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      Republicans’ topsy-turvy take on aid for Ukraine reveals party in thrall to Trump

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      Nearly a decade ago, as Russian troops entered the Crimean peninsula, congressional Republicans were in uproar, blaming Moscow’s land grab on what they claimed was a retreat from American leadership by then president Barack Obama. Loudest among the Republican critics was the South Carolina senator Lindsey Graham, who assailed Obama as a “weak, indecisive leader”.In a pre-dawn vote on Tuesday, Graham joined the majority of Senate Republicans in opposing a foreign aid package that would rush wartime assistance to Ukraine as it approaches the second anniversary of Russia’s full invasion.It was a shocking – if not entirely surprising – turn for one of the chamber’s leading defense hawks and a steadfast Russia critic. But these days Graham has another distinction: he is one of Donald Trump’s most loyal allies on Capitol Hill, where the former president – and likely Republican nominee – has been whipping up opposition to Ukraine’s war effort.Just 22 Republican senators broke with Trump to approve the aid package for Ukraine, Israel and other US allies – yet another sign of how thoroughly the former president’s America First vision has supplanted the party’s consensus toward internationalism and interventionism.There has long been an isolationist strain among hardline Republicans who contend that investment in foreign entanglements risks bringing the US closer to war and diverts money away from domestic challenges. But then Trump came to power and sidelined the defense hawks, ushering in a dramatic shift in Republican sentiment toward America’s allies and adversaries.Nearly half of Republicans and right-leaning independents said the US was providing too much aid to Ukraine, according to a survey by the Pew Research Center conducted late last year. This share rose sharply from the early stages of the war following Russia’s invasion in February 2022.In his statement on Monday night, Graham insisted that he still supported Ukraine but said unless and until lawmakers turn the $95bn military assistance package into a “loan instead of a grant”, he would oppose it.It echoed comments Trump made over the weekend, in an all-caps social media post addressed to the US Senate, in which he said foreign aid should be structured as a loan, not a “giveaway”. Later in a campaign speech, Trump rattled American allies in Europe when he claimed that he would encourage Russia to attack Nato allies who did not pay enough to maintain the security alliance.But in Washington, most Republicans dismissed or downplayed the remark.“I was here when he was president. He didn’t undermine or destroy Nato,” senator Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican who sponsored legislation to block a US president from unilaterally withdrawing from Nato, told reporters. The senator, who built a reputation as a defense hawk, voted against the military assistance measure on Tuesday.The bill, which includes $60bn for Ukraine, divided the Senate Republican leadership. From the Senate floor, Senator Mitch McConnell, the top Republican, delivered increasingly urgent pleas for his conference to rise to the occasion and support America’s allies, even after his plan to tie border security to foreign aid collapsed, torpedoed by Trump’s opposition.“This is about rebuilding the arsenal of democracy and demonstrating to our allies and adversaries alike that we’re serious about exercising American strength,” McConnell said. “American assistance with these efforts is not charity. It’s an investment in cold, hard US interests.”McConnell’s deputy, John Thune of South Dakota, voted for the measure, while John Barrasso of Wyoming, the No 3 Senate Republican, opposed it. Barrasso has endorsed Trump for president.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionIn a floor speech, Senator Rand Paul, who led the effort to delay the measure, accused McConnell, a fellow Republican from Kentucky, of collaborating with Democrats to “loot the Treasury”. He panned McConnell’s argument that bolstering Ukraine’s defense was critical to American national security as “ludicrous”.The Ohio senator JD Vance, another Trump loyalist, claimed the effort to replenish Ukraine’s war chest was a “plot” by the Republican establishment to “stop the election of Donald Trump”. Meanwhile, some arch-conservatives suggested it was time for McConnell to step down.Now the bill goes to the House, where the speaker, Mike Johnson, must tread carefully not to meet the same fate as his prematurely deposed predecessor. Johnson indicated that he was unlikely to bring the measure to the floor for a vote because it lacks border enforcement measures. But just last week he announced that he would refuse to bring a version of the bill that included a border security deal because the Trump-allied hardliners who hold outsized power over his thin majority were wary of handing Joe Biden anything that resembled a political victory.House Democrats and the remaining pro-Ukraine House Republicans are casting about behind the scenes for a solution. But there are many political and logistical hurdles to overcome before a majority bloc not accustomed to working together in the tribal House comes together to circumvent Johnson – and by extension Trump.“If it were to get to the floor, it would pass,” congressman Andy Biggs, a member of the hardline House Freedom caucus and a staunch opponent of the aid package, told a conservative radio host on Tuesday morning. “Let’s just be frank about that.”But until the bill reaches Biden’s desk, Biggs’s admission is cold comfort to American allies waiting for Congress to act. More

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      Joe Biden calls Trump’s Nato remarks ‘dumb’, ‘shameful’ and ‘dangerous’

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      Joe Biden has attacked Donald Trump’s comments on the US pulling out of the Nato military alliance as “dumb”, “shameful” and “dangerous” in a blistering speech attacking Republican opposition to legislation partly aimed at providing support for Ukraine in its stand against a Russian invasion.Trump’s remarks about encouraging Russia to attack Nato allies who did not contribute what Trump called their fair share of Nato funding have set off alarm bells across Europe among leaders who eye the prospect of a second Trump presidency with growing disquiet.In a speech after the foreign aid bill – which also includes aid to Israel and Taiwan – passed the Senate, Biden urged reluctant Republicans to pass the legislation in the Republican-controlled House.“Supporting this bill is standing up to Putin,” Biden said. “Opposing it is playing into Putin’s hands.”Biden then attacked Trump for his encouraging of Republicans in the House to refuse to support the bill and for his comments about Russia and Nato.“Can you imagine a former president of the United States saying that? The whole world heard it,” he said. “The worst thing is, he means it. No other president in our history has ever bowed down to a Russian dictator. Let me say this as clearly as I can: I never will.“For God’s sake it’s dumb, it’s shameful, it’s dangerous. It’s un-American. When America gives its word it means something, so when we make a commitment, we keep it. And Nato is a sacred commitment.”The passage of the bill through the House, however, looks far from assured despite the president’s urging and its hard-won success in the Senate. Mike Johnson, the hard-right Republican House speaker, in effect rejected the aid package because it lacked border enforcement provisions.“The mandate of national security supplemental legislation was to secure America’s own border before sending additional foreign aid around the world,” he said, adding: “In the absence of having received any single border policy change from the Senate, the House will have to continue to work its own will on these important matters. America deserves better than the Senate’s status quo.”Many see such sentiments as richly ironic given it was Johnson and his House Republicans who – under pressure from Trump and his allies – tanked an earlier version of the aid legislation which included a bipartisan immigration deal intended to tackle the US-Mexico border crisis.Conservatives had insisted recently that the foreign aid package must be tied to border security measures but with immigration poised to play a critical role in the November elections and Trump increasingly certain to be the Republican nominee, the party was suddenly scared of handing Biden a domestic policy victory by trying to solve the issue.But the crises being tackled by the legislation are not just limited to the border, Ukraine and Russia – or just Republicans.Biden also stressed the part of the package passed by the Senate that he said “provides Israel with what it needs to protect his people against the terrorist groups like Hamas and Hezbollah and others, and it will provide life-saving humanitarian aid to the Palestinian people desperately need food, water and shelter. They need help.”That was a message to Biden’s own party: three senators (two Democrats and the Democratic-aligned Bernie Sanders) also voted no on the bill, citing Biden’s staunch support for Israel’s military strikes in the Palestinian territories. More

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      US House to vote again on impeaching Biden’s homeland security secretary

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      The US House of Representatives could vote on Tuesday on whether to impeach Alejandro Mayorkas, Joe Biden’s secretary of homeland security, on explicitly political charges related to deteriorating conditions at the southern border and Republican attempts to capitalise on the issue in an election year.Tuesday’s vote has been threatened by winter weather conditions, forcing Republicans to first hold a lower-stakes vote on a different issue to find out if they have enough members present to impeach Mayorkas. The impeachment vote would follow an embarrassing failure for the House speaker, Mike Johnson, last week, when Republican absences and defections contributed to defeat in a first vote.If Republicans are successful, the effort to remove Mayorkas – for allegedly refusing to enforce immigration law – would move to the Senate, where it has next to no chance of producing a conviction.Last weekend, Mayorkas told NBC that Republicans’ allegations against him were “baseless … and that’s why I’m really not distracted by them.“I’m focused on the work of the Department of Homeland Security. I’m inspired every single day by the remarkable work that 216,000 men and women in our department perform on behalf of the American public.”Conditions at the border with Mexico, where numbers of undocumented migrants remain high, “certainly” represented “a crisis”, Mayorkas said.But he said the Biden administration did not “bear responsibility for a broken system. And we’re doing a tremendous amount within that broken system. But fundamentally, Congress is the only one who can fix it.”Last week, Republicans in the Senate abandoned and sank an immigration and border deal, reached after extensive negotiations with Democrats, after Donald Trump, the likely Republican presidential nominee, made his opposition clear.After the failure of the first Mayorkas impeachment vote, Mike Gallagher of Wisconsin, a Republican who voted no and was subjected to intense pressure to change his mind, said he would not seek re-election in November.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionGallagher, until now a rising star in the party, said: “The proponents of impeachment [of Mayorkas] failed to make the argument as to how his stunning incompetence meets the impeachment threshold.”Such a purely political impeachment, he added, would “set a dangerous new precedent that will be weaponized against future Republican administrations”.Another Republican who opposed the first vote, Tom McClintock of California, said his party was seeking to “stretch and distort the constitution in order to hold the administration accountable for stretching and distorting the law”. More

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      Wisconsin senate adopts new legislative maps that could undo gerrymandering

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      Wisconsin lawmakers voted on Tuesday to adopt legislative maps drawn by the Democratic governor, Tony Evers – inching the state closer to undoing the extreme gerrymander that has ensured Republican control of the state for more than a decade.The pair of votes in the Republican-dominated state assembly and state senate are a sign that the years-long battle over Wisconsin’s legislative maps may be finally drawing to a close, giving Democrats a chance to win control of the state legislature in upcoming elections for the first time since 2012.The vote is the result of a December ruling from the Wisconsin supreme court that the current state assembly and senate maps are unconstitutional, ordering the state to adopt new legislative maps before the 2024 election – and setting a mid-March deadline. Republican and Democratic lawmakers, the governor and multiple third party groups submitted revised maps to the court for consideration, and in a 1 February report, consultants hired by the court to review them said that the GOP-drawn maps maintained the partisan gerrymander and “do not deserve further consideration”. The maps submitted by Democrats retained a Republican advantage, the consultants found, but to a much-reduced degree.Democrats in both chambers overwhelmingly voted against the bill after a failed attempt send it back to committee for review, alleging that because the bill would not go into effect until fall 2024, it was designed to protect Republicans like assembly speaker Robin Vos, who is currently facing a recall attempt.“We should let the supreme court continue to do its job to put in place a fair map in just a couple weeks,” said Democratic senator Mark Spreitzer.The maps still need to be signed by Evers to go into effect. Evers previously signaled he would sign the legislation if it comes to his desk. A Marquette University researcher, John Johnson, found that Evers’ maps still give Republicans a slight edge at retaining their legislative majorities, but by a much narrower margin than the current maps.By accepting Evers’ maps, Republicans avoid rolling the dice on a court-drawn map that could be less favorable to them.“The court will likely pick one of the other three maps,” said the Republican senator Devin LeMahieu. “We’re going to end this sham litigation and pass the governor’s map.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThis fight was set in motion when liberal judge Janet Protasiewicz won an April 2023 state supreme court race, giving liberals a majority on the court for the first time in more than a decade. Protasiewicz had telegraphed her views of the Republican gerrymander during the election, calling the maps “rigged”. Republican legislators spent months threatening to impeach her if she didn’t recuse herself from the case, but dropped the issue after consulting with former Wisconsin supreme court justices who recommended against pursuing impeachment.Wisconsin’s current legislative maps, drawn by Republicans, are among the most gerrymandered in the country. The GOP in Wisconsin has strong majorities in both houses of the state legislature, holding nearly twice as many seats as Democrats in the assembly and senate even though statewide races are often decided by razor-thin margins. These new maps will erase much of that partisan advantage. More

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      Trump endorses daughter-in-law for RNC role as he tightens grip on party

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      Donald Trump moved to tighten his grip on the Republican party, announcing a slate of endorsements, including his daughter-in-law Lara Trump, for leadership positions within the Republican National Committee.The approach of turbulence within the RNC – which helps organize the party and its elections – has been apparent since last week, when its chair, Ronna McDaniel, who has held the position since 2017, told the former US president that she would be stepping down.Overnight on Monday, Trump posted on his social media site that he is backing Michael Whatley, chair of the North Carolina Republican party, as committee chair, Lara Trump to serve as co-chair, and senior adviser Chris LaCivita as its chief financial officer.“This group of three is highly talented, battle-tested, and smart,” Trump wrote in a statement. “They have my complete and total endorsement to lead the Republican National Committee.”The significance of Trump’s endorsements, and specifically Lara Trump, who is married to his second son, Eric, is interpreted as a move to quell any intra-party dissent toward Trump. The chair and co-chair positions must still be elected by RNC committee members.Trump is the overwhelming favorite to win the party’s 2024 nomination to go up against Joe Biden in the race for the White House. All his serious rivals, aside from the former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley, have dropped out and Haley herself is badly behind him in the polls, including in her home state.But according to federal election commission filings, the RNC had, in 2023, its worst fundraising year in a decade, and entered this year with just $8m in the bank.In contrast, the Democrat National Committee holds $21m, according to Ballotpedia.Betsy Ankeny, Nikki Haley’s campaign manager, described the endorsements as “rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic”. Ankeny said Haley’s plan for the RNC was to “blow it all up”.“Everyone at the RNC will be fired, there will be a full and complete audit of the gross misuse of funds, and there will be a formal application process to become RNC chair based on MERIT, not on back scratching,” she added.Haley herself said Trump was trying to steamroller the result of the nomination contest. “He tried to get the RNC to name him the presumptive nominee. We don’t do coronations … Think about what’s happening right now. Is that how you’re going to try and take an election?” she said on the campaign trail in South Carolina.But Whatley, Lara Trump and LaCivita are nothing if not loyalists to the Trump cause.Whatley has echoed Trump’s claims of 2020 election fraud; LaCivita has worked as a senior strategist at the pro-Trump Super Pac Make America Great Again Inc; and Lara Trump was floated as a 2022 North Carolina US Senate candidate, before joining her father-in-law on the campaign trail.She married Eric Trump in 2014 while working as a producer on Inside Edition. In 2016, she spearheaded the Trump-Pence Women’s Empowerment Tour and was a Trump fundraiser and consultant to his 2020 re-election bid, a job that included being a warmup speaker at the 6 January 2021 “Save America” rally that preceded the Capitol riot.In 2021, she joined Fox News as a contributor but left the next year when Trump declared his re-election bid. More

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      US Senate moves forward $95bn Ukraine and Israel aid package

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      After many setbacks and much suspense, the Senate appeared on track this week to approve a long-awaited package of wartime funding for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, as Republican opponents staged a filibuster to register their disapproval over a measure they could not block.The Senate voted 66-33, exceeding a 60-vote margin, to sweep aside the last procedural hurdle and limit debate on the measure to a final 30 hours before a vote on passage that could come on Wednesday.Senators had worked through the weekend on the roughly $95bn emergency spending package, which cleared a series of procedural hurdles as it moved toward final passage. The chamber voted on the legislation on Monday night following hours of debate and a talking filibuster led by Republican senator Rand Paul and joined by a coterie of Donald Trump’s allies in the chamber.On Monday, Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat, said the weekend votes demonstrated “beyond doubt that there’s strong support” for advancing the foreign aid package.Schumer said: “These are the enormously high stakes of the supplemental package: our security, our values, our democracy. It is a down payment for the survival of western democracy and the survival of American values.”He continued: “The entire world is going to remember what the Senate does in the next few days. Nothing – nothing – would make Putin happier right now than to see Congress waver in its support for Ukraine; nothing would help him more on the battlefield.”If the bill passes the Senate as expected, the bill would next go to the Republican-led House, where next steps are uncertain. Though a bipartisan majority still supports sending assistance to Ukraine, there is a growing contingent of Republican skeptics who echo Trump’s disdain for the US-backed war effort.“House Republicans were crystal clear from the very beginning of discussions that any so-called national security supplemental legislation must recognize that national security begins at our own border,” read a statement from House speaker Mike Johnson.The Republican speaker said the package lacked border security provisions, calling it “silent on the most pressing issue facing our country”. It was the latest – and potentially most consequential – sign of opposition to the Ukraine aid from conservatives who have for months demanded that border security policy be included in the package, only to last week reject a bipartisan proposal intended to curb the number of illegal crossings at the US-Mexico border.“Now, in the absence of having received any single border policy change from the Senate, the House will have to continue to work its own will on these important matters,” Johnson said. “America deserves better than the Senate’s status quo.”The measure includes $60bn in funding for Ukraine, where soldiers are running out of ammunition as the country seeks to repel Russian troops nearly two years after the invasion. Much of that money would go toward supporting Ukraine’s military operations and to replenishing the US supply of weapons and equipment that have been sent to the frontlines. Another $14bn would go to support Israel and US military operations in the region. More than $8bn would go to support US partners in the Indo-Pacific region, including Taiwan, as part of its effort to deter aggression by China.It also allots nearly $10bn for humanitarian efforts in Ukraine, Israel and Gaza, where nearly a quarter of residents are starving and large swaths of the territory have been ravaged.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionNot included in the package is a bipartisan border clampdown demanded by Republicans in exchange for their support for the foreign aid package. But after months of fraught negotiations, Republicans abandoned the deal following Trump’s vocal opposition to the border-security measure.Though its Republican defenders argued that it was the most conservative immigration reform proposal put forward in decades, Trump loyalists on Capitol Hill deemed it inadequate amid record levels of migration at the US southern border. Others were more explicit, warning that bipartisan action to address the situation could help Joe Biden’s electoral prospects in the November elections.Border security is top of mind for many Americans, the overwhelming majority of whom disapprove of the president’s handling of the issue.After the Senate failed to advance the border security measure, Schumer stripped it out and moved ahead with a narrowly-tailored foreign aid package. In floor speeches on Monday, several Republican senators lamented the absence of border enforcement policies, though all had voted to reject the bipartisan immigration deal last week.“Open the champagne, pop the cork! The Senate Democrat leader and the Republican leader are on their way to Kyiv,” Paul said, launching the filibuster. He continued: “They’re taking your money to Kyiv. They didn’t have much time – really no time and no money – to do anything about our border.” More

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      Republicans say Trump call for Russia to attack Nato allies was just fine, actually

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      A leading Republican senator said Donald Trump was “simply ringing the warning bell” when he caused global alarm by declaring he would encourage Russia to attack Nato allies who did not pay enough to maintain the alliance, as Trump’s party closed ranks behind its presumptive presidential nominee.“Nato countries that don’t spend enough on defense, like Germany, are already encouraging Russian aggression and President Trump is simply ringing the warning bell,” Tom Cotton of Arkansas, a former soldier, told the New York Times.“Strength, not weakness, deters aggression. Russia invaded Ukraine twice under Barack Obama and Joe Biden, but not under Donald Trump.”Cotton was referring to the annexation of Crimea in 2014 and the invasion of Ukraine in 2022.As president between 2017 and 2021, Trump was widely held to have shown alarming favour, and arguably subservience, to Vladimir Putin.Trump made the controversial remarks at a rally in South Carolina on Saturday.View image in fullscreenIn remarks the Times said were not part of Trump’s planned speech but which did repeat a story he has often told, the former president said: “One of the presidents of a big country stood up and said, ‘Well, sir, if we don’t pay and we’re attacked by Russia, will you protect us?’“I said, ‘You didn’t pay, you’re delinquent?’ He said, ‘Yes, let’s say that happened.’ No, I would not protect you. In fact, I would encourage them [Russia] to do whatever the hell they want. You’ve got to pay. You’ve got to pay your bills. And the money came flowing in.”Amid fierce controversy over remarks the Biden White House called “appalling and unhinged”, another Republican hawk in the Senate, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, told the Times: “Give me a break – I mean, it’s Trump.”Graham, who has vacillated from warning that Trump will “destroy” the Republican party to full-throated support, added: “All I can say is while Trump was president nobody invaded anybody. I think the point here is to, in his way, to get people to pay.”Last year, Marco Rubio co-sponsored a law preventing presidents unilaterally withdrawing from Nato. On Sunday the Florida senator, whom Trump ridiculed and defeated in the 2016 primary, also dismissed Trump’s remarks about Russia.“Donald Trump is not a member of the Council on Foreign Relations,” Rubio told CNN, referring to a Washington thinktank. “He doesn’t talk like a traditional politician, and we’ve already been through this. You would think people would’ve figured it out by now.”Among other Senate Republicans there was some rather muted pushback. Thom Tillis of North Carolina reportedly blamed Trump’s aides for failing to explain to him how Nato works, while Rand Paul of Kentucky was quoted by Politico as saying Trump’s remarks represented “a stupid thing to say”.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionTrump’s last rival for the presidential nomination, which he is all but certain to secure, is Nikki Haley, who served as United Nations ambassador under Trump. Asked about his remarks, Haley told CBS: “Nato has been a success story for the last 75 years. But what bothers me about this is, don’t take the side of a thug [Vladimir Putin], who kills his opponents. Don’t take the side of someone who has gone in and invaded a country [Ukraine] and half a million people have died or been wounded because of Putin.“Now, we do want Nato allies to pull their weight. But there are ways you can do that without sitting there and telling Russia, have your way with these countries. That’s not what we want.”A former candidate for the nomination, the former New Jersey governor Chris Christie, told NBC the Nato remark was “absolutely inappropriate” and “consistent with his love for dictators”.Among former Trump aides, John Bolton, Trump’s third national security adviser, told MSNBC: “When he says he wants to get out of Nato, I think it’s a very real threat, and it will have dramatically negative implications for the United States, not just in the North Atlantic but worldwide.”HR McMaster, Bolton’s predecessor, who was a serving army general when Trump picked him, said Trump’s Nato comment was “irresponsible”.Another former general and former Trump adviser, Keith Kellogg, told the Times he thought Trump was “on to something” with his remarks, which Kellogg said were meant to prompt member nations to bolster their own defences.“I don’t think it’s encouragement at all,” Kellogg said of Trump’s apparent message to Russia. “We know what he means when he says it.”But Liz Cheney, the former Republican Wyoming congresswoman who became a Trump opponent after the January 6 attack on Congress, called Nato “the most successful military alliance in history … essential to deterring war and defending American security”. She added: “No sane American president would encourage Putin to attack our Nato allies. No honorable American leaders would excuse or endorse this.” More

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      Supine Republicans don’t just dance to Trump’s tune – they amplify his racism

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      “I just love you!” Tim Scott bleated at Donald Trump.The South Carolina senator, who three months earlier had said Trump could not beat Joe Biden in the presidential election, was speaking on stage at a rally in New Hampshire.Criticism of Scott, who ended his own presidential campaign in November and later endorsed Trump, was swift.“Humiliating,” said Al Sharpton, the civil rights leader and news host. “A deeply, deeply pathetic moment,” said a fellow MSNBC host. “Cringe-y and painful,” was the opinion of The View.It was all of those things, but the self-abasement of Scott, who harbors ambitions of being Trump’s vice-president, was more importantly an illustration of how Trump remains the master puppeteer of the Republican party.The vice-presidential race – playing out in real time despite the presidential election being nine months away – is serving as a microcosm of what it means to be a success in the modern-day Republican party.In the current environment, anyone wishing to remain relevant in the GOP has to dance to Trump’s tune and kiss his big ring, surrendering any self-respect along the way.View image in fullscreenKristi Noem, the governor of South Dakota, and Elise Stefanik, a congresswoman from New York, are both seen as potential picks for vice-president. They have each campaigned with Trump and adopted Trump’s racially charged language, in Noem’s case, to the extent that she has been banned from tribal lands in her own state.Marjorie Taylor Greene, a longstanding Trump champion and bizarro star of the rightwing world, is a long-shot candidate, as the race to get Trump’s attention seems set to intensify.“Allies also say that while loyalty – and having a dependable attack dog who can effectively defend him – is paramount,” Associated Press reported, in a piece about the audition to become Trump’s vice-president.Beyond the vice-presidential race, it’s clear that Trump continues to embody the GOP. In the Senate and in the House, Republicans are forced to do his bidding or suffer the consequences.“I think the Republican party believes that he can deliver the voters and the party believes he is the best way to deliver the voters. He wields a tremendous amount of control over the party’s decision-making capacities,” said Shannon Bow O’Brien, a professor in the department of government at the University of Texas at Austin.“He does a lot of obedience through fear. He does have a very committed base who he says: ‘Jump’ and they say: ‘How high?’ He posts inflammatory things online and people respond and do what he asks essentially.”After Liz Cheney, a Republican congresswoman, voted to impeach Trump in the wake of the January 6 insurrection, Trump successfully backed a rival candidate against her in her state primary – a tactic he has deployed against other Republicans who aren’t sufficiently obsequious.“The people who vote in primaries are typically the most ardent and the most faithful,” O’Brien said.“And so if you have a candidate who Donald Trump has attacked, and has said: ‘This person needs to go,’ they run a serious risk, particularly in those primaries, of having that committed core coming out voting against them.”The bending of the knee to Trump is everywhere you look.During a bitter presidential primary campaign, Donald Trump dubbed Ron DeSantis “DeSanctimonious” and suggested he might be a pedophile, while a Trump campaign spokesperson said DeSantis walked “like a 10-year-old girl who had just raided her mom’s closet and discovered heels for the first time”.DeSantis set all that aside when he dropped out of the race and endorsed Trump in January.View image in fullscreenIf Trump’s influence only extended to demanding that people praise him, it would be easier to write off. But the former president has essentially forced people to amplify his inflammatory rhetoric about immigration and race, with increasingly overt racist language becoming the messaging of the Republican party.“I have been to the southern border many times. Some of you have, too. I have witnessed first-hand the invasion taking place. What shocks me is that every time I go, it is more of a war zone than the time before,” Noem said in an address in South Dakota at the end of January.“The sheer number of illegal migrants coming into the country has made it so that every state is now a border state.”Noem added: “This issue is about preserving this great nation for our kids and our grandkids.”The comments didn’t come out of nowhere. Despite his mother, like two of his wives, being an immigrant, Trump has long demonized and dehumanized people seeking refuge in the US. Notably, he did so in December when he claimed people entering the US across the southern border were “destroying the blood of our country”.And Noem’s invective seems to have worked. Four days after her speech, Trump praised Noem – along with Scott – in a Fox News interview, when asked about who he might choose as his running mate.“Kristi Noem has been incredible fighting for me. She said, ‘I’d never run against him because I can’t beat him.’ That was a very nice thing to say,” Trump said.Others are circling too. Stefanik was once seen as a sober Republican thinker, a moderate who was one of the most bipartisan members of the House. She isn’t seen as that any more.When Trump began calling the people jailed for their part in the January 6 insurrection “hostages” earlier this year, Stefanik immediately jumped on board.“I have concerns about the treatment of Jan 6 hostages,” Stefanik said in an NBC News interview, a day after Trump had started using the term. In the same interview, Stefanik also refused to commit to accepting the results of the 2024 election – something which no doubt would delight Trump, with whom she has appeared on his primary campaign trail.Stefanik stayed silent after Trump’s “poisoning the blood” claim, and in January seemed to adopt Trump’s dehumanizing tone when she claimed immigrants were set to “cross our borders and bleed into New York”.View image in fullscreen“When we look at Trump’s message around immigration, his message around the border, conversations around banning critical race theory, talking about crime in inner cities, he understands that America is at a very interesting point with respect to race relations. And so one way to keep the divisions alive is to talk about immigrants as if they are the problem,” said Emmitt Riley, a professor of politics and African and African American studies at Sewanee University and the chair of the National Conference of Black Political Scientists.“What we see happening with Republicans is that they now understand that Trump has spoken a message to the base of the Republican party and so if anyone disagrees with Trump, they’re vilified, they’re not likely to be successful when it comes to politics.”With the back and forth over how to address the number of people seeking to cross the US-Mexico border, Trump is unlikely to tone down his incendiary rhetoric on immigrants and foreigners – invective that Riley says “threatens the very fabric of American democracy”.And given Trump’s enduring influence and control, the chorus of similar Republican attacks is only likely to grow.“What’s different about Donald Trump is he’s emerged as a leader of the party, primarily because of voters seeing him as the face of the movement,” Riley said.“We haven’t really seen a candidate who has been able to exert such powerful influence over almost everything within the Republican party in this way.“And I think that that is also what makes him a little more dangerous.” More