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    Donald Trump is gone but his big lie is a rallying call for rightwing extremists

    Donald Trump is gone but his big lie is a rallying call for rightwing extremists The myth of the ‘stolen election’ – simple and endlessly repeated – is likely to be a rallying call for far-right terroristsWhen the back wheels of Air Force One finally lifted off the tarmac at Joint Base Andrews on Wednesday bound for Mar-a-Lago, Donald Trump’s White House-in-exile in West Palm Beach, cheers erupted in millions of households across America and around the globe.Four years of screeching tweets and ugly divisiveness were over, and for many it felt like the hope of a calmer, more civil world had swept in.Will Trump start his own political party? | Lloyd GreenRead moreIn one respect, though, the acrid, bitter smell of Trump continues to hang in the air: he left the presidency having never conceded that he lost the election to Joe Biden.Trump’s decision to shun Biden’s inauguration – the first outgoing president to do so in 152 years – can be explained away as the hissy fit of a sore loser. But there’s a darker side to it. By forgoing the ritual of the peaceful handover of power that has been a pillar of American democracy since the country’s founding, he leaves a black cloud over the incoming administration.Trump’s refusal formally to pass the baton means that the terrible events of 6 January are unfinished business. The armed mob of Trump supporters and white supremacists who stormed the Capitol Building, fired up by Trump’s lies about the “stolen election” and hunting for members of Congress to lynch, still have their marching orders. It is a legacy, made manifest on inauguration day by the 7ft non-scalable fences and the war zone-like presence of thousands of national guard troops in Washington DC.As Trump legacies go, this one could prove much harder to unpick than those he left behind on the pandemic, immigration or the climate crisis that Biden tried to reverse with the flick of a pen on day one.The legacy of the “stolen election”, by contrast, has the potential to endure. Michael Chertoff, the former homeland security secretary under George W Bush, told the Guardian recently that domestic terrorism inspired directly by Trump “is going to be the security challenge for the foreseeable future”.Current intelligence chiefs agree. They are primed to have to deal with a lasting threat posed by Trump’s ongoing refusal publicly to accept the will of the American people.An intelligence bulletin obtained by the Washington Post that was written just a week before the inauguration spelled out the intelligence community’s anxieties. The memo concluded that “amplified perceptions of fraud surrounding the outcome of the general election … very likely will lead to an increase in DVE [domestic violent extremist] violence.”At the center of this new domestic terrorism threat is the seed of doubt that Trump has implanted in the minds of millions of Americans that the 2020 presidential election was “rigged”. It is the “animating lie”, as the former homeland security official Juliette Kayyem has put it, that drove the mob to storm the US Capitol and that now hangs in the air like a toxic gas.Trump’s campaign to overturn the results of the presidential election amounted to a “big lie” familiar to those who study demagogic propaganda. Embedded within it are many of the core elements of what the Yale historian Timothy Snyder has called Trump’s post-truth, “pre-fascism”.The lie was simple – able to be repeated and shared on TV and social media in six short words: “They stole the election from me.” That “they” was important too – by signaling a clear enemy, it allowed his supporters to direct their frustration and anger at identifiable targets.Trump lashed out repeatedly at the media, which he denounced as the “enemy of the people”. He attacked “cowardly” Republican election officials who refused not to do their jobs, his own vice-president, and finally the heart of US democracy, Congress itself.For Bandy X Lee, a forensic psychiatrist and violence expert, there was another key aspect to the “stop the steal” big lie – it was rooted in paranoia. In her analysis, paranoia, perceiving threat where none exists, is the most common symptom to cause violent behaviour.“The fact that Trump actually believes himself to have been wronged and persecuted, or has paranoid ideations, spreads and finds resonance in paranoia that already exists in the population. That will increase the chances of violence,” Lee said.As any student of tyrannies will tell you, for big lies to work they have to be repeated and repeated. Trump certainly fulfilled that requirement. He has been working assiduously to spread his animating lie for years. Consider the headline in the New Yorker, “Trump and the truth: the ‘rigged’ election”. The article beneath it reported that Trump was “trying to delegitimize a national election even while campaigning for the presidency” and that his ploy was working – about half of his supporters thought the election was cooked.That New Yorker piece was published on 8 October 2016.Trump’s efforts have paid even greater dividends in this election cycle. The most recent opinion polls suggest that more than a third of the total US electorate still believe that Trump won the November election, a proportion that rises above 70% when you ask Republicans. Nor is there any sign such a stunningly large number of Americans who bought Trump’s make-believe is on the wane. As Snyder wrote in the New York Times, “the lie outlasts the liar”.Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of Trump’s sleight of hand is that he presented himself in the cloak of the protector of American democracy precisely in order to undermine American democracy. He invoked patriotism in order to legitimize the ultimate act of sedition – overthrowing the electoral will of the American people.That is what most concerns David Gomez, a former FBI national security executive who spent many years countering domestic terrorism. He fears that Trump, by wrapping his actions in the cloth of patriotism, has given his blessing to violent action that could linger beyond his presidency.“This is what makes this particular moment in time more dangerous,” he told the Guardian. “Fashioning yourself as a patriot makes it easier to justify, in your own mind, participating in acts that might lead to violence.”The patriotic rhetoric acts like an ethical get-out clause, Gomez said. “It provides the average person a face-saving scenario to participate. ‘Oh, I’m not a bad guy, I’m a good guy acting as a patriot to save my country.’”Into this mix has been poured the even more poisonous influence of far-right and white supremacist groups, motivated by racial animus and wielding their Confederate flags inside the Capitol building. Trump made repeated overtures to them throughout his presidency, from his “you had very fine people, on both sides” comment about the 2017 neo-Nazi rally in Charlottesville, to his notorious invitation to the Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by”.White supremacists have enthusiastically heeded his call. For them, this was the break for which they had long been waiting, the welcome gesture that would usher them into the fold.Shortly before the storming of the Capitol, the Three Percenters, an extreme anti-government militia network, put out a statement in which they aligned themselves overtly with Trump’s “stolen election”. They name-checked Ted Cruz, the Republican senator from Texas who was complicit in Trump’s big lie, as well as the ever more erratic Rudy Giuliani and the former national security adviser and pardoned criminal Michael Flynn.“We are ready to enter into battle with General Flynn leading the charge,” the group said.This all presents the incoming administration with a bilious soup of disaffected Trump supporters and their white supremacist allies hooked on the idea that Biden is an illegitimate president. Given the millions of Americans who have bought into the fantasy, should even a tiny fraction of them harbor violent aspirations or find themselves drawn to the newly elevated white supremacist groups, that would give rise to a national security challenge of monumental proportions.Biden himself has vowed to tackle the trouble head-on. In his inauguration speech he addressed the threat directly, talking about the “rise in political extremism, white supremacy, domestic terrorism that we must confront and we will defeat”.But the new president may find himself hamstrung by the relative lack of attention that has been paid up until now to the phenomenon.Last year Chris Wray, the FBI director who Biden intends to keep in post, told Congress that “racially and ethnically motivated violent extremists” were the main source of ideological killings, overshadowing international jihadism that has dominated US intelligence thinking for 20 years.Yet the way the FBI dishes out its resources is the exact opposite. Some 80% of its counter-terrorism budget goes on fighting international terrorism, and only 20% on domestic.Gomez, the former FBI supervisor, said that any residual sluggishness on the part of the FBI in refocusing its sights on far-right violence will have vanished on 6 January. The storming of the Capitol was a “call to action for the FBI as it showed that there are individuals and groups within these political movements that are violent and willing to act out their frustrations and ideations in public”.The FBI’s immediate priority, Gomez said, was likely to be on identifying the main conspirators behind the attack. “The FBI are going to focus on those groups that wore color-coordinated clothing at the Capitol, used communications and tried to organize specific actions,” he said.The longer-term ambition will be to flip many of the more than 150 suspected rioters who have already been arrested and turn them into informants who can act as the feds’ eyes and ears. In all, Gomez expects a “paradigm shift” within the FBI away from international terrorism towards far-right and white supremacist domestic terrorism similar in scale and significance to the seismic change that followed 9/11.As they scramble to make up for lost time, federal agencies will face some daunting obstacles. How do you begin to identify individuals who have the capability of violence when they are embedded in such a vast mass of American citizenry?As the Atlantic has pointed out, the mob that breached the Capitol was full of “respectable people” – business owners, real-estate brokers, Republican local and state legislators. The only indication that they would take part in a rabble that beat a police officer to death was their shared belief that they have, in the Atlantic’s words, an “inviolable right to rule”.Also among the mob were current and former law enforcement officers and at least six people with military links, signaling what may become the largest challenge of all – the fact that an unknown number of heavily armed and weapons-trained servants of the federal government are indirectly or even actively engaged in white supremacy. That’s a problem that long precedes Trump, but that has been supercharged by his presidency.Here, too, what amounts to a crisis in American society has been largely overlooked. Two years ago, the Department of Defense revealed that out of almost 2 million serving military personnel only 18 had been disciplined or discharged for extremist acts over the previous five years.So when security chiefs in charge of protecting dignitaries at Biden’s inauguration realized they had a fundamental problem, and called in the FBI to vet some 25,000 national guard troops brought to Washington for the event, they were acting exceptionally late in the day.“The growing threat of rightwing nationalism in the military has been ignored, it hasn’t been emphasized enough,” Jeff McCausland said.McCausland, a retired army colonel and former dean of the US Army War College, said that only now was the scale of far-right infiltration in the military being properly assessed. “Throughout the Trump administration, there was no focus on this problem because it did not fit their narrative that the threat was coming from the left.”Asked whether the Pentagon was finally taking the matter seriously, McCausland replied: “Their words suggest they are stepping up the effort. Let’s see how well they have done in a year.”Working in Biden’s favor will be the hope that with Trump off the scene – banished both from Washington and from social media – the allure of the stolen election myth will fade. “Now that Trump has been removed, much of his impact will dissipate,” said Bandy X Lee.She added that it would remain important that Trump is discredited and disempowered to curtail his pull. “Prosecution and firm boundaries will be critical to keeping his influence under check.”On Monday the article of impeachment against Trump for “incitement of insurrection” will be handed to the US Senate, and his second trial will begin in the week of 8 February. But the chances of conviction look slim. For now at least the nation remains on alert. The big lie outlasts the liar, suspended in air and obscuring Biden’s sun.TopicsDonald TrumpUS politicsUS elections 2020featuresReuse this content More

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    Senate Republican threatens impeachments of past Democratic presidents

    The Texas Republican senator John Cornyn warned on Saturday that Donald Trump’s second impeachment could lead to the prosecution of former Democratic presidents if Republicans retake Congress in two years’ time.Trump this month became the first US president to be impeached twice, after the Democratic-controlled House, with the support of 10 Republicans, voted to charge him with incitement of insurrection over the assault on the Capitol by his supporters on 6 January which left five people dead.Trump failed to overturn his election defeat and Joe Biden was sworn in as president this week.After a brief moment of bipartisan sentiment in which members from both parties condemned the unprecedented attack on Congress as it met to formalize Biden’s victory, a number of Senate Republicans are opposing Trump’s trial, which could lead to a vote blocking him from future office.“If it is a good idea to impeach and try former presidents, what about former Democratic presidents when Republicans get the majority in 2022?” Cornyn, a 19-year veteran of the Senate who last year tried to distance himself from Trump when it seemed his seat was at risk, tweeted at majority leader Chuck Schumer. “Think about it and let’s do what is best for the country.”Democrats hold narrow majorities in the House of Representatives and Senate but it is common for a president’s party to lose seats in elections two years after a presidential contest. Impeachment begins in the House. The Senate stages any trial.Republican Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell has said the mob in the Capitol putsch was “provoked” by Trump – who told supporters to march on Congress and “fight like hell”. Other Senate Republicans claim trying Trump after he has left office would be unconstitutional and further divide the country.There are also concerns on both sides of the aisle that the trial could distract from Biden’s legislative agenda. Schumer, who became majority leader this week, tweeted on Friday that the Senate would confirm Biden’s cabinet, enact a new Covid-19 relief package and conduct Trump’s impeachment trial.The trial is due to be held in the second week of February. More

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    Biden urged to commute sentences of all 49 federal death row prisoners

    Led by two prominent African American congresswomen, 35 Democrats have urged Joe Biden to commute the sentences of all 49 federal prisoners left on death row – days after the Trump administration finished its rush to kill 13 such prisoners.Early last Saturday Dustin Higgs, 48, became the last of those prisoners to be killed, after Trump lifted a long-standing moratorium on federal executions. Biden entered the White House on Wednesday.According to the Death Penalty Information Center, of the 49 people still on federal death row, 21 are white, 20 are black, seven are Latino and one is Asian.Among those prisoners is Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, convicted of planting pressure-cooker bombs on the route of the Boston Marathon in April 2013, killing three and injuring 264. His death sentence was overturned last year, a decision that is now before the supreme court.In a letter sent to Biden on Friday, Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts and Cori Bush of Missouri led lawmakers in calling on Biden “to take swift, decisive action”.“Commuting the death sentences of those on death row and ensuring that each person is provided with an adequate and unique re-sentencing process is a crucial first step in remedying this grave injustice,” they said.The representatives said they looked forward to the new administration enacting “just and restorative policies that will meaningfully transform our criminal legal system for the better”.Addressing Biden, they wrote: “By exercising your clemency power, you can ensure that there would be no one left on death row to kill.”Such a gesture, they said, would be “an unprecedented – but necessary – action to reverse systemic injustices and restore America’s moral standing.”Pressley has been consistently outspoken in her opposition to capital punishment. In July 2019, soon after Trump attorney general Bill Barr announced the lifting of a 16-year moratorium on federal executions, the Massachusetts Democrat proposed legislation to “prohibit the imposition of the death penalty for any violation of federal law, and for other purposes”.“The death penalty has no place in a just society,” Pressley said then.But by the time Trump left office, he had overseen the most executions by a US president in more than a century.Among those supporting the new appeal is Kelley Henry, a supervising assistant federal public defender based in Nashville and an attorney for Lisa Montgomery, who on 12 January became the first woman killed by the US government in nearly 70 years.“Congress is right,” Kelley told CNN on Friday. “President Biden must go further than just not carrying out executions and should immediately commute all federal death sentences.“When the supreme court, without any explanation, vacates lower court stays to allow the execution of a woman whose mental illness leaves her with no understanding of why she is being executed, we know the federal death penalty system is broken beyond repair.”New White House press secretary Jen Psaki would not be drawn on specific plans to address the federal death penalty.“The president, as you know, has stated his opposition to the death penalty in the past,” Psaki said. “That remains his view. I don’t have anything more for you in terms of future actions or mechanisms, though.”Karen Bass of California, Rashida Tlaib of Michigan and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York were among other well-known names to sign the letter to the new president.Appealing to Biden in December, Pressley said: “With a stroke of a pen, you can stop all federal executions.” More

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    Melania Trump leaves Donald Trump alone in front of the cameras – video

    The former first lady Melania Trump apparently spurned the conventions of her role by leaving Donald Trump alone in front of the cameras at Palm Beach airport after the couple left the White House for the final time ahead of Joe Biden’s inauguration. Trump himself paused to wave at photographers, but his wife continued walking until she was firmly offscreen, leaving her husband alone and triggering speculation about the state of her marriage to the now former presidentMelania Trump’s photo snub prompts speculation over post-White House path Continue reading… More

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    Joe Biden's inner circle: meet the new president's close-knit team

    Many of Biden’s new team have worked together before, and get on well – in sharp contrast to Trump’s ‘team of rivals’At the core of the administration Joe Biden is building is a trusted circle of officials, who are bound together by many years of working together in a close-knit team in the Obama administration, by a shared faith, or, in some cases, by a tie with Biden’s late son, Beau.It is the very opposite approach to the one taken by Donald Trump, who assembled a sharp-elbowed “team of rivals” – powerful men from different walks of life, who he had never met but thought looked the part. Biden treasures familiarity and nice-guy collegiality, and warned new appointees on Wednesday that if they don’t treat each other with respect, “I will fire you on the spot.” Continue reading… More

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    The inauguration was full of exquisite moments: but what was the best bit? | Emma Brockes

    Apart from Joe Biden we had Kamala, Lady Gaga, Bernie’s mittens – and Trump suddenly seeming an irrelevanceIt started on Tuesday with nerves in the playground: why weren’t they holding it indoors? No one with sense, we agreed, had an appetite for spectacle, and our systems couldn’t take any more. Donald Trump was going, good riddance, but let’s not tempt fate; besides, on Wednesday morning we all had things to do. After a year of rolling crises, even New Yorkers were feeling meek and defeated. Let’s get this thing over with and try to move on.The most surprising thing about the inauguration this week – apart from the reminder that, when it comes to its national ceremonies, America is if anything even more camp than Britain – was the sheer, irrepressible joy of it. From the first minute to the last there was no containing this thing and nothing – not pragmatism, superstition, trauma fatigue or work – would get in the way of the feeling. “Bye bye Trump, that dummy,” said one of my daughters on Wednesday morning. And so it began. Continue reading… More

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    A doctor wanted to make a difference. Now he’s a top Covid adviser to Biden

    Called to act after violence in Charlottesville, Cameron Webb ran for Congress. He lost, but is still headed to WashingtonIn Charlottesville, there is before 12 August and there is after. So decisive is this date that it often appears in Virginia newspapers without a year attached. It is the local 9/11. Continue reading… More

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    ‘Gondor has no king’: pro-Trump lawsuit cites Lord of the Rings

    Texas case offers baseless mix of allegations of electoral fraud but cites the imaginary kingdom of Gondor as evidenceDonald Trump’s diehard supporters are often accused of living in fantasyland, but one court case recently launched to try to reinstall him as president has surprised even the most hardened observers of Trumpian strangeness by citing as evidence a mythological realm from The Lord of the Rings. Related: Pittsburgh official goes viral by rebuking Ted Cruz – and looking like Jeff Daniels Continue reading… More