january3–16, 2022 | newyork 7For the Republican Party to beripefor
Trump’s takeover in 2016 requireddecades
of degeneration. That degenerationacceler-
ated under Trump. And in the pastyear, the
pace has accelerated yet again: Theparty
has changed more dramaticallysincehe
unwillingly left office than in thefouryears
he held it. It is a party reborn, of adistinctly
new and more dangerous cast, andJanu-
ary 6 was its true founding.
Before January 6, Trump’s partywas
naïve about his true nature. OnNovem-
ber 7,2020,formerchief ofstaffMick
Mulvaney wrote an op-ed headlined“IfHe
Loses, Trump Will Concede Gracefully.”As
Trump began laying the groundworkto
cancel the election result, Mitch McConnell
waved it off, saying, “A few legalinquiries
from the president do not exactlyspellthe
end of the Republic.” A cynic mightprotest
that Trump’s allies understoodperfectly
well where he planned to take hiscampaign
to discredit the election. But theirshockand
horror suggest they truly had convinced
themselves it was just an act. Asmayhem
spread through the Capitol, sycophantsas
devoted as Laura Ingraham, DonaldTrump
Jr ., and Sean Hannity sent frantictextsbeg-
ging Trump to halt the violence.
In the days that followed January6,
the Republican Establishment broke with
him abruptly. McConnell told associates
that Trump had committed impeachable
offenses and opined that impeachment
would make it easier to purge him from
the party. Kevin McCarthy had a scream-
ing match with Trump and mused pri-
vately about supporting impeachment.
Numerous pundits in the Murdoch media
empire publicly called for Trump to resign
before his term expired. Major corporations
announced they would withhold donations
from any members of Congress who refused
to endorse the legitimacy of the election.
Within a week, this conviction began to
falter. On January 13, Axios reported that
McConnellwasmorelikelythannotto
voteforimpeachmentbutthat topRepub-
licanswere“dividedwhethertodoit with
onequickkillviaimpeachment,or let
himslowlyfadeaway.”Thevery way they
hadconstructedthechoicerevealedtheir
answer.If Trumpwereboundtofadeaway,
whybothertoexertthemselves?
In February, McConnell and most
Republicansinoffice,whilemaintaining
thatTrumpwasmorallyculpable,voted
against impeachment on the narrow
groundsthat it wasimpropertoconvict
a presidentwhohadalreadyleftoffice.
Instead,they proposeda d t mecha-
nismtoholdTrumpaccoun We need
a 9/11Commissiontofindoutwhat hap-
pened,” Lindsey GrahamannouncedonFox
News.Withina fewmonths,Republican
supportforsucha commissionhadmelted
away. Two weeksafter votingagainst
impeachment,McConnellassuredFox
Newsthat if Trumpweretowinthe 2024
nomination,hewould“absolutely” support
him.Thenotionthat Trumphadmorally
disqualifiedhimselffellbythewayside.In
April,SenateRepublicans,concernedthat
Trumpmightholdtheirpreviousstate-
mentsagainst them,presentedtheformer
president with a “Champion of Freedom”
trophy,whichthey hadcreatedespecially
for the occasion. Trump’s attempt to vio-
lently seize power had progressed from
impeachable to worthy of investigation to
deserving of honor.
By the spring, Trump was sensing weak-
ness in his erstwhile critics and seized the
offensive. He began incorporating into
his public diatribes a revisionist story of
January 6 in which the protesters had
been peaceful tourists victimized by sav-
age cops. And he threw himself into purg-
ing his remaining Republican critics. His
allies removed Liz Cheney from her lead-
ership position for continuing to challenge
Trump’sclaimsthat the election had been
stolen.Herdemotion struck most Repub-
licansascommonsensical. “If you had a
memberoftheDemocratic leadership and
saidthey didn’t believe in climate change
anymore,doyou think they would still
remaininDemocrat leadership?” explained
oneRepublicanmember of Congress.
Cheney’spositionon the election and Janu-
ary6 hadbrieflybeen the predominant one
inherparty.Butnow, having maintained
thestancewhileher colleagues backed
awayfromit,shewas an apostate.
Sincethespring, the Republican Party
hasbeenoperating under an informal
understanding:Trump, amplified by his
supportersinthe conservative media, is
freetospreadhis narrative that the “realinsurrection” took place on November 3,
while his Republican critics must keep their
doubts to themselves. With Trump given a
free hand by party leadership, his purge of
his critics has intensified. In Georgia, David
Perdue announced a primary challenge to
sitting governor Brian Kemp based solely
on the latter’s refusal to cooperate with
Trump’s demand to discard the election
results in his state. In other states across the
country, pro-Trump legislatures have voted
to place power over elections in the hands of
fellowRepublicans,andpro-Trump candi-
dates have run for positions overseeing the
casting and tabulation of votes.
Just as the Kremlin’s position could be
discerned from Pravda, the comings and
goings on Fox News have reflected the
party-line shift back to Trump. The day
before Trump left office, several of the
reporters involved in the network’s elec-
tion call of Arizona for Joe Biden quietly
departed. Later, in the fall, Jonah Goldberg,
Stephen Hayes, and Chris Wallace, who
had challenged Trump’s lies, all left too. In
November, the corporate boycott of dona-
tions to members of Congress who deny
the election outcome ended. The objective
of isolating supporters of the Big Lie had
failed, and there was business to be done.
Of course, Republicans have been doing
business with Trump, sometimes while
holding their noses, all along. So what’s
different now? It is easier to comprehend
if you consider the situation from the stand-
point of its insiders. The Republican elite
have always seen Trump as a clown, not a
menace. Crucially, they assumed he would
lose reelection, and if he tried anything truly
dangerous, they felt confident that respon-
sible Republicans would stand up to him.
The future would belong to those Repub-
licans who made it to 2021 without being
covered in the Trump stench. For them, the
2020 election arrived as a positive shock—
Trump came within a hair of winning
reelection, demonstrating that four years
of miserable polling results had reflected
a distorted reality. Maintaining a distance
from Trump no longer appeared smart.
And they discovered that things they had
once regarded as intolerable could in fact
be tolerated. A year ago, most Republicans
would have drawn a bright-red line at over-
turning an election result through physical
menace. Now, nearly all of them have stood
with the leader who stomped over the line
and is prepared to do so again.
After the 2016 election, Republicans
were stunned to find that control of gov-
ernment had fallen into their lap. Now, they
confidently anticipate the chance to seize it.
And when they do, they will not be as con-
fused, divided, or gentle as last time. ■The formerpresident’s attemptto violentlyseize power hasprogressedfrom impeachableto deservingof honor.