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John, I know we are in the heat of election season, and you’re getting a lot of emails. Trust me, I am too. That’s why this email is a little bit different.
Because I had to take a moment to share with you some of the thoughts I’ve had over the past few years, while serving on the Intelligence Committee — the committee Kevin McCarthy intends to remove me from if Republicans retake the House.
As Republicans and their allies in the right-wing media have embraced Donald Trump and his lies and eschewed American democracy, so too have they embraced far-right autocrats and strongmen around the world.
They won’t say a cross word about Vladimir Putin.
They continue to threaten aid to Ukraine — from Trump blackmailing President Zelensky for dirt on Joe Biden, which led to his first impeachment, to Kevin McCarthy threatening to cut off aid to Ukraine if Republicans retake the House.
They are also great fans of far-right Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán, so much so that Tucker Carlson spent an entire week hosting his Fox News misinformation hour from Hungary.
Then CPAC, the Conservative Political Action Conference of American politicians, even selected Hungary as the international destination of their conference. Seriously.
If that wasn’t enough, Republicans invited the anti-immigrant, anti-LGTBQ Orbán to give a keynote address at CPAC Texas. Trump welcomed his “friend” Orbán to his golf club in New Jersey, too, after hosting him at the White House during his presidency.
This isn’t just playing footsie with autocrats. It’s a full-on bear hug. And Republicans know exactly what they’re doing.
John, you may not be familiar with every far-right politician in the world. But Republican leaders in Congress have worked hard to befriend them. And as they have continued to embrace Trump’s authoritarian tendencies, they look not to Lincoln, Roosevelt, or Kennedy for inspiration, but to Putin, Orbán, and other right-wing tyrants.
This is not by accident. The political project of Trumpism is to replace liberal American democracy with a system where voting rights, civil liberties, and freedom itself are subject to limits imposed by right-wing authorities — not our Constitution or our rule of law.
The United States is engaged in a global struggle against authoritarianism, and that is a fight that we cannot afford to lose.
So I am asking you, John, to help the United States continue to be a champion of freedom, democracy and human rights — at home and abroad. This struggle is too important to sit in the sidelines. Everyone needs to do their part, and I need your help.
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See, I told you this email would be a little different.
Thank you,
Adam Schiff
