The Best People

 Our forthcoming book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration is off to an ominous start.  MAGA people (e.g., Hegseth) have replaced the normals (e.g., Mattis) that populated the first Trump administration.

Jessica Glenza at The Guardian:

Donald Trump nominated Casey Means, a wellness influencer and medical doctor with an inactive license for US surgeon general this week – his second nominee to serve as “the nation’s doctor”.

Trump abruptly withdrew his first nominee, Dr Janette Nesheiwat, before her Senate confirmation hearing, amid criticism from the right and confusion about her medical credentials.

His new nominee, Means, is a 37-year-old Los Angeles-based medical entrepreneur who shot to prominence in right-leaning wellness circles by criticizing mainstream medicine and advocating for a healthier food supply.

...

 “We should not toss out the window everything Casey is saying, but I would proceed with caution given her training,” said Prof Gabby Headrick, as assistant professor and director of nutrition programs at George Washington University’s Milken School of Public Health.

“Typically and historically, the person appointed to that role and confirmed is someone who has an active medical license, someone who has completed residency, and has held a leadership role in a medical institution. Casey Means does not have the resumé … She also is not trained in nutrition.”

Means also faces opposition from the far right. Activist Laura Loomer, who was critical of Trump’s first nominee, is skeptical of Means – calling her “unfit” for surgeon general and promoting events with Means’s critics.

Loomer previously described Nesheiwat as “a pro-Covid vaccine nepo appointee who is currently embroiled in a medical malpractice case”. Covid vaccines and the technology that underpins them have become a target of right-leaning politicians.

Paul Schwartzman, Spencer S. Hsu and Jeremy Barr at WP:

Jeanine Pirro, the Fox News host chosen by President Donald Trump to become interim U.S. attorney in D.C., is the archetype of what he has shown to prefer in his appointees: combative, camera-ready and loyal enough to have sought to discredit the results of the 2020 election that he lost.

Yet Pirro, a former New York judge and prosecutor, also possesses enough political baggage that she is sure to provoke fierce partisan debate if Trump nominates her as the permanent leader of the nation’s largest U.S. attorney’s office.

Less than 24 hours after Trump announced Pirro’s appointment, hailing her as “incredibly well qualified,” Democrats and Republicans staked out vastly divergent positions on her looming arrival in Washington. She’ll replace the president’s first interim choice, Ed Martin, who is departing after 15 turbulent weeks in office.

Rich Shapiro at NBC:

Long before she was a Fox News host who pushed pro-Trump election conspiracy theories, Jeanine Pirro was an ambitious New York politician whose career stalled after she was recorded plotting to bug her then-husband’s boat to catch him in an affair.

The revelation rocked Pirro’s campaign for New York attorney general nearly 20 years ago, resulting in days of front-page headlines in the city’s tabloids (“BUG THIS LOVE BOAT!” blared the Daily News cover).

The conversation took place in 2005 between Pirro and the former commissioner of the New York Police Department, Bernard Kerik, a close ally of Rudy Giuliani’s.

“What am I supposed to do, Bernie? Watch him f--- her every night?” Pirro said, according to a transcript obtained by WNBC-TV’s Jonathan Dienst in 2006. “What am I supposed to do? I can go on the boat. I’ll put the f-----g thing on myself.”

Peter Aitken at Newsweek:

Pirro is the 23rd current or former Fox News employee Trump has recruited for his administration since taking office earlier this year. However, his relationship with the network runs far deeper and longer than just this year nominees.

During his first administration, Trump regularly called Fox News hosts live on air to have impromptu, off-the-cuff interviews. He also allegedly would consult any number of hosts off the air, including Fox News powerhouse Sean Hannity.

Trump, however, decided to elevate that special relationship in his second administration by appointing hosts, many of whom have only ever had glowing praise for Trump during their broadcasts, to key Cabinet positions and high-profile roles. Comedian and TV host Bill Maher quipped on Friday night during Real Time with Bill Maher that "I've heard of state-run TV; this is TV run state."

Why Trump Backed Down

Our forthcoming book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. The second Trump administration is off to an ominous start.

Mike Allen at Axios:

President Trump's boosters hailed his decision to pause tariff increases for countries around the world as a strategic masterstroke, Axios' Marc Caputo reports. But few are buying the spin. Trump buckled under tremendous, mounting-by-the-minute pressure from CEOs ... friends ... GOP senators ... the markets ... and bond prices. Trump himself admits he blinked when "people were getting a little queasy" about the bond market.

Why it matters: Inside the White House, the episode highlighted the competing views and roles of Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick as they animated Trump's risky game with trade.

Inside the room: Both men were advising Trump in the Oval Office when he decided to post a message on Truth Social announcing the tariff pause for 90 days while the administration negotiated with as many as 75 countries.The stunning move, which rallied cratering markets globally, was based on three factors, according to three sources familiar with the meeting:Panic: The real credit, "Trump's advisers admit privately, should go to the bond markets," the N.Y. Times reports. "Trump's decision was driven by fear that his tariffs gamble could quickly turn into a financial crisis. And unlike the two previous crashes of the past 20 years — the global financial crisis of 2008 and the pandemic of 2020 — this crisis would have been directly attributable to only one man."

Michael Birnbaum, Natalie Allison, Cat Zakrzewski and Theodoric Meyer at WP:

[From] Tuesday evening to Wednesday afternoon, Trump and his trade advisers spoke to several Republican lawmakers and top foreign leaders who raised concerns about the faltering global markets and the growing concerns of a worldwide recession, urging him to do something.

By late Wednesday afternoon, Trump was saying he had been thinking about switching course “over the last few days.”

The final decision, he said, “probably came together early this morning, fairly early this morning. Just wrote it up. We didn’t have the use of, we didn’t have access to lawyers,” he told reporters in the Oval Office. “We wrote it up from our hearts.”

“But this was something certainly we’ve been talking about for a period of time, and we decided to pull the trigger, and we did it today, and we’re happy about it,” he added.

Late Tuesday night — after Sean Hannity’s 9 p.m. show ended on Fox News — Trump had an extensive, roughly hour-long phone call with a group of Republican senators who had appeared on the episode, according to three people with knowledge of the conversation. Some of the senators had expressed concern about the tariffs. That evening, Trump was also watching bond markets, “where people were getting a little queasy,” he said Wednesday.

Before the end of the last commercial break during the Hannity interview, Sen. John Neely Kennedy (R-Louisiana) asked the host for “15 seconds to speak directly to the president” on tariffs, Kennedy told The Washington Post, because Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) had told Kennedy that Trump would be watching the show. Kennedy and Graham were among those in the group interview with Hannity, along with Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-South Dakota), and Republican Sens. Tim Scott of South Carolina, Katie Boyd Britt of Alabama, Tom Cotton of Arkansas, Ted Cruz of Texas and Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma. Some of the senators expressed a desire for Trump to negotiate with other countries coming to the table on tariffs, and several of them spoke to the president after the show ended.

DeSantis Admits That Conservative Media Outlets Are For Trump

Our most recent book, Divided We Stand, looks at the role of conservative media in the 2020 election.  This segment of the press is just as significant in 2024.  After the first indictment, it swung decisively for Trump.

Jonathan Chait at New York:

Meeting with reporters Friday, Ron DeSantis blurted out something every Republican politician knows, but never says: Conservative media does not hold Republicans accountable. “He’s got basically a Praetorian Guard of the conservative media — Fox News, the web sites, all the stuff — they just don’t hold him accountable because they’re worried about losing viewers,” he said of Donald Trump. “And they don’t want to have their ratings go down.”

DeSantis is running through the bitter final days of an immensely disappointing presidential campaign that saw him transformed from the shining knight of the post-Trump party to a punch line. And so he is understandably lashing at at the conservative media, which is now operating mainly as a public-relations vehicle for the candidate who is destroying him.

Facing defeat, he is finally venting about Trump himself:

 

DeSantis: You can be the most worthless Republican in America, if you kiss the ring, Trump will say you are wonderful. pic.twitter.com/bfbOtN9n1D

— Acyn (@Acyn) January 15, 2024

Background on McCarthy's Fall

Our 2020 book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses the state of the parties. The state of the GOP is not good.  

On Saturday morning we had no idea what was happening. Scalise told the GOP they were moving bills that signaled imminent shutdown. This is what we expected. Then McCarthy suddenly and unexpectedly did an about face and announced a vote on a CR. We didn't know what to make of it pic.twitter.com/m3eyB1eB0k

— Aaron Fritschner (@Fritschner) October 4, 2023

David Weigel at Semafor:

But the vote that empowered Gaetz empowered the new conservative media, too, becoming the latest in a decade-long run of stories about Republican leaders underestimating their insurgents. On One America News, Arizona Rep. Andy Biggs condemned the “uniparty” of Democrats and Republicans who’d funded the government without deep cuts; on Steve Bannon’s “War Room,” Biggs and other conservatives who’d deposed McCarthy were saving the country from weak, unserious party leaders.

...

In the mainstream and older conservative media, McCarthy’s prolific fundraising — he raked in more than $260 million to help Republicans win the House in 2022, including some of the members who ousted him — was one of his chief strengths. Among the newer MAGA personalities, it was a source of deep suspicion and resentment.

The latter ecosystem has grown in influence and audience since Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter, which he renamed X; Laura Loomer, an activist banned from the site for much of the Trump presidency, was reinstated last year, and kept her nearly 600,000 followers informed of the donations McCarthy was routing to Republicans like Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert, implying that he was buying off support to keep his job.

...

After Gaetz’s gambit against McCarthy succeeded, his many enemies inside the GOP conference went to mainstream media outlets to denounce him. Gaetz isn’t allergic to that; Republicans have vented all week about outlets giving him so much time when they should be skeptical of what he’s saying. “You all know Matt Gaetz,” McCarthy said, sourly, at the press conference where he confirmed that he wouldn’t try to get the gavel back.

But Gaetz and the rest of the GOP’s rebels kept up a direct line of communication with conservative activists and influencers, who could not be mollified by McCarthy. Not by the impeachment inquiry, which Gaetz and Bannon agreed was set up to fail; not by the threat of retaliation, which they relished, after a 2022 cycle when Republicans who’d defied Trump and voted to impeach him were nearly wiped out. (The two Republicans who voted for impeachment and remain in the House come from states with all-party primaries, not states where only GOP primary voters decide who’s nominated.)

“Rep. Gaetz has always been more in tune with younger audiences, and good with social media, and he often hops on X Spaces with the public,” said Alex Lorusso, who posts across different social media networks as ALX — and was restored to Twitter/X last year after a lengthy ban. “I would describe most of the online action as encouraging him to file the motion to vacate, rather than him having to build support… Republicans will be doing next week what I believe they should have done from the beginning.”

First GOP Debate

Our most recent book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics. The 2024 race has begun.

Lloyd Green at The Guardian:

On Wednesday night, eight Republicans clashed in Milwaukee. The debate was more than simply an audition to be the former guy’s running mate. Over the course of two hours, real differences emerged within the field. Donald Trump’s impregnable lead remains intact.

Ron DeSantis dodged the question of whether Mike Pence did the right thing on January 6. Florida’s governor emerged diminished. Tim Scott won the vice-president wannabe contest. An oleaginous and belligerent Vivek Ramaswamy repeatedly puckered-up to Joe Biden’s predecessor.

Nikki Haley, Trump’s UN ambassador, jabbed at the Trump administration’s spending record, called him the “most disliked politician in America”, and defended aid to Ukraine.

Chris Christie dinged Trump and Hunter Biden. New Jersey’s former governor also reminded the audience of the Trump-Putin bromance and Russia’s lawlessness.

On January 6, a mob prepared makeshift gallows for Mike Pence to his former boss’s delectation. With the cameras rolling, Pence again embraced the “Trump-Pence” label.

As the 45th president avoided his competitors, his legal woes mount. His bail in Georgia is set at $200,000, conditioned on not threatening witnesses or co-defendants.

On Tuesday night, a filing by the special counsel’s office laid out a failed effort to destroy Mar-a-Lago videos when faced with a federal grand jury subpoena. Trump as mob boss, Goodfellas repeats itself.

His interview with Tucker Carlson, where he reveled in the prospect of civil war and bloodshed, did not confer the immunity he so badly craves.

Newsom on Hannity

Our most recent book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses state and congressional elections. 

California Governor Gavin Newsom spent much of 2022 trying to raise his profile outside the state. The effort continues.

 

Here is a fact that the @GOP doesn't want you to know:@POTUS has created more jobs than the last 3 Republican presidents COMBINED. pic.twitter.com/YGQw38HVkF

— Gavin Newsom (@GavinNewsom) June 13, 2023

Tucker Carlson and Other Russian Stooges

 Our latest book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses foreign influence and Trump's attack on democracy.  Russia helped Trump through 2020.  As Russia began its latest invasion of Ukraine, Trump lavished praise on Russian dictator Vladimir Putin. 

Jeffrey Sonnenfeld and Steven Tian at Time:

Rhe western media has shown strange mixes of courage and cowardice, as well as naivety and cynicism, in their parroting of Putin disinformation. On the one hand, the Murdoch-controlled Wall Street Journal has pursued the truth on Russia’s economic implosion to the peril of its kidnapped Moscow based reporter Evan Gershkovich. Paradoxically, in the aftermath of Tucker Carlson’s firing from the Murdoch-controlled Fox News last week, perhaps the loudest laments came from, of all places, the Kremlin, with Kremlin commentators mourning the loss of an anchor who consistently echoed Putin’s talking points to the point where Russian state media often used re-runs of Tucker’s show.


In fact, CNN’s Erin Burnett just showed how false declarations from Carlson that “if there is any single American who deserves scorn and indeed blame for the invasion of Ukraine, it is Joe Biden” and “Ideologues within the Biden Administration did not want a negotiated peace in Ukraine, they wanted a regime change war against Russia” literally echoed, word-for-word, prior commentary from Kremlin spokespeople and Russian state media. Even worse, Carlson repeated, verbatim, doctored and false “intelligence” that there were seven Ukrainian casualties for every Russian casualty when in reality these numbers were invented, the product of a pro-Putin former Navy technician named Sarah Bils digitally altering leaked documents from the Discord trove and posting them online.


But Tucker Carlson is not the only western journalist to repeat Russian propaganda. Steven Brill and Gordon Crovitz’s Newsguard has found more than 350 news sites promoting 100 false narratives about Russia’s war in Ukraine.

Seditious Conspiracy Update

Our 2020 book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses the state of the parties. The state of the GOP is not good. Trump and his minions falsely claimed that he won the election, and have kept repeating the Big Lie.  And we now know how close he came to subverting the Constitution.  

From DOJ:

A jury in the District of Columbia, today, returned guilty verdicts on multiple felonies against five members of the Proud Boys, finding four of the defendants guilty of seditious conspiracy for their actions before and during the breach of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

According to the evidence at trial, in the months leading up to January 6, the defendants plotted to oppose by force the lawful transfer of presidential power, and to prevent the Members of Congress, and the federal law enforcement officers who protect them, from discharging their duties. Henry “Enrique” Tarrio, 39, of Miami, Florida, the former national chairman of the Proud Boys; Ethan Nordean, 32, of Auburn, Washington; Joseph Biggs, 39, of Ormond Beach, Florida; Zachary Rehl, 37, of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania were found guilty of seditious conspiracy, and conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding. The four defendants and co-defendant Dominic Pezzola, 45, of Rochester, New York were also found guilty of obstruction of an official proceeding, conspiracy to prevent Members of Congress and federal law enforcement officers from discharging their duties, civil disorder, and destruction of government property. Pezzola was also found guilty of assaulting, resisting, or impeding certain officers and robbery involving government property.

... 

In the 27 months since Jan. 6, 2021, more than 1,000 individuals have been arrested in nearly all 50 states for crimes related to the breach of the U.S. Capitol, including more than 320 individuals charged with assaulting or impeding law enforcement. The investigation remains ongoing. Anyone with tips can call 1-800-CALL-FBI (800-225-5324) or visit tips.fbi.gov. 

CNN put together a “no one has been charged with sedition” clip collection pic.twitter.com/alAVbbR2Eg

— Acyn (@Acyn) May 5, 2023

DeSantis: "A Territorial Dispute Between Ukraine and Russia"

 Our latest book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses foreign influence and Trump's attack on democracy.  Russia helped Trump through 2020.  As Russia began its latest invasion of Ukraine, Trump lavished praise on Russian dictator Vladimir Putin. 

Now DeSantis has joined J.D. Vance in the "Don't Care" camp.

Jonathan Swan and Maggie Haberman at NYT:

Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida has sharply broken with Republicans who are determined to defend Ukraine against Russia’s invasion, saying in a statement made public on Monday night that protecting the European nation’s borders is not a vital U.S. interest and that policymakers should instead focus attention at home.

The statement from Mr. DeSantis, who is seen as an all but declared presidential candidate for the 2024 campaign, puts him in line with the front-runner for the G.O.P. nomination, former President Donald J. Trump.

The venue Mr. DeSantis chose for his statement on a major foreign policy question revealed almost as much as the substance of the statement itself. The statement was broadcast on “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” on Fox News. It was in response to a questionnaire that the host, Mr. Carlson, sent last week to all major prospective Republican presidential candidates, and is tantamount to an acknowledgment by Mr. DeSantis that a candidacy is in the offing.

On Mr. Carlson’s show, Mr. DeSantis separated himself from Republicans who say the problem with Mr. Biden’s Ukraine policy is that he’s not doing enough. Mr. DeSantis made clear he thinks Mr. Biden is doing too much, without a clearly defined objective, and taking actions that risk provoking war between the U.S. and Russia.

Mr. Carlson is one of the most ardent opponents of U.S. involvement in Ukraine. He has called President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine a corrupt “antihero” and mocked him for dressing “like the manager of a strip club.”

“While the U.S. has many vital national interests — securing our borders, addressing the crisis of readiness with our military, achieving energy security and independence, and checking the economic, cultural and military power of the Chinese Communist Party — becoming further entangled in a territorial dispute between Ukraine and Russia is not one of them,” Mr. DeSantis said in a statement that Mr. Carlson read aloud on his show.

On September 27, 1938 Neville Chamberlain spoke in similar tones about Czechoslovakia and Nazi Germany: "How horrible, fantastic, incredible it is that we should be digging trenches and trying on gas masks here because of a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know nothing. It seems still more impossible that a quarrel which has already been settled in principle should be the subject of war."  

Tucker's Bad Day

 Our most recent book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses the state of the parties. The state of the GOP is not good. Trump and his minions falsely claimed that he won the election, and have kept repeating the Big Lie. 

Lots of big revelations coming out tonight in the exhibits to Dominion's lawsuit against Fox News.

Days before Jan. 6, Tucker Carlson wrote in a text message exchange about Trump: "I hate him passionately" and "I truly can't wait" to ignore him. pic.twitter.com/ykk5s4jvLo

— Will Sommer (@willsommer) March 8, 2023

"Tucker Carlson’s effort to rewrite history isn’t just laughably incompetent; it’s already falling flat," @RadioFreeTom writes: https://t.co/jPfD59EbT7

— Jim Swift (@JimSwiftDC) March 8, 2023

Trump v. Murdoch

Our most recent book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses the state of the parties. The state of the GOP is not good. Trump and his minions falsely claimed that he won the election, and have kept repeating the Big Lie. 

Dan Ladden-Hall at The Daily Beast:

Donald Trump is furious with his former ally Rupert Murdoch after the media mogul made astonishing admissions that some of his Fox News hosts “endorsed” lies that the 2020 election had been “stolen.” Murdoch, 91, also said in a deposition unsealed on Monday that he wished his organization had been “stronger in denouncing” the false narrative that the election was rigged by corrupt voting machines. Dominion Voting Systems is suing Fox News for $1.6 billion over the issue—but the network denies defamation. “Why is Rupert Murdoch throwing his anchors under the table, which also happens to be killing his case and infuriating his viewers, who will again be leaving in droves—they already are,” Trump fumed on his Truth Social platform on Tuesday. “There is MASSIVE evidence of voter fraud & irregularities in the 2020 Presidential Election,” Trump continued, pointing to Dinesh D’Souza’s conspiracy film 2000 Mules as evidence.

Of Murdoch and Malice

Our most recent book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses the state of the parties. The state of the GOP is not good. Trump and his minions falsely claimed that he won the election, and have kept repeating the Big Lie. 

Jeremy W. Peters and Katie Robertson at NYT:

Newly disclosed messages and testimony from some of the biggest stars and most senior executives at Fox News revealed that they privately expressed disbelief about President Donald J. Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him, even though the network continued to promote many of those lies on the air.

The hosts Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham, as well as others at the company, repeatedly insulted and mocked Trump advisers, including Sidney Powell and Rudolph W. Giuliani, in text messages with each other in the weeks after the election, according to a legal filing on Thursday by Dominion Voting Systems. Dominion is suing Fox for defamation in a case that poses considerable financial and reputational risk for the country’s most-watched cable news network.

...

On Nov. 12, in a text chain with Ms. Ingraham and Mr. Hannity, Mr. Carlson pointed to a tweet in which a Fox reporter, Jacqui Heinrich, fact-checked a tweet from Mr. Trump referring to Fox broadcasts and said there was no evidence of voter fraud from Dominion.

“Please get her fired,” Mr. Carlson said. He added: “It needs to stop immediately, like tonight. It’s measurably hurting the company. The stock price is down. Not a joke.” Ms. Heinrich had deleted her tweet by the next morning.

... 

“This filing argues a fire hose of direct evidence of knowing falsity,” said RonNell Andersen Jones, a professor of law at the S.J. Quinney College of Law at the University of Utah. “It gives a powerful preview of one of the best-supported claims of actual malice we have seen in any major-media case.”

The Tea Party Road to Trump

 Our book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses the state of the parties. The state of the GOP is not good. Trump and his minions falsely claimed that he won the election, and have kept repeating the Big Lie. 

Charles Homans at NYT Magazine:

The echoes from the earliest days of the Tea Party are instructive. The movement’s advent in early 2009 quickly piqued the interest of Theda Skocpol, a Harvard political scientist who has studied grass-roots organizing for decades, and Vanessa Williamson, her graduate student. In its profusion of local groups, its library public-room conclaves, the Tea Party harked back to a kind of civic activism that had gone largely dormant in American politics. Skocpol and Williamson began attending Tea Party meetings in several states and interviewing dozens of participants. 

The movement arrived at a moment of crisis for the Republican Party. Its elites, and many of their foreign and domestic policies, had been battered by the unpopularity of the George W. Bush administration; voters had broadly turned against the party at the national level, and even its own base seemed demoralized. The Tea Party, arising in the first days of Obama’s presidency, offered the promise of reinvigoration, and almost immediately an array of well-funded conservative and libertarian organizations — Americans for Prosperity, FreedomWorks — backed by major donors and staffed by Beltway Republican lifers jumped on its bandwagon. With their own priorities in mind, they tried to cast it as a people’s uprising on behalf of well-established conservative fiscal objectives: austerity in budgeting, the rollback of entitlement programs and the reduction of taxes.

But in their 2012 book, “The Tea Party and the Remaking of Republican Conservatism,” Skocpol and Williamson argued that most of these views were not what drove the grass-roots activists. These activists represented the Tea Party’s novel contribution to politics — what distinguished it from the professional, top-down organizing that had dominated liberal and conservative activism for half a century, and its real source of political strength. They were overwhelmingly white baby boomers and retirees who were relatively well educated, disproportionately evangelical and only occasionally direct casualties of the financial crisis that had, in the popular understanding of the Tea Party, prompted the movement. Though they made common cause with the political professionals’ tax-cutting agenda, their concerns were otherwise less economic than social and cultural.

“As a general rule, the participants in the Tea Party seemed like sweet grandmotherly and grandfatherly types who had watched an awful lot of Fox News,” Williamson, now a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, told me. Their specific preoccupations varied, but they boiled down to a profound pessimism about the future of the country, a sense that it was imperiled by the left, the young and the nonwhite. Local organizers and activists were often quick to distance themselves from the most baldly racist derisions of Obama. Far more common, and openly sanctioned, were anti-immigrant sentiments and Islamophobia, which informed not only the conspiracy theories about Obama but also the panic about the supposed threat of Shariah law being imposed across the country and the plans to construct an Islamic cultural center near ground zero in Manhattan.

Two particular themes of the Tea Party’s politics struck Williamson at the time and loomed larger to her after the 2020 election. One was the conspiracism that characterized the views of many grass-roots Tea Partyers, despite the best efforts of the more mainstream-oriented leaders. It drew from a wide range of sources: vintage ones like the John Birch Society and Barry Goldwater’s 1964 presidential campaign — alumni of both often turned up in Tea Party meetings — and newer strains like Alex Jones’s Infowars media empire and the wild-eyed quest for Obama’s “long-form” birth certificate. Where those sources met was in a narrative of dispossession in which true Americans were losing their country to actors from outside the proper bounds of public life. This was the other big theme: “the idea,” Williamson told me, “that a substantial part of the American public were not legitimate actors in American politics.”

This idea reached its purest expression in the conspiracy theories about Obama, whose presidency was so unsquarable with what the Tea Partyers believed to be the true nature of America that to some it seemed, ipso facto, to represent a crime. Even those who in interviews did not espouse conspiracy theories like the birth-certificate claim confided to Skocpol and Williamson an uneasiness about the new president that went beyond normal partisanship. “I think that he’s actually not what he seems to be,” one Virginia Tea Partyer told them. Several interviewees told them that Obama planned to give amnesty to illegal immigrants in order to secure 10 million extra votes for his re-election — enough to allow him to “continue to ignore the interests of real Americans,” Skocpol and Williamson wrote.

Murder and "Great Replacement Theory"

In Defying the Odds, we discuss Trump's dishonesty and his record of disregarding the rule of law.  Our next book, Divided We Stand, looks at the 2020 election and the January 6 insurrection.  Some Republican leaders -- and a measurable number of rank-and-file voters -- are open to violent rebellion, coups, and secession.  

Ben Collins at NBC:

A manifesto apparently written by the suspect in a mass shooting at a Buffalo supermarket that killed 10 laid out specific plans to attack Black people and repeatedly cited the “Great Replacement" Theory, the false idea that a cabal is attempting to replace white Americans with non-white people through immigration, interracial marriage and eventually violence.

The manifesto, which appears to be written by 18-year-old Payton Gendron, included a shared birth date and biographical details with the suspect in custody. The PDF was originally posted to Google Docs at 8:55 p.m. Thursday, two days before the shooting, according to file data accessed by NBC News.

...

“Great Replacement" theory has recently received support from traditional power centers of the American right. According to an AP-NORC poll released this week, 1 in 3 U.S. adults believe there is an ongoing effort “to replace U.S.-born Americans with immigrants for electoral gains.”

Fox News’ Tucker Carlson has repeatedly pushed “replacement” rhetoric on his show. “I know that the left and all the little gatekeepers on Twitter become literally hysterical if you use the term ‘replacement,’ if you suggest for the Democratic Party is trying to replace the current electorate, the voters now casting ballots, with new people, more obedient voters from the Third World,” Carlson said in April of 2021.

 

He managed to turn the murders of 10 people into an opportunity to brag about himself. https://t.co/m4qnNBNVuX

— Yvonne Left 🇺🇦 (@LeftYvonne) May 15, 2022

The elected officials, candidates, and media personalities who've embraced, toyed with, or winked at "replacement theory" have a duty to denounce today's mass murder in Buffalo. They also have a responsibility emphatically to tell their supporters or followers to reject violence.

— Bill Kristol (@BillKristol) May 14, 2022

AZ State Senator Wendy Rogers is saying that the Buffalo mass murder was a false flag operation by the FBI. She must be removed from office immediately. The AZ GOP is a damn disgrace. pic.twitter.com/X0pYKLELLu

— Ron Filipkowski 🇺🇦 (@RonFilipkowski) May 15, 2022

Fifth Column Update Mid-March

 Our latest book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses foreign influence and Trump's attack on democracy.  Russia helped Trump through 2020.  As Russia began its latest invasion of Ukraine, Trump lavished praise on Russian dictator Vladimir Putin. 

 David Corn at Mother Jones:

On March 3, as Russian military forces bombed Ukrainian cities as part of Vladimir Putin’s illegal invasion of his neighbor, the Kremlin sent out talking points to state-friendly media outlets with a request: Use more Tucker Carlson.

“It is essential to use as much as possible fragments of broadcasts of the popular Fox News host Tucker Carlson, who sharply criticizes the actions of the United States [and] NATO, their negative role in unleashing the conflict in Ukraine, [and] the defiantly provocative behavior from the leadership of the Western countries and NATO towards the Russian Federation and towards President Putin, personally,” advises the 12-page document written in Russian. It sums up Carlson’s position: “Russia is only protecting its interests and security.” The memo includes a quote from Carlson: “And how would the US behave if such a situation developed in neighboring Mexico or Canada?”

The document—titled “For Media and Commentators (recommendations for coverage of events as of 03.03)”—was produced, according to its metadata, at a Russian government agency called the Department of Information and Telecommunications Support, which is part of the Russian security apparatus. It was provided to Mother Jones by a contributor to a national Russian media outlet who asked not to be identified. The source said memos like this one have been regularly sent by Putin’s administration to media organizations during the war. Independent media outlets in Russia have been forced to shut down since the start of the conflict.

.@CawthornforNC:

“Zelenskyy is a thug. Remember that the Ukrainian government is incredibly corrupt and is incredibly evil and has been pushing woke ideologies.”

h/t @WRAL pic.twitter.com/cf3sew7MOp

— The Republican Accountability Project (@AccountableGOP) March 10, 2022

Tulsi Gabbard is now spreading Russian disinformation about biolabs in Ukraine. It’s only a matter of time before this gets picked up by Russian propaganda outlets, as it has so many times before. pic.twitter.com/exi6VZAO7w

— Caroline Orr Bueno, Ph.D (@RVAwonk) March 13, 2022

The Fifth Column

  Our latest book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses foreign influence and Trump's attack on democracy.  Russia helped Trump through 2020.  As Russia began its latest invasion of Ukraine, Trump lavished praise on Russian dictator Vladimir Putin. 

NEW: Donald Trump AGAIN repeatedly praised Vladimir Putin from a Mar-a-Lago fundraiser tonight — attended by #NCSen candidate @TedBuddNC, #NVSen candidate @AdamLaxalt, and #GASen candidate @HerschelWalker. pic.twitter.com/TPptW6czHM

— American Bridge 21st Century (@American_Bridge) February 24, 2022

Having watched Putin bomb Russian apartment buildings to justify the Chechen war, murder Boris Nemtsov, poison Alexei Navalny, and now to invade Ukraine, it’s unbelievably offensive to see @TuckerCarlson trying to convince Americans that Putin’s a good guy https://t.co/thJjbGmwwb

— Bill Browder (@Billbrowder) February 23, 2022

Steve Bannon and Erik Prince say we should be supporting Russia because Putin is anti-woke and has no tolerance for LGBTQ. pic.twitter.com/qzHl2TkwxJ

— Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) February 24, 2022

Steve Bannon once again parrots pro-Kremlin rhetoric.

This time, he tries to defend Putin’s argument that this is about “de-Nazification” of Ukraine. pic.twitter.com/wd7DwHkhEo

— The Republican Accountability Project (@AccountableGOP) February 24, 2022

I suggest every American who wants to know what’s *actually* going on in Russia and Ukraine, read this transcript of Putin’s address. As I’ve said for month— NATO (under direction from the United States) is violating previous agreements and expanding eastward. WE are at fault. https://t.co/NDmou8I36H

— Candace Owens (@RealCandaceO) February 22, 2022

#Russia's state TV is proudly showing off Mike Pompeo's recent commentary, where he said about Putin: “Very shrewd. Very capable. I have enormous respect for him." pic.twitter.com/bxPU6yigAD

— Julia Davis (@JuliaDavisNews) February 22, 2022

The New GOP

Our new book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses the state of the parties. The state of the GOP is not good. Trump and his minions falsely claimed that he won the election, and have kept repeating the Big Lie. 

 At Axios, Jonathan Swan and Lachlan Markay write that Trump changed the GOP power structure.  He revealed that old organizations had little sway with primary voters.  New organizations do.

Who had the power:

• The U.S. Chamber of Commerce
• The NRA
• The Koch network
• Heritage Action
• The Drudge Report
• National Review
• Conservative movement groups such as Tea Party Express, FreedomWorks, and the Senate Conservatives Fund.

Who has power now:

• Donald Trump
• Tucker Carlson
• Family and former aides to Trump
• Fox News
• Club for Growth
• Daily Wire
• Breitbart News
• Online influencers including Candace Owens, Ben Shapiro, Dan Bongino, Joe Rogan, Jack Posobiec, Charlie Kirk and Marjorie Taylor-Greene.
• Steve Bannon
• Susan B. Anthony List

Insurrection Revisionism

Our new book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses the state of the parties. The state of the GOP is not good. Trump and his minions falsely claimed that he won the election, and have kept repeating the Big Lie.  And we now know how close he came to subverting the Constitution.  

Matthew Rosenberg, Jim Rutenberg and Michael M. Grynbaum at NYT:

The reimagining of Jan. 6 has not so much evolved as it has splintered into rival, but often complementary, false narratives with a common goal — to shift blame away from Mr. Trump, his supporters and a Republican Party maneuvering to win back control of government. The riot was a “false flag” operation by antifa, the loose left-wing collective; the F.B.I. planted agents to stir up the crowd; the protesters were mere “tourists” wrongfully accused by a Democratic-led Justice Department and vilified by a biased mainstream media; police officers recounting their injuries and trauma were “crisis actors.’”

Mr. [Tucker] Carlson has emerged as a leading proponent of Jan. 6 revisionism, most prominently with his three-part “Patriot Purge” series. Carried on the Fox Nation streaming service, it amplified a debunked “false flag” conspiracy theory that the F.B.I. had instigated the violence as a pretext to lock away peaceful but concerned Americans because of their political views, creating a class of patriot martyrs. On Thursday night, he aired excerpts from “Patriot Purge” on his prime-time show, spreading those conspiracy theories to one of the largest audiences on cable television.

Greg Weiner at AEI:

The latest in this revisionist genre comes from Eric Lendrum at American Greatness, who calls January 6 the left’s Reichstag fire and the right’s storming of the Bastille.

Lendrum’s assessment of January 6 is so filled with contradiction that it would flunk freshman composition. January 6 was a Reichstag fire because it was a pretext for progressive authoritarianism, he asserts, but the fact that progressive authoritarianism was already upon us justified the riot. The insurrection, meanwhile, was simultaneously peaceful, as though the rioters had knocked politely on the door and been let in for a tour by the Sergeant-at-Arms, and the second coming of the Bastille, whose commander, Jourdan de Launay, was stabbed to death after surrendering. Therein lies one essential difference: Lendrum’s proof that the protest was peaceful is—this is for real—that Trump supporters killed “[n]ot one person” on January 6. Refraining from assassination passes for a laudable accomplishment. Do they get a participation ribbon for that? The emphasis in the original suggests they should.

But permit Lendrum his paradoxes. Perhaps, like Rousseau, he cannot think without them. He apparently cannot think without morally repulsive Nazi analogies either. Conservatives, he proclaims, are “on a course for being every bit as ostracized and alienated from broader society as Jews were in the years leading up to Nazi Germany.” Republicans outnumber Democrats by 27 to 23 among state governors. They control a majority of state legislative seats. The Jews, by contrast—is it actually necessary to say this? Yes, apparently it is—were marched into gas chambers by the millions. Their descendants will have to set aside our snowflake impulse to take offense at this execrable trivialization of the Holocaust. Lendrum is after bigger game than respecting the memories of the Six Million: He is out to save civilization from the progressive hordes seeking our “enslavement by the state.”

Daniel Dale and Marshall Cohen at CNN:

In a December 21 statement, Trump called January 6 a "completely unarmed protest." Similarly, in a tweet on December 17, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia wrote, "One of the biggest holes in the lie about J6 being a planned insurrection is that all the people there were unarmed. Anyone with half a brain knows that gun owners only leave their firearms at home when they don't feel the need to carry a gun or are obeying the law."

Facts First: It's not even close to true that all of the people at the Capitol on January 6 were unarmed -- and the claim is still false even if it is specifically about guns. People who illegally entered Capitol grounds during the insurrection were armed with a wide variety of weapons, including guns, stun guns, knives, batons, baseball bats, axes and chemical sprays. The Department of Justice said in an official update last week that so far "over 75" people charged in connection to the attack "have been charged with entering a restricted area with a dangerous or deadly weapon."

Fox Hosts on January 6

In Defying the Odds, we discuss Trump's dishonesty and his record of disregarding the rule of law.  Our next book, Divided We Stand, looks at the 2020 election and the January 6 insurrection.  Some Republican leaders -- and a measurable number of rank-and-file voters -- are open to violent rebellion, coups, and secession.  

 Jeremy Barr at WP:

Three Fox News hosts who have been among Donald Trump’s most ardent media boosters were so horrified by the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol that they begged the then-president’s chief of staff to convince him to intercede, according to newly aired messages from that day.

“Mark, the president needs to tell people in the Capitol to go home,” Fox News prime-time star Laura Ingraham texted Mark Meadows. “This is hurting all of us. He is destroying his legacy.”

The text messages were read aloud by Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) during a Monday night hearing of the House select committee investigating the events of Jan. 6, which voted to hold Meadows in criminal contempt for defying a subpoena to appear before the committee.

“According to the records, multiple Fox News hosts knew the president needed to act immediately,” Cheney said. “They texted Mark Meadows, and he has turned over those texts.”

Cheney opening statement here. 

Just gonna put this right here.. https://t.co/45Z3HToUmy

— Alyssa Farah Griffin (@Alyssafarah) December 14, 2021