Republicans

Subterms

    More stories

    • 188 Shares199 Views

      in US Politics

      A year after the Capitol attack, what has the US actually learned? | Cas Mudde

      by

      A year after the Capitol attack, what has the US actually learned?Cas MuddeThe government is finally taking the threat of far-right militia groups seriously. But the larger threat are the Republican legislators who continue to recklessly undermine democracy One year ago, he was frantically barricading the doors to the House gallery to keep out the violent mob. Today, he calls the insurrection a “bold-faced lie” and likens the event to “a normal tourist visit”. The story of Andrew Clyde, who represents part of my – heavily gerrymandered – liberal college town in the House of Representatives, is the story of the Republican party in 2021. It shows a party that had the opportunity to break with the anti-democratic course under Donald Trump, but was too weak in ideology and leadership to do so, thereby presenting a fundamental threat to US democracy in 2022 and beyond.The risk of a coup in the next US election is greater now than it ever was under Trump | Laurence H Tribe Read moreClyde is illustrative of another ongoing development, the slow but steady takeover of the Republican party by new, and often relatively young, Trump supporters. In 2015, when his massive gun store on the outskirts of town was still flying the old flag of Georgia, which includes the Confederate flag, he was a lone, open supporter of then-presidential candidate Trump, with several large pro-Trump and anti-“fake news” signs adorning his gun store. Five years later, Clyde was elected to the House of Representatives as part of a wave of Trump-supporting novices, mostly replacing Republicans who had supported President Trump more strategically than ideologically.With his 180-degree turn about the 6 January insurrection, Clyde is back in line with the majority of the Republican base, as a recent UMass poll shows. After initial shock, and broad condemnation, Republicans have embraced the people who stormed the Capitol last year, primarily referring to the event as a “protest” (80%) and to the insurrectionists as “protesters” (62%), while blaming the Democratic party (30%), the Capitol police (23%), and the inevitable antifa (20%) for what happened. Unsurprisingly, the vast majority of Republicans (75%) believe the country should “move on” from 6 January, rather than learn from it. And although most don’t care either way, one-third of Republicans say they are more likely to vote for a candidate who refuses to denounce the insurrection.The increased anti-democratic threat of the Republican party can also be seen in the tidal wave of voting restrictions proposed and passed in 2021. The Brennan Center for Justice counted a stunning 440 bills “with provisions that restrict voting access” introduced across all but one of the 50 US states, the highest number since the Center started tracking them 10 years ago. A total of 34 such laws were passed in 19 different states last year, and 88 bills in nine states are being carried over to the 2022 legislative term. Worryingly, Trump-backed Republicans who claim the 2020 election was stolen are running for secretary of state in various places where Trump unsuccessfully challenged the results.At the same time, the situation of the non-Republican far right is a bit less clear. While some experts warn that the militia movement, in particular, has turned toward more violent extremism, the violent fringes of the far right are also confronted by a much more vigilant state. This is particularly true for groups linked to the 6 January attacks, such as the Oath Keepers, which has faced increasing public and state scrutiny after 21 of its members were alleged to have participated in the attacks. Similarly, Proud Boys leaders are facing trial over the event, and some have agreed to cooperate with authorities in their investigations.After decades of the US government ignoring or downplaying the threat of far-right violence, President Biden has made “domestic violent extremism” a key concern of his new administration, regularly singling out white supremacists as “the most lethal terrorist threat in the homeland”. Partly in response to reports that former military personnel were prominently involved in the 6 January attack, the Pentagon has acknowledged “the threat from domestic extremists, particularly those who espouse white supremacist or white nationalist ideologies,” to the military and the country at large.This is not to say that the state is in control of the violent far right. While more than 700 suspected insurrectionists have been arrested, only some 50-plus have been convicted so far, mostly facing fines and probation, after judges rebuffed the DoJ. And media reports found that both the military and law enforcement have struggled to rid themselves of far-right ideas and supporters. But potentially violent far-right individuals and groups are now surveilled much more than they have been since 9/11 – we’re in a moment perhaps more similar to the short period after the Oklahoma City bombing of 1995, still the most deadly domestic terrorist attack in US history.In short, a year after the Capitol attack, US democracy is in a different but still fragile place. Most importantly, the extremists are no longer in the White House, encouraging and protecting the far-right mob. In fact, the state is more aware of and vigilant towards the far-right threat than ever before this century. The threat of far-right direct violence is probably less severe than before – not because the movement is weaker, but because the state is stronger.At the same time, the Republican party has become increasingly united and naked in its extremism, which denies both the anti-democratic character of the 6 January attack and the legitimacy of Biden’s presidency, and is passing an unprecedented number of voter restriction bills in preparation for the 2022 midterms and 2024 presidential elections. As long as the White House mainly focuses on fighting “domestic violent extremism”, and largely ignores or minimizes the much more lethal threat to US democracy posed by non-violent extremists, the US will continue to move closer and closer to an authoritarian future.
      Cas Mudde is Stanley Wade Shelton UGAF professor of international affairs at the University of Georgia, the author of The Far Right Today (2019), and host of the podcast Radikaal. He is a Guardian US columnist
      TopicsUS Capitol attackOpinionUS politicsRepublicansThe far rightJoe BidenBiden administrationTrump administrationcommentReuse this content More

    • 125 Shares199 Views

      in US Politics

      Trump’s ‘cult-like control’ of Republican party grows stronger since insurrection

      by

      Trump’s ‘cult-like control’ of Republican party grows stronger since insurrection A year ago, it seemed as though the Republican party might snap out of its love affair with the former president. Not soWhether it was praising white supremacists, siding with Vladimir Putin or suggesting bleach as a coronavirus cure, there was nothing that Donald Trump could do to make the Republican party fall out of love with him.Then came 6 January, and – for a brief moment – it seemed that was no longer true.“Today all I can say is: count me out,” said Lindsey Graham, standing in a Senate chamber that just hours earlier had been overrun by a pro-Trump mob determined to overturn the 2020 presidential election. “Enough is enough.”Indictment of alleged Proud Boys leaders over US Capitol attack upheldRead moreA week later he was joined by Kevin McCarthy, the Republican minority leader in the House of Representatives, who called on Trump to “accept his share of responsibility” for the deadly violence at the Capitol. Other allies turned against the president. If ever there was a moment that the party could snap out of its five-year fever dream, this was it. Yet it did not.In the year since the insurrection that reverberated around the world, Trump’s stranglehold on Republicans has seemingly become stronger, not weaker. Graham was soon back on the golf course with him; McCarthy was soon kissing the ring at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. Many leaders of the party have set about changing the narrative of the insurrection to portray it as a heroic last stand – a new “lost cause”.“We now have a major political party that is embracing violence systematically,” said Elaine Kamarck, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution thinktank in Washington and former White House official. “They’re rewriting the events of January 6. They’re referring, as President Trump does, to these people as patriots. They are stirring up a minority.”Trump was the first president in American history to inspire an attempted coup. After a rally where the defeated incumbent urged supporters to “fight like hell”, the angry mob laid siege to the US Capitol to disrupt the certification of Joe Biden’s victory.Five people died, scores of police were beaten and bloodied and there was about $1.5m in damage in the first major attack on the Capitol since the war of 1812. More than 700 people have been charged in one of the biggest criminal investigations in American history.But even on the night 6 January, as members of the House and Senate stepped over blood and broken glass to get the job, some 147 Republicans still voted to overturn the election results. It was the first clue that Trump had burrowed too far down into the party’s foundations to be expunged – and that anyone who tried would themselves be purged.The second clue came after Trump had been impeached – for the second time – by the House, a vote in which just 10 Republicans joined Democrats. A majority of senators voted to convict the former president but fell 10 votes short of the two-thirds majority required by the constitution. Trump was acquitted.Jamie Raskin, a Democratic congressman who was the lead impeachment manager, said: “The evidence was so overwhelming, our legal case was so airtight and Trump’s culpability was so plain to see, I thought that perhaps the Republican party would use this as an opportunity to perform an exorcism on their own body.“But Trump just controls way too much money and too much power in the Republican party and it was really only a matter of a week or two before he reasserted his authoritarian, cult-like control over the whole GOP [Grand Old Party] apparatus.”The third clue, demonstrating Raskin’s point, came in May when Senate Republicans voted down an independent commission to investigate the riot, based on the model of a commission that examined the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. Even the minority leader, Mitch McConnell, who had condemned Trump for inciting the violence and remains an arch foe, dismissed the proposed commission as a “purely political exercise”.Democrats instead created a House select committee to examine the events of that day and understand what role Trump played. It has interviewed hundreds of people and is threatening jail time for those who refuse to comply. But it has only two Republican members, Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger, and their fates say much about the direction of the party.Cheney, vice-chair of the committee and daughter of the former vice-president Dick Cheney, has faced the wrath of the Republican party of Wyoming, which voted to no longer recognise her as a Republican. She will be challenged for her seat in a primary election by a pro-Trump candidate. Kinzinger has been subjected to death threats and will not seek reelection.Michael Steele, former chairman of the Republican National Committee, said: “They have to rewrite the history because that’s the only way they can justify their existence because if you let the actual facts of history speak to the truth of who they are, then I don’t know how they look themselves in the face in the morning.”Today the loudest voices in the Republican party belong to the extremists. For them, Trump’s “big lie” that the election was stolen from him due to voter fraud, rendering Biden an illegitimate president, goes hand in hand with the lie that the insurrection was a morally justified crusade, an righteous endeavor to save democracy, not destroy it.Trump himself perpetuates this through a regular barrage of interviews, rallies and emailed statements since he was barred from Twitter. Notably he has sought to lionize Ashli Babbitt, who was shot dead during the riot, as a martyr.Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Republican congresswoman, has cast rioters currently held in detention in a similar light. In November she visit a Washington jail’s so-called “patriot wing” and complained the inmates were enduring “inhumane” conditions because of their political beliefs.Other pro-Trump Republicans in the House echo these messages – one referred to the Capitol attack as a “normal tourist visit” – or do little to contradict them. Some Republican senators are evidently more uncomfortable with the web of deceit and urge the party to look forward to the next election. But again only a small minority are willing to take Trump on directly.All are aware of the power of rightwing media over state Republican parties and the “Make America great again” base. Fox News host Tucker Carlson produced a three-part documentary, Patriot Purge, for the Fox Nation streaming platform that pushed the bogus claim that the insurrection was a “false flag” operation designed to hurt Trump’s supporters.Steve Bannon, a former adviser to Trump, uses his “War Room” podcast to promote the “big lie” that Trump won re-election in a landslide and features guests such as Mike Lindell, a pillow businessman who peddles wild conspiracy theories. Bannon encourages listeners to support the legal defence of the 6 January “political prisoners”.This has helped fuel a climate in which fealty to Trump and his debunked narrative is a litmus test for Republican candidates for Congress. Almost a third of Republicans believe violence may be necessary to “save” the US, according to a recent poll by the Public Religion Research Institute.Trump’s resilient ability to bend the party to his will, and to his disinformation about election “integrity”, have fueled a drive to make it harder to vote, likely to have a disproportionate impact on Democrats. Between January and October, 19 states enacted 33 laws to restrict voting access, according to the Brennan Center for Justice.In addition, Trump loyalists are running as candidates for secretaries of state and other positions that would give them power over the running of future elections. With Republicans in a strong position to regain control of the House and Senate this year, the party is readying for a repeat of 6 January with a different outcome.Steele added: “The elements of it are being played out in states throughout the country as Republicans rewrite the election laws in their favor.”One year on, many analysts argue that America is now split between a Democratic party and anti-democratic party, the latter being barely recognisable as the one-time home of Abraham Lincoln and Dwight Eisenhower. Instead Trump remains its most powerful and popular figure and could run for the White House again in 2024.Kurt Bardella, an adviser to the Democratic National Committee, believes that 6 January will go down as the day that the Republican party surrendered to “an anti-democratic terrorist cell” and that its mission since has been to permanently undermine democracy.“I have long said that January 6 was merely a dress rehearsal for how Republicans intend to try to hijack free and fair democratic elections in this country going forward,” added Bardella, a former Republican congressional aide.“They know that when the playing field is level and everybody can participate in the democratic process, they cannot win, so the only recourse that they believe that they can obtain power is by throwing out democratic norms and overthrowing elections, even if that means using instruments of violence, fear and terror to do so.”TopicsRepublicansUS politicsDonald TrumpUS Capitol attackfeaturesReuse this content More

    • 163 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      Biden to speak ‘truth’ on Capitol attack anniversary as Trump cancels his event

      by

      Biden to speak ‘truth’ on Capitol attack anniversary as Trump cancels his eventPresident will honor police in his remarks while Republicans voiced concerns about Trump overshadowing the somber day Joe Biden will mark the first anniversary of the deadly assault at the US Capitol this Thursday by honoring the bravery of law enforcement on the scene, and outlining the unfinished work the nation needs to do to strengthen its democracy, the White House said in its first preview of the president’s remarks.“On Thursday, the president is going to speak to the truth of what happened, not the lies that some have spread since, and the peril it has posed to the rule of law and our system of democratic governance,” the White House spokesperson Jen Psaki told reporters on Tuesday afternoon.The preview came as Donald Trump announced he was cancelling his own anniversary event, a press conference at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida that had been scheduled for the evening of 6 January. Several Republicans had expressed concerns about Trump’s news conference overshadowing the somber day.The former president blasted the House committee investigating the 6 January insurrection, which continues its work and on Tuesday issued a letter seeking the cooperation of the Fox New host Sean Hannity, who exchanged messages with Trump and his chief of staff Mark Meadows in the days leading up to the attack.Capitol attack panel seeks cooperation from Fox News host Sean HannityRead moreIn a statement, Trump said that he was cancelling his conference “in light of the total bias and dishonesty of the January 6th Unselect Committee of Democrats, two failed Republicans, and the Fake News Media” at Mar-a-Lago, and would address the issue instead at a rally on 15 January.Biden and Kamala Harris will speak on Thursday morning at the US Capitol, one year after a mob loyal to Trump raided the complex in a failed attempt to stop the counting of electoral college votes that officially delivered Biden’s election victory.Trump, fellow Republicans and rightwing media personalities have pushed false and misleading accounts to downplay the attack, calling it a nonviolent protest or blaming leftwing activists. Four people died on the day of the riot, and one Capitol police officer died the day after defending Congress. Dozens of police were injured during the multi-hour onslaught by Trump supporters, and four officers have since taken their own lives.Biden will put an extra spotlight on the role of Capitol police and others on the scene, Psaki said.“Because of their efforts, our democracy withstood an attack from a mob, and the will of more than 150 million people who voted in the presidential election was ultimately registered by Congress,” Psaki said.Psaki was asked what the president’s message will be to the many Republicans who believe Biden stole the election from Trump, despite overwhelming contrary evidence.“What he’s going to continue to do is speak to everyone in the country. Those who didn’t vote for him, those who may not believe he is the legitimate president, about what he wants to do to make their lives better,” Psaki said.TopicsUS Capitol attackJoe BidenDonald TrumpUS politicsRepublicansnewsReuse this content More

    • 138 Shares169 Views

      in US Politics

      Marjorie Taylor Greene a ‘Democrat or an idiot’, fellow Republican says

      by

      Marjorie Taylor Greene a ‘Democrat or an idiot’, fellow Republican saysCongressman Dan Crenshaw throws barb at congresswoman in spat over his support for using Fema to operate Covid testing sites The extremist Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene “might be a Democrat – or just an idiot” – according to a fellow hardline conservative.US reports global record of more than 1m daily Covid casesRead moreDan Crenshaw, a Texas congressman and former Navy Seal, threw the barb back at the Georgia congresswoman in a spat over his support for using the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) to operate Covid testing sites.The US is experiencing a crippling surge of Covid cases thanks to the infectious Omicron variant, with more than 1m recorded on Monday and lack of access to testing hampering state and federal responses.Greene has consistently spread Covid conspiracy theories. On Sunday, she was permanently suspended from Twitter, for spreading misinformation.That drew support from Donald Trump, who without discernible irony called Twitter “a disgrace to democracy”, said Greene had “a huge constituency of honest, patriotic, hard-working people”, and added: “Keep fighting, Marjorie!”Regardless, on Monday Greene was temporarily suspended from Facebook, for spreading misinformation.She took aim at Crenshaw on Instagram, writing: “No Fema should not set up testing sites to check for Omicron sneezes, coughs and runny noses.“And we don’t need Fema in hospitals, they should hire back all the unvaccinated [healthcare workers] they fired.“He needs to stop calling himself conservative, he’s hurting our brand.”Crenshaw responded on Instagram, saying: “Hey, Marjorie, if suggesting we should follow Trump policy instead of Biden mandates makes you mad, then you might be a Democrat – or just an idiot.”Greene has been repeatedly fined for failing to wear a mask on the floor of the House of Representatives.Crenshaw, however, has his own history of provocative behaviour.As the Houston Chronicle pointed out, “Before calling for federally funded testing sites, Crenshaw used to share wild posts to social media, before Greene took office, including posting action movie-style videos of him beating up Antifa members.”More than 827,000 people have died in the US from Covid-19.TopicsRepublicansUS politicsOmicron variantCoronavirusnewsReuse this content More

    • 163 Shares169 Views

      in US Politics

      Will the hundreds of Capitol rioters in court ever be held truly accountable?

      by

      Inside the FBI’s Capitol riot investigation: will the attackers be held accountable? As Republicans spread a revisionist history of the insurrection, its perpetrators are celebrated and even elected to public officeIt’s been one year since a mob of Donald Trump supporters stormed the United States Capitol, as the “stop the steal” rally demanding to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election turned into a deadly insurrection.After the attack, the Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation mobilized one of the largest criminal investigations in American history. Those efforts have so far resulted in more than 700 federal cases and counting, with more suspects expected to be charged. But for all that we have learned about the insurrection and the people who took part in it, crucial questions remain about the fallout of the attack for the far right and what it means to hold its perpetrators accountable.Federal prosecutors want the arrests and convictions of those responsible to act as a deterrent against extremism and future attempts to undermine democracy, experts say, but despite more than 150 guilty pleas so far, the legacy of 6 January is already contentious. A judicial debate has emerged over the appropriate sentencing for rioters, while trials in the coming months will test whether prosecutors can secure convictions on more serious charges facing far-right extremists.The fundamental understanding of what happened on 6 January is also being increasingly contested, as Republican lawmakers and rightwing media attempt to whitewash the events and reframe the insurrection as an act of justified political protest. More than any court case, researchers say, this revisionist narrative may have long-lasting implications for the far right and for political violence in America.The suspectsIn the months after the insurrection, law enforcement officials investigated hours upon hours of videos from the day, thousands of social media profiles and hundreds of thousands of tips from the public. They have arrested hundreds, sometimes raiding homes where suspects had stockpiled weapons and ammunition.As the arrests rolled in, researchers began to get a more complete picture of who was involved in the attack. The people charged came to Washington DC from nearly every state in the union, and ranged from teenagers to senior citizens. Beyond sharing a fervent support for Trump and belief in election conspiracies, no single profile has emerged.Overall the suspects are overwhelmingly male – about 80% according to research from George Washington University’s project on extremism – and the average age is 39. The vast majority of suspects are white. Many belonged to far-right militias and white nationalist groups that played an outsize role in the attack, but most had no direct affiliations with extremist organizations.“They’re sort of your nextdoor neighbor,” said Kurt Braddock, an assistant professor of communication at American University and extremism researcher. “It shows how far far-right ideologies have extended.”There were white-collar workers, people who came with their family members and a cross-section of other Trump supporters radicalized into committing political violence. Many believed in the QAnon conspiracy movement that viewed Trump as a messianic figure who would return to office and destroy a cabal of liberal elite pedophiles.The charges and sentencingAlthough the charges range from misdemeanors such as trespassing to violent assaults against Capitol police officers, the bulk of cases that have come in front of a judge so far have involved individuals pleading guilty to minor charges. Except for some high-profile rioters – including “QAnon shaman” Jacob Chansley, who was sentenced to 41 months in prison after pleading guilty to a felony charge of obstructing Congress – most of the sentences doled out have not exceeded several weeks in prison. Many of the rioters have received no jail time at all, instead receiving fines or probation.There have been significant differences between how US district court judges have approached sentencing and cases. One group of judges has questioned why prosecutors are seeking jail time for misdemeanor offences such as trespassing on Capitol grounds. US District Judge Trevor McFadden, a Trump appointee, made comparisons between Black Lives Matter protesters and the 6 January attackers and told a defendant that he was “acting like all those looters and rioters last year”.(McFadden did, however, later reject a defendant’s claim that he was being treated unfairly compared with leftist protesters in Portland.)Other judges have vehemently rejected the comparison to BLM, and have insisted that participants in the riot face serious consequences for their involvement. US District Judge Tanya Chutkan stated that the siege was an unprecedented attempt to “violently overthrow the government” and “stop the peaceful transition of power”. Chief US District Judge Beryl Howell questioned why prosecutors were letting rioters accept lighter misdemeanor plea deals and lamented that “the government has essentially tied the sentencing judge’s hands”.“No wonder parts of this public are confused about whether what happened on 6 January at the Capitol was simply a petty offense of trespassing, with some disorderliness, or was shocking criminal conduct that posed a grave threat to our democratic norms,” Howell said.The more complex cases and serious charges will probably go to trial in the coming months, researchers say, including those involving members of the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, Three Percenters and other far-right militias.One member of the Oath Keepers, Jason Dolan, already admitted as part of a plea deal that he traveled with other militia members and stashed an M4 rifle at a Comfort Inn a short drive outside the Capitol. In December, 34-year-old Matthew Greene became the first member of the Proud Boys to plead guilty in a felony conspiracy case, with prosecutors stating that he and other Proud Boys coordinated their actions using programmable radios and dressed to conceal their affiliation with the group. After the riot, Greene allegedly ordered more than 2,000 rounds of assault-rifle ammunition, bragged that his group “took the Capitol” and told a friend to study guerrilla warfare and be ready to “do uncomfortable things”.The criminal trials this spring for felony charges such as obstructing Congress and a multi-defendant conspiracy case against members of the Oath Keepers may reveal new details about the level of coordination and planning that went into the attack on the Capitol. But they will probably also present difficulties for prosecutors. The government has already succeeded in dismissing some pre-trial defense objections, such as whether the common charge of “corruptly obstructing an official proceeding” was unconstitutionally vague, but more challenges will come.“It’s going to get complicated very quickly,” said Seamus Hughes, deputy director of the program on extremism at George Washington University. “You’re going to get into uncharted water with this prosecution at some point, just by the sheer number.”The investigationThe FBI received more than 250,000 tips related to the siege, including family members turning in relatives and Facebook friends reporting old high school acquaintances. One suspect, New York state’s Robert Chapman, told a match on the dating app Bumble that he had stormed the Capitol and bragged about making it all the way to the National Statuary Hall. “We are not a match,” the other Bumble user replied, according to court filings, before sending a screenshot of their exchange to law enforcement.More than 80% of cases cite some form of social media as evidence for the charges, but the FBI’s investigation goes far beyond relying on amateur online sleuths and combing through social media profiles. Law enforcement has also used invasive technology and surveillance tactics that could expand law enforcement powers and have implications for future investigations.In addition to using facial recognition software to identify rioters, itself a deeply controversial practice, law enforcement appears to have expanded its use of geofencing search warrants – a process that involves using data from digital services to locate people within a certain area during a given time period. In practice, it means that authorities can demand Google hand over anonymized user location data, then ask for specific users’ private information, including their names, emails and phone numbers. Dozens of Capitol rioter cases cite Google location data in their court filings, according to a Wired investigation.“It’s going to set a precedent for geofencing,” Hughes said. “If they can get enough successful prosecutions … that will be something that’s used in future investigations.”The FBI’s use of surveillance has come under additional scrutiny in recent weeks after a New York Times investigation found that the bureau deployed surveillance teams to monitor Portland activists’ protests against policing, a move that civil rights groups condemned as domestic spying.Whitewashing the attackAs the FBI has carried out its investigation, there has been a parallel effort to create a different narrative of the insurrection. Republican politicians and conservative media have been on a months-long campaign to whitewash the attack on the Capitol. Over the past year they have settled on a story that presents 6 January as a largely peaceful protest for legitimate election grievances, sometimes baselessly claiming that any violence was the result of antifa or leftist infiltrators.Prime-time Fox News host Tucker Carlson in November aired a three episode special entitled Patriot Purge that uncritically interviewed rightwing activists with ties to the white nationalist movement, who claim that the FBI investigation is an unjust political crackdown on conservatives. Carlson states in it that there is a leftist “purge aimed at legacy Americans” and features sympathetic interviews with people who took part in the insurrection. Two Fox News contributors quit over the special, with one suggesting that it would lead to violence.Many of the rioters have embraced a burgeoning celebrity status within the far right. Some suspects refer to themselves as “1/6ers”, and have launched online fundraising campaigns where they identify as political protesters and victims of government persecution. One collective fundraising page for the approximately 40 suspects being held in pre-trial detention has already raised hundreds of thousands of dollars and sells hoodies emblazoned with the slogan “free the 1/6ers.”Other high-profile suspects have created individual pages to capitalize on their notoriety. Richard “Bigo” Barnett, a self-described white nationalist who stole a document from speaker of the house Nancy Pelosi’s office and was photographed putting his boots up on her desk, launched a fundraising site that doubles as a manifesto for his anti-government views.“Richard Barnett’s picture at Speaker Pelosi’s desk has become the face of the new anti-federalist movement,” Barnett’s website states on its fundraising page. “We will not go gently into that good night. Click below to donate to the fight.”The group being held in pre-trial detention at the Correctional Treatment facility in Washington DC has also banded together while incarcerated, calling themselves the “Patriot Wing” and attempting to become far-right influencers. These suspects include numerous members of extremist groups such as the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers, as well as others facing more serious charges of violence and conspiracy related to the insurrection. They have started writing open letters and reportedly passed around a handwritten newsletter in the jail, in which they boast about reciting the pledge of allegiance and singing the national anthem together.Some Republican lawmakers have amplified this far-right narrative that the suspects being held in pre-trial detention are political prisoners and unjustly suffering for their beliefs. Representatives including Marjorie Taylor Greene, Paul Gosar, Matt Gaetz and Louie Gohmert have rallied in support of insurrection suspects and staged an attempt to visit the jail, claiming a conspiracy to mistreat the prisoners and that their detention was evidence of Marxism and totalitarianism. Meanwhile, more mainstream Republican lawmakers have stonewalled a House committee investigation into the roots of the attack, and Trump allies have refused to cooperate with subpoenas.All these developments – the solidifying of in-group identity among the more dedicated insurrections, the financial support for rioters and Republican lawmakers’ willingness to paint them as martyrs – concerns extremism researchers about the long-term effects of 6 January. Even if those responsible face significant prison sentences, there is little incentive for them to de-radicalize once incarcerated.“You may get to a point where folks who spend their time in jail come out and are basically provided a kind of a rockstar status within the movement,” Hughes said.The revisionist history of 6 January has also correlated with a declining interest among Republicans in punishing those involved. After the insurrection there was wide bipartisan support for prosecuting rioters, but a Pew Research Center study in September found the number of Republicans who believe it is important to hold those responsible legally liable for their actions significantly declined over the course of the year. Involvement in the events of 6 January is also apparently not disqualifying for Republicans seeking public office. At least 10 people who attended the Washington rally have now been elected to various positions, according to HuffPost, including three in state legislatures.What concerns some extremism researchers is that while it’s critical for prosecutors to secure convictions for those involved in the insurrection, these broader problems remain of how deeply embedded the far right has become in American politics. Even if authorities may be better prepared against future rallies aimed at subverting the democratic process, the reaction from rightwing media and some Republican lawmakers has threatened to legitimize far-right ideology and resorting to political violence to achieve their goals.“January 6 exemplified what the far right is now,” Braddock said. “But it definitely doesn’t end with January 6.”TopicsUS Capitol attackRepublicansUS politicsfeaturesReuse this content More

    • 188 Shares179 Views

      in US Politics

      The next US civil war is already here – we just refuse to see it

      by

      The next US civil war is already here – we just refuse to see it The right has recognized that the system is in collapse, and it has a plan: violence and solidarity with treasonous far-right factionsNobody wants what’s coming, so nobody wants to see what’s coming.On the eve of the first civil war, the most intelligent, the most informed, the most dedicated people in the United States could not see it coming. Even when Confederate soldiers began their bombardment of Fort Sumter, nobody believed that conflict was inevitable. The north was so unprepared for the war they had no weapons.In Washington, in the winter of 1861, Henry Adams, the grandson of John Quincy Adams, declared that “not one man in America wanted the civil war or expected or intended it”. South Carolina senator James Chestnut, who did more than most to bring on the advent of the catastrophe, promised to drink all the blood spilled in the entire conflict. The common wisdom at the time was that he would have to drink “not a thimble”.Next Civil War book illustrationThe United States today is, once again, headed for civil war, and, once again, it cannot bear to face it. The political problems are both structural and immediate, the crisis both longstanding and accelerating. The American political system has become so overwhelmed by anger that even the most basic tasks of government are increasingly impossible.The legal system grows less legitimate by the day. Trust in government at all levels is in freefall, or, like Congress, with approval ratings hovering around 20%, cannot fall any lower. Right now, elected sheriffs openly promote resistance to federal authority. Right now, militias train and arm themselves in preparation for the fall of the Republic. Right now, doctrines of a radical, unachievable, messianic freedom spread across the internet, on talk radio, on cable television, in the malls.The consequences of the breakdown of the American system is only now beginning to be felt. January 6 wasn’t a wake-up call; it was a rallying cry. The Capitol police have seen threats against members of Congress increase by 107%. Fred Upton, Republican representative from Michigan, recently shared a message he had received: “I hope you die. I hope everybody in your family dies.” And it’s not just politicians but anyone involved in the running of the electoral system. Death threats have become a standard aspect of the work life of election supervisors and school board members. A third of poll workers, in the aftermath of 2020, said they felt unsafe.Under such conditions, party politics have become mostly a distraction. The parties and the people in the parties no longer matter much, one way or the other. Blaming one side or the other offers a perverse species of hope. “If only more moderate Republicans were in office, if only bipartisanship could be restored to what it was.” Such hopes are not only reckless but irresponsible. The problem is not who is in power, but the structures of power.The United States has burned before. The Vietnam war, civil rights protests, the assassination of JFK and MLK, Watergate – all were national catastrophes which remain in living memory. But the United States has never faced an institutional crisis quite like the one it is facing now. Trust in the institutions was much higher during the 1960s. The Civil Rights Act had the broad support of both parties. JFK’s murder was mourned collectively as a national tragedy. The Watergate scandal, in hindsight, was evidence of the system working. The press reported presidential crimes; Americans took the press seriously. The political parties felt they needed to respond to the reported corruption.You could not make one of those statements today with any confidence.Two things are happening at the same time. Most of the American right have abandoned faith in government as such. Their politics is, increasingly, the politics of the gun. The American left is slower on the uptake, but they are starting to figure out that the system which they give the name of democracy is less deserving of the name every year.An incipient illegitimacy crisis is under way, whoever is elected in 2022, or in 2024. According to a University of Virginia analysis of census projections, by 2040, 30% of the population will control 68% of the Senate. Eight states will contain half the population. The Senate malapportionment gives advantages overwhelmingly to white, non– college educated voters. In the near future, a Democratic candidate could win the popular vote by many millions of votes and still lose. Do the math: the federal system no longer represents the will of the American people.The right is preparing for a breakdown of law and order, but they are also overtaking the forces of law and order. Hard right organization have now infiltrated so many police forces – the connections number in the hundreds – that they have become unreliable allies in the struggle against domestic terrorism.Michael German, a former FBI agent who worked undercover against domestic terrorists during the 1990s, knows that the white power sympathies within police departments hamper domestic terrorism cases. “The 2015 FBI counter-terrorism guide instructs FBI agents, on white supremacist cases, to not put them on the terrorist watch list as agents normally would do,” he says. “Because the police could then look at the watchlist and determine that they are their friends.” The watchlists are among the most effective techniques of counter-terrorism, but the FBI cannot use them. The white supremacists in the United States are not a marginal force; they are inside its institutions.Recent calls to reform or to defund the police have focused on officers’ implicit bias or policing techniques. The protesters are, in a sense, too hopeful. Activist white supremacists in positions of authority are the real threat to American order and security. “If you look at how authoritarian regimes come into power, they tacitly authorize a group of political thugs to use violence against their political enemies,” German says. “That ends up with a lot of street violence, and the general public gets upset about the street violence and says, ‘Government, you have to do something about this street violence,’ and the government says, ‘Oh my hands are tied, give me a broad enabling power and I will go after these thugs.’ And of course once that broad power is granted, it isn’t used to target the thugs. They either become a part of the official security apparatus or an auxiliary force.”Anti-government patriots have used the reaction against Black Lives Matter effectively to build a base of support with law enforcement. “One of the best tactics was adopting the blue lives matter patch. I’m flabbergasted that police fell for that, that they actually support these groups,” German says. “It would be one thing if [anti-government patriots] had uniformly decided not to target police any more. But they haven’t. They’re still killing police. The police don’t seem to get it, that the people you’re coddling, you’re taking photographs with, are the same people who elsewhere kill.” The current state of American law enforcement reveals an extreme contradiction: the order it imposes is rife with the forces that provoke domestic terrorism.Just consider: in 2019, 36% of active duty soldiers claimed to have witnessed “white supremacist and racist ideologies in the military”, according to the Military Times.At this supreme moment of crisis, the left has divided into warring factions completely incapable of confronting the seriousness of the moment. There are liberals who retain an unjustifiable faith that their institutions can save them when it is utterly clear that they cannot. Then there are the woke, educational and political elites dedicated to a discourse of willed impotence. Any institution founded by the woke simply eats itself – see TimesUp, the Women’s March, etc – becoming irrelevant to any but a diminishing cadre of insiders who spend most of their time figuring out how to shred whoever’s left. They render themselves powerless faster than their enemies can.What the American left needs now is allegiance, not allyship. It must abandon any imagined fantasies about the sanctity of governmental institutions that long ago gave up any claim to legitimacy. Stack the supreme court, end the filibuster, make Washington DC a state, and let the dogs howl, and now, before it is too late. The moment the right takes control of institutions, they will use them to overthrow democracy in its most basic forms; they are already rushing to dissolve whatever norms stand in the way of their full empowerment.The right has recognized what the left has not: that the system is in collapse. The right has a plan: it involves violence and solidarity. They have not abjured even the Oath Keepers. The left, meanwhile, has chosen infighting as their sport.There will be those who say that warnings of a new civil war is alarmist. All I can say is that reality has outpaced even the most alarmist predictions. Imagine going back just 10 years and explaining that a Republican president would openly support the dictatorship of North Korea. No conspiracy theorist would have dared to dream it. Anyone who foresaw, foresaw dimly. The trends were apparent; their ends were not.It would be entirely possible for the United States to implement a modern electoral system, to restore the legitimacy of the courts, to reform its police forces, to root out domestic terrorism, to alter its tax code to address inequality, to prepare its cities and its agriculture for the effects of climate change, to regulate and to control the mechanisms of violence. All of these futures are possible. There is one hope, however, that must be rejected outright: the hope that everything will work out by itself, that America will bumble along into better times. It won’t. Americans have believed their country is an exception, a necessary nation. If history has shown us anything it’s that the world doesn’t have any necessary nations.The United States needs to recover its revolutionary spirit, and I don’t mean that as some kind of inspirational quote. I mean that, if it is to survive, the United States will have to recover its revolutionary spirit. The crises the United States now faces in its basic governmental functions are so profound that they require starting over. The founders understood that government is supposed to work for living people, rather than for a bunch of old ghosts. And now their ghostly constitution, worshipped like a religious document, is strangling the spirit that animated their enterprise, the idea that you mold politics to suit people, not the other way around.Does the country have the humility to acknowledge that its old orders no longer work? Does it have the courage to begin again? As it managed so spectacularly at the birth of its nationhood, the United States requires the boldness to invent a new politics for a new era. It is entirely possible that it might do so. America is, after all, a country devoted to reinvention.Once again, as before, the hope for America is Americans. But it is time to face what the Americans of the 1850s found so difficult to face: The system is broken, all along the line. The situation is clear and the choice is basic: reinvention or fall.TopicsThe far rightRepublicansUS politicsfeaturesReuse this content More

    • 188 Shares109 Views

      in US Politics

      Capitol attack panel in race against time as Trump allies seek to run out clock

      by

      Capitol attack panel in race against time as Trump allies seek to run out clock A barrage of delay tactics as Republicans are expected to do well in 2022 midterms that would give them control to shut down inquiryThe House select committee investigating the 6 January attack on the Capitol is facing a race against time in 2022 as Trump and his allies seek to run out the clock with a barrage of delay tactics and lawsuits.Bannon and allies bid to expand pro-Trump influence in local US politicsRead moreRepublicans are widely expected to do well in this year’s midterm elections in November and, if they win control of the House, that would give them control to shut down the investigation that has proved politically and legally damaging to Trump and Republicans.The select committee opened its investigative efforts into the 6 January insurrection, when a pro-Trump mob stormed the Capitol to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s election win, with a flurry of subpoenas to Trump officials to expedite the evidence-gathering process.But aside from securing a trove of documents from Trump’s former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, the select committee has found itself wading through molasses with Trump and other top administration aides seeking to delay the investigation by any means possible.The former US president has attempted to block the select committee at every turn, instructing aides to defy subpoenas from the outset and, most recently, launching a last-ditch appeal to the supreme court to prevent the release of the most sensitive of White House records.His aides are following Trump in lockstep as they attempt to shield themselves from the investigation, doing everything from filing frivolous lawsuits to stop the select committee obtaining call records to invoking the fifth amendment so as to not respond in depositions.The efforts amount to a cynical ploy by Republicans to run out the clock until the midterms and use the election calendar to characterize the interim report, which the bipartisan select committee hopes to issue by the summer, as a political exercise to damage the GOP.The select committee, sources close to the investigation say, is therefore hoping for a breakthrough with the supreme court, which experts believe will ensure the panel can access the Trump White House records over the former president’s objections about executive privilege.“I think the supreme court is very unlikely to side with Trump, and part of it is the nature of executive privilege – it’s a power belonging to the President,” said Jonathan Shaub, a former DoJ office of legal counsel attorney and law professor at the University of Kentucky.“It’s hard to see how a former president could exercise constitutional power under a theory where all the constitutional powers are vested in the current president, so I think Trump is very likely to lose or the court may not take the case,” Shaub said.Members on the select committee note that several courts – the US district court and the US appeals court – have already ruled that Biden has the final say over which White House documents are subject to executive privilege, and that the panel has a legislative purpose.A victory for the select committee at the supreme court is important, members believe, not only because it would give them access to the records Trump has fought so hard to keep hidden, but because it would supercharge the inquiry with crucial momentum.The select committee got its first break when House investigators obtained from Meadows thousands of communications involving the White House, including a powerpoint detailing ways to stage a coup, and are hoping the supreme court can help to sustain their pace.“It’s pretty clear that these documents are serious documents that shed light on the president’s activities on January 6 and that may be quite damaging for Trump,” said Kate Shaw, a former Obama White House counsel and now a professor at the Cardozo School of Law.“They could make a difference to the record being compiled by the committee and thus they could give the process additional momentum,” Shaw said. “That’s probably why Trump is resisting their release as hard as he is.”More generally, the select committee says they are unconcerned by attempts by Trump aides and political operatives to stymie the inquiry, since Democrats control Washington and the panel has an unprecedented carte blanche to upturn every inch the Trump administration.“The legislative and executive branches are completely in agreement with each other, that this material is not privileged and needs to be turned over to Congress,” said congressman Jamie Raskin, a member of the select committee. “Things have been moving much more quickly.”But the select committee acknowledges privately that they face a longer and more difficult slog with Trump aides and political operatives who are mounting legal challenges to everything from the panel’s attempts to compel production of call records and even testimony.The trouble for the select committee, regardless of Democrats’ controlling the White House, Congress and the justice department, is that they are counting on the courts to deliver accountability for Trump officials unwilling to cooperate with the inquiry.Yet Trump and his officials know that slow-moving cogs of justice have a history of doing nothing of the sort. House investigators only heard from former Trump White House counsel Don McGahn this past summer, years after the end of the special counsel investigation.The House has not even been able to obtain Trump’s tax returns – something Democrats have been fighting to get access to since they took the majority in 2018 – after repeated appeals from the former president despite repeated defeats in court.Trump and his aides insist they are not engaged in a ploy to stymie the investigation, though they admit to doing just that in private discussions, according to sources close to the former president.When the select committee issued its first subpoenas to his former aides Mark Meadows, Dan Scavino, Steve Bannon and Kash Patel, Trump’s lawyers told their lawyers to defy the orders because it would likely serve to slow down the investigation, the sources said.The result of Trump’s directive – first reported by the Guardian – is that Bannon and Meadows refused to appear for their depositions, and the select committee now may never hear their inside information about the Capitol attack after they were held in contempt of Congress.It remains possible that Bannon and Meadows seek some kind of a plea deal with federal prosecutors that involves providing testimony to the select committee in exchange for no jail time, but the court hearing for Bannon, for instance, is scheduled late into the summer.The reality for House investigators is that the cases are now in the hands of a justice department intent on proving it remains above the political fray after years of Trump’s interference at DoJ, and therefore indifferent to the time crunch felt by the 6 January committee.The situation for the select committee may be even trickier with Republican members of Congress involved in 6 January, as they just need to stonewall the investigation only through the midterms, before which the panel hopes to release an interim report into their findings.A spokesperson for the select committee declined to comment on the outlook for the investigation and their expectations for the supreme court hearing in the case against Trump, which the panel, cognizant of their limited timeframe, has asked to expedite.Bennie Thompson, the chairman of the select committee, originally aimed to have the final report completed before the midterm elections, but the efforts by the most senior Trump officials to delay the investigation means he could need until the end of the year.Either way, sources close to the investigation told the Guardian, the select committee is hoping that the supreme court will deliver the elusive Trump White House records – and that it could pave the way for the investigation to shift into yet another higher gear.TopicsUS Capitol attackUS politicsHouse of RepresentativesRepublicansUS supreme courtnewsReuse this content More