The GOP’s dark turn

The Republican Party system is being turned upside down. Extremism is rewarded, while the honest work of governing is harshly punished. If, like Sen. Mike Lee, you work “14 hours a day” to overturn an election for Donald Trump, you get an endorsement, and the party will protect, fund, and amplify you. But if, like retiring Rep. Fred Upton, you stand up for democracy or work across the aisle to solve America's problems in good faith, you get death threats. If, like Ron Johnson, you use your committee power to spread conspiracies, you raise $7 million in one quarter. But if, like Renewer Rep. Liz Cheney, you tell the truth and try to stop another attack, you get kicked out of party leadership. The longer the GOP protects those who tried to use violence to overturn an election, the more it emboldens violence as its main political force. GOP leaders occasionally pay lip service and denounce these threats, but their embrace of insurrectionists and conspiracism speaks louder than their soundbites. Extremist organizations, fundraising networks, PACs, and the caucus of radicals growing in Congress are gaining steam, and they have one mantra: “Power by any means.” The GOP won't break this descent into political violence unless we make them. That will take sustained political courage from principled leaders like Upton and Cheney. But even more importantly, it will take us—everyday American voters standing alongside them. —Mike Ongstad, Communications Director, Renew America Movement

• Russia ratchets up battle for control of eastern Ukraine —Mercury News

• Senators heading to Poland, India, Germany to rally Ukraine support —The Hill

• U.S. to train Ukrainians to use new weapons —Defense One

• Judge voids national mask mandate for airplanes, other transportation settings —The Washington Post

• Attempt to bar Marjorie Taylor Greene from Congress can proceed, judge says —The Guardian

This isn't your father’s Republican Party

The days of Eisenhower, Reagan, and Bush feel like a lifetime ago as Donald Trump remains atop the Republican Party food chain. The party has taken on the crass, backbiting, unscrupulous personality traits of the man himself, who from Mar-a-Lago hoards cash and doles out favors like a party boss of old. Whether he runs for president again in 2024 remains to be seen. But he's still making his mark on 2022, seeking to crush rivals and oust officials who thwarted his attempted subversion of the 2020 election. For sure, there are still Republicans holding down the GOP establishment fort, but there are fewer and fewer of them, and it's harder than ever for moderate Republicans to gain a foothold in a party that is increasingly trending toward stoking anti-democracy sentiments, cultural outrage, and ideas that are just, well, weird… —The New York Times

• “There’s a deep sense of paranoia this rhetoric inspires.” You know the expression that art imitates life? Well in politics, mainstream media increasingly imitates social media. Take “Libs of TikTok.” The account reposts a steady stream of TikTok videos and social media posts, primarily from LGBTQ+ people, often including incendiary framing designed to generate outrage. Videos shared from the account have found their way to the most prominent names in right-wing media—Tucker Carlson, Laura Ingraham, and others. The account has emerged as a powerful force on the Internet, influencing millions, shaping right-wing media messaging, and even impacting legislation. —The Washington Post

• "It's the realization that there is no political solution beyond vengeance.” If you really want to go down a rabbit hole, there's the #DarkMAGA movement spreading on social media. For these folks, Trump was “too kindhearted, too forgiving,” and they encourage both the ex-president and his followers “to embrace the villain role.” Needless to say, violence is part and parcel of the Dark MAGA “aesthetic,” which is all about seeking retribution for the perceived political persecution of the MAGA crowd by elites and “normies.” Hoo boy. —Newsweek

• “There is a multi-pronged attack on the core principles of our democracy in the name of election integrity.” Because Dark MAGA is the furthest extreme, it makes the other elements of the movement seem less scary. And that’s a problem, because they’re doing some scary things that are flying below the radar. Case in point: The Conservative Partnership Institute, which includes two Trump allies who helped push lies about voter fraud in 2020, is spearheading “election integrity” summits in battleground states, advocating for expanded poll watching, “clean” voter rolls, and other measures that election watchdogs say could amount to voter suppression. —The Guardian

MORE: Who will run the 2024 election? They’re on your ballot in 2022 —Politico

Mounk: Protecting citizens in a diverse democracy 

“Guaranteeing their citizens’ freedom from oppression by an out-group is a key task of a liberal state. But citizens of diverse democracies must also know that they will be free to leave the group into which they were born; to violate its norms without fear of suffering destitution, violence, or death at the hands of their own elders; and to define themselves by the identities and associations they themselves choose. Any state that neglects its citizens’ freedom from coercion by their own group neglects an equally important precondition of meaningful self-determination.” —Yascha Mounk in The Atlantic

Yascha Mounk is an associate professor at Johns Hopkins University and a senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund. He is the author of "The Great Experiment: Why Diverse Democracies Fall Apart and How They Can Endure.”

MORE: Republican Rep. Fred Upton says death threats made bipartisan votes ‘frightening’ —Axios

Brown: The problem with partisan silence

“The result of this willingness among Republican leaders to stand by their own is that the GOP electorate writ large is left unwilling to judge their preferred candidates on the merits of the accusations. Instead, they’re fully prepared to believe that someone (but not an accused candidate) is spreading lies: Democrats and RINOs who want to take down the Trump-supported ‘Real Conservatives,’ the liberal media, or the women themselves, whom they paint as the real villains.” —Hayes Brown on MSNBC

Hayes Brown is a columnist and editor at MSNBC Daily.

MORE: Complaint filed against Divider Rep. Madison Cawthorn by fired staffer —Smoky Mountain News

The Jan. 6 plot thickens

A newly released cache of text messages reveals that members of the far-right extremist group the Oath Keepers—now facing seditious conspiracy charges for their involvement in the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol—chatted for days about providing security for some of the highest-profile figures associated with Donald Trump’s effort to overturn the election. The members described potential partnerships with other extremist groups and security details for Roger Stone, Alex Jones, Ali Alexander, Michael Flynn, and others upon whom the House select committee investigating the attack have focused. The group was also apparently in touch with some “congressmen” in the days leading up to the attack. Rep. Ronny Jackson, formerly the White House physician, even contacted the Oath Keepers during the insurrection, asking them for cover, because he had “critical data to protect.” —Politico

• Someone’s got something to hide. Trump attorney John Eastman revealed yesterday that he has asserted attorney-client privilege on 37,000 pages of emails related to his work to overturn the results of the 2020 election. The House committee has objected to “every claim” over those pages, which now sends the dispute to U.S. District Court Judge David Carter for a case-by-case review. Carter has already ruled that he believes Eastman and Trump “more likely than not” engaged in a criminal conspiracy to obstruct Congress, an effort he called “a coup in search of a legal theory.” —Politico

• Here comes Kim. Kimberly Guilfoyle, the fiancée of Trump’s eldest son, Donald Jr., met with the House committee yesterday—more than a month after she abruptly ended a voluntary interview with lawmakers. Guilfoyle spoke at the rally held on the White House Ellipse before the Jan. 6 riot. As a chair of the Trump Victory Committee, the fundraising arm of the ex-president’s campaign, she also raised funds for the rally and was in direct contact with its key participants and organizers. —Associated Press

• Getcha popcorn ready? Rep. Jamie Raskin, a member of the House committee and a lead prosecutor during Trump's second impeachment trial in the House, says Trump himself may be called to testify about the events of Jan. 6. “This was a coup organized by the president against the vice president and against the Congress in order to overturn the 2020 presidential election," Raskin said. “It's a president fearful of defeat, overthrowing the constitutional process.” Stay tuned. —Newsweek

MORE: James Downie: Will the media let Sen. Mike Lee go unquestioned? —The Washington Post

Simon: Ukraine is a warning to the U.S.

“[A]llowing anti-democratic forces in the U.S. to chip away at democracy is akin to allowing Russia to continue to advance on Ukrainian cities, little by little, over a period of time, until there is no independent Ukraine left. Similarly, if we allow the unfounded claims of voter fraud to lead to reduced access to voting rights in some states, we will enable authoritarian elements to take root.” —Alan J. Simon in The Fulcrum

Alan J. Simon is a technology consultant and a contributing author of “Leveraging: A Political, Economic, and Societal Framework.”

MORE: Francis Fukuyama on Putin, Trump and why Ukraine is key to saving liberal democracy —Salon

Woodlief: Rise of the unaffiliated voter

“Independents participate in primaries they perceive to offer real choices. Imagine that: real choices. What all this means is that common-sense candidates with the stomach to enter the fray, knock on doors, and raise enough small-dollar donations to garner name recognition, even in a media environment that favors partisan spitball fights, have a real chance of attracting independent voters. The party bosses are sitting atop dying brands. In the long run, no amount of map-drawing machinations can save them.” —Tony Woodlief in The Washington Post

Tony Woodlief is the author of “I, Citizen: A Blueprint for Reclaiming American Self-Governance.”

MORE: Center-right pushes back against election deniers —The Fulcrum

I enjoyed reading Friday’s "Our Take" by Melissa Amour, and in response to her question "is the Republican Party still a party at all?" I have to say that in my considered opinion it is not, but rather a nihilist death cult, void of principle and obsessed with maintaining and expanding its own power at any cost and to the detriment of the nation (and indeed the world).

As for "the party’s traditional values and policies," I would like to know whether there is any consensus as to what exactly that means, beyond incendiary, bigoted culture-war "red meat" for the plebes designed to distract from the ever-growing piles of money dumped in the laps of the aristos. —Scott K., California

I appreciate Mr. Karem’s optimism in suggesting that “time is up” for authoritarian autocrats. But I disagree. Though the author is correct when he identifies the proliferation of evidence of crimes and misdeeds being produced (text messages, cell phone videos, and documentary movies), having evidence is not enough. What we lack is enforcement. 

Vladimir Putin is still very much in power, even after evidence of soldiers slaughtering civilians in Syria and Ukraine. Viktor Orban just won re-election in Hungary, where CPAC just held their latest conference. White Nationalist candidate Marine Le Pen is likely to be the next president of France. The United States no longer has a conservative party. The Republican Party and its media apparatus have morphed into a neo-fascist movement led by a former president who attempted to overthrow our Congress.

Perhaps Mr. Putin is just trying to hang in there long enough to get his Western allies in office. Then they can truly reshuffle the global order. The authoritarians are winning. Democracy and Western liberal values are reeling on their heels. And We The People are fighting, like Ukraine, with our backs against the wall. —Christopher J., California

The views expressed in "What's Your Take?" are submitted by readers and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editorial staff, the Renew America Movement, or the Renew America Foundation.