessential businesses closed. Maddock wasted no time rallying opposition, calling for a protest on April 15.
A national advisory board member of the Women for Trump wing of the president’s reelection campaign, she appeared often with Trump and his surrogates on their many visits to Michigan. Her husband, Matt Maddock, the owner of a bail bond business who has boasted of personally apprehending bail jumpers, is a state lawmaker from a Detroit suburb.
In the first major protest in the country against stay-at-home orders, thousands of cars, trucks and even a few cement mixers jammed the streets around the Statehouse in Lansing, in what Meshawn Maddock called Operation Gridlock. About 150 demonstrators left their vehicles to chant “lock her up” from the Capitol lawn — redirecting the 2016 battle cry about Hillary Clinton against Whitmer. A few waved Confederate flags. About a dozen heavily armed members of the Michigan Liberty Militia turned up as well.
Maddock declared Michigan a “tyranny” that night on the Fox News Channel, though she later distanced herself from the armed men. “Of course the militia is disappointing to me, the Confederate flag — look, they’re just idiots,” she later told Bridge Michigan, a nonprofit news organization.
Trump tweeted “LIBERATE MICHIGAN” two days later, and Maddock’s protest inspired a wave of others around the country.
When local armed groups in Michigan began discussing more demonstrations, most Republicans shunned them at first. “They were scared of the word ‘militia,’ ” recalled Phil Robinson, a member of the Liberty Militia.
But his group found eager promoters in Kelley, a real estate broker and Republican planning commissioner in a suburb of Grand Rapids, and Howland, a local sales consultant who had been posting online videos minimizing the pandemic. They called the stay-at-home restrictions “unconstitutional” and formed the American Patriot Council “to restore and sustain a constitutional government,” Kelley said in an interview.
As the Legislature met April 30 to vote on extending the governor’s restrictions, Kelley and his militia allies convened hundreds of protesters, including scores of armed men, some with assault weapons. One demonstrator hung a noose from the back of his pickup. Another held a sign warning that “tyrants get the rope.” Dozens entered the Capitol, some angrily demanding entrance to the lower chamber.
“We were harassed and intimidated so that we would not do our jobs,” said Rep. Donna Lasinski, leader of the Democratic minority. Lawmakers were terrified, she added.
Matt Maddock, the Republican legislator and Meshawn Maddock’s husband, recognized some of the intruders and left the House floor to confer with them. “I like being around people with guns,” he later told The Detroit News.
Trump sided with them, too. “The Governor of Michigan should give a little, and put out the fire,” he tweeted. “These are very good people.”
Other Republicans also came to accept the presence of armed activists. Gatt, who took part in protests organized by Kelley and Meshawn Maddock, said she felt “intimidated by the militia when I first started getting involved,” but soon changed her mind.
“I was able to see that they are patriots that love their country like the rest of us,” she said, adding that they are “all Republicans.”
Shirkey, the Senate leader, was initially more cautious. The founder of a manufacturing company who is known for singing hymns from the podium, Shirkey issued a statement on April 30 criticizing “intimidation and the threat of physical harm” and calling the armed protesters “a bunch of jackasses.”
Yet he had mingled with them in the gallery. Surrounded by militiamen about two weeks later in Grand Rapids, at an event also organized by Howland and Kelley, the senator said in a speech that they had taken him to task for his “jackasses” comment and he effectively retracted it.
He also met privately in his office that month with a handful of militia leaders — to establish a “code of conduct,” he explained in an interview. “Do you tell your people to make sure that there’s not a live round in a chamber?” he said, recounting the conversation. “That’d be a good start.”
In May, armed men stood watch for days outside a barbershop in Owosso, defending the proprietor from the police so he could cut hair in defiance of the lockdown.
Meshawn Maddock, following suit, then arranged for hairdressers to offer their services on the Capitol lawn, again watched over by armed men.
The state GOP quickly jumped into the fight. In June, a nonprofit group linked to the Republican Party began providing more than $600,000 to a new advocacy group run in part by Meshawn Maddock that was dedicated to fighting coronavirus restrictions. A charity tied to Shirkey kicked in $500,000.
Racial Tensions Erupt
Critics argued that race was an unstated factor in the battle over the stay-at-home order. The Republicans who rallied against the rules were mostly white residents of rural areas and outer suburbs. But more than 40% of the deaths in Michigan early on were among African Americans, concentrated in Detroit, who made up less than 15% of the state’s population.
Those tensions spilled into the open last summer when police killings of African Americans set off protests around the country.
The Black Lives Matter protests in Michigan were rarely violent or destructive, and the largest took place in Detroit. But Republicans in the rest of the state reacted with alarm to the flashes of violence elsewhere around the country, and Trump reinforced their fears with his warnings about “antifa.”
Calls to stand up to the feared rioters brought the party and its militant allies even closer together.
“Liberals look for trouble and civil unrest and conservatives PREPARE for it,” Gary Eisen, a Republican state legislator and owner of a concealed-weapon training business, wrote on his Facebook page. “I thought maybe I would load up a few more mags,” he added, later saying he had been joking.
In June, about 50 militiamen called together by Kelley squared off against a few dozen Black Lives Matter protesters over a statue of a Confederate soldier in his town, Allendale. “There were children there, and militia members were pointing guns at people,” said Ali Bates, 20, an activist with the Black Lives Matter movement.
Kelley said he feared what was coming to Allendale. “Statues all over the country were getting torn down, people were lighting things on fire, there were riots everywhere,” Kelley said in an interview, echoing Trump. “You are not going to come here and destroy public property.”
He accused Democrats of encouraging violence. “The Democrats have got antifa; they have got BLM,” he said. “The Democrats championed all of this stuff from a leadership level.”
More prominent Michigan Republicans portrayed the Black Lives Matter movement as a looming threat, too. Meshawn Maddock told the news site MLive.com that the “destruction” caused by the protests was “absolutely devastating” and “inexcusable.”
Armed militiamen responded by turning up at some protests as vigilante guards. In August, dozens of Proud Boys marched in Kalamazoo, Michigan, the site of several Black Lives Matter demonstrations, saying they wanted to support the police. They took pepper spray and used it in fist fights with activists.
At the peak of the protests against police violence, though, Kelley’s American Patriot Council still aimed its sharpest attacks at Whitmer and her stay-at-home order. It released public letters urging the federal authorities to arrest her for violating the Constitution. “Whitmer needs to go to prison,” Kelley declared in a video he posted on Facebook in early October that was later taken down. “She is a threat to our Republic.”
A few days later, federal agents arrested more than a dozen Michigan militiamen, charging them in a plot to kidnap the governor, put her on trial and possibly execute her.
At least two of the suspects had participated in the April 30 protest at the Capitol, as well as the gathering with Shirkey in Grand Rapids. Prosecutors said that the men had tried to recruit other conspirators at an American Patriot Council rally. (Kelley and Shirkey denied any knowledge of the plot.)
It was the culmination of months of mobilization by armed groups, accompanied by increasingly threatening language, and Trump declined to condemn the plotters. “People are entitled to say, ‘Maybe it was a problem, maybe it wasn’t,’ ” he declared at a rally in Michigan.
‘Stop the Steal’
Hours after the Nov. 3 election, Meshawn Maddock wrote on Facebook: “35k ballots showed up out of nowhere at 3 AM. Need help.” She urged Trump supporters to rush to “monitor the vote” at a ballot-counting center in Detroit. “Report to room 260 STAT.”
As the counting showed Trump had lost the pivotal state, Michigan Republicans began a two-month campaign to overturn the result and keep him in power, channeling the momentum of the previous year’s battles over Black Lives Matter and COVID-19.
Kelley, with Howland and their armed militia allies, showed up for a rowdy protest outside the ballot counting. Later that month Kelley told a rally outside the Statehouse that the coronavirus was a ruse to persuade the public to “believe Joe Biden won the election,” The Lansing State Journal reported. One woman held a sign saying “ARREST THE VOTE COUNTERS.”
When attempts to stop the counting failed, Meshawn Maddock in December led 16 Republican electors trying to push into the Michigan Capitol to disrupt the casting of Democratic votes in the Electoral College. During a “Stop the Steal” news conference in Washington the next day, she vowed to “keep fighting.”
Marching toward the Capitol on Jan. 6, Maddock tweeted that the throngs were “the most incredible crowd and sea of people I have ever walked with.”
She also pushed back on Twitter against an observer urging Sen. Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader, to take control of his party. “That’s where you’re very wrong,” she said. “It’s Trump’s party now.”
Maddock has condemned the violence and said she took no part. “When it comes to militias or the Proud Boys, I have no connection whatsoever to them,” she wrote in an email.
Kelley and Howland were filmed outside the U.S. Capitol during the riot. Both men said they did not break any laws and argued that the event was not “an insurrection” because the participants were patriots. “I was there to support the sitting president,” Kelley said.
Gatt, the Republican activist, had posted a video on Facebook of herself in Washington for a rally in December talking with members of the Proud Boys, saying: “I hang out with the Michigan Proud Boys.”
During the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol, she climbed scaffolding set up for the inauguration: “I made it to the top of the Capitol,” she bragged on Facebook.
Shirkey, the Michigan Senate leader who came around to work with the militias, declined to follow the movement behind Trump all the way to the end. Summoned to the White House in November, Shirkey refused the president’s entreaties to try to annul his Michigan defeat.
But in an interview last week, the lawmaker said he nonetheless empathized with the mob that attacked Congress.
“It was people feeling oppressed, and depressed, responding to what they thought was government just stealing their lives from them,” he said. “And I’m not endorsing and supporting their actions, but I understand where they come from.”
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
© 2021 The New York Times Company
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Post by the Scribe on Feb 10, 2021 19:05:59 GMT
'There's Nothing Left': Why Thousands of Republicans Are Leaving the Partywww.yahoo.com/news/theres-nothing-left-why-thousands-130835550.html Nick Corasaniti, Annie Karni and Isabella Grullón Paz Wed, February 10, 2021, 6:08 AM
A crowd cheers as President-elect Joe Biden speaks via video feed in Wilmington, Del., after winning the election on Nov. 7, 2021. (Amr Alfiky/The New York Times)
In the days after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, the phone lines and websites of local election officials across the country were jumping: Tens of thousands of Republicans were calling or logging on to switch their party affiliations.
In California, more than 33,000 registered Republicans left the party during the three weeks after the Washington riot. In Pennsylvania, more than 12,000 voters left the GOP in the past month, and more than 10,000 Republicans changed their registration in Arizona.
An analysis of January voting records by The New York Times found that nearly 140,000 Republicans had quit the party in 25 states that had readily available data (19 states do not have registration by party). Voting experts said the data indicated a stronger-than-usual flight from a political party after a presidential election, as well as the potential start of a damaging period for GOP registrations as voters recoil from the Capitol violence and its fallout.
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Among those who recently left the party are Juan Nunez, 56, an Army veteran in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania. He said he had long felt that the difference between the United States and many other countries was that campaign-season fighting ended on Election Day, when all sides would peacefully accept the result. The Jan. 6 riot changed that, he said.
“What happened in D.C. that day, it broke my heart,” said Nunez, a lifelong Republican who is preparing to register as an independent. “It shook me to the core.”
The biggest spikes in Republicans leaving the party came in the days after Jan. 6, especially in California, where there were 1,020 Republican changes on Jan. 5 — and then 3,243 on Jan. 7. In Arizona, there were 233 Republican changes in the first five days of January, and 3,317 in the next week. Most of the Republicans in these states and others switched to unaffiliated status.
Voter rolls often change after presidential elections, when registrations sometimes shift toward the winner’s party or people update their old affiliations to correspond to their current party preferences, often at a department of motor vehicles. Other states remove voters who are inactive or who have died, or those who have moved out of state from all parties, and lump those people together with voters who changed their own registrations. Of the 25 states surveyed by The Times, Nevada, Kansas, Utah and Oklahoma had combined such voter list maintenance with registration changes, so their overall totals would not be limited to changes that voters made themselves. Other states may have done so, as well, but did not indicate in their public data.
Among Democrats, 79,000 have left the party since early January.
But the tumult at the Capitol, and the historic unpopularity of former President Donald Trump, have made for an intensely fluid period in American politics. Many Republicans denounced the pro-Trump forces that rioted on Jan. 6, and 10 Republican House members voted to impeach Trump. Sizable numbers of Republicans now say they support key elements of President Joe Biden’s stimulus package; typically, the opposing party is wary if not hostile toward the major policy priorities of a new president.
“Since this is such a highly unusual activity, it probably is indicative of a larger undercurrent that’s happening, where there are other people who are likewise thinking that they no longer feel like they’re part of the Republican Party, but they just haven’t contacted election officials to tell them that they might change their party registration,” said Michael P. McDonald, a professor of political science at the University of Florida. “So this is probably a tip of an iceberg.”
But, he cautioned, it could also be the vocal “never Trump” reality simply coming into focus as Republicans finally took the step of changing their registration, even though they hadn’t supported the president and his party since 2016.
Kevin Madden, a former Republican operative who worked on Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign, fits this trend line, though he was ahead of the recent exodus. He said he changed his registration to independent a year ago, after watching what he called the harassment of career foreign service officials at Trump’s first impeachment trial.
“It’s not a birthright and it’s not a religion,” Madden said of party affiliation. “Political parties should be more like your local condo association. If the condo association starts to act in a way that’s inconsistent with your beliefs, you move.”
As for the overall trend of Republicans abandoning their party, he said that it was too soon to say if it spelled trouble in the long term, but that the numbers couldn’t be overlooked. “In all the time I worked in politics,” he said, “the thing that always worried me was not the position but the trend line.”
Some GOP officials noted the significant gains in registration that Republicans have seen recently, including before the 2020 election, and noted that the party had rebounded quickly in the past.
“You never want to lose registrations at any point, and clearly the January scene at the Capitol exacerbated already considerable issues Republicans are having with the center of the electorate,” said Josh Holmes, a top political adviser to Sen. Mitch McConnell, the minority leader. “Today’s receding support really pales in comparison to the challenges of a decade ago, however, when Republicans went from absolute irrelevance to a House majority within 18 months.”
He added, “If Republicans can reunite behind basic conservative principles and stand up to the liberal overreach of the Biden administration, things will change a lot quicker than people think.”
In North Carolina, the shift was immediately noticeable. The state experienced a notable surge in Republicans changing their party affiliation: 3,007 in the first week after the riot, 2,850 the next week and 2,120 the week after that. A consistent 650 or so Democrats changed their party affiliation each week.
But state GOP officials downplayed any significance in the changes, and expressed confidence that North Carolina, a battleground state that has leaned Republican recently, will remain in their column.
“Relatively small swings in the voter registration over a short period of time in North Carolina’s pool of over 7 million registered voters are not particularly concerning,” Tim Wigginton, the communications director for the state party, said in a statement, predicting that North Carolina would continue to vote Republican at the statewide level.
In Arizona, 10,174 Republicans have changed their party registration since the attack as the state party has shifted ever further to the right, as reflected by its decision to censure three Republicans — Gov. Doug Ducey, former Sen. Jeff Flake and Cindy McCain — for various acts deemed disloyal to Trump. The party continues to raise questions about the 2020 election, and this week Republicans in the state Legislature backed arresting elections officials from Maricopa County for refusing to comply with wide-ranging subpoenas for election equipment and materials.
It is those actions, some Republican strategists in Arizona argue, that prompted the drop in GOP voter registrations in the state.
“The exodus that’s happening right now, based on my instincts and all the people who are calling me out here, is that they’re leaving as a result of the acts of sedition that took place and the continued questioning of the Arizona vote,” said Chuck Coughlin, a Republican strategist in Arizona.
For Heidi Ushinski, 41, the decision to leave the Arizona Republican Party was easy. After the election, she said, she registered as a Democrat because “the Arizona GOP has just lost its mind” and wouldn’t “let go of this fraudulent election stuff.”
“The GOP used to stand for what we felt were morals, just character, and integrity,” she added. “I think that the outspoken GOP coming out of Arizona has lost that.”
This is the third time Ushinski has switched her party registration. She usually reregisters to be able to vote against candidates. This time around, she did it because she did not feel that there was a place for people like her in the “new” Republican Party.
“I look up to the Jeffry Flakes and the Cindy McCains,” she said. “To see the GOP go after them, specifically, when they speak in ways that I resonate with just shows me that there’s nothing left in the GOP for me to stand for. And it’s really sad.”
Nunez, the Army veteran in Pennsylvania, said his disgust with the Capitol riot was compounded when Republicans in Congress continued to push back on sending stimulus checks and staunchly opposed raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour.
“They were so quick to bail out corporations, giving big companies money, but continue to fight over giving money to people in need,” said Nunez, who plans to change parties this week. “Also, I’m a business owner and I cannot imagine living on $7 an hour. We have to be fair.”
Though the volume of voters leaving the GOP varied from state to state, nearly every state surveyed showed a noticeable increase. In Colorado, roughly 4,700 Republican voters changed their registration status in the nine days after the riot. In New Hampshire, about 10,000 left the party’s voter rolls in the past month, and in Louisiana around 5,500 did as well.
Even in states with no voter registration by party, some Republicans have been vocal about leaving.
In Michigan, Mayor Michael Taylor of Sterling Heights, the fourth-largest city in the state, already had one foot out the Republican Party door before the 2020 elections. Even as a lifelong Republican, he couldn’t bring himself to vote for Trump for president after backing him in 2016. He instead cast a ballot for Biden.
After the election, the relentless promotion of conspiracy theories by GOP leaders, and the attack at the Capitol, pushed him all the way out of the party.
“There was enough before the election to swear off the GOP, but the incredible events since have made it clear to me that I don’t fit into this party,” Taylor said. “It wasn’t just complaining about election fraud anymore. They have taken control of the Capitol at the behest of the president of the United States. And if there was a clear break with the party in my mind, that was it.”
Taylor plans to run for reelection this year, and even though it’s a nonpartisan race, community members are well aware of the shift in his thinking since the last citywide election in 2017.
He already has two challengers, including a staunch Trump supporter, who has begun criticizing Taylor for his lack of support for the former president.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
© 2021 The New York Times Company
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Post by the Scribe on Feb 12, 2021 1:58:37 GMT
Republican Politicians Now Fear For More Than Just Their Political Liveswww.yahoo.com/lifestyle/republican-politicians-now-fear-more-162300697.html Charles P. Pierce Thu, February 11, 2021, 9:23 AM
Photo credit: Pool - Getty Images From Esquire www.esquire.com/news-politics/a35479931/republican-politicians-afraid-of-base/
Having watched the prosecution present its case in The Second Impeachment for two days, and preparing to watch the wrap-up on Thursday, I have discovered that there are two emotions for which I have no patience any more. First, the events of January 6 no longer make me sad. I do not mourn any more. I’m ready to march on Harfleur. I have nothing left but what Shakespeare calls “hard-favored rage.” The other state of being for which I no longer have time is mystification. As in, “How can Republicans still essentially vote in favor of the mob that came after the Congress with blood in its eyes?” A new poll from, of all places, the American Enterprise Institute, explains that phenomenon and leaves no room for doubt. From NPR: www.npr.org/2021/02/11/966498544/a-scary-survey-finding-4-in-10-republicans-say-political-violence-may-be-necessa?utm_term=nprnews&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=npr&utm_medium=social
The political concrete is thick and set. Forty years of radio and television propaganda, eight to 10 hours a day of it, and four decades of conservative politics incapable of resisting a slide into angry fantasy, have made a radical cult out of one of our two major political parties, and Republican politicians are now afraid of more than a threat simply to their political lives. Mike Pence was not running for re-election in those newly revealed security videos. He was running for his life.
(Speaking of whom, where the hell is the Choirboy anyway? Doesn’t the guy owe at least the respect of his presence to the people who saved him from the mob? Doesn’t he owe the Capitol Police a public thank-you? And wasn’t it reassuring to see how close the mob came to getting its hands on the nuclear “football”?)
Photo credit: The Washington Post - Getty Images
It’s even worse out in the country. State parties are demonstrating that they have become completely demented. The Arizona GOP censured Cindy McCain, of all people. Young Ben Sasse is in Dutch with the Nebraska Republicans. (Smarm is no defense against crazy.) Already, we’ve had Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Breathalyzer) demonstrating his willingness to go to hell or Wyoming to enforce loyalty to his departed leader. (Most recently, Gaetz has opened the ball on Rep. Adam Kitzinger, too.) In South Dakota, Senator John Thune has become Target A simply because Thune said publicly that the insurrection horrified him. Elected Republican state politicians were well-represented in the mob that ran riot on January 6. Of course, Republican senators are pretending to be unmoved—the ones that aren’t genuinely unmoved…coughJoshHawleycough…anyway. Josh Mandel, a Tea Party retread in Ohio, has announced that he will run to replace alleged moderate Rob Portman in the Senate. Mandel already has lost three Senate races, but he clearly senses that the time has arrived at last for his brand of nutbaggery. From WKYC: www.washingtonpost.com/politics/republicans-loyalty-trump/2021/02/10/f3f87e4c-6bc2-11eb-9f80-3d7646ce1bc0_story.html www.cnn.com/2021/02/04/politics/ben-sasse-nebraska-gop-censure/index.html thehill.com/homenews/house/538361-gaetz-hits-back-at-kinzinger-pac-targeting-trumpism apnews.com/article/joe-biden-donald-trump-south-dakota-pierre-elections-9d222929b080274c98232f3fd2179f33 www.npr.org/2021/01/09/955128569/more-than-a-dozen-gop-state-lawmakers-attended-rally-that-gave-way-to-riots?utm_medium=email&utm_source=dlcc&utm_content=4+-+NPR&utm_campaign=what+they%27re+saying:+GOP+fueled+riots+20210115&source=what+they%27re+saying:+GOP+fueled+riots+20210115 www.politico.com/news/2021/02/10/josh-mandel-senate-run-ohio-468277 www.wkyc.com/article/news/politics/former-ohio-treasurer-josh-mandel-claims-2020-election-stolen-from-president-trump/95-37c54b44-cdec-403a-ab6a-04b498a52937
On the other hand, Reuters tells us that 120 allegedly influential Republicans are meeting to discuss forming a Not Insane Party, which is as clear an indication of surrender as a white flag against a clear blue sky. www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-party-exclusive-idUSKBN2AB07P
Good luck with that, Sparky. Maybe you can nominate Zombie William Seward next time.
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Post by the Scribe on Feb 21, 2021 21:48:04 GMT
How easily fooled and deluded conservatives are. The only thing this proves is their gullibility and prone to propaganda they are. Trump studied the Hitler/NAZI playbook for decades. He learned how to manipulate people the way a hypnotist does at the beginning of their show. A certain percentage of people are easily hypnotized and the hypnotist seeks them out early in the show and gets them onstage. When the hypnotist is an elite malignant narcissist like Trump then expect nefarious things to happen. And when that hypnotist takes control of a government....LOOK OUT!!!
A little fact checking could go a long way but it has become obvious there is NO fact check media bias site that will convince these lemmings of anything other than what they are told to believe. And our political system is especially vulnerable to that as evidenced by 2016 where opposition voter rolls were purged by Republicon Party operatives allowing an outdated electoral college system to thwart the real wishes of the majority. Exclusive: Defeated and impeached, Trump still commands the loyalty of the GOP's voterswww.yahoo.com/news/exclusive-defeated-impeached-trump-still-170019540.html
Former President Donald Trump and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell are in a struggle for control of the Republican Party. Susan Page and Sarah Elbeshbishi Sun, February 21, 2021, 12:43 PM
If there's a civil war in the Republican Party, the voters who backed Donald Trump in November's election are ready to choose sides.
Behind Trump.
An exclusive Suffolk University/USA TODAY Poll finds Trump's support largely unshaken after his second impeachment trial in the Senate, this time on a charge of inciting an insurrection in the deadly assault on the Capitol Jan. 6. www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2021/01/17/trump-hurt-democracy-violence-feared-inauguration-poll/4165750001/
By double digits, 46%-27%, those surveyed say they would abandon the GOP and join the Trump party if the former president decided to create one. The rest are undecided.
Related: Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino imploded in Atlantic City
"We feel like Republicans don't fight enough for us, and we all see Donald Trump fighting for us as hard as he can, every single day," Brandon Keidl, 27, a Republican and small-business owner from Milwaukee, says in an interview after being polled. "But then you have establishment Republicans who just agree with establishment Democrats and everything, and they don't ever push back."
Half of those polled say the GOP should become "more loyal to Trump," even at the cost of losing support among establishment Republicans. One in five, 19%, say the party should become less loyal to Trump and more aligned with establishment Republicans.
The survey of 1,000 Trump voters, identified from 2020 polls, was taken by landline and cellphone last Monday through Friday. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.
They express stronger loyalty to Trump the person (54%) than they did to the Republican Party that twice nominated him for the White House (34%).
A post-Trump era? Not so fast Those will presumably be distressing findings for Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell and other senior GOP figures who had hoped Trump's decisive defeat for reelection and his subsequent impeachment might mean a post-Trump era was poised to begin.
More: Donald Trump rips Mitch McConnell as each seeks to exert leadership after impeachment trial www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2021/02/16/donald-trump-rips-mitch-mcconnell-each-seeks-exert-leadership/6772181002/
Former President Donald Trump and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell are in a struggle for control of the Republican Party.
The overwhelming allegiance the former president commands among the party's voters gives him the standing to weigh in on GOP primaries and seek retribution on those officeholders who voted to impeach and convict him. He is scheduled to make his first major address since leaving the White House at the influential Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) next Sunday in Orlando, Florida.
Though a majority of the Senate voted to convict Trump in his second impeachment trial, by 57-43, lawmakers failed to reach the two-thirds threshold required for conviction. He was acquitted Feb. 13.
Trump voters are prepared to punish those who crossed him. Eight in 10 say they would be less likely to vote for a Republican candidate who supported Trump's impeachment, as 10 representatives did in the House. An equal portion, 80%, say the seven Republican senators who voted to convict Trump were motivated by political calculations, not their consciences. www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2021/02/13/trump-impeachment-trial-7-republican-senators-voted-convict/4476227001/
Trump doesn't need to form a third party, says Francis Zovko, 63, a Republican from Jefferson Hills, Pennsylvania. "I think he's just going to, you know, take over the Republican Party, much as he did in 2016," the systems analyst says. "They all kind of thought he was a big joke, and by the end, they weren't laughing anymore."
Only 4% say the impeachment trial made them less supportive of Trump; 42% say it made them more supportive. Fifty-four percent say it didn't affect their support.
Paleologos on the Poll: Move over Fox News, Trump voters are shifting toward Newsmax, OANN www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2021/02/21/paleologos-poll-newsmax-and-oann-out-foxing-fox/4533848001/
Embracing an untruth: antifa's role
Most Trump voters embrace a version of events on Jan. 6 that has been debunked by independent fact checkers and law enforcement agencies.
Asked to describe what happened during the assault on the Capitol, 58% of Trump voters call it "mostly an antifa-inspired attack that only involved a few Trump supporters." That's more than double the 28% who call it "a rally of Trump supporters, some of whom attacked the Capitol." Four percent call it "an attempted coup inspired by President Trump."
Law enforcement investigations found no evidence of a role by antifa, a loose alliance of leftist, anti-fascist groups that have staged demonstrations in some cities, particularly on the West Coast. Most of those arrested in the assault Jan. 6 identified themselves as Trump supporters. www.usatoday.com/story/news/2017/08/23/what-antifa-and-what-does-movement-want/593867001/ www.usatoday.com/storytelling/capitol-riot-mob-arrests/
"It looked horrendous, but how are we to know who was actually taking part?" asks Christine Rodriguez, 79, a Republican from Galveston, Texas, who was among those surveyed. "You could have somebody planted there from the left ... pretending to be a real Trump supporter."
"There were a variety of people who were there," says William Case, 40, an electrician and independent voter from Vacaville, California. "I mean, outside there was a bunch of Trump supporters that didn't go in, but there's video proof of other groups that did, antifa being one of them. There were also reporters that broke in and followed everybody."
Though credentialed journalists covered the attack, some after being trapped in the Capitol, none has been charged with wrongdoing. No one known to be affiliated with antifa has been among those arrested.
In the poll, more than nine of 10 Trump voters say the former president isn't guilty of inciting an insurrection. Almost 8 in 10 say the crowd would have stormed the Capitol even if Trump hadn't urged them to "fight like hell" at a rally outside the White House that day.
Calling Trump responsible for the attack is "insane," protests Jane Wiles, 76, a retired insurance manager from Treasure Island, Florida. "Was he there? No. Unless he was there leading the pack, he is not responsible."
By 2-1, 59%-29%, Trump voters say they want him to run for president again in 2024. If he ran, three of four, 76%, would support him for the nomination; 85% would vote for him in a general election.
"I think he's probably exhausted," says Peter St. Ong, 47, an independent voter from Berlin, New Hampshire. Trump might decide not to run again, he says, then reconsiders: "He seems to be more or less addicted to being the center of conversation, so I would honestly be pretty shocked" if he didn't run again in 2024.
Even so, St. Ong suggests it's possible that in four years, the Republican Party would be ready to turn to a fresh face. "I do like the populist ideas that he has brought into the party," he says of Trump. On the other hand, "his mouth kind of got away with him sometimes, and I think some of these other people have a little bit more discipline, so they might be more successful, more able to reach across the aisle."
No honeymoon for Biden
Trump voters aren't ready to acknowledge Joe Biden as president despite his margin of victory of 7 million votes nationwide.
Three of four, 73%, say Biden wasn't legitimately elected. Most don't want their representatives to cooperate with him, even if that means gridlock in Washington.
Six in 10, 62%, say congressional Republicans "should do their best to stand up to Biden on major policies, even if it means little gets passed." That's more than double the 26% who say congressional Republicans "should do their best to work with Biden on major policies, even if it means making compromises."
USA TODAY/Suffolk Poll: Americans, braced for violence at the inauguration, see democracy damaged after Trump www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2021/01/17/trump-hurt-democracy-violence-feared-inauguration-poll/4165750001/
There are disquieting findings in the poll for Fox News, which has prospered as the dominant news source for conservatives. In a USA TODAY/Suffolk Poll in October 2016, 58% of Trump voters said Fox was their most trusted source of news. In the new poll, that drops to 34%.
Trust has risen in two relatively new outlets that have made their reputations by championing Trump. Newsmax is the most trusted among 17% of Trump voters, followed by 9% for One American News Network, or OANN. www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/tv/2021/01/11/dc-riots-how-newsmax-oan-conservative-outlets-fueled-mob/6589298002/
David Paleologos, director of the Suffolk University Political Research Center, says the findings could reflect "a seismic shift in the landscape of trusted news sources for conservatives in the country." www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2021/02/21/paleologos-poll-newsmax-and-oann-out-foxing-fox/4533848001/
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Exclusive: The Trump Party? He still holds the loyalty of GOP voters www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2021/02/21/exclusive-trump-party-he-still-holds-loyalty-gop-voters/6765406002/
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Post by the Scribe on Mar 1, 2021 18:55:28 GMT
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Post by the Scribe on Mar 1, 2021 19:13:47 GMT
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