The #January6Hearings delivered more than anyone could have reasonably expected, the case against Donald Trump is ironclad. But the forces that elevated him are dominating the Republican Party more than ever - and they are escalating their assault on democracy. 1/
https://twitter.com/january6thcmte/status/1580644805318565888
It is a testament to the Committee’s crucial work that we now have a clear and detailed picture of what happened between the 2020 election and the January 6 attack – of the multi-week, multi-level auto-coup attempt and its evolving strategies. 2/
There can be no doubt that this was a deliberate campaign to nullify the result of the election and prevent the transfer of power. Had it succeeded, it would have been the end of constitutional government in America. And Donald Trump was at the center of it all at all times. 3/
In that sense, the committee was entirely justified in focusing on Trump’s role, in making the best-possible case against Donald Trump in the public hearings, clearly hoping to turn as many people away from Trump as possible. 4/
In order to achieve these goals, the committee decided to build its case almost entirely on testimony from Trump people, to prove the nonpartisan nature of the proceedings – and to foreground the role of Republicans in the defense of the republic. 5/
There were always potential downsides to this strategy. For instance, it presented many people who were deeply complicit in Trump’s machinations in a favorable light, people who stood with Trump almost to the bitter end and fought long and hard to keep him in charge. 6/
The narrow focus resulted in a tale in which people like Bill Barr and Mike Pence who have never spoken out publicly or only when they had a revelatory book to promote, people who still say they would vote for Trump again in 2024, emerged as heroic figures. 7/
It is true that they were, in this specific moment, instrumental in preventing Trump’s auto-coup from succeeding. But they are also still part of an *ongoing* Republican assault on the political system – something that goes well beyond Trump. 8/
But isn’t it the most important task to cut off the head of the snake, basically? I wish it were that easy. The metaphor doesn’t fit. Trump was always more effect, rather than cause of the Republican radicalization against democracy – there are so many snakes. 9/
The danger is that a narrow focus on Trump, on preventing Trump from regaining power, on preventing another January 6 could take too much attention away from Trumpism (with or without Trump) as the animating force on the Right and the *ongoing* assault on democracy. 10/
How we define the scope of our examination and what moment we choose to focus on determines our understanding of the threat to democracy. For instance, there was a brief moment immediately after January 6 when it seemed like Republican leaders were done with Trump. 11/
Yesterday’s hearing emphasized this particular moment, showing footage of Republican leaders acknowledging Trump’s culpability, Mitch McConnell accusing him of ignoring his duty as president, Kevin McCarthy declaring Trump should have “immediately denounced” the attack. 12/
They were not just pretending. There was a moment right after the attack when Republicans in Congress as well as some of Trump’s allies in the rightwing media were shaken by what had happened, uncertain of how to continue and what to do with Trump. 13/
But it’s key to look beyond that particular moment and remember what happened next: January 6 obviously wasn’t enough for Republicans in Congress to actually impeach or break with Trump in any meaningful way, or for the Right to turn away from him. Instead, they closed ranks. 14/
Republicans quickly rallied behind Trump: They first acquitted him, then they started obstructing every attempt to hold him accountable, and now most Republican candidates are running on his Big Lie. The few who broke with Trump have been marginalized, ostracized. 15/
Republicans did not come to see January 6 as the end of the line, the outrageous conclusion of the Trumpian experiment – they now see it as a blueprint: Never concede an election, never accept defeat at the hands of a what they see as a fundamentally “Un-American” enemy. 16/
I have no doubt that many Republicans, like McConnell himself, thought – and probably still think – that Trump is a despicable person, that he never should have summoned a mob to attack the Capitol. But all the reasons why they initially united behind him in 2016 still apply. 17/
They may consider Trump crass, just as they probably aren’t super comfortable with extremists like Marjorie Taylor Greene or with how close the Republican Party has gotten to fascistic militants like the Proud Boys who increasingly act like the party’s paramilitary arm. 18/
But they certainly don’t consider any of that a dealbreaker. And that’s not just because they are opportunistic, cynical, and power-hungry – although they are all that too, as they understand they can’t win without the base, and the base loves Trump / Trumpism. 19/
They also understand that, as crass or radical or outrageous as January 6 may have been, they are ultimately pursuing the same political project as Trump, Marjorie Taylor Greene, and all the other extremists – upholding a traditional elite order and white Christian rule. 20/
Nothing Trump has ever done has betrayed this project or the “Higher Truth” of conservative politics: That only white conservatives – and the party that represents them – are entitled to rule in America, that Democratic governance is fundamentally illegitimate. 21/
And so the permission structure of conservative politics remained fully intact and quickly allowed for a realignment / re-uniting behind Trump: Anything is justified to fight back against the supposed onslaught from a radically “Un-American,” extremist “Left.” 22/
This fundamental logic of conservative politics was always likely to drown out everything else after a moment of shock in the wake of January 6 – because Trump himself was never the cause and always a result of this “Higher Truth” politics, of this permission structure. 23/
In yesterday’s hearings, Liz Cheney’s opening remarks captured this tension between a necessary concentration on January 6, specifically, and the problem of a much broader assault on democracy that could potentially be obscured by a narrow focus on Donald Trump. 24/
Cheney was impressive, as she has been throughput the hearings. She issued a remarkably clear warning that American democracy might not endure, that the country is in a moment of acute crisis – that it really could happen here. 25/
January 6 could happen again, Cheney warned us. She’s right, of course. And yet, this notion of preventing “another January 6” also underestimates the current danger. Because in a very real sense, January 6 isn’t over yet, it is still ongoing. 26/
Denying the legitimacy of the 2020 election, of the political opponent more generally, is not a fringe position in the Republican Party – it has become the conservative mainstream, shared by the majority of GOP nominees across the country. 27/
https://twitter.com/tzimmer_history/status/1578403698530832386
As many of these candidates are basically guaranteed or heavily favored to win their elections, we must expect a significant shift towards the conspiratorial Right in the next Congress as well as on the state and local levels. 28/
The problem isn’t confined to the level of GOP candidates and elected officials: A clear majority of Republican voters is in on the Big Lie, doesn’t accept the legitimacy of the 2020 election, and/or considers the attempts to nullify its results at least somewhat justified. 29/
Our institutions, Cheney reminded us, can only hold if people make them hold. And no one understands this more clearly than the Right - than the Republicans who are bringing themselves in position to make the institutions fail. That’s happening across the country. Right now. 30/
There is no separating January 6 from the broader context of the American Right’s anti-democratic radicalization and the ongoing Republic assault on the system. This is one political project, and it may yet succeed. 31/
The Committee had a clearly defined task. And it delivered. Now it is up to the institutions that are tasked with upholding democracy in America to do their job. And it is up to us in the pro-democracy camp to draw the right conclusions from what the hearings have presented. 32/
It is absolutely necessary to prevent Trump from getting back to power. But it is not sufficient if the goal is to safeguard democracy – for America to finally become the egalitarian, multiracial, pluralistic democracy it has often promised, the land it never has been yet. /end
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